V2Sv vs F8Sv

the f8 will probably be weaker gaming wise than the g1 since ASUS won't want to undercut their premium gaming machine. that is why a lot of us think it will use the GDDR2 RAM. this still needs to be confirmed by ASUS though

yes, the docking station is a really nice add on, but it's kinda expensive.

 

So the docking station has to be brought separately? And I'm probably getting the V2S because it is so much more beautifuler and durabler then the f8.

 

Yes, it was never included in the original V1 and V2.

 

plus it keeps the price to consumers a bit lower not to include it. come on, you're already getting a nice bag and mouse!

 

Won't there be a V2S with a less powerfull CPU in it? I like the 7500, but a 7100 would do for me. It would save a lot of Dollars I think.

 

ASUS seems to be going with this kind of plan now, what with the several different versions of the F3S and G1S. Who knows, maybe we'll see several tiers of the V2S.

Maybe one will have a Blu-Ray drive.

 

I was reading about significant rippling in the screen and keyboard flex for the asus v2 series, does anybody think asus has fixed the problem by reinforcing the chassis or something? I think this notebook finally might be "it" after more than a month of searching. the only thing I'm waiting on is battery life and build quality impressions.

 

I don't believe the chassis has changed much from the V2Je. This is based on the fact that all of the new ASUS Santa Rosa refreshes use the same bodies as their last-gen counterparts.

That said, I don't think build quality will be a concern. The ASUS V and W series are among their most solidly-built, as any W3J or V1 owner will tell you.

 

Are Asus keyboards in general only ok?? I have searched a bit but can't seem to find any real information on how good/bad Asus keyboards are. I am thinking of switching off of Thinkpads to a F8Sv or V2Sv and while I can *probably* live without a trackpoint... I don't think I can haven o trackpoint and a poor keyboard.

 

Check the ASUS V2J review that was posted earlier. Since the V2S will use the same body, I think it's safe to assume that those characteristics will be the same.

 

I question that, If all Asus was doing was slapping in a new mobo for santa Rosa they could have had these notebooks out far sooner, I think their might be one or two surprises for us.

 

i agree....ASUS must have fixed some of the previous issues

 

i hope so, coming from the thinkpad line, I can't tolerate keyboard flex

 

This has become an extremely unhelpful poll, since we now know they won't be the same price. If they were the same price, obviously the vast majority of people would get the V2, especially considering the fact that it comes included with a 6cell and a 9cell battery in the box.

Also, for everyone stressing about the VRAM speeds:
1) The 8600M-GS in the V2s will be GDDR3.
2) The 8600M-GS with GDDR3 is still 10-20% slower than the 8600M-GT with DDR2, if both are at stock nVidia settings and both systems have equal RAM.
3) If you up the system RAM on the V2s to 3GB, it is highly likely that it would be able to match the stock performance of an 8600M-GT with GDDR3 VRAM and 2GB of system RAM. However, if you up the system RAM on the F8Sv, you'd be able to nearly double your performance as well, so in comparison the 8600M-GS is still a significantly weaker card.

 

The 8600GS has a lot more overclocking headroom owing to its GDDR3, which means you could [potentially] overclock it to match the 8600GT in terms of performance.

 

While that is true, keep in mind the GS will only be able to reach stock 8600GT DDR2 speeds. Once the user overclocks the DDR2 GT a little, the GS is gone.

 

Yep, the 8600GS only OC's to the 8600GT (DDR2) stock speeds; the 8600GT can blow it out of the water overclocked.

Besides, I don't know how much of the 3DMark increase actually translates into real world gaming performance; that is, I do not know whether the OC'ed 8600GS will be able to keep up with the stock DDR2 8600GT.

 

at lower resolutions it will
but once you hit higher resolutions...say bye bye

 

So the 8600gt 128mb will still be better then a 8600-gs 256mb which the v2s will be using?

 

The 8600GT has so little overclocking headroom that the 8600GS could probably get within ~300 points of even an overclocked GT.

 

Does anyone have solid information on the specs of the 8600GS and GT? Things like memory bandwidth, interface, etc.?

 

should be up on the nVidia site...

 

I assume you're talking about the one in the standard MBP? Yes, it will outperform the 8600M-GS in the V2s, in pretty much all situations.

Where are you getting this from? The card itself has great overclocking potential, as seen in the numerous Compal, Zepto, and Asus forums around the web. It's true that the limited room in the V1s might produce a problem, but with some thermal compound on the GPU and a good notebook cooler, you should be fine.

 

Any mention if either machine will have bluetooth?

I also presume they will both have external mics?

I'm leaning to the F8, mainly because of the cost.

 

both should have bluetooth
the V2s for sure has bluetooth.

 

Battery life difference please.

I know V2s packs about 4.5 hours, will the F8 have the extra cell batteries, or just plain 6 and a crap 2.5h battery life?

 

just a plain 6....and around that much battery life

 

Well, with the 6-cell battery in both, battery life should be very similar. It was around 2.5hrs for the older A8 series, so expect at least that, maybe slightly more due to better power efficiency in the Santa Rosa platform and the 8m video cards. However, with the V2s' 9-cell (which does stick out, kind of killing the extra portability of the V2s over the F8s) you should expect 50% better battery life, so figure 3hr45min to 4hr or so.

 

it shouldn't stick out that much for the 9 cell, but it will stick out some. besides, i'm sure the bag that the V2s comes with can carry an extra battery, which shouldn't even weigh much

 

No, it shouldn't weigh much, I'm just saying that it helps even out the differences in portability between the V2s and the F8sv. After all, the total weight difference is only half a pound, which isn't that much at all in most circumstances.

 

Actually, assuming they both have the 6-cell battery, the V2S is 5.07lbs. and the F8SV is 5.75lbs. It's actually quite a pronounced difference.

 

Well, according to Asus the F8sv is a ~5.7lbs (2.59kg) with the 6-cell pack and the V2s is ~5.1lbs (2.3kg) with the 6-cell pack. The V2s should weigh ~5.4lbs with the 9-cell batter pack, and in addition it should be about about .3" longer than the F8sv (13.3" x 10.1" x 1.4" versus 13.6" x 9.8" x 1.5"). So yes, the V2s is definitely smaller, lighter and more portable under pretty much any circumstances, though the difference is much less pronounced with the 9-cell battery, and the difference would be almost negligible if you carried both the 6-cell and the 9-cell battery with you. Of course then the total battery life of the V2s would kill that of the F8sv.

 

Precisely. Either it's lighter/smaller and they have the same battery life, or it's the same size and has better battery life.

In either case the V2S wins. I think the only reason people should not get it is if their budget doesn't allow for it. It's basically an upscale F8S, after all. Maybe the 8600GT will also make a large-enough difference, but that remains to be seen.

 

the 8600GT will perform much better than the 8600GS but you need to sort out your needs. For college students, the V2s will be better since better portability and such.

 

debates about the GT and GS have been ongoing for so long. Like is the GDDR3 GS as good as the GDDR2GT? etc. just keeps going. Its never going to end, but the GS is good enough for me. It should be able to play most games and maybe future games med. to med. high settings so its all good

 

I don't know what kind of book you read :S
But my textbooks are like 1 kg each :S

 

notebooks i meant xP

 

There are just teasing people with these cut down video cards. Kind of giving you the hope of gaming with the far off gaze of a star but not giving you enough to really reach it.

The DDR2 GT wont really do much, some very limited gaming or medium settings for old games. The GS even worse, low/med settings on old games and horrid settings for new games.

I really think with what the V2 is targeted at "business class" "long battery life" ect they should have just stuck a 8400 in there or even intergrated. Cut the cost and then it would have even more battery life, less heat (making lap use much more a possible thing) and it would only improve its high points and wipe away that false shread of hope for gaming.

The F8... well I guess its like the middle man, its between what a G1S and a V2 wants to be, again tho its not really going to give you anything pronounced. The little bit extra for the G1S is probably MUCH worth it, they just needed to put the 8600gt GDDR3 in here and they would have had a great machine, but we all know why they didnt do that. Because it would have killed the G1S sales. Shame too because the G1S didnt appeal to me due to the looks, while the F8 I could have been very happy with.


The other thing about gaming is that I just got my Asus C90 my first notebook ever, I planned on doing alot of gaming with it. I found myself not doing so much.... a 15" screen made it rather hard to play some games things just seem too small and I dont generally have things like my headset or controller on the go wich can be important. So I can only imagine gaming on a 14" screen, it would be even smaller :/

 

Well...even business people have to have some fun once in awhile right? Besides, it's not like the 8600 series is "horrid" at gaming...they're pretty good...just not all that everyone expected them to be. But I have no complaints. For gaming...just stick with desktops.

 

Yeah right... I can play CS: Source on a Radeon 9200 with high settings and mid-low resolution and average 30-40 fps and I would consider that an old game. There is absolutely no contest between a 9200 and an 8600m gt, and though I haven't personally used an 8600m GT, I am willing to bet that it will play most old games at max settings.

 

Agreed. I believe Vicious is comparing these cards to a desktop gaming rig, in which case it's true that the DDR2 8600MGT is not really a gamer's card. However it's blatantly untrue that it will give "very limited gaming or medium settings for old games," as the 8600M-GT DDR2 should be able to max old games at lower resolutions (1280x800) or nearly max (maybe turn AA down) at medium resolutions (1440x900). And it will give consistent medium-high performance in modern games, and will still be able to run games smoothly for several generations down the line. You just can't expect to be able to crank the settings up, like you could on a desktop gamer's card.

And as for 14.1" being to small to game, it depends on many things. How close you are to the screen is a big factor. I can play games on a 12" standard screen when the laptop is on my lap, and I don't feel like the game is too much smaller than my 17" LCD at my desk. 14.1" screens are not at all "too small" for most gaming purposes, though again it won't compare to desktop gaming on a 22" WS LCD, of course.

 

CS: Source is old!!! not to mention the type of game it is, very low on resources.

I have a 8600gt 512mb in my c90 and even it struggles with newer games if you try high settings.

 

Yea, but does your 8600m GT offer limited gaming for OLD games?

 

For people in the UK...
I've got the feeling the V2S won't be coming here at the same time as everywhere else. It isn't listed on the UK ASUS site, whereas it is listed for countries that have it confirmed (e.g. Germany). Neither are there any UK resellers listing it.
Lastly, this reply from nexus doesn't make me too hopeful:

 

"I’ve spoken to Asus about the V2S; so far it will be the same spec as the V1S with similar pricing £1249-£1269."

Except the graphics card right?

 

I'm guessing. I was a bit surprised at that, but I think it's a mistake on his part. (Every single spec of the V2S we've seen so far has been 8600GS)

 

That and i don't think the V2 has the modular bay option...

 

V2S - Updated video card makes it close to being a W3J replacement.

 

It's not a 13" form factor and no modular bay.

 

The W3J wasn't a 13" form factor either...