Turion X2 Barebones?

I was wondering if there's going to be a nice Turion X2 barebones kit. Sure, Core 2 may be superior, but I'm a long time supporter of AMD, and while I've been looking at some Core Duo kits, I'd still like to look at some AMD notebooks. I'd also like to support AMD, as ATM they don't integrate TPM into their processors.

What I'd like (preferably) is a 14" widescreen, 15" would be the max, but it's have to be at least WXGA+. A dedicated video card is a must, but it doesn't have to be powerful. A GF 7300 would be perfect. But what I'm looking for the most is build quality. The closest to what I want seems to be the Z92T, but it looks awful. Battery life is important too, i was planning on the A8Js until i found out there were no higher capacity batteries for it.

In short, an AMD version of the S/Z62j is exactly what I'm looking for.

Anyways, are there any notebooks that come close to this, or are there any upcoming notebooks. I'd appreciate links to any Turion X2 notebooks at all as well.

Thank you,

zach

 

I don't know of any current Asus AMD models - one of the vendors may correct me there.

MSI has several, but I don't have any personal experience with the quality there. I passed them over in my buying search mainly because of looks and battery life issues - <5 hours on the 8-cell extended battery, even on the Pentium M model. Unacceptable for a 12" laptop.

 

Well, Asus and AMD have always had a rocky relationship.... that'll happen when you sleep with their arch enemy.... But, there are two X2 barebones and frankly I'd tell you that they're not really impressive. There's no development money in AMD systems, so Asus uses old P4 designed chassis' to build out their AMD barebones. The newest models are the Z92T and Z92M... the Z92T being the better of the two with a 256mb Nvidia 7600. We don't have any of those in yet, but If you need help getting one, you could drop me a line. The Z92 is built on the A6 chassis and it's like the retarded cousin everyone's embarrassed by. I know that's not PC, and plenty of people love their A6's.... but the build quality and design are blah compared to the newest intel models...... I'm not saying you're going to find better elsewhere, but it's too bad they couldn't make an X2 barebone off even say the old W1 chassis.... that would be the hottest AMD notebook around..

 

your dream machine does exist.. the A8Tc. 14" with an Nvidia 7300.. although it seems unlikely it'll come stateside, and if it does, probably not as a barebone

 

yeah, the problem there is again, battery life, as it appears to be the same case as the A8Jm, there is no room for a larger battery.

I wasn't aware of the bad relationship between ASUS and AMD, I've always used ASUS+AMD for desktops, and they've worked great together.

 

It's not a bad relationship really.... Intel just gives them money to develop and AMD doesn't have it.... Asus makes the BEST AMD desktop motherboards... and frankly, the notebook motherboards are great too.... Asus just doesn't have the AMD development money AND the AMD notebooks don't have the market share either... Now, I could say maybe they would if they had either their own new designs or used some of the newer but new newest chassis designed for the centrino systems.... but that's not how Asus sees it. Asus sees the A6 chassis as cheap... because it's been used for almost 15-18 models over the last few years and that makes the cost to produce it less...... and Asus thinks AMD customers want cheaper systems, with high performance...... that's basically it.

 

so, what are the major factors preventing them from slapping AMD parts into the case of one of their intel models? It can't be that hard, seeing as the A8J and A8T (intel and amd, respectively) both seem to use the same enclosure

 

It's not about just slapping them in there... it's about being designed for them... the newest turion x2 boards can fit into the intel chassis', the problem is that Asus doesn't want any of the current core duo chassis' being used with the AMD systems... whether it's about confusion or money from intel stopping them... but if intel is giving them more for new development, I'm sure that they have some input to say that they can't use that for any other platforms for a certain period of time.

Asus did make a W3z, which was identical to the W3n/v/j chassis, but turion based. The US didn't want to import it because the W3 was currently the best selling centrino model they had...... I would think that would make it a great platform for a turion - but then again, there have to be more forces at play. I imported a single W3z mobo and installed it into a W3v chassis for a promotional thing we did last winter - thinking eventually we'd be able to import the W3z's and nothing ever came of it.

 

the only other turion x2 barebpnes i know of is from msi. i know that xoticpc, rjtech, and rawpowerpc sell them

 

thats for sure, ugly to the max!

Aparently my work will be getting some new 14.1" core 2 duo ASUS notebooks in early next year... the buyer couldnt tell me off hand what model it was, but might just swap my notebook again! the way I'm going with all my notebook swaps I'll always have a new notebook....

Any news Justin of new (probably low end) 14.1" core 2 Duo models for next year? Core 2 duo, intel graphics, 100Gb HDD, 1.3mp camera, 512MB ram.... maybe a model with low end dedicated GPU.... too.

insane

 

It's hard enough for me to trust confirmed/signed information that's within 45 days from delivery.... beyond that, I only like to open my mouth if it's either a: really interesting, or b: a product that is going to be so obviously popular that we'll have to get them in.

Right now..... the W3 and A8 are the only 14" models and they're both higher end........ it's a popular form factor, so there may be more next year, but in terms of barebones... you've got the Z62j - although maybe a little prettier than the Z92 --- it's not much. We'll see what else happens next year.

 

cool, cheers for the quick reply!... only thing i forgot to say is that, again 'apparentally' its not going to be of the z series.....


insane