Is the G73jh-A2 good for medicore/casual gamers?

so I am about to get the g73jh-A2 laptop for 1500 US dollar and i picked it because of its awesome video card and processor for such a cheap price. I am a casual/medicore gamer at most and i usually spend around 3 hours in total on games a week as i mostly use my laptop for work and surfing the internet. so is the g73jh good for casual gamers like me?

i am really hesitating about buying it because i dont really think i NEED all those high tech just for gaming. i am a bit concerned about its weight and battery life as well since i will be carrying it around a lot. can someone also tell me about the general battery life if i just use it on word and facebook on minimum brightness?

thx

 

If your budget allows, I would purchase it. However, this isn't an office productivity laptop. It was specifically designed for gaming.

It's portable but I wouldn't want to be lugging it around on a daily basis. Battery life is not that great. I believe the norm is two hours with some tweaks but usually less. I knew this when I purchased it and it's not a concern of mine. There's actually a thread on extending battery life on this forum.

If you really want it then buy it. Your gaming session length tells me your not hardcore into gaming. So, a less power hungry 15" laptop would probably fit your needs much better.

To me, it's the best designed, reasonably priced laptop I've seen released since the Gateway P, FX series.

 

I don't understand why people correlate how much someone games with how good of a computer they need. There could be a hardcore SC1 gamer who can play even on the worst laptops, while there are people who play Crysis maybe a few hours a week.

So yeah, consider that and buy the appropriate laptop. Buy the G73 if you feel you need the juice and will use it, even if not frequently. Otherwise, look toward other alternatives.

 

For longevity, I would go with the G73, but as requested, battery life isnt the greatest on this. 2 hrs is the very Max you can expect with tweaks. As far as office work, if you work from your own personally laptop daily and bring it to and from work, I would suggest getting a smaller, lighter laptop like a UL-50 or 80 series with dual graphics or something. Those 2 laptops have decent graphics for gaming when you decide to do gaming, but when just lounging around, can give you up to 10hrs of battery life.

UL-50: http://1toppc.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=UL50Vt-A1
UL-80: http://1toppc.com/Merchant2/merchant.mv?Screen=PROD&Product_Code=UL80Vt-A1

Oh, and final thought, did I mention this will save you probably 500-700 dollars and seems to be more practical to what you listed?

 

There are much better and cheaper choices than the G73 for your needs.
Battery life is only 2-3 hours max.
This laptop is made for hardcore gamers in mind so it uses high performance hardware and uses a lot of juice and it's not exactly the most portable laptop around.
Do yourself a favor and find something that suits your needs better you will save some money and get much better battery life.

 

Please do not buy this laptop, you will hate your decision.

4 reasons: heat, size, screen quality, and battery life.

This laptop is too big for taking with you every day. It is not a bad laptop, but is not balanced in favor of productivity.

This laptop is hot. All G series laptops are hot. Their fans can be loud, and generally are not ideal work computers comfort wise.

This laptop has a subpar screen, and depending on what kind of work you do on it, you might HAVE to buy an external laptop. I am a hobbist photographer, and the G51j works for me. That said, if my job required colour corectness, or I regularly watched movies on my laptop with friends, this laptop would FAIL MISERABLY. I have read similar reviews of the G73.

Finally, this laptop has poor battery life which will frustrate you when doing menial tasks such as spreadsheets, word processing.

Investigate the N61 series laptops. They have better battery life, better screen, less heat, similar CPU, and a very capable graphics card. If you don't require the best of the best graphics, you will save money and have a better work station.

 

wow... who drug you out of the gutter and slammed you around with the G73... its obvious were not talking about the same G73...

It has the best cooling of all the G series laptops and you will not feel the heat of it unless you place your hands in the back up against one of the 2 vents to feel any of the heat...

The screen is amazing compared to the G51J... the G51J has probably the worst screen in all the ROG laptops ASUS has produced...

The size you can equate as this is intended as a "desktop replacement" for gamers who will have the advantage of taking there primary system with them to a buddies house for a LAN party or something... Battery life is not really an issue sense it is a "desktop replacement".

So not really sure what G73 you "saw", but I doubt its the same one that all of us here have and that 99% of those people would slam your post for defaming this laptop...

 

Wow......I'm sorry sir, but I really need to disagree with you for your saying the G73 is hot and loud. The one I have runs cool, quite, and is a real pleasure to do work on, apart from being awesome to game on. I used it the whole of this past week to do real estate appraisal reports (while I did a full system restore on my desktop), and I was pleasantly surprised at just how comfortable it was.

Now the G73JH is a large laptop, and like its been said is specifically geared towards gamers. As a result, the high end components draw a lot of juice, leaving one with not much battery time. This is not a problem if you are going to be using it on a desk and plugged in most of the time - and personally, I hardly see myself using it any other way.

But like I said, it is a large unit (my biggest problem to date was finding a large enough carrying case, which was not a backpack), and if you are not really much of a gaming enthusiast, but need to carry a laptop around with you much of the time, I would advise you get something smaller, that is more suited to your needs.

Other than that, the G73JH is a totally awesome monster of a laptop, doing what it was designed to do exceptionally well.

I wonder sir, do you actually own a G73JH?

 

Don't listen to this guy, he is WRONG on EVERYTHING. Incredible, haven't read a post where every single part is wrong in this thread yet until today.

I use this everyday at work. Fan noise is minimal. Heat, you can't even feel it. I do transport this work day. I walk a mile to the train, on the train, ride the subway about 10 minutes, 10 minute walk to work and back. And if your back can't handle 9 lbs of laptop and power pack, then yes, this is not the notebook for you.

And from reviews, the G73 has the BEST screen on any single GPU gaming laptop. Only a workhorse Dell laptop has a better screen as expected as it's meant for that type of work.

This guy has some odd vendetta to provide information that is so wrong on everything!

 

I am NOT A GAMER. Yes, I occasionally play a game here and there. However, I use my G73 as my work laptop for web design, photoshop, video editing, graphics, and general web surfing, email, to watch movies and to get things done.

Here are my comments:

1) It is NEVER HOT. It is slightly warm underneath and at the back vents.

2) The screen is BEAUTIFUL. Very nice and very well calibrated out of the box for color.

3) I like (not love) the keyboard. I have no problems with it. Just have to be a bit careful to remember to press down on the keys fully when typing.

4) I find it "slightly" heavy. But that is why I use a laptop backpack rather than a shoulder bag. Most laptops with a 17" or 18" screen are heavier.

5) I LOVE the real estate the screen provides for my work. I was going to go with an 18", but they are just too heavy. This one, being 8lbs is suitable. It is great to work on photoshop with.

6) It is blazing fast. Expect to spend $3500+ for a laptop with these specs and future-proofness for every day work with graphics, etc...

7) It just feels good. The layout of everything (ports, keyboard, touchpad, buttons, etc...) and the coating of the machine (non-glossy), are great.


I would not go with anything else on the market right now if you only have a $2000 max budget.

If you have an UNLIMITED budget and want a "for work" 17" laptop, check out the Lenovo W701.

GL

 

^^ Ditto^^ Good laptop but I wouldn't want to pack it much out of the house

 

Hell yeah. I was drooling over that when it was announced. If it used the 5800 FireGL instead, that would just be heavenly. Did you see the option to have an additional 10" screen that you can pull out on the right side of the screen?

What a beast workstation machine that is.

 

I have read some reviews before deciding to buy the g73jh, and one of the many reasons i liked it is because of its great cooling system and low noise. I personally dont care about weight since i already do carry a 10 pound (with my 5 pound laptop) bag for 3km walk (from work to home) everyday, so an extra 3-4 pound is not of my concern.

After reading all your helpful replies, now i am trying to find a good laptop with good battery life and can at least play bfbc2 (i have already traded 10 of my old psp games for that one). i found it really hard to find something like that. so any more suggestions of decent laptops that can play it are very welcome. but most of the laptop i found that has the right specs have even less battery life than g73jh.

 

All desktop replacement have "1-2" hours. I think g73 is great because it gives additional 30 minutes above average and fit in the MAX "2-3" hours range. There is only one "gaming" laptop that have up to 10 hours and thats Alienware M11X Netbook, 11".

 

I have been thinking of just having this as my main gaming notebook and having my m17x R1 as my entertainment machine lol, this is much more better for going to lan parties and for work especially, its quite no heat, and finally not flashy!! Plain and basic mostly and powerful. Hard to get used to the keyboard at times though.

 

I agree, but also disagree with a lot of what you said. Here is what I agree with:

1) The subpar screen is subjective. I think the A2 has the good 1080p screen, so you must be talking about the auo screen on the best buy g73 with 1600x900? That's the reason I had returned my g73. Viewing angles aren't that great on the screen I had, but some say they are better on the g73 with the LG screen.

2) Batterly life is actually good in comparison with other gaming laptops...but of course with a laptop like this you can't expect too much.

3) Heat isn't an issue IMO. One I had ran very cool..and more importantly it didn't get hot any where around the casing.

4) As far as it being loud, I strongly disagree with this. The laptop on the g73 is actually very quiet and even stays quiet when I gamed on it.

 

Looks like I really stirred the pot here, unintentionally so. I'm also glad others are here to balance my opinion.

I was not trying to defame the G73. I think it is a fantastic product. However, it may not be the best fit for a "casual gaming" laptop since it is quite a powerhouse, and comes with obvious drawbacks.

Noise wise, I think the laptop is quiet considering it's class, but other, more cost effective solutions exist for a casual gamer.
The screen on the G73 is in fact better than that on the G51J, but I do not believe it would be work quality if color correctness was nessicary at work. The laptop I saw WAS the best buy model, but I think my advice was a far cry from misinformation. I think at least a warning about the screen, in case he was buying sight unseen, would be reasonable.

I have read reports that the G73 is a hot laptop, like any gaming powerhouse laptop. No, it is not as hot as the G51, and the cooling system is quite impressive. But this man is asking for a balanced design and I think that the G73 is pretty hot for a casual gamer.

Ref: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=474721

Battery life is a consideration for work. There is not much more I can say on this point.

If he was asking for it to destroy all games on high, then I think the G73 is the best ASUS solution out there. But I think that for a casual gamer where GPU power is less important than functionality, a more balanced, cost effective solution exists.

I am just trying to help him make a decision which balanced finances, power, and portability. I'm sure these trade-offs are easy for some to make, but it is good to discuss the positive AND negatives when you are talking about something like the G73.

 

^^ makes more sense. For a " Casual gamer" then your post makes more sence .

 

You don't want to be carrying the g73 around a lot. Not unless you got a nice big backpack that will fit the monster the g73 is. The problem with the G73 is that it's not so low profile. It has a huge thick hump in the back. That is one small gripe I had with it. I knew I wasn't going to lug it around a lot, so it didn't bother me. Aside from that it's considerably light, but carrying around that bulky ac adapter doesn't help things one bit.

 

Yep, but remember that AC Adapter is a 150 Watt PSU.

 

Like i said, weight isn't much of a issue to me and i do have a nice big bag ready for the 17 inch laptop.
I am really having trouble finding something that has decent battery life AND can play the newest games (i've spent way too long on my crappy toshiba playing counter strike) if the 2 hour is the maximum i can get then i guess i might as well buy it and save myself the time looking for laptops.

 

Depending on your priorities, there are better options than the G73 for a balance of battery life and gaming capability.

Also, it's quite amusing that the OP refers to him/herself as a "mediocre gamer".

 

Horrible trolling aside, I think the N61-x2 might be a better choice for you. Yes, you take a bit hit in GPU performance, but it is a little bit lighter and easily gets more than double the battery life of the G73.

If you really need 4-5 hours of battery life you are going to want the N61. It has the same CPU, a decent GPU, two hard drive bays and good overall build quality and a design that is very "down to earth" and generic.

Get the Asus G73 if you want to play everything on High settings for the next few years and don't mind lugging around a huge beast of a machine that has a very "in your face" design.

 

really? n61 has over 4 hours of battery life? i couldn't find any reviews for it so i never really considered n61. btw what is the g73jh's battery life if i use it for internet with minimum brightness and power save (without manual downclock)? i'm not sure if downclocking it manually is safe and healthy for the computer though.

one of the many reasons i picked g73jh over the lighter 15 inch laptop is because i am sure its very future proof for future games. is the 5730 a good video card future proof wise?

 

There is a g73 thread going on where they got 2:30-2:40 by underclocking or undervolting the gpu and cpu. That's pretty good.

 

and what would be its battery life if i dont manual downclock?
with minimum brightness, power save and surfing the internet

 

From what I've seen reading these forums and the G73 threads, the battery life should be around 1.5-2 hours without underclocking. (Correct me if I'm wrong please).

 

I think it totally inappropriate for someone who does not, or has not owned a particular device to give the kind of write up/review as you did in your first post in this thread titled "Please do not buy this laptop, you will hate your decision" (post #6). It is obvious that everything you wrote was based only on what you had read and probably observed on a store model, and absolutely nothing was based on your personal use or experience with the device.

I do believe disseminating such uninformed information is not only misleading, but is also totally irresponsible.

The moral of the tale? At least spend some time using a device (and I don't mean "in store"), before you begin dishing out reviews on it.

Again, just my personal opinion!

 

Consider a 17" MSI GX740. Has i7+HD5870, lower 1680x1050 LCD, but is a lightweight at 7.1lbs with 9-cell. A G73J weights 8.5lbs with 8-cell. So could carry around another 1.1lbs 9-cell and still be lighter than a G73J, yet extend your battery life.

 

There's also the GX640, which is even lighter. Alternatively, if you drop down a tier in GPU performance, there's options that will get great battery life with switchable graphics.

 

I also think talking to owners of the G73 might be misleading while they are still in the honeymoon phase with their new computer.

It seems that others here agree with my assessment that the G73 would be overkill for many people's work computer needs.

This might be more up your alley if you don't mind the settings down a little.

http://www.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=Oj7bkcUi5KMCSylx

These things aren't easily upgraded, so future-proofing is almost a moot point. In three years time, both GPUS will have problems keeping up. I'm not sure spending an extra 30% on tech is a good investment if you are only buying yourself an extra 6 months.

During all that time, you could be enjoying a quieter, lighter, more energy efficient computer at work. The question is, do you plan on working more, or playing more?

If you plan on playing more, the G73 is a kickass machine. But it's silly to throw money at it if you will spend most of your time looking at spreadsheets.

...Wait for it, I can hear you raging...

 

I think switchable graphics would be something good to consider, as that is the best way to increase battery life.

Also note that the g73 will get a maximum of 2.5 hours right when you buy it with tweaks. In a year or two, you will likely have 1 - 1.5 hours.

In the long run you will need to replace the battery or run from outlet to outlet . Depends on how portable you want your laptop to be.

 

im getting it to play sc2 beta and then diablo 3 when it comes out, overkill? probably but the amount of time i spend (waste) playing games i think its worth it

 

If you play a lot, the G73 is the best offering in the G series, and you will see major benefits over something like the nvidia 335M.

Both games you mentioned, however, are designed to run on mainstream platforms, and could easily be played on the N62 or N82.

Where you will really see the improvement of the G73 over a multimedia computer would be games like Crysis, STALKER, Oblivion, Fallout, Metro 2033, BF2.

Typically, first person shooter style games are the most demanding, with the exception with a few strategy games.

 

I don't think overkill. You get a great 17.3" screen which shall make the usually pastel, vibrant colors of Blizzard games shine, and play it at 1080p with no framerate issues.

Good luck.

 

did i forget to mention? It isn't out yet.. pre-ordering.. if u want future proofing u have to sacrifice something.. at least it doesn't weigh 9lbs like the aluminium M15x 15 inch hulk.

 

I wonder how many ppl o nthe g73 waiting list will jump over to the msi if it comes out in the next few weeks!

 

I would like some proof of this extra battery life please.

The MSI is a 1 fan solution with HD5870 and Intel. There is a user with this machine and his FPS is half of mine for Prototype, I wonder if this is because the HD5870 is underclocked because of it's cooling?

 

Truly amazing how you can continue to offer such in depth advice on this product, when you don't own one, and never have.

Really boggles my mind!

 

He might not be in a position to comment on areas like ergonomics, but anyone can tell you what the performance will be like because all you need to see for that is various gaming benchmarks. You don't have to own a product to read reviews of it; otherwise it would be almost impossible for anyone to give good advice in the "What notebook should I buy?" subforum because people would only be able to give advice about the one notebook they own, and not be able to give a useful comparison to any other notebook.

 

For performance G73 hands down. Think we need to define what a "casual gamer" is and what a "casual gamer" plays for this thread to get anywhere.

If a "casual gamer" plays Crysis at max settings for a half hour every day...then he definitely shouldn't get anything less than a g73.

 

I'm just still reacting to his first post in this thread (#6), which was pretty much uninformed and misleading, especially with regards to heat and noise.

I guess its time for me to rest my case........

 

The GPU hits 95 - its a powerful GPU that gets hot. Why are you so resistant to the idea that not everyone is comfortable with that?

Therein lies the difference between a hardcore and casual gamer. Some people don't care if their game is 1080p.

 

After going through 2 gateways and now on my Third ASUS, I can tell you first hand you're going to have a hard time finding a laptop with good battery life that can play BFBC2. The nature of gaming laptops is that they're more of a desktop replacement (large/heavy in design). Sure you can squeeze a few more minutes out of the battery with tweaking, but its just not the nature of a gaming laptop to be battery efficient.

That said, I've owned only one laptop that runs cool and quiet while gaming BFBC2... and it sure as hell wasnt a gateway or g60 series. The G73 is the only laptop that I can play FPS games ON my lap and still keep my wrists, nuts and legs cool at the same time. It doesnt even break a sweat running BC2 on high settings @1600x900 (best buy version). But be warned, it is a tad heavy and cumbersome... Its sturdy just not as portable as other laptops... BUT it was designed that way for a reason - to perform as well as it does.

 

Stating false information doesn't help you, just dig yourself a bigger hole. What's your problem? Every post is spreading wrong information.

Even running Furmark Extreme Burn for 20 minutes, top temperature for GPU was 87 which is the SAME as a Clevo. Highest for Vantage run as 78. 78 = 95 in your world of vendetta apparently.

Oh BTW, I OWN THE G73JH, was one of the first. I've personally run almost every benchmark on this machine, MYSELF/PERSONALLY. You have not. You do not own it. You are just spreading your own speculation which are completely wrong. But more, I believe you just have some weird vendetta against Asus.

Just stop now, don't post anymore.

 

I've seen posts in these forums of people getting 95-100C running Furmark on the G73. However, what's more important here is the fact that Furmark is quite far from a typical gaming scenario.

There's pretty much nothing wrong with the G73JH as a gaming machine, but since the OP mentioned weight and battery life as factors there may be better options.

 

Nope not one post. Nada, zero. No one has reached 95 on Furmark yet.

We have Memory Controllers reaching those temps but that is NORMAL. Even on desktop HD5870s, the memory controllers are running around 102-105C. Furmark only posts the highest temperature, which is stupid because it's neither the memory or the core. It's a pretty stupid temperature gauge, actually idiotic. That's why people who use it run HWinfo32 or AMD GPU clock tool to measure the temps.

The temps on the G73 for normal use are the SAME if you use a Clevo or MSI. If you are just gaming and using the G73 as it's meant to be used, you won't notice any problems, keyboard cool, the bottom will be room temperature etc. Temperature is a completely mute issue with the G73 as long as the OP doesn't abuse it as some idiotic benchmarking toy. His memory controller temps should be around mid 80s which is about 25C before he needs to start worrying.

So again, wrong wrong wrong wrong, and wrong.

 

I never said there was anything wrong with those temperatures, but thanks for the information. I guess this means my MSI GX640 runs cooler than I thought it did - I had assumed that the GPU Temperature in GPU-Z/GPU Thermal Diode in HWiNFO32 was the important temperature to look at, but the Shader temp is significantly cooler.

 

The temps to look at the core temps. But from what I saw, the GX740 and the G73 temps are fairly similar, G73 running about 4C cooler.

Don't know about your GX640 as both your CPU and GPU are very different. That will affect how effective your single fan system significantly compared to GX740.

 

By core you mean TSS 2 in the GPU Clock Tool or what is labelled as "GPU Shader" in HWiNFO32, yes? That's great news. I'll have to go post it to the MSI subforums, as some people have been worrying about temps over there. Assuming what you say is true, you've just single-handedly dropped my core temps by almost 10 degrees - no mean feat.

Incidentally, while the CPUs are quite different, the HD 5850 is actually very similar to the HD 5870 - the only difference is 625MHz vs 700MHz core clock.

Your explanation does make sense, since the "fourth sensor" seemed to just follow the MemIO value very closely. I assumed that they were different because the values weren't *exactly* the same 100% of the time, but the fact that they differ by at most 1 degree probably means the discrepancy is only caused by the values being measured at slightly different times. It does make sense that the Shader temp would be the one that actually corresponds to the GPU proper, and it explains why at 100C all that happened was a faster fan speed rather than a shutdown or throttling.