A successor to the G73??

I'm interested in the G73, but how long will it be able to play PC games coming out in the near future? Will it be able to play Crysis 2 at acceptable frame rate?

I really don't need one until maybe late this year. I had my last one stolen by a thief. If the consensus is that it won't be obsolete by late 2010, I might just pull the trigger on this one.

 

There's always going to be newer and faster laptops every year. For the money, the G73 is the best you can get for now. It can probably play crysis on high settings but not maxed out.

 

with that logic, you will NEVER be able to settle for anything to buy

 

My Plan:

I was looking at waiting for a laptop with Crossfire HD5870. I went with the G73 from Best Buy. I think I be happy with it until mobile GPUs from the 28nm process appear. 1] That will be 2nd or 3rd gen DX11 tech. 2] That will permit more choices between ATI and Nvidia. 3] PC games are too tied to what the old consoles can do, so real jumps in performance aren't needed until the next-gen consoles appear. I figure 18-24 months of decent playtime can come from the G73 and then around that time all the above starts to converge.

Then I'll go dual GPU.

 

My guess is there will be a refresh before years end, last year asus had the G51VX around may/june, to release the G60VX with window 7 on october, then release the G60JX around march, so 3 models in less than a year, almost the same with 17'', G71 was released around the same june09, with a G72 refresh around october with win7 release, and now in march the G73.

Now i dont see much things changing shorterm though, sandybridge probably wont be released on 2010, and Nvidia FERMI wont make it laptops anytime soon with the huge power consumption and high temps, and i dont see much reason for ATI to push a refresh while its on top. My guess is we might see a refresh probably USB3/SATA3/eSATA/etc just cause it didnt make it in time for the G73 release, and probably a more worth it upgrade when Intel releases Sandybridge or nvidia releases a gpu that can compete with ati line on the mobile side.

 

There is no future proofing when it comes to laptops, saying that the G73 will be able to game for a while.
I'd be more interested in a 15" G73, same specs but smaller size.
The current 15" G series is starting to show it age, hardware wise it's decent but a upgrade in the chassis would be a welcome site.

 

The one I previously owned was the G51 New Egg version with the dual core and 260GTX and loved it. The best laptop I've owned, I had no regrets. I took a quick peek at the Best But's version of the G73 and thought it was awesome. Not a bad price, but I think I'll opt for the non-BB version to get the better screen resolution and free mouse and laptop sack..

 

oh brother

 

oh and did i forget.. the better warranty lol

 

Ha..ya and the utility discs

 

I wouldn't worry about games. More and more games are made with engines that are cross platform, DX9 and DX10 primarily. And I haven't played any games with true DX11 features yet, so I'm not worried.

G73 I think should be fine with Crysis 2.

Overall I'd say 2 years for the G73 for high quality settings in games, then you'll have to start dropping the settings. Even if that...

Remember current consoles will stick around for another 3-4 years at minimum. Game developers rather keep making games for console than always spending more to keep up with PC hardware and that's what we've been seeing already.

Even games like BC2 that claim not to be console port, are most definitely console ports.

 

All the refreshes showed up because of new processors and gpu. No announcement for new gpu and new i7 that come out are expensive as balls.

I think the Asus is a safe buy. But of course if you always need the fastest and the most powerful you are going to want to get in on desktop building. Its the only way to keep up.