A8J, W3J or W7J

Well, I'm trying to decide which laptop to get, and I think it is narrowed down to these 3. Am I right in assuming that the only difference between an A8Jm and a A8Ja is the video card?
Other than that, are there any obvious pros/cons to each of these? The reason I ask is becasue I currently have an Acer 5672, which is an awesome laptop for the money, but it has some really annoying ergonomics like the vga out port is on the right side instead of the rear and the audio ports are on the front. This makes it hard to use it for its main function which is mostly presentations hooked up to multimedia systems. I made the mistake of buying the Acer online without actually playing with one, and I don't want to make another mistake!
So what I am looking for is video out, audio and at least some usb ports on the rear. I'd also like either a CF reader or a PC card slot since my camera uses CF cards. It doesn't seem like any of the newer laptops support CF.
I'd really like DVI also, but it isn't crucial. I like the portability of the 13in laptop, but I don't think I can spend that much. Can any of you who have these models shed some light on which one would best suit me?

 

There is DVI on the A8Jm.
The 13.3" W7J is actually the cheapest of the 3 laptops you have given.
Yes, the only dif is the video card.
Most laptops now have audio on the front or side.....

 

well you dont have to worry about the A8ja/A8jm because the US only has the A8jm.
the W3J is the most expensive, with the W7j being the cheapest (not by much. Geared2play has the lowest w7j price so far at $1449 while Milestonepc has the A8jm for $1499).

the W3j doesn't have much going on in its rear due to the battery pack. but the A8jm has 5 usb ports spread out nicely. It's also the only one of the 3 to have a DVI port too. The ethernet/phoneline is also in the back, rather than in the left-middle side on the W3j.

 

My Acer has an ATI X1400, and obviously the X1600 would be faster, but how does the 7400 and 7600 fit in? It will be used for mostly multimedia stuff, but I also edit and playback some HD video files. The X1400 is fine, but I have heard some people say that the Ati cards are better for HD and multimedia stuff. Has anyone with a 7400 or 7600 tried playing back a HD file? It looks like it is narrowing down to a A8Jm or the W7J.

 

The x1400 is similiar to the 7400, as is the x1600 to the 7600

 

The Go7600 in the A8Jm is the best gfx card in a sub 17" laptop because it has 512MB dedicated vram. It is a better gfx card than the one on the W3J. The W7J only makes sense if you think you cant handle the 6.5 lb traveling wight (inc the AC adapter) of the A8Jm and are willing to sacrifice a lot of graphical performance for it.

 

the only real negative for the a8jm is if you desperately need bluetooth..which it doesnt come with...however the w3j does allow for swapping out of the dvd-rw for either a 2nd battery or even an extra hdd

 

Hmm, let's see...

A8Ja/m

Rear VGA/DVI/S-Video ports? Check.
Rear USB ports? Check.
Rear line-out/SPDIF? No, it's on the left side of the chassis, in front of the optical drive.
CF slot? No, the card reader supports SD/MMC/MS/MS Pro.
PC Card slot? No, it has the newer ExpressCard slot instead.

The good news is, a CF adaptor for ExpressCard has been released. This page lists some of the adaptors available.

All up, I'd say the A8J is the most powerful and flexible machine for your needs.

 

The x1600 outperforms the 7600 in most benchmarks and games even with less memory

 

Which weighs less? the A8JM or the W3J? (i know the W7J does... for sure, at 4.1Lbs... but between those 2 i mentioned, which is lighter? thinner? worse to carry?)

 

They are very close cards in terms of speed. The X1600 does seem to do better in benchmarks such as 3dmark05. But, either of them are great, top of the line cards for a 14" notebook.

As for what one you should get, it really depends on what your going to be using it for...

If your gaming a lot, the W3j and A8jm are great options. The W7j is fine for light gaming, and is a good notebook if your going to be traveling a lot. The W3j, (with the extra 6 cell battery) has the best battery life by a long shot, so if you need lots of battery life, it's the way to go.

@ reicanden, I think they are both 5.4lbs. But with the W3j, you can put in the travelers drawer, and then it weighs only 5lbs.

 

Incorrect here. The 7600 gets 3dMark06 about 2350 with stock drivers and up to 2630 Overclocked. The x1600 only gets 2250 stock and less than 2500 overclocked.

 

I have seen these numbers Darrick but I have also seen numbers that suggest otherwise. What we need is someone to play the same intensive game on both and give there review. Real world experience is what counts and people get way too involved in these numbers when in actuality.....you will not 'see' the difference

 

how heavy is the w3j with the second battery in the modular bay....

listening to your situation i would go with the w7j...it doesnt seem like you need a laptop for intensive gaming and you will be lugging the laptop a lot for presentations...you'll probably want to stuff other things in your bag along with your laptop so going with the lightest one seems logical

 

Deus, I understand that its real world experience, and really there shouldn't be much difference. But the post I replied to was talking about how the x1600 outperforms Go7600 in benchmarks and games, and I was just making a counterpoint based on his arguments.

 

Actually, gaming is not the big test for me, it is multimedia performance. The Avivo stuff that the X1000 series cards have is excellent. It even includes the software to convert formats. I'm just wondering if the Nvidia cards play back HD video smoothly, etc. I think will take an HD file on a disc to Best Buy and see how it plays in one of the Sony sz laptops which I think only have 7300 or 7400 cards. I'll report back after!
The layout of the A8Jm looks just about perfect but the portability of the W7J is tempting.

 

bluetooth really shouldn't be the issue in looking for the right laptop. you can get a bluetooth usb adapter for like $20... hehehe

 

Most of the recent nVidia GPUs employ an equivalent technology called PureVideo. A little judicious googling will find many articles comparing the two technologies.

You'll want at least the 7600 if you go for an nVidia GPU, the 7300/7400 lacks spatio-temporal deinterlacing.

 

Well, I have done some reading and the ati cards are definately the pick of the video/multimedia people if for no other reason than avivo can also do hardware encoding. So what I really want is what I can't get here in the US- a A8Ja. Sucks. It's always like that.
But heres another question. Have anyone moved from a 15.4 to a 14in screen? I looked at the difference in size/weight between my Acer 5672 and the A8Jm and I'm wondering if there is any real reason to go to a 14in. There doesn't seem to be much difference until you move to the 13.3. The 13.3 is getting in the size range where you just pick it up like a book and take it with you. But the 15.4 and 14 are still big enough that you need to put them in bag, etc.

 

I guess it depends on which 15" you're talking about. The S96J seems pretty bulky to me based on the size and weight specs. But something like the V6J or Macbook Pro seem like they would be nearly as portable as many 14" models, given the thin and light design.

As for the hardware encoding with ATI cards.... yeah, I have an older desktop ATI All-In-Wonder and it does hardware encoding quite well. However, it seems like this would only be useful if you were capturing video with the laptop. If you were just rendering video that you had edited, then the CPU would handle encoding duties at that point.

 

Loopdot has a point. Unless you require realtime encoding, then I wouldn't worry overly much about nVidia's lack of hardware encoding. Your shiny new dual core CPU will make short work of most encoding tasks.

 

Well... The X1600 gets higher in 3dmark05.

 

Haha.. we've been over this over and over again Jason

It's 06 that matters

 

the real game play is what counts and the 7600go looks bit smoother with everything cranked up on bf2 compared to x1600 side by side. I am really impressed with REAL WORLD game playing of 7600go, you can`t go wrong with either card however the nvidia shines through side by side in my opinion.

 

If you're wondering why the 7600 gets the win in 3DMark06 while the X1600 wins in 3DMark05, it's really quite simple. ATI hasn't gotten around to "optimising" (i.e. cheating) their drivers for 3DMark06 yet. nVidia is always on the cutting edge when it comes to benchmark tweaking...

No, I wasn't being all that serious... although both manufacturers have been caught out doing this. Bottom line is they're both awesome cards.

 

agreed, also seems the 7600go in the A8JM is alot more powerfull in game play and benchmark then the 256mb versions in hp, etc... Alot of people were saying the 512mb was overkill but it actually makes the card perform alot better.

 

What about the W7J with 9 cell battery? I think it would rival the W3J with modular battery. Perhaps that W3J would outlast it by 20 min or so.

You have to figure the W3J's graphics card and larger screen suck more battery life.

I'm personally torn between the W7J (for portability) or IBM Z61t with WXGA+ screen (for the higher resolution). Dimensions-wise it doesn't look like the W7J is too much smaller, but I'm worried that it's one of those differences that's more apparent in person than on paper. Any ideas, guys?

 

I think I'm going with the A8Jm. It has everything I need in terms of ports and ergonomics and is only slightly bigger than the W7J. Plus it has 2-3 times the video power (3D Mark 06 of 2300 vs. 800). I really want the ati version but the only way I can get that is by getting a W3J which is out of my comfort zone price-wise. I needed a way to get data from a CF card and found this-
http://item.express.ebay.com/Camera...0CamerasQ20Q26Q20AccessoriesQQcmdZExpressItem
Now I need to find the best deal on it. Any recommendations?

 

Did you check the page I linked to in my first reply? It lists some internal CF card readers for the A8Jm's expresscard slot.

http://www.expresscard.org/web/do/pub/product/list?parentId=4

 

Im just curious though. I have seen the Catylst control panel, like where people are able to overclock/underclock their graphics card.

I'd just like to ask, is this possible for the Go7400?

 

Apparently, an express card 34 slot is actually smaller than a CF card, so it doesn't appear that there will be CF adapters for it unless they stick way out and are bigger on one end. Plus, some of the guys who use SLR type digital cameras said that the CF readers that are either built in or use the old PC card slot are considerably slower than a usb 2 or firewire adapter. I haven't researched it enough to separate fact from fiction at this point, but the usb readers seem like a good cheap solution.

 

Ah, my mistake... I thought that the A8Jm had the larger slot (54mm). While I agree that a PCMCIA solution may be slower than an external USB/Firewire, I doubt this would apply to ExpressCard; it has a rated bandwidth of 500MB/s...