T9600 vs P9500? Help..

Alright so with Xoticpc's recent drop in price for the NP8660, i could get the T9600 upgrade (was planning on P9500 before).
But was wondering if the T9600 is worth it.
Mainly use the laptop for surfing, IMing, gaming.
I plan on playing GTAIV when it releases this Dec, so was wondering if the 0.2ghz would help NOTICEABLY to the eye? (Don't care if it would give higher scores, just care about the visuals I see playing games with my eyes).
Having that said, what do you think I should do? Pocket the $200 or is it worth it to spend it on the T9600?
Thanks.

P.S. Is AIM compatible with Vista 64bit?
Have XP right now so I'm going to be a new vista user.

 

For gaming? probably not. If you plan on a lot of high end multimedia encoding, or lots of photoshop I would consider the T9600.

AIM should work with X64

 

Gaming, there's little to no chance you'll notice the difference between the two. Other tasks, you might notice a very small difference, but it's nothing substantial. I would personally save the money and get a P9500. One of the best benefits I see from the P9500 is the 25 W TDP (vs 35 for the T9600).

And I'm pretty sure AIM is compatible with Vista x64.

 

I would go with the P9500.

Even in CPU intensive activities such as DVD Ripping you wont notice anything more then 10% increase. And that is in strictly CPU intensive applications.

In my opinion, the 25W TDP of the P series is much more attractive then .2GHZ.

Less Power Consumption, Less Heat, Longer Battery Life, Almost equal performance.

Go with the P9500


P.S. AIM is compatible with X64 Vista

 

The speed difference between the cpu's is like 5% at most. They are almost identical in processing power. The difference of 200Mhz is equivalent of about 400Mflops, or in demanding tasks, the difference may be only a few seconds. Its not really worth it to go for the T9600, cause the P9500 is more power efficient.

K-TRON

 

Alright, thanks guys.
Also i was considering maybe spending the 200dollars im saving on 1920x1200 screen.
But not sure on that, since its a 15" laptop.
Plus wouldn't that only be good for videos and worksheets?
Because I mean to run the newer games I'm most likely going to have to drop it to 1680x1050 in the settings, so wouldn't it be better for gaming to have 1680x1050 to be the native resolution?

 

Well it depends.

Newer screens seem a bit better at running below or above native resolutions in my opinion.

However, some people do complain of ghosting etc. Personally I never notice ghosting and it really doesnt bother me all to much even though I will say it is not as "crisp" a picture running a non-native resolution.

As for video's and spreadsheets. 1920x1200 is considered a "high-definition" resolution so to fully reap the benefits of your screen you would need to use an HD format ie. Blu-Ray, HD Dvd, or their respective ripped formats (Uncompressed Mpeg-2, etc.)

Spreadsheets on the other hand will greatly benefit from the added space.

What Processor do you currently have in your laptop. Screens and processors are two different things. One gives you better performance while the other more of an aesthetic and gives you better viewing angles, more screen size etc.

 

He's looking at purchasing the M860TU. 1920 x 1200 on it might be a tad overboard.

 

P9500 without a doubt. $200 is a lot of money for a negligible performance boost.

 

Ah. Sorry, I did not read the OP.

If your talking an INTEGRATED screen I would NOT go with 1920x1200. Font will be a challenge to read as will a spreadsheet. 1920x1200 on a 17" has been a mainstay in the market for a while but in your case, I would stay away.

Go with a 1680x1050!

IMO!

 

GTA4 is gonna be very CPU intensive. The recommended CPU is a Quad Core 2.4Ghz. So if you really need more visual candy, get the T9600.

 

I can see how a game like GTA4 would be CPU intensive. The engine itself is CPU intensive not the graphical aspect persay. Much mathematical calculation etc. goes into the pedestrian A.I., Car physics, etc.


**Although I will not stress enough that .2 GHZ is NOT worth $200 in my book!

In some synthetic benchmarks you will see a noticeable increase however in real life performance, MOST games are GPU intensive and do not have extensive physic's engines etc. which throttle the CPU, therefore you will see MINIMAL (1FPS) increase!

Not worth it. ^

The two processors offer a very similar architecture with the only notable difference being there TDP.

If say, the two had notably different architectures such as do the new Core i7 MP's I would say go for it.

In this case, you are wasting your money IMHO!

 

Alright.
I'll go with
1680x1050.
P9500.
9800M GTS.
4GB RAM.
320GB 5400RPM (cooler, and as we all know its best to have a cooler HDD in this system).


Comes to roughly $1,800.
Sound good?

 

?! 1920x1200 may be popular with gamers, but it is hardly the norm for a 17" screen. Most are still 1440x900 or 1680x1050.

 

Yes, but you will find for MOST gamers who are willing to spend 2k+ on a laptop in the 17" range will USUALLY spring for a WUXGA+ screen.

Check out the Clevo forum

But yes you are right, the NORM for 17" screens is around 1440 or 1680, however, I am speaking top end.

This thread relates to a Sager/Clevo

 

Yeah, when I was deciding to go with the M17 or not I was getting the WUXGA+ screen (since it was 17inch).
But just decided the system was overall to big and non portable for me so jumped down to the best 15" (at this date).

 

I wager that any of the Core 2 Duo processors available with that system are going to be more than fast enough. As noted, you're making the right choice going with the P9500 over the T9600.

I have a P8400 2.26GHz in my notebook, which has proved to be quite powerful. I have not encountered a situation where I need more CPU power (GPU yes ). You can find benchmarks for it in my signature.

Also, I tested the Sager NP8660/Clevo M860TU with the P9500 - benchmarks are here:
http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsId=4591
It's a very nice machine, you won't be disappointed.

 

If you need some more advice on your future machine you should post in the Clevo/Sager area of this forum.

Very knowledgable guys. They will help you out!

 

Sounds good! However be cautious with the 1680x1050 too! My old laptop (ASUS Z70V) had that resolution (w/ 15.4") and even that was a bit distracting if I had to use the machine for more than 4 hours...

If you ever tried it before and feel yourself comfortable, go ahead! However I know a few other people who couldn't use 1680x1050 due to their eye problems and downgraded their screens...

IMO, 1920x1080 would be really ridiculous within a 15.4" screen...

 

Alright thanks guys.
Awesome review Chaz, the benchmarks helped a bit.

And if the 1680x1050 is to small (im guessing thats what your talking about)
Couldn't I just lower it in the display settings?

 

If 1680x1050 is too high of a resolution, you can always set the resolution lower, like to 1440x900, 1280x800 and so forth,

K-TRON

 

Yeah thats what I thought.
That person had said they switched the screen for a lower resolution one so that made me wonder "wth?" Lol.