Lenovo Y50 getting updated with a GTX 960M

Well, I guess we all expected this but I for one did not expect it so soon.

Lenovo Y50 with GeForce GTX 960M coming in March

It appears that they will be using the same chassis, so it's just a refresh, not a successor. Thoughts?

 

And rumor is 960M is simply a refresh of 860M with higher clocks. Guess this is why Nvidia is now locking out overclocking on its mobile GPUs.

 

Do you think this will increase the price at all or by much?

I have a Canadian Y50 that will arrive on Friday, I can cancel it if a considerably better version would be available soon.

But if it's going to be far more expensive, or take months to actually arrive, i'm not going to bother. Tough call, and terrible timing for me.

 

yeah, bad timing, really. but IMHO you should just stick with your order. the 960M ist supposed to be faster than 860M, but "just" by 10-20% (and I have doubts about those 20%, this would mean really close results compared to the 965M). and 10% faster 860M is easyly achieved by OC - if you stick with older drivers.

what I am courious about the new Y50 is the CPU - will it still make almost no use of the turbo boost? or has Lenovo finally solved that purely BIOS-induced problem?

 

If it were me personally, I would cancel the order, and wait for the update.

 

that's pretty disappointing they're simply going to use a clocked up 860m when for the same price it will launch at you can get a sager. The IPS screen is a good change though so good on lenovo for that.

 

I cancelled my order Y50-70 order. According to an Asus community manager dude, the 960m is not a simple rebrand of the 860m (gm107) but rather gm204.

http://rog.asus.com/399392015/g-ser...15-inch-gaming-laptop-with-4k-pcie-ssd/?tp=14

It might have more cores than the 640 cores in the 860m (between the 860 and 965 counts ~ 768 maybe?). Maybe not, but it's worth waiting for after all.

 

That might actually make it worth a look, provided we still get good battery life.

 

I don't believe GM204. Cost reasons plus there's no way they're disabling over 50% of that chip. If not a GM107 rebadge then a cutdown GM206.

Edit: Unless 960M is an underclocked 965M as 760M was to 765M. That I could see.

 

It depends on what the yields are like. Maybe they have lots of gm204 chips they can't sell as full fledged.

I'd be cool with slower 1024 core GPU. Would explain lain the driver fiasco too.

 

I'm still flip flopping. The current model can be had for less than $800 + tax. Is the ips and 960m worth $300? Probably not.

 

It would be more economical for them to sell a full or partially disabled GM206 than a GM204 that's been cut down by over 50%, which is unprecedented

 

Sager with 970m and IPS can be had comfortably for $1300. How will they differentiate or will they not take Sager seriously?

 

Sager build quality isn't great, and in some countries Y50 will be cheaper and much easier to obtain.

 

The basic panel on the FHD Y50 is pretty bad - it definitely is worth something to upgrade to the IPS.

 

According to reviews, their build quality is actually pretty good.

 

fwiw my Sager is a much more solid machine than my y50 touch was. although the y50 looks much prettier.

 

I have heard some people on this forum complain that Sager build quality isn't as good as say AW/Asus. Anyway, just an observation.

 

The build quality on their older models wasn't as good, but it is much better on the NP8651/8652, which would be the models in question. There's a reason they are some of the most recommended models in "What Laptop Should I Buy?" threads. These models combine great hardware with good build quality at a reasonable price (good luck finding a 970m for <$1400 from any other manufacturer).

For the Y50 to be competitive, the 960m models need to start in the <$1000 range. The Y50 is a nice machine, but it simply cannot compete performance-wise with the Sager NP8651, and needs to stay clear of its price bracket.

 

I saw a Clevo P650SE yesterday on Slickdeals with 970M, i7, and 1080p IPS for $1200. Lenovo can't compete with that unless they price the refreshed Y50 at around a grand or below.

 

To be fair, nobody can compete with that right now. MSI, Alienware, Gigabyte, etc., all of their 970m options start at ~$1500. $1200 has generally been the domain of X60m cards. Putting a 970m in that price range just makes things unfair.

 

I know. That's why my Y500 with 650M SLI was such a steal at $950 two years ago. 650M GDDR5 is just underclocked 660M. When overclocked I was getting 675MX/770M OC or stock 680M performance and those notebooks started at almost twice the price.

 

They should really bring back the ultrabay for their Y-line. The decision to get rid of it was probably to make it more portable, but the Y510p was still pretty portable for a 15.6 inch gaming laptop. I mean, the GT 755M SLI combo just absolutely destroyed anything else within its price range, and then some. How awesome would a GTX 960M SLI config be for ~$1000?

 

The previous UltraBay design on the Y510p was really poorly thought out IMO, and was plagued with issues:

1) Most of the time, the UltraBay GPU's & accessories were 'vaporware' - they rarely existed. Its unacceptable for the laptop to be heavily advertised with such capabilities, when the manufacturer has ceased support and sales of ultrabay accessories before the product even hit the market.

2) There was a huge blunder associated with the GT 750M ultrabay accessory. Most users found that the 750M ultrabay card sold separately by Lenovo was never compatible with their single GPU (750M) Y510p's. The system didn't recognize the card, it simply didn't work.

3) The ultrabay cards were notorious for overheating. The factory paste application was awful, and the fan profiles for the card were ridiculous. The fan never ran close to maximum. These two mistakes resulted in serious overheating, and in at least one user's case, the ultrabay card burning the ultrabay interface.

But I agree. If implemented properly, I think it has great potential.

 

"I saw a Clevo P650SE yesterday on Slickdeals with 970M, i7, and 1080p IPS for $1200. Lenovo can't compete with that unless they price the refreshed Y50 at around a grand or below."

It's a good deal if you happen to have an OS around. It's not included.

A no name brand sold by a no name reseller with out an os. Hardly anything Lenovo is going to worry about. Lol

 

I have my own OS. And there's an additional 10% off code, more than covers an OS if you need one.

Idk what you're talking about. Like have you never even heard of Clevo or Eurocom? Do a search on this forum. MickyD's P377SM-A and Mr. Fox's P570WM are both Eurocom machines.

 

And there's always Linux...

 

the y50 with the 960m is available now. It's listed as
Lenovo Y50-70 Laptop - 59440654 - Black: Web Special

 

Aaannd...960M confirmed to be rebadged 860M with a measly 79 MHz core OC

 

ouch lol that really sucks. glad i moved onto my np8651.

 

They've probably kept the OC on this one low so that it won't overshadow the probably-also-just-an-OCed-860M 965M.

 

bah! The price on the old one went up $100 today.
maybe they'll pull a 'lenovo' and forget to cancel my order. LOL 4 days with no confirmation yet so who knows

 

Eh? 965M was released a while ago. It's a 1024 shader 128-bit card, basically the same as the desktop 960 but GM204 instead of GM206.

 

It is?
Oh wait, yeah, the GE62 and P670SA had it.

 

Didn't see this mentioned anywhere else.

One of the configs for the Y50 now includes the 4GB version of the 960m.

Lenovo Y50-70 Laptop - 59440654 - Black: Web Special
Web price:
$1,619.99
After Instant Savings:
$1,299.99

Edit: Doh! See I was beaten to the punch by quite a bit. Cue an image of the Titanic....

 

Good news I hope that the Y70 will be updated aswell with the 960m.
But in the mean time my Y500 with a 750m is still going strong but it's beginning to lack gaming performance.

 

Of course I know who Clevo are. And Eurocom have been selling them out of their basement for about 15 years. My point is that Lenovo does not have to compete with Clevo. They don't care what Clevo does. Clevo's stature in this market has not changed in a decade.

That said, I have no problem with Clevo. They make nice rigs, and its tough to argue with a 970m +i7 QM rig for under $1500, although the build quality and materials is kind of suspect according to some reviews.

Lenovo pulled a Lenovo and shipped my cancelled Y50. Crazy that they would send me a laptop I cancelled two weeks ago. The CSR even warned me this might happen. I might just crack it open and keep it. Under $900 CDN shipped, taxes in and OS included.

 

Would really appreciate if you could tell where you are getting it for that price. I have been waiting for the laptop to decrease in price but the lowest I can find it is USD 850

 

It was $849 CDN a couple of weeks ago, or $829 using the EPP, that sale is over now. I think the best USD price was $799 not too long ago. Because of the poor state of the CDN dollar I don't think we will see those prices again.

I read about the deal here: http://forums.redflagdeals.com/newe...426157-i7-4700hq-16gb-1tb-hd-8gb-ssd-1678645/