Do I give up my ASUS G73 for an Alienware M17x R2

So the rig I'm writing on right now is a G73 with an i7 and 6Gb of 1333 RAM and a HD 5870M DX11 GDDR5. Running 1600x900 res. Beautiful laptop.

Guy wants to trade for an older Alienware M17x R2 which has an i5 with 8Gb of 1066 RAM and the same HD 5870. Running 1900x1200 Glossy RGB LED (sweet screen)

Now here's the thing. The Alienware can run swappable dual SLI crossfire cards, upgradable to almost every mobility card that comes out ATI or NVidia.

Is it worth it? WIll I take a hit in performance on the i5 coupled with the higher res LED on the same HD 5870? My lower res, now on the G73 pushes this HD 5870 temps up as it is.

What do you think? The biggest thing here is that I can swap GPU's and CPU's to newer technology as it comes out and play it all on a sweet LED WUXGA RGB screen

Would you do it? Gimmie reasons!!

 

Well, it seems due to the GPUs inside, your best cpu upgrade will be an i7 920/940xm CPU and up to HD7970m. Both of those upgrades, if possible, would bring a massive performance increase in your gaming, but they will set you back a high cost.

Do you plan on upgrading, or perhaps exchanging laptops soon? If you decide to keep your current rig, your first limitation will be the CPU as you can only get so far with it. It's still a very powerful solution though, but you will most likely invest over 300dlrs on the CPU alone.

Consider the cost of buying a whole new machine too. Will selling your laptop help the cost to have a new machine with better specs than your current? Or is the cost of new gpu and cpu lower and bring better performance?

I would probably do it out of curiosity, but I would most likely sway for a new machine due to how powerful current hardware is!

 

I would, just for the fact that M17X R2 has better resale value than the G73, and of course, being the easier one to upgrade in terms of CPU and GPU.

 

TailGunner has the strongest point so far. Just for resellvalue, the Alienware wins out. You should do it.

 

I would definitely support this.

Be very careful though. Used laptops can be very tricky and even deceptive. Make sure you know exactly what you are getting and it's condition, as well as if you can return it.

Keep in mind though, upgrading the Alienware to an i7 will run you about 300$. The 5870 is showing it's age at 1080p and a new GPU will cost you even more. So, if you are making this trade just to upgrade the Alienware, I would instead suggest you just sell the Alienware (because it is worth more than the G73), and put that money into a new laptop.

 

I would do it just for the RGB screen and much better chassis, irrespective of the rest of the specs. I also agree with the above posts. Make the trade, wait for the announcement of the new Alienwares on June 10th. If a RGB panel is available with the new models, sell the R2 (since it's worth more than G73) and get the new release. If not, then keep the R2 and you'll have one of the best screens out there. Put some money into upgrades then. This is what I would do, but then again it comes down to how much cash you got lying around.