New M1730 laptop against my old 4 year old desktop?

I have placed my order for the dell xps m1730. It's going to be a Core 2 Duo 2.4 ghz, 4 gig ram & dual 512mb m8800GTX sli running on Vista Premium. Will be my first time with Vista so am a little nervous about moving away from XP. Anyway just a couple of questions, did I do the right thing saving myself several hundred pounds not opting for the Core 2 Duo Extreme (2.9 ghz I think)? I figured the gaming performance benefit the extreme processor would give me will be minor seeing as the graphics cards are so powerful and the dominant factor. Also I know/hope the laptop's performance should be pretty mindblowing, although it's hard to compare but I have been labouring with my almost 4 year old desktop. Running Pentium 4 3 ghz, with 1 gig ram & 256 mb ATI Radeon 9800 XT it's been a trusted friend which has done well for me over the years. Games like Unreal Tournament 2003 & Doom 3 have run absolutely fine but I recently bought Pro Evo Soccer 2008 and it struggled a bit. I daren't unleash the likes of Crysis & Bioshock on it. Anyway probably a silly question but roughly how much faster will my new laptop be compared to my old desktop - 5 times, 10 times, 100 times faster???

Thanks in advance

 

Simply put, it'll be by alot.


+1 for e-peen?

 

When you get your lappy, try not to crap your pants.


Yeah, it's that good.

 

you won't be disappointed with its performance. it will run newer games just fine.

 

Its hard to quantify this hence the "it will make u crap urself" comments.

Run 3DMark and PCMark on both your desktop and new laptop to get some numbers. This will give you a % increase in performance.

 

No doubt that the M1730 will smoke your desktop.

 

The new laptop will be a breath of fresh air. Download some newer demos like Bioshock and Crysis and try them on both your desktop and your new laptop. Even stepping up from a Pentium 4 to a Duo Core will allow you to feel the extra leg room.

 

It is light years ahead of your current desktop, you can never imagine how smooth games will run in SLI with these cards. I know how smooth every game runs with my desktop 8800GTX which of course is more powerful than a 8800m GTX but still

 

Going dual core is great. I was amazed by my first dual core. My single core CPU really choked when faced with an AV scan and Battlefield 2142. My dual core handles everything so much better.

 

The jump to dual core is really the big shift in power. Things will move so much faster. The dual GTXs will make you one of the few able to play Crysis at high settings with payable framerates.

Only game I can think of that might strain your computer is really jacked up Supreme Commander, as that can sometimes get out of hand all over your processor.

 

Thanks for all the comments guys. I am pretty darned excited about this laptop. I knew it was good but didn't know how much so. Rest assured I will compare the demos and marks as suggested. I just hope Vista doesn't let me down. I know things progress and the transition has to be made some time but I have a lot of great games that I will dissapointed not to play if the compatibilty doesn't work out. Just have to wait and see. One thing I would like to ask if possible - when I get the laptop me and my girlfriend will have one each. Hers still on windows xp home (sp2) & mine to be on vista premium. In terms of networking we will still be able to share files etc despite the different operating systems?

 

I am pretty sure this will be possible- i dont use this function so cant comment any further.

If all else fails send stuff over msn messenger!!