M15x and M17x Help Me Choose!!

Basically im stuck between the 2 laptops, i prefer a 17inch screen, but like the 15.4 because its smaller. ive heard on here that the build quality of the m15x is poor and the lcd lid is bad. i would be taking the laptop into college which is very close. is the m17x ok for taking is to college once a day shouldnt be that big and heavy right?
any advice people?? thanks, Imran

 

M15X is 7 Lb with good battery life single gpu

M17X 10 Lb With 2 Hours of battery life Dual gpus. But you need a big bag.

I think the best idea is go on the m15x General Information Thread *READ BEFORE POSTING. Then check Worldwide m15x forum survey and Worldwide m17x forum survey and List of issues fixed/not fixed with the m15x

 

If you will be taking your notebook around campus with you the 17 inch screen is way to big. The 15.4 inch screen is a perfect balance of performance and mobility. I do concur with you about the build quality. I had to send mine back for repairs, but all is well now. By the time you order, all of the bugs should be smoothed out concering the drivers.

 

thats cool, if i didnt like the 15x laptop or i had a hinge problem could i return it for a full refund? or whats the deal on the refunds?

 

The refunds are subject to a 15% restocking fee. If you didn't like it, then you'll have to deal with the restocking fee.

 

does that mean 15% of what i paid for the laptop?

 

Yes.

10char.

 

here is basically what you need to consider

 

I think the m17x can only utilize somewhere around 2 gigs of RAM too, right?

 

you ive never seen any alienware in real life so i duno about size i sorta want the m17x duno why bigger and better muhhahaaha lol
can anybody comment on the fan noise from both?

 

yes because of SLI

since the m15x seems to have more heat im guessing more noise. the noise is not really that loud. you can hear it if you have no sound in your room. if you are playing a game with sound on you wont really notice the fan turn on. in fact you might be really into the game and wont even notice the fan at all.

 

ic thats for the replies guys
i will probs go for the m15x but now im worried about build quality of it

 

That's me most of the time.

I feel like I've said this too much but, if it makes you feel any better, those of us that have gotten' our m15x's recently (in like the past 2 months) haven't had any major issues with it. Doesn't mean it's completely fixed though, only time will tell.

If you get it, just try to take care of it. Despite the majority of customer service experiences being nightmares, some people, I dare say a decent amount of people actually, have had positive CS experiences.

So go for it. Take care of it. Be happy with it.

 

wow ennea, you really give me a boost in the alienware direction =)
i just dont want to fork out over 1200 pounds on a laptop and then it doesnt work, whats the deal on returns and refunds?

 

im assuming you live in the UK. Since UK has better consumer protection laws you can just ask AW for a refund and they cant refuse. Of course theres a time period but i forgot how many days. It is definitely easier to get a refund in UK than in the US.

 

ok then thanks guys!!
going to go for the m15x
amazing help here!!
any one wanna post pics of there m17x or m15x in this thread? =)

 

I hope you get a good one, my review of the m17x has some pictures in it.

Oh and yo might want to buy a mug as well, so i've done a review for that too...

It's all in my signature (",)

OB

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=240250

pics from my original thread. if you want more pics i could just take them for you.

 

Neither!!!!!!!!!

 

i cant wait to get my m15x ordered!!! thanks for the pictures guys, how can you pay for the laptop? i take it you cannot paid via paypal haha?

 

i think they only accept credit cards and paypal.

 

oo if they accept paypal thats fantastic because im selling my old laptop for 800 and the money is being sent through paypal woohoo. how does everybody find the loudness? do the fans only kick in when your gaming? like if im surfing the net and word processing for about 2 hours would the fans become loud?

 

and also can you only buy another hard drive for the smart bay when your specing your laptop, is there anywhere else i can buy it from

 

you can order an empty SB cage after you buy and put in your own HDD from places like newegg.com or frys.com or tigerdirect.com or whatever you prefer

 

Even the M15X is quite heavy, i have the Dell XPSM1730 and its the same weight as the M17X is let me tell you, its freakin heavy. I would NOT want to be carrying that around!

 

its not seriously heavy i have a inspiron 9400 its heavyish but i cant carry it around i just want something smaller and faster

 

The m17x is very silent even when gaming which is normal for a 17-inch notebook. The m15x fans are not any nosier than any 15-inch laptop I know. Actually I found out the m1530 is just a little quieter when gaming because it only has a single fan. Overall, the m15x fans are audible and can be heard clearly but that if you are really waiting for them to turn on at full blast.

 

pics of inside the smart bay drive

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=240250&page=3

the weight for the m15x isnt that bad. i carried it to school 2 times in the summer and it wasnt too bad. maybe ill be complaining when i have to carry the m15x everyday. Its only 7 pounds. Theres this girl in my school that carries the HDX to school every day. The HDX is a 20.1 inch laptop that weighs 15.5 pounds. That must be hell >>

 

haha thats some laptop! i just want the fans to be pretty quiet when im in class in college thats all! i guess i could put on stealth mode yano=D

 

if you use binary gfx the m15x cant really be heard at all. binary gfx uses the intel integraded card. the intel card shares the same heatsink and fan as the cpu so the other fan is turned off. that means less noise since the gpu fan is turned off. the gpu fan is also the biggest one in the m15x.

 

ok cool and whats the deal with the m15x and RAM if the laptop has vista home premium, can the laptop use 4GB 800mhz ram?

 

you can put in 800 mhz ram. it will just downclock to 667 mhz

 

what he said. latencies will go down to CL4 (in most cases), but you won't notice this.

 

so theres no point putting 800mhz ram in?

 

yea theres not really a point.

you could always pretend that you dont know it goes down to 667 and think that the ram is working faster

 

ok thanks again, i think im going to get 2gb ram just, this seems to be enuf and ppl say 4gb doesnt really work
does the 1gb cache accelerater memory thing work? or speed the laptop up alot?

 

it will just speed it up during boot times but i would rather get 4 gigs of ram than get 1 gig of turbo memory. use the money from the turbo memory to get 4 gigs of ram. its a better inverstment in my opinion. you can only use 3.2 gigs since the os 32 bit.

 

ic, so im getting the 8700gt card, will it be able to play cod4 with a decent fps. and it there any way of upgrading my graphics card in the future

 

yea just call AW and then say you want to buy a 8800M GTX. they will send you the 8800 and you can just install it yourself. its very to install the video card.

 

ok cool what about call of duty 4? can the 8700gt play it good will there much differance between playing it with a 8800gtx compared with 8700gt

 

well there probably wont be a difference since both cards can run the game on high. the only difference between the 8800 is that it is alot more powerful so you can run future games on max. eventually the 8700 wont be able to handle games on max anymore but the 8800 can still continue. the 8800m gtx is even more powerful than 2 8700s in sli.

 

hmm ic could the 8700gt run crysis?

 

it can but not very well. even the 8800m gtx cant run crysis very well.

 

lol well at least i know that i can upgrade to the 8800gtx in the future, im just dreading the long wait for the laptop

 

i hated the wait for my m15x too. i eventually grew tired of waiting for it until suddenly i saw a change in phases and my m15x was being build. at least you dont have to wait a month and a half for your m15x.

 

Go for a Clevo like the the D901C(SLI)17" or the M57TU/RU(single card solution)17" you'll get just as much raw gaming power, better cooling, better customer service, and a much much better build quality for a lot less cash... The D901C will Destroy an m17x, yes.. destroy, some guy recently scored 14900 in 3DMark 06 with the D901C and a Quad core with 2 9800M GT's u can get a D901C for anywhere from 500 to 1000 dollars less than an m17x. The D901C uses desktop processors, and Dual 9800M GT/GTX. The processor is also easier to upgrade being that they are of the desktop variety. Does it get really hot you ask? no not nearly as hot as you would expect from a desktop CPU in a laptop, the cooling in the D901C is second to none, and you wont have any issues, allthough its always good to have a notebook cooler on any gaming laptop, regardless of mobile cpu or desktop cpu. Also the D901C can contain up to 3 hard drives in raid, also Clevo systems are relatively easy to open up and change parts, like the CPU, GPU, HDD, or RAM. I would seriously look into Clevo if i were you, check out XoticPC, Sager or Power notebooks if you are in the US or Eurocom if you are in canada.

 

you should of read the thread that he already order the m15x.... although he could cancel if he wanted to tho

 

Too bad for him

 

so how long does delivery normally take, i was expecting 2 months from ordering

 

My m17x arrived in three weeks and it was fully loaded, depends on what parts and if they have them in stock.

A good bit of advice is to ring them each awek to make sure that any delays (see my review) are sorted asap. It's not being annoying, they are there to help lol

Excal27 - Nice Avatar (",)

OB