Bought a new m17x 285m sli with 1200p screen

Total Charges: $2,386.09



What do you guys think?

 

That's a sweet deal congrats!

 

Looks great from the specs!!!

 

Everything looks good except the sli 285s why put old cards in a new machine

 

Because he may prefer NV over AMD. It all comes down to personal choice.

Nice build - enjoy the system! One thing to consider Omega, extend that warranty if you can. 1 year might be ok on a lower price system but if you want to preserve that purchase, you want to go for the max warranty which you can afford.

 

That's a pretty good price for THIS laptop and a dual-gpu setup. Hope the GPU's will perform as good as our HD5870's. Enjoy!

 

Wait I can probably still change my order, dual 285m aren't as good as dual 5870s?

I will be using this laptop mainly for black ops, so what kind of FPS can i expect from a 2x285m vs 2x5870?

 

agreed, The warranty should be the very first thing to upgrade, it will more than pay for itself.

they're better for the games that are nvidia optimized, otherwise they're slightly slower overall.

 

We currently have both sli 285's and cf5870 and honestly, we don't notice a difference (not counting 3dmark benches of course). We play WoW, MW2, StarCraft2, SupremeCommander 1 & 2, Arma et al, and various other games. It really does come down to a personal preference.

Enjoy the new system! I know you'll love it!

Edit: I whole-heartedly agree with the warranty. I normally don't get it for toy appliances (laptops are those for us - we can live without them), but AW is a cut above the rest. I highly recommend getting as much as you can afford.

 

I don't really care about other games, I just care about black ops. What gfx configuration gets me more FPS 285m sli or 5870 cf? I see a lot of people saying the 5870 CF is better, unless you actually have tested both configs you can't really be sure. I want responses like:

"Oh yeah I ordered the 285m SLI and it sucked and sent it back for the 5870 CF"
-or-
"Look at this thread, this guy ordered the 285m SLI and he says it sucks"
-or even better-
"Here is a comparison of how many FPS you get in black ops on a full 18 man multiplayer game on nuketown, between 285m sli vs 5870 CF"

Because right now, I am reading these replies with people saying that what they have (and almost everyone here has the 5870cf) is the best thing in the world. It's somewhat un-scientific and not helpful at all. How can you say 5870s cf is better then 285m sli if you only ever tested the 5870s cf? Also, just because the cards are newer doesn't make them better. I want a little bit more of a scientific approach to this "which is the better graphics card setup" issue because it is very important to me, and ultimately will make me decide whether to give my sales agent a call to try and change my order.

 

Oh perfect, do you have black ops and can you test how much average FPS you get on both these configurations, preferably in a full 18 man server? press tilde and /cg_drawfps 1

All I have to go on was this:
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 285M SLI - Notebookcheck.net Tech

If you scroll down to where it says "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" and click on the "comparison links" it shows that:
285m SLI is 18% faster then 5870 CF in medium settings
285m SLI is 16% faster then 5870 CF in high settings
285m SLI is 3% faster then 5870 CF in ultra settings

I don't really know how accurate these benchmarks are, but these benchmarks is what made me decide to go for the 285m SLI. I know that Modern Warfare 2 isn't Black Ops, but it is the closest game comparison I could find between the two graphics configurations

 

I had the unfortunate pleasure of having them for about 3 days. They don't. And they blue screened like a sombish (unless, of course, just mine were defective).

Their performance was on par with the 4870's :-S

 

omega, you'll find that the majority of opinion on this topic is based on benchmark numbers alone. Benchmark numbers are all fine and dandy however they do not always accurately represent actual game play. I understand where you are coming from. Sadly, you wont find many on here who have had both configurations in their possesion to accurately report on actual game play differences.

I think RedViking hit the nail on the head...

I posted this in another thread,
Remember, if you aren't happy in that first 21 day period from date of invoice, you can return it.

If it was me, I'd be content with my decision and not second guess. Sorry I cant provide you with a game by game comparison.

 

I have!
and while I don't have numbers.. I didn't have to really tone down any significant settings in any game I played to play them with my 285's vs my 5870s. your money is better spent on a faster processor in these laptops rather than agonizing over which GPU you're going to buy that'll be obsolete in 2 months.

they haven't had a new engine for 5 years.. It's safe to assume GTX285's are slightly faster for black ops.

 

Yep Lozz... why I said 'you wont find many'. Good to hear some input from you.

 

I wish we could get rid of all these benchmark programs that spit out a number and only do benchmarks like:

1) Operating System Boot Time Duration (CPU + HD)
2) Game Exe Launch Time Duration (CPU+GFX+HD)
3) Game Map Load Time Duration (CPU+GFX+HD)
4) Game FPS Comparisons (CPU+GFX)

Those are the only 4 that matter to me, and those are the only 4 that should matter to you as well. (You do own a gaming laptop and these 4 things are the main things a gaming laptop should be good at)

I am actually going to go ahead and call my sales agent to ask about the 285m sli and 5870 cf, (which one gives more FPS on black ops)

Alienware is a gaming computer company, and Black Ops is the biggest game right now. There is no reason for alienware not to know the FPS for the different gfx configs from the heart!

 

Hate to tell you this - but you probably wont receive an accurate response. Remember, regardless of the company, you'll be hitting a sales rep. They only have access to the scripts and KB's in front of them. Unless they are actually a BlackOps player, they most likely will not know.

 

Again, you assume. You don't know for sure, because you didn't test both configurations. You are basically making this statement up, where did you get your information? It is not helpful to me unless it's fact, and I don't want to come to a wrong decision! You might be wrong! Maybe black ops is faster with 5870 CF, or maybe not. I will definitely not take the word of some random guy on an internet forum that tells me to assume. This is a pretty big purchase for me, and this is a very important decision for me.

Which brings up another point, let's say you are right and GTX285 sli is slightly faster, what exactly is your definition of "slightly faster"? 1 fps faster? 10 fps faster?

Also, according to notebookcheck's graphics card comparisons on modern warfare 2, there is about 18% 16% 3% difference, which isn't "slightly faster", it's significantly faster.

 

Won't hurt to try

 

Black ops is just one game. It would be ridiculous to build a system around it. The smarter purchase is the 5870s because they are built on a smaller process, have overall higher performance and a newer feature set. 285M is based on the G92 which is a very old core. If you want nVidia, wait on the dual 460M's to be available this holiday season.

 

yes, I have, I'm one of few people on the whole board that has, and with that note, I'm out. Good luck with your purchase.

fingers *and* toes crossed

 

I did just get off the phone with my sales agent, he talked to his tech support team and they said that dell/alienware doesn't support benchmarking because of the different software configurations and that I should check out tomshardware.com

Also he said that he never got a question like this before.

 

Nothing works for Black Ops right now As it stands. Hopefully Treyarch gets off their lazy bums and releases a patch that fixes something. As of right now, I don't think either will give you respectable framerates.

 

I am feeling bummed out and I feel like I want to cry.. I feel like I made the wrong decision in selecting a graphics card.

What is even worse is that it's not like it's a charge on my credit card, I signed up for the 1 year no interest thing.

 

There's a lot of exaggeration and hyperbole going on here. Both sets of cards are great. I have 285s and I'm very happy with the performance.

I agree with BatBoy that for the most part, it's just personal preference, unless certain features (e.g. CUDA or DX11) are essential to you.

 

Yeah don’t feel bummed out, you will be thrilled with the performance I bet. I am a little bummed that I didn’t go with the Nvidia instead. I play one game much of the time that happens to support physx. I miss not being able to turn it on and actually use it with my ATI cards. I chose the ATI because I had one in my G73 and I was impressed by their performance, plus directx 11 support. However, I do miss the easier overclocking through the nvidia control panel and I always preferred nvidia driver support. They each have their merits and it seems like they are very close in performance anyways, depending on the game and settings of course.

Plus with nvidia, your 3dmark vantage CPU score will be really high compared to those of us with ATI

 

For some real gaming numbers with regards to 285M vs 5870M: ATi 5870M vs Nvidia GTX 285M Benchmarks for G860 and G870

Now factor in that 5870s are overclocking monsters and stable at high OC's and support DX11 and you will find they are the better choice over an old G92 core found in the 285M.

Like I said before, if you insist on nVidia, wait for the 460M SLi to be made available.

 

to the OP, you can always cancel your oder if it has not shipped, or return it within the 21 days once you get it, so no need to fret over it.

You paid a decent price for the laptop, and it will still kick no matter which GPUs you have.

If the R3 (rumoured by December) comes out before your 21 days are up, just return it and get it then.

 

yah the nvidia 285's are not directx11 and the 5870's are. Also the 285's have old gddr3 memory where as the 5870's have gddr5 which is an upgrade in it self.

Either way your getting a laptop that has good build quality and will last for a good time. Although 2300 is no chump change. Thats alot alot of money. Thats more then 99% of all PC's out there I would venture to guess. Hope you get something that satisfies you.