So long G73JH...Hello Alienware m18x :)

After about a year of owning my G73JH, Im about to go through with ordering me a m18x with the following specs;

Nebula Red Anodized Aluminum
Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium, 64bit
Intel® Core™ i7 2630QM 2.0GHz (2.8GHz w/Turbo Boost, 6MB Cache)
4GB Dual Channel DDR3 at 1333MHz (2DIMMS)
18.4-inch WideFHD 1920 x 1080 WLED
Dual 2GB GDDR5 AMD Radeon™ HD 6970M - AMD CrossFireX™
320GB 7200RPM SATA 3Gb/s
Slot-Load Dual Layer DVD Burner (DVD+-RW, CD-RW)
Internal High-Definition 5.1 Surround Sound Audio
Intel® Advanced-N 6200 a/g/n 2x2 MIMO Technology and Bluetooth 3.0
McAfee® Security Center – 30-Day Trial edit
HDMI INPUT
1 Year Basic Plan edit


It sells at roughly $2550 on Dell/Alienware's website, but I can snag one for $2039 BRAND NEW. Oh yeah!

I got my g73jh for $860 about a year ago and I thought that was an awesome deal until this trumped it in every possible way. Worst case scenario, I will only be able to sell my G73jh for $500. Optimistically, because im in a big city, I can get lucky enough to sell it for at least $700. Regardles, im sure someone will bite, making this ridiculously awesome upgrade run me at about $1300-1500. Of course I will start the sale price at $850 and see if I get lucky.

I know the specs above are lacking in the HDD capacity department as well as the almost mandatory BluRay drive, but Im already looking into purchasing an SSD and I have a ps3 and rarely watch blu ray movies so i can skip out on that no problem. Also I mostly just game so I can live with 4gb of RAM for a while longer.

I'm just looking into some more things, but im pretty sure I will be finalizing this order tonight.

 

Im sure that most of the people on this forum would like this laptop It is currently the best gaming setup on the market and if you dropped a 2920XM and SSD in it then it would destroy all.

But it comes down to Price because that is a huge cost and you will want a warranty with this especially as the recent information regarding 6970M's failing and with 2 of the beasts in there that is going to burn God bless your Electricity bill

Do you really need that much power? I find my JH produces 30-40fps at Ultra in most games at the moment the 920XM has stabalised my frames making my setup only $850. I just think it would be better to maintain what you have because in a years time the M18x should be a much more reasonable price.

 

If i knew I wasn't getting some money back from selling the g73jh I wouldnt even consider buying it. Even then, it only caught my attention today when I found out I can get this awesome deal and shave off over $500 which I can easily use to purchase an SSD as well as increase the warranty period from 1 year to 2 years, maybe even 3 for about $100.

With the amount of gaming I plan on doing, if the 6970ms will ever burn out, it will happene within my warranty period no doubt. If EVER.

 

I like it I think it looks the dogs and will produce 22000+ 3Dmark06 points which is on par with Desktop setups. But you will need a tractor to carry it around with you as your looking at 6Kg with it packed with hardware and you might as well sell the battery

 

Thankfully the deal isn't going anywhere anytime soon. Gives me time to research a bit more into it and stuff. Im curious as how it can handle Crysis 2 at dx11 + ultra settings. Ive seen footage of it maxing crysis, but not crysis 2 after the recent updates.

 

I'm personally going the desktop route after I'm done with my G73. I already put two grand aside for my future beast desktop, hehe.

 

$2k on a PC? Yeah thats absolutely going to destroy.

I would have gone the desktop route but I absolutely need the portability. Had I not, I probably could build a m18x desktop equivalent for a little over half the price...

 

same, won't toss the g73 but I'll pair it up with a desktop, with something like 1000 euros you can play safe for a couple of year

 

Yeah I need portability right now for school and that I just don't have any room for a desktop. The case I want is ridiculously massive, I have no room for it at all. When I move into a new apartment that'll change, that's still a ways off though. I'm content with the G73 though, I'd jump on that Alienware too if I didn't have this baby. Crossfire 6970M's will molest any game I would think, I think the 6970M is the same as a 6850 desktop card which is pretty decent. 2 of them will have no problems at 1080p.

 

gah...

just told a couple of friends about this and they're recommending I hold off...The CPU wouldnt have been upgradable to a 2920xm because extreme edition chips require a dual pipe heatsink which are only included if you order the laptop with it...and the price for the 2920xm upgrade compared to the stock 2630qm is over $600...

I was told I should wait for a RGB 1080p screen to be available as opposed to the WLED screen. They also mentioned the bad batch of 6970's but I was really not too worried about this especially because of a ridiculously cheap extended warranty. Apparently, there will be an inevitable m18x - r1/2/3 with better upgrade options in the near future. More importantly, SLI 580m's are available for the m18x on the main site but the retailer im buying from doesn't have it as an option...

Worst of all, I was expecting some sort of miraculous increase in gaming performance but while it can max games like Crysis to be steady at 60fps, it still has trouble with more recent games..namely the witcher 2 and crysis 2. I was expecting it to absolutely destroy the witcher 2 playing it at ultra with Ubersampling on and all that, but apparently it still has trouble running it completely maxed. Also crysis 2 with dx11+hi res updates average at about 30-35fps with dips as low as 20s.

ugh...if I was going to spend $2k i want it to completely dominate...seems only like a 30-35% overall performance increase from my current rig...

 

You wouldn't need a 2920XM that would just be overkill.

A single powerful card will always be better price vs power than a duel mobile setup because you dont get a 100% increase in performance by having two cards but still have to pay and rely on two cards not failing with increased heat.

Drivers will restrict performance until the cards have been out long enough to be updated fully and no mobile setup can max Witcher 2 with Ubersampling to 60+ FPS because ubersampling requires multi GPU desktop setups. You also are relying on games being updated.

Exactly no point in spending all that money when your current setup just like mine will do the job. Once you are over 30+ FPS anything else is just extra its not worth a $1000+. If you want a performance boost pick up an SSD or do what I did and get a 920XM

 

You're right.

I was just informed about this deal so I got a bit excited. The deal isn't going anywhere so I could pretty much sit on it for as long as I have to...If i get a store coupon/discount promo code for 10-15%+ off id probably jump on it..but right now I just became extremely hesitant.

I would love a 920xm upgrade, especially after seeing your benches its really tempting, but tbqh i was looking forward towards a functioning 6970m. Hopes have been shattered after what seems like another failed attempt by tijo.

 

Several people paid $2k for their g73 units, when they came out. It's not actually that crazy.

 

Nice laptop man! I am waiting for the m18x r2 with RGB screen with 580 sli or 6990 crossfire.

 

Let's get real here. An m18x is a real big desktop replacement. I'm pretty sure that a 2600k + 6990 + 8gb g.skill Snipes 1866 ddr3 + 128gb SSD (OS) and 320gb 15,000 RPM + Z68 mobo + 23" IPS display and 750 Corsair + NZXT case (bargain priced) will not only trump that but can be had for about $1200 - $1300. Dude if you're going to spend that much why not just build a desktop that is at a fraction of the cost but will out perform such a behemoth of a laptop?

 

Also don't forget that games need to be tweaked. I just finished tweaking Alice Madness Returns and the game had some overkill Physx settings, plus other ones as well. And wth 31fps cap?!

The game also requires ThrottleStop on the G73SW. (This throttle issue is annoying since it was causing the video drivers to keep resetting) After applying my OC's were again stable, and managed a decent 60 fps running around in the beginning. Also fixed the stuttering with some cache settings. I love how the default settings assume you have a 1GB system. Combined the game with D3DOverrider for Triple Buffering with VSync. Smooth gameplay ftw.

 

Are you talking about cxf or sli profiles? Yes they are a pain because some games don't take advantage or require manual adjustment or crash when trying to scale for these formats. IMO, if you are going to spend more than 1200, you might as well build a new gaming desktop, they are cheaper and superior in everyway and just get a 6990 gpu with dual on board gpus and 4 gigs of gddr5. A desktop Sandy is just the smartest cpus around energy consuming wise.

 

No Alice is a pain on ATI and has so much Physx in game you have to make adjustments to the game settings through the config.ini because there is no option in game.

We all know that Desktop's run better and have heard it a million times hence why the desktop fan boys were booted from the forum a while back to keep it a nice tidy notebook only zone

We have no care for price or for power and we are all about portability and luxury and the ability to get as much out of a mobile setup as we can. The fact that you can game from a laptop the size of a book is pretty special. Personally I would never go back to desktops because notebooks are just....too cool.

 

+351 rep

 

perfect assessment.

 

+1,0000 rep! Not everyone have the space for a desktop....

 

If your are already spending roughly 2.4k in this beast, why do not spent 300-400 more and get 580M in SLI. Way more powerful, and overall, better driver support.

For me, the best JH replacement should be the 17x (better portability than 18x) with 580M.

 

Best part of a gaming laptop? Gaming and browsing in bed...I can't be the only one.

 

Nice Alienware, but how about your HDD it's pretty small space there or you would end up adding more space?

Few years ago I wanted an SLI cards or Xfire, but after reading reviews and some threads I end up liking a single GPU on a laptop or desktop. Dual cards is a little bit hassle.

 

@Nekki : Actually, for the set up i posted I would be paying a little under $2040 tax free + free shipping.

But ive completely decided to hold off especially with the 6990m's arriving really soon which will no doubt support the m18x. I want to see 6990m xfire and 580m sli benchies then i'll get whichever wins...assuming theyre both going the be the same price...

...but i have a feeling the 6990m's will not only be cheaper, but also outperform the 580m...i dunno only time will tell.

Also, my next laptop definitely needs to have dual-gpu's for even more future-proofing. So it boils down to a m18x or a m17x-r2, but I can only get the m18x discounted and not the other.

@yupitchie : if I went through with getting the laptop, i would have spent the saved cash towards an ssd for sure and maybe some other gadgets.

 

so true my laptop was made for my bed and it sits nicely on top of my SF-19 Storm.

I still remember the days of my old Acer One which I used to leave actually on my bed with no fan extraction at all and it used to burn hot. I was too young to know about cooling at that point and used to get very annoyed when it would randomly switch itself off at TJ max. I just turned it back on again and carried on as normal

I was quite lucky to make it to adulthood.

 

^^LOL, indeed, I too am a laptop bed user, I actually have a small stand for it that sits beside the bed, works perfect though. Wasn't meant to be a laptop stand, but it sure works good as one. :>

I had an Aspire One netbook(first gen) for a little while, didnt like how hot it ran, I could barely keep that thing in my lap, it would literally make my whole body start to sweat from how hot it felt on my leg/legs. Eventually I just gave up and sold it, since technically it was operating in normal temps, the casing just did not do a good job at insulating the heat away from the bottom.

But yeah, I am a laptop lover too, used to have desktop/laptop combo, but now its laptop/laptop. I don't miss having a desktop around 1 bit, electric bill is down, my room stays cooler and just like the portability. So have fun with the mx18 j00zl33, even if you decided to wait, which is a good decision IMO with all these post about the 6970m being cancelled from retailers.

 

Yo I found this article NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580M GPU Launches with the Alienware M18X - Gear News at IGN
It says that 580M SLI have a 100fps

I love my desktop, but yeah, desktop is hot inside a room (if no air conditioner) specially when playing games.

 

To go from my 50fps to 100fps for about $1000 I just dont see the reasoning in that tbh.

They really should compare those cards to something respectable like Witcher 2 not a game that was created in a basement in Kentucky by a bloke called Jim.

 

He will spend his $2000 with ATI GPU (no problem), I'm saying that Nvidia released their dual GPU on Alienware so he can compare both, not with our G73.
Some users said that even with Xfire or SLI you can't play TW2 on very high fps.

Edit: This + $1000 is @__@

 

$2450,00 to be exact, or €1690,00. Thats how much I payed in april 2010 for my g73
And its worth every penny!!

 

The seller im buying it from doesn't offer the 580m SLI. The only place online (that i know of) that can customize it with 580m SLI is dell/alienware's official site for $1200....not worth it at all. This would bring the laptop to over $3000 easily.

If my seller would have the 580m option available it would most likely be cheaper than $1200 but unfortunately they dont. Thats why right now im hoping they would just release the 6990m already and wait for my seller to have it available since like i mentioned im sure it will be cheaper than the 580m SLI.

I really want to see how well 6990m xfire will be able to handle Crysis 2 Ultra on dx11...

 

Hmmm... When I looked it was 1999!

Alienware M18x Gaming Laptop Details | Dell

Enjoy it, awesome machine!

 

Yea, its $1999 WITH A SINGLE 1.5GB GDDR5 NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 460M. The starting price they list is always the uncustomized/weakest specs.

Through a different retailer, I can get it with dual 6970m's for just another $40.

 

I stand corrected Sir!

Again: Awesome, just awesome...

 

Man, if I already had a JH and an extra 2k in cash to spare for another laptop, I'd spend it on a tasty Gibson Les Paul I saw lying around Ebay the other day, but I digress. =)

 

I bought mine for $2k CDN around the same time. Very happy with mine, and if it lasts another 2-3 years then it'll be money well spent.

 

Yup. In the end, that's all it really boils down to. So long as you're happy with your purchase, and granted the product lasts you a good amount of years, its well worth it.

 

I'd definitely wait for the 6990M's in Crossfire. I plan to upgrade my 6970M's once the 6990M's are available.

 

Which retailer? Or are you not allowed to say due to forum policy? Hopefully you're not just hogging the deal for yourself

Also in your OP you say that you thought the JH was a good deal for like $870 *until* you saw the M18x. Surely the fact that it costs $1200 more with not much noticeable performance increase in-game would indicate just how fantastic a deal the JH was? And it's not dead yet, wait until they drop in price. Or just wait until your JH is having to play things on low...

You must have all of the money! Care to share?

 

Saving the deal for myself? No lol. Im buying it from AAFES. Military only...or spouse. or friend.
It's pretty widely known in the NBR alienware forums that AAFES has unbeatable alienware prices. Theres even a humungous thread about it ; http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m17x/559738-aafes-r3-base-config-1-124-25-a.html

I customized it on their website and my jaw dropped when I saw how much of a discount I was going to get so I got over excited and decided I was going to buy it out of a whim. At first I thought that the 6970m was already a major improvement from the 5870m so crossfire 6970m sounded like a really good performance boost...but it wasn't really. Luckily (like i already mentioned) some people persuaded me to hold off, including ValkerieFire (due to his thread that you linked.)

As for being a good deal, I only really saved a few hundred (comparing to stock price) from nabbing a g73 for $860 @ newegg late last year. The reason why I said the alienware deal is better is coz I was saving about $500 for a brand new rig and not a refurb.

 

Ahh I see, so you were going by money saved rather than for price vs performance. I think the G73 probably wins in that category against anything else, unless I'm missing something. Alienware are fairly expensive for what you get, are they not?

 

True alienware laptops are a bit pricey but what other choice do I have if I want the absolute best performance on a portable rig? I was kinda hoping that the g74 was going to feature a better GPU that it comes with...or that it was going to be upgradable. But a big hell no for both..So Im skipping out on Asus this time around.

I also looked into Sager/Clevo and from what I hear they have SLI CFX in the X7200 and X8100. The X8100 is hard to come by and it doesn't support 6970m's natively. You'd have to mod it. The X7200 will be far more expensive than the M18x because it uses desktop cpu's. The funny thing is though. The SB laptop chips match or outperform all the first generation i7 desktop chips used in the x7200 (except the i7 980x), so the better deal is the M18x unless you can find the x7200 amazingly cheap somewhere.

When the 6990m's are available, ill wait for 6990m crossfire benchies and if its one hell of an improvement, definite buy.

 

lol...after I bought my M17x R2 and it had it's share of issues Dell/AW upgraded me to the specs in my sig.

It is a huge improvement more like 40% at minimum.

 

What's the desktop equiv of crossfire 6970m's? And while I'm asking 6990m's too.

 

6850 for the 6970m I believe. No idea about the 990 though. Try notebookcheck's GPU section.

 

I guess the 6990m is the apology for the 6970m failures?

 

I have owned the R3 & M18x both with the 6970M. Its good that you keep that type of talk here in the Asus forums where you are not prevy to that level of tech. The only issue I have ever seen with the 6970M was that I had received one with bad pins for the crossfire bridge. I called AW around 1:15PM, the next day my brand new replacement 6970M & Crossfire cable were delivered by Fedex at 3:00PM. Other than that the 6970M's in Crossfire have and countinue to exceed.

No doubt I'll upgrade to the 6990 CF or 580M SLI.

 

I still get my 60 fps in my games, and I don't need to run a hairdryer out the back of my lappy.

 

The 6970m is equivalent to an underclocked desktop 6850.

40% increase? Possibly. Right now on my g73jh-rbbx05 alone im averaging 22fps on ultra + dx11 (no i dont normally play in these settings) on Crysis 2. And according to Review Alienware M18x Notebook - Notebookcheck.net Reviews an m18x with crossfire 6970m's AND a 2920XM averages at 43 FPS on Extreme. And reports online say that m18x on Ultra + dx11 settings barely runs Crysis 2 at a constant 30fps.

What Im saying is, if Im going to splurge on a laptop over 2x the amount I paid for my g73jh, it damn well better be more than just a 40% increase. Going from 22 fps to roughly 30fps (which isn't even a 40% increase btw) on a game I plan on playing a lot doesnt justify me spending $2000+.

If the eventual 6990m crossfire benchies dont cut it, I might possibly go the desktop route...