Thinking of buying new m17x- Need Help with configuration.

Hey guys. I'm a noob here. Thinking of buying a new m17x. Thinking of getting it with this configuration-

-Black
-T9600 2.8ghz
-Dual 1gb ATI HD4870
-1200p screen
-4 gb (1333) memory
-1 TB raid 0 hard drive
-Blueray burner

So what do you guys think. I really want the QX9300 but it is too pricey!
But I think this a good base to start off with can alway upgrade the cpu later on. Also do you think its a good choice to go with ATI or Nvidia 280m?
I have been reading alot of the post, the m17x seem to have alot of issues, have most of them been resolved yet?

Any input would help. Thanks Guys!!!!

 

You called that a base start??? LoL...yep QX9300 is an arm and a leg at the moment...so far nice rig setup...just jealous that I can't afford them 4870's Xfire..and blue ray....

 

What will be the primary use of the machine? Gaming? Work? Multi-tasking? Girl-catching?

 

Pretty much all of the above. Use for work during day and gaming at home. So a complete desk top replacement. At work use for photoshop and other imaging software, multi tasking is a must. At night use for gaming like MW2, TF2, LFD2 so I play anything with a 2 in it, LOL.

Also LOL at first comment, yea base because gpu and blue ray is hard to impossible to upgrade later.

Thanks for input guys

 

Your usage profile sounds identical to mine.

Outside of upgrading to the Q9300X and mortgaging your income stream for years to come, I might spring for more RAM than 4GB. You may be planning to do this with Kingston RAM or something after you get the M17x, I dunno. If you multi-task a lot and leave bunches of apps open, I'd definitely go 6 or 8GB on the RAM.

Normally, I'd prefer a quad core chip too, but in your case the T9600 should be fine. The other quad cores offered w/the M17x seem kinda lame for gaming. I think more memory and the T9600 would do ya good.

From the feedback I'm getting on an earlier thread, the ATIs seem to be the GPU of choice, too.

Are you concerned at all by the latency problem some folks are having with their rigs?

 

Yeah I hear about the latency problems, I was hoping most of the m17x issues are solved already before I buy. Yeah memory upgrade I think is a must too, but will do myself because $800 for the 8gb seems way too pricey.

 

I would be careful buying this system with the DPC Latency issues it suffers from. There still is no fix for it.

It's 10 times worse under Windows 7.

 

To be fair, Its not that bad under windows 7, i get occassional spikes to 4k but most of the time it stays under 2k. Also i'm not experiecing hiccups anymore in MP3s or movies playing to the big screen.

 

Hi all, im also a noob on here looking to bin my gaming desk top for a all new m17x.

But what do i go for in the way of setup, the last fing i need is to end up with a bag of poo, all im going to do with it is game, play dvd's, and ebay.

hope u can help all the best lee

 

Give a spending limit to work with otherwise you can just max it out and be very happy with it.

 

well all i need it for is top end gaming, so if it runs my games flat out im a happy noob, there is no limit, i will spend what you lad's think is best for my gaming, but there is no point going mad if the game is not going to use all that power or will it, im on new ground here.

 

qx9300, ati 4870s and 1920x1200 from Dell. Buy third party SSD and memory. That's what I did with 2 years of complete care warranty.

 

Thanks fo the info guys, yeah the latency issues with the m17x is holding me off from buying it rite away. Hopefully everything would be resolved soon. Yeah my max budget for this laptop is around $3500. Man the m17x looks sweet but so many issues with it. The only reason I'm getting this laptop is because of the graphic card, top one out rite now I think and the lighting is pretty sexy I must admit.

 

Also thinking of getting 2 HDD should I get raid 0 or raid 1 ???? any performance increase or it doesn't matter?

 

I ran raid 0 for awhile on my m7700a, but tbh I never saw a measurable performace boost. If you're into drive benchmarking, then maybe it's worth it. Also with Raid 0 you risk losing all data on both of your drives if one drive fails. Of course, all of us back up our data frequently, right?

For laptops, I feel raid 1 is a bit of overkill for data protection, especially at the expense of drive space.

Raid tends to be good for database related work, but most of those solutions are Raid 1+0 or Raid 5, both of which aren't options in a notebook.

The only raid I use now is the stuff that comes out of a can.

 

hey what is your innappropiate name

 

Thanks again for the quick response. LOL , I think I will go with raid 1 for protection since raid 0 has no really performance increase. And my inappropriate name was i love bOObs!!! which I don't find in inappropriate at all. Its my gamer tag on most games and who doesn't like boobs.

 

don't worry about the raid configuration you can do that later get the best cards you can 280's or ati's and the best prosessor like mandrake says and i love boobs too but i guess is inappropiate :laugh:

 

In my PC Raid 5 fried the motherboard memory controller, thankfully I was able to RMA it so that might be why it's not offered. I later went with Raid 0 but also saw no significant increase in performance and when 1 hard drive eventually died I lost everything in the Raid, thankfully I kept the OS on a seperate hard drive so that was fine.

 

On a second note I'm strongly considering getting an M15x on Nov. 30th but if I wait another 2 weeks I can get a M17x on Dec. 15th. My question is with all this talk about a refresh coming to the M17x in possibly Dec. but more probably in Q1 2010 is it really worth waiting for? Yes I understand if I keep waiting for the next best thing I'll never get one, but with it being right around the corner is it still worth waiting for. The idea of getting an i7 in the M17x is very tempting but is it necessary? I've had SLI in PC's and never saw a significant increase in performance so is that necessary for anything other then running benchmarks?

 

Get the M17x now and sell in 3 months when that next best thing comes out. I would advice to see what deals surprise us on Black Friday.

 

I am eagerly awaiting to see what Dell throws at us for Black Friday. Hopefully an M17x refresh also wont be to far off the horizen.

 

Depends on your primary usage profile (gaming, multitasking, video encoding, etc.). Check out this review for a comparison of mobile i7 vs M17x. If gaming is your primary use, then the M17x is the choice. If you're a heavy multitasker and only a part-time gamer, then getting the M15x would do ya just fine.

Finally, who's to say what problems might have to get ironed out with a mobile i7 implementation on the M17x. The DPC latency issue needs to get fixed first.

 

So r u telling they going to come out with better cpu and gpu option. Any idea when is this going to happen or is it just hear say right now. Should I wait to buy???

 

I guarantee that the day you buy your system is the day they upgrade to i7. Murphy's Law!

Other than that, I'm aware of no dates for release of upgrades. It's 100% speculation at this point. No doubt the M17x will get upgraded before my wife's cooking skills do.

 

Well.. u could wait for the option(might add new graphic cards too) but if u're still impatient u can do as mandrake said ..

 

LOL SagerMeister the cooking is that bad huh. Yeah I wish I can do what mandrake said, but don't have that kind of money, and my wife would kill me. This would have to last me 2-3yrs. mandrake I think I saw you on sager furom too, man your everywhere lol. Well I'm waiting for the latency issue to be solved than I would buy it.

 

Thanks for the info mate, im going to have a good look at this, i may even come to the U.S to get 1, its so much cheeper than the uk.

The uk setup im looking at is around £2800 = $4480 but if the doller goes up then im going on a holiday to the us lol.

Thanks for all your help lads