M11x R3 Upgrades...

Hi there, I make this thread to know what are the upgrades that really worth it, 1 or 2Gb for the graphic card? I5 or I7? wait for the new I7 that have 100mhz more that the actual I7? 4Gb or 8Gb of RAM? The cost if you upgrade the components is considerable but, is the gaming impact is so important or is this just to make more money with the same performances?
Sorry for my bad english, thanks in advance for your replies.

 

I have the r3 with the i7 and 2gb gpu I have added the intel ultimate n 6300 and 256gb ssd and this plays extemely smooth with no over clocking. I also have 8gb of ram. So there is not much more I can do. But I will say that I had an r2 i7 and with some over clocking it gamed pretty well. I have just taken the ssd hard drive out of the r2 removed the old devices and installed new drivers and cleaned up the drive and I will tell you that the game play is smoother as well as I can ramp up the graphics to a much higher level. So over all the 400 dollars it cost me to upgrade to the r3 was worth it. Hope that helps

 

Which SSD did you put into the R3? I am assuming it's the Crucial C300.

 

Let me guess, you stayed with only 1yr warranty w/ a machine that cost over $1k+.

 

Thanks for the replies, should I wait for the new i7 and maybe the fan fix or should I buy it right now?

 

if i were you, id just get the i5 and the 1gb GT540.
2gb of video ram is utterly worthless and will never be used. and for the i5, its still a fast processor, and you probably wont see a difference between this and the i7 in real world tasks.

if i were buying an R3 id be getting a 320gb hard drive, the i5, and 1gb GT540.

 

Ok thanks, I want to see i5, 1Gb GT540, 4Gb Ram VS i7 2Gb GT540, 8Gb but I think I have to wait...

 

i can tell you right off, there wont much of a difference.
the extra gpu memory will not even be used. and 4gb ram vs 8gb ram, no difference in speed there.

and only a slight increase in performance from the i5 to the i7

 

so an i5, 4gb, GTS540M 1GB is plenty?

 

To me it will be. That's what I bought: 100% stock. But I know a lot of the guys here what every little extra drop of performance increase out of their machines so it's really a question of preference.

I'd say if you are not looking to break any synthetic benchmark records, you'll notice little difference. It's better to save the money and put it towards a SSD. Then you'll see some real change.

 

yea. but the extra video memory will come in handy if you try to play at higher resolutions with an external monitor..

 

I suppose so, but at least in my case, my 17" animal pulls the heavy weight. You should definitely consider what you plan on doing with your little beast before buying.

 

well my desktop handles my power fix.. but I tried to connect my R2 to my tv and run 1900x1200 or something to that and it was bad trying to run just cause 2.. so I am sure there will be little price difference between the I5 and I7 and the 2GB vs 1GB cards.. so my advise is wait for a dell coupon and get the best there is.. you will be able to keep it longer and have more options available to you..

 

An 18.5" or 20" monitor is huge and sufficient enough for external monitor needs and 1600x900 is quite impressive and even the text and icons are too small. So I dunno why use full 1080p for an external monitor for gaming on the m11x.

 

i would just run it at 720p and make the TV the main screen which disables the built-in screen.

 

yea.. but currently I have two PC monitors one is a 23 inch that does 2048x1152 and the other is a 27 that does 1900x1200.. and most of my tvs will handle at least 720p

 

no it will not. even a gtx460 wont utilize all of its memory (1gb) at highest settings and 1920x1080. the extra video memory is pointless. and i think its just simply there to make people "think" its better. when its really not.

2gb would only be useful running games at a res of 2560x1600. and there is no way the GT540 could handle that anyway.

http://en.expreview.com/2010/08/08/exclusive-review-of-zotac-geforce-gtx-460-2gb-edition/9041.html/8

 

Yeah but if you buy an i7 you have 2Gb and you have no choice, anyway I will not plug my m11x to an external monitor, or if I do it, it will be a 19" I think.
With my M11x, I'll play GTA IV, League Of Legends, L4D2, TF2, Portal 2, Minecraft and some "old" games (Like UT, Killing Flood, Indies 2D games and Retro games with emulators NES SNES Megadrive N64 ect...). And I'll take the best Wifi card because It will be my school computer so I'll can connect to internet anywhere. First I was like "4Gb of ram is enought" but I am thinking about 8Gb since some days.
And for the SSD, I'm going to buy the Crucial C300 some months after I'll buy the m11x.
I just want to have the best so I'll have no regrets later.
Thanks for your replies guys.

 

technically if you select the i5 model and just upgrade the CPU you can get a 1gb 540M but the price for the CPU is not worth it.

you may not use the full 2gb but i would call it an unnecessary bonus.

 

there is nothing wrong with having 2gb video memory, but my problem is, why have it if its never going to be used?

most games wont even actually utilize 512mb of video ram.

 

The only game that I know of that can use over a gig of ram is GTA4 and that is because it is poorly coded.

 

its probably smarter to spend money upgrading the warranty than to upgrade configs that probably won't make much of a difference. the SSD might be the next most profitable upgrade, but odds are you can find a cheaper one on newegg than the cost dell is charging. then again, if the convenience of them doing the work for you is worth it, then go for it.

for something as mobile as this machine is intended to be, it just makes sense to get an extended warranty on it. it would be a total tragedy to spend $1500 on one and then see it get destroyed by dropping it or spilling whatever on it.

the stock config for this baby is plenty fast, but if you have the money and want to max the specs, go for it. i just don't think you are getting a significantly better machine for it.

 

So will the extra 1GB of VRAM draw much power? If the extra RAM is not going to be used, I'd rather improve battery life... that's if it uses any extra power

 

i wouldnt think so. couse the gpu will be running at the same voltage i think.

it would be like adding more RAM to a pc, and that doesnt do anything to battery life.

 

Just thought I would quote what an IBM engineer said only a few years ago...

"What the hell will anyone do with more than 24k of memory?" -Some forgotten IBM Engineer.

Just because you do not make use of it right now, does not mean in a year or two it will still not be used. There is NOTHING wrong with buying a machine with higher than anticipated specs. If I am going to dump money into a system, I am damn well going to max certain non-upgradeable components to ensure I did all I could to future-proof it.

Just because you can, doesn't always mean you should...

You should, when you know you can...

 

having 2gb of video memory isnt future proofing anything.. i'm not sure if anyones understanding me.
2gb of video memory would only help if your running at a res of over 2560x1600. and the GT540 DOES NOT have the power to run a game at any res that high. therefor, 2gb is useless.

even running at 1920x1080 the 1gb wouldnt even be fully used.

 

there are some games that are designed to leave textures inside of VRAM for faster access to them. This would allow both more textures to remain as well as more to be loaded.

A perfect example of this is RTS games with massive maps. The map gets loaded into texture memory and leave RAM free for other processes. I am not saying that we will see maps that take up 1GB of texture memory anytime soon, but its not always about resolution.

While you do not see the need for it right now and I completely respect that, do not say that could NEVER be used. Never is a final word, and if you know technology, you know that nothing is ever final. Innovation happens daily.

 

Is there a large difference in speeds in the M14x 2630QM and the i7 in the m11x r3?

... I'm very torn, but all in all I just need a school laptop that is able to handle most games on decent settings.

I am a girl, so weight was a factor...
And of course I travel a bit so the 8h battery life looked more appealing than the 6h one.

 

i also see your point, but if you go back a page, i posted a link. it shows the difference between video memory, and when its needed.
i think the extra video memory would only come in handy if you had a really high end gpu. because otherwise it wont be used couse the gpu is too slow to handle it.

 

M11x for portability and Battery life. M14x for performances.

 

It really depends on what you're looking for. I had a work laptop I was lugging around a lot that weighed the same as the m14x, and it started hurting my back. Neither systems are all that heavy .. even for us girls! But it depends on how much you're actually going to be dragging it all over. The m11x is the perfect weight for carrying around, imo. And of course battery life is very good in the m11x.

So far I have been able to play any game I've tried on it; I haven't run any formal tests or checked FPS rates yet, but COD Black Ops, Dragon Age 2, Fallout 3, Batman Arkham Asylum, all w/ smooth gameplay, no lags, no crashes, it's definitely plenty powerful for me.

 

Awesome.

After some unboxings, reviews, and consideration (as well as getting the money for it) I think I'll buy it around Christmas season.

 

I'm thinking about getting the R3 as well. I was planning to go with the i7 but after reading some of the comments here about the marginal performance over the i5, I might go with the latter and use the extra money to get the SSD. But I still want something better than what I have now which is a Core 2 Duo P9500 clocked at 2.53GHz. How does the i5 compare?