Questions for a new M15x

I have been reading these forums for a while now and have been struggling with deciding first which laptop to get (was at the which laptop to buy forum for a long time). I have it narrowed down to the ASUS G51Jx-A1 vs. the Alienware M15x.

I am leaning towards the Alienware right now because I get massive discounts through my employer that makes a pretty decent M15x normally costing around $1750 cost about $1300.

I have a few questions though.

I have read through the throttling forums in entirety and I know there are no definite answers yet but I thought I could ask a few questions anyways...

Does the 240M GPU perform better due to throttling than the 260M? How limited would I be if I got a 240M in terms of playing new games? Any help on this issue would be very helpful.

Also, does the A03 bios update address any of the throttling issues...so far it seems that most threads currently stand at the "not sure" phase. I didn't know if anything has come up since then.

Thanks for the help

 

no the 240 is not better and we dont know yet what A03 fixes, i am VERY happy with mine and game a ton on it so i would recommend this unit to anybody.

 

Ah, the 240M isn't as fast as the 260 (i.e. this one goes up to 11 quote comes to mind) and no one is really sure right now why the 240 doesn't throttle. Me, I got the 240 because I'm not a heavy gamer. But, and here's the cool "but", this laptop has a user upgradable CPU and GPU. So it's basically gonna be fast for a while. It'll supposedly handle the new Arrandale CPUs too. Yeah, which CPU/GPU you get is up to you. I'm in love with my system.
-joeaux-

 

I had the same decision to make last month and narrowed to the same two machines. Settled on the M15x, even though it was significantly more expensive than the Asus - no big Dell discounts for me
Anyway, the reported heat issues, the overall build quality comparison as well as both hardware and software problems for the Asus scared me away (although I really, really liked the dual hard drive option...)

I haven't run in to throttling issue - been playing L4D2, and a few other games. My gut feeling is that it will be fixed before it becomes a major issue. The majority of throttling seems to come when people are purposefully pushing the limits in an attempt to get it to throttle! I think during normal usage (including gameplay) the throttling will only be apparent in very specific games and specific situations.

 

This is really interesting because when i spoke with Dell, i was strictly told that if i bought the M15x with a maxed out CPU or GPU (best option that they offer) i would not be able to upgrade. So what really is the answer for this, or will we just have to wait till new cards come out and see what happens?