Thinking about getting an Acer Aspire TimelineX 5820TG

I'm thinking about getting one of the following:

Acer TimelineX 5820TG i5-460M/640GB/ATI 5650: link - $859.99 (buy in store)

or

Lenovo IdeaPad Y560 i5-460M/500GB/ATI 5730: link (IdeaPad Y560 Laptop - 06463RU, first column from left) - $999.99 - $100 (e-coupon) = $899.99 (free shipping)

Pretty much the only differences here are brand names (I guess Lenovo is more popular? Not sure), battery life (Acer being the better one), design (Lenovo looks slightly better), thickness (Acer is slightly thinner), and a slight price difference (Acer is $40 cheaper).
I heard that the 5820TG has some problems with having a weak speaker and a glitchy CD/DVD eject button. But I also heard the Lenovo Y560 has some serious driver bugs (youtube), and a bug known as the "big cursor bug" that glitches the onscreen cursor, as well as ridiculously low battery life.
What are your suggestions on these two? Thanks.

 

If I was buying a 15" unit, I would want more than 720p resolution. I would probably spend a bit more and get the MSI GX640 with a faster stock HD and far better resolution, not to mention the HD 5850 GDDR5 GPU.

If you don't need as powerful a GPU, I would get the Sager NP5135 with the 1080p upgrade. It has a NVIDIA GT 425M GPU. Base price is $879 and the 1080p display is only a $60 upgrade.

Bronsky

 

Is that really necessary though if I don't play that much games? Most other 15" laptops are 1366x768 aren't they?
$900 is pretty much my upper limit, anything going above that I'll only consider if it has the same or better specs and if it looks more stylish (like Sony VAIOs).

 

It's actually the opposite - games today will display the same point of views (fps) and game field coverage (rts) on any resolution. Having higher resolutions makes working on the desktop, including web browsing, MUCH better. The statement of not needing higher than 768 pixels in height is no different than claiming that you're fine with 1024x600, or better yet 640x480, as long as you're not playing games.

Either way, most people use lower, non-native resolutions on their larger 15-17" displays anyways as anything higher is "too small" (DPI settings aren't perfect yet either). If you're happy with how your applications/uses look at 1366x768, then go ahead and get one with that resolution.

 

No. Most 15" laptops are higher resolution like the MSI GX640 or provide an upgraded display like the Sony EB does. You could probably get an EB for abound $900 if you don't need a 1080p display. I would also wait a few days since the new Dell 15" XPS will be released this week. It looks like the 15" will have a Fermi GT 445M GPU. No idea on price though. Dell always has coupons and deals going.

Bronsky

 

Unfortunately yes. Upgrades with a higher screen resolution are mostly available for the more expensive models.

Michael

 

For the resolution I meant more mainstream laptops, like ones you could pick up in places like Best Buy. Gaming laptops like MSI has much better specs and screens but are also much more expensive.
I'm in Canada so the prices are much higher and the choices are much fewer here. The lowest price for an EB here is $699.99, with the lowest specs possible on the market today. Anything that is even remotely "average" will be at least $1000. Anything that resembles the Lenovo/Acer is at least $1500.
Isn't the XPS already out? I see it on Dell's website. Dell's coupons right now only get a $100 off, which doesn't make that much of a difference as the XPS would still cost around $1100, or $1243 after tax.

 

The Dell website shows the Studio XPS 16. There are Studio models and the Single Studio XPS 16 model. The new models are going to be called just XPS and are really a rebranded replacement for the Studio series. I would guess that they won't be that expensive. The Studios weren't.

Have you ever thought about a smaller notebook. The Acer 3820TG currently being sold in Canada is a very nice computer. It runs about $750 with an I3-370CPU and an HD 5650 GPU. It has no internal DVD drive but has a dual fan/heat-sink cooling system that is second to none.

In the end, it is you, not me that has to live with the resolution of the display. I would not own anything larger than 13.3" with 720p resolution. At 14", I would want 1600 x 900 and at 15.6" I would want 1080p. But, that is me. I would also like 350-400 nit brightness.

As between the Lenovo and the Acer, it is really a tough call. The Lenovo has a better GPU. The HD 5730 performs significantly better than the HD 5650 in the 5820TG. The Acer has far better battery life. On proper settings you should be able to get 5-6 hours. The odds are that you can overclock the Acer's CPU as well as its GPU (although heat is more of an issues in the 5820TG than the 3820TG). The Acer is thiner and lighter but the Lenovo is like a tank. I would guess that the Lenovo has the better keyboard (although it's not as good as a thinkpad KB and the Acer KB grows on you). I like the Acer's metal skinned top far better than the ugly plastic top of the Lenovo.

If you can live without the better GPU, go with the Acer. I tend to buy the most powerful GPU I can when I buy a computer because I keep them for a long time. You can normally upgrade the CPU but rarely the GPU.

Bronsky

 

Thanks for the detailed answer. I guess at $100 more I would go with the 5820. To the contrary I actually think the Lenovo looks more stylish (though I guess neither is stylish enough to compete with something like Vaio) with its chubby design. Acer looks so plain and last decade-ish.
Do you have information on the new XPS, like its looks, specs and approximate prices?
Also is it possible to upgrade the screen resolution once I buy the laptop?
Thanks.

 

You will not be able to upgrade the display resolution once you buy the unit AFAIK. Here is a thread on the new Dells. http://forum.notebookreview.com/dell-xps-studio-xps/517971-news-studio-xps-15-xps-17-a-45.html

Bronsky

 

Last Fall, Lenovo had a sale for Win7 introduction, and I bought a Lenovo IdeaPad Y550 (nvidia GT240m) for the wife. (should have known about Lenovo quality control as soon as we received the Win7 laptop that shipped with Vista instead, even though it had Win 7 stickers, and was offered as win7 specially "optimized only for Lenovo" intro special, but that mess is another story). The "in stock" IdeaPad also took 6 weeks to get here after ordering.

Over the past couple months added a TimelineX 3820tg and 4820tg. From order placed to opening packages took 5 days each with one bought at PChome Taiwan and other bought at Newegg. Much faster than any Lenovo and normal Dell's

No comparison between Ideapad and TimelineX.
Ideapad is Lenovo's cheap budget line, while TimelineX is a step up in Acer's line.

The Ideapad is big, heavy, poor build quality, and after using for a while, feels very cheap and low end. Build quality compares to the $350 Compaq AMD laptops frequently seen at Staples on sale.

The TimelineX looks and feels like a well built machine, in another class compared to the Ideapads. For the wife that just uses the Lenovo on the coffee table, the ideapad is fine. But for travel, I would not want to depend on it or lug it around.

As to screen resolution comments, if you have the eyes, go high.
My prior laptop was a 17" Dell with 1440x900, and small text was tough on the eyes. The TimelineX's I now use above are 1366x768, with display set to 125%, to enlarge enough that my eyes can see without reading glasses.

EDIT: Perfect timing. After posting this, just received an email from Acer.

"Dear Customer,
You recently purchased and registered an Acer notebook. Now that you have been able to use it for some time, we are keen to learn from you what you like about it and what you think we should improve....We would appreciate it if you would complete a short survey for us..."

Funny how I never get those emails from Lenovo. I guess they already know or don't care. Looks like Acer does want to know and does care.

 

Oh wow that is a completely different response from the one I got in another forum who claimed IdeaPad had a very good build quality compared to any Acer laptops, since Acer is a low-budget line. Personally I like the IdeaPad look slightly better than the dull, rectangular Acer as well, but I never used either brand so I can only compare from physical looks. I guess because I'm into arts and design I want a more stylish and trendy look and specs are only second priority. From videos I saw people complained about the heavy weight and low battery life, and monitor problems of IdeaPad Y560.
Gah why does this decision have to be so difficult lol. >.<

 

Also do some reading at the official Lenovo Ideapad forums.

IdeaPad Y, U, B, V, and Z series Laptops - Lenovo Community

Note that unlike here, those forums are heavily censored by Lenovo, and if a poster complains too loudly, or asks the wrong questions, the posts or entire thread will be deleted. Their rules do not allow posts that might hurt sales (although they do let some of the bad things discussed slide for a while).

 

Yeah official forums tend to do that. Shipping seems to be a major problem with Lenovo, many people on the forum complain about shipping. And shipping is a major concern here, if shipping takes like 1-2 months then I might as well wait for a Christmas sale, Lenovo's guaranteed to roll out some coupons that's much better than the pathetic $100-off coupons we have in Canada, and the Acer TimelineX will probably be slightly cheaper than the $850 as well.