Is Sager for Me?

Hey, i've beem looking at the sager/clevo laptops for a while (been waiting 4 months to buy a new laptop) and had a few questions about them. Specifically, I was looking at the NP 5160 but I have a few things i'm looking for in a laptop: A good battery life (something above 4-5 hours), good power (from what i've seen this won't be a problem from a sager), and somewhat portability (>6 pounds). I like gaming but need the bleeding edge highest settings, just want the games to play smoothly with little hiccups. I'm also going to be takign this laptop with me to college so the portability/battery life is pretty important. Also, and this is just me being my obsessive self , but is the lid of the NP 5160 textured? I really hate it when a laptop is textured. I can stand it on the lid but if its on the palm rest its pretty much a deal breaker.

 

Hey,

Battery life hasn't been tested yet as people don't have them in their hands yet, however, Clevo has said that battery life should be around 4 hours when NOT using the NVIDIA GPU just the intel GPU. Otherwise everything you asked for fits with the 5160 just fine, they are great laptops for doing work and the gaming all in one laptop while not being overly heavy and getting good battery life. For the lid it has a glossy smooth finish and the palm rest is the "brushed metal" look and it has a bit of a texture not totally smooth, but not too rough either.

 

I don't think you can get what you want from a sager notebook, or any current notebook actually. Most systems that run the bleeding edge games cannot run optimus and are not that portable ( < 6lbs ). The 5160 runs a 540M and is soldered on, so there is no upgrading option for it. This card definitely won't run the latest games at the highest settings.

Your best bet may be to wait for the alienware m15x R3 refresh and get one without the 1080p panel. (The 1080p 3D panel turns optimus off, giving you no option for 5 hour battery life.)

EDIT: With a grammar mistake, I mistook that you wanted bleeding edge gaming, woops.

 

You don't have to stick with Nvidia to get a good battery life + playable games (at max settings) @1080p - Laptops equipped with a AMD's 6970M will have a graphics switching through CCC and giving both up to 5hrs of battery life and high FPS. Unless Clevo decides to disable the option in the modified drivers, we may be getting all-in-one solutions offering the best of the two worlds - great portability and bleeding edge power.

 

When can we see a Sager with this graphics card and will it be affordable? I was looking at the NP8130 and NP5160 and I really like the NP8130 (nice GPU, nice sound system for a notebook, and matte screen), but I was disappointed when I found out Optimus was disabled on every laptop which included the GTX 460m. I really need a new laptop soon and I'm pretty much looking for the same laptop Dekabal wants.

 

As previously mentioned, your best bet will be to wait for the 6970m graphics card. Should allow for switchable graphics which will increase battery life, and be "reasonably priced" for a high performance card

 

I don't understand how the 6970m will enable switchable graphics. Do the cards themselves come with two modes?

 

No ETA yet but it looks like the 6970M adds about 170-200$ to the 460M (huge IMHO).

AMD has the option of switching to the IGP through the Catalyst Control Center. You have to do this manually, but from what we've seen, no reboot is needed.

The only question is, will Clevo leave this option unlocked in their modified drivers?...

 

Won't the motherboard have to support it though? From what I've heard the 8130/8150 don't have the IGP wired to the screen.

 

Any links supporting this statement?

 

Here mythlogic says that the display is wired to the MXM slot.

 

I think (but wouldn't bet on it), that it's the Optimus related wiring which is lacking in this case (possibly, due to some licensing issues with Intel???).

Just checked the AW M17X-R3 threads regarding this issue - Optimus not possible, while the AMD cards can be switched to the IGP.

 

I'm sure it depends on how the machine is wired to the display. Regardless if nVidia or AMD card, can't change that.

 

I am interested in something like this as well. Was considering a y560p at first until I found out the engineers did not allow for switchable to be possible ever. The 8130 does look optimal but am probably going to look to the 5160, cause of money and the added note about the igp. The non-glare screen is quite inviting though because I've heard the anti-glare film is more of an annoyance than a relief. Thank you for the thread and all those with information the added notes on the AMD compatibility are def. food for thought.

 

both w860cu & p150hm

battery life is about 20min - 40min

please do not expect the battery , it's just a UPS .

 

The W860CU has a 3 cell battery hence the 30 min battery life but the P150HM actually has a 2 hour-ish battery life since it has an 8 cell.

 

That's what I was afraid of... the NP8130 was already pushing my original budget. It's really surprising that the laptops (gaming laptops) that would benefit from switchable graphics cards generally do not take advantage of it. Thanks for answering.

 

Honestly with nothing else to do, but obesess over what laptop I want for the past month, I've read a lot of reviews, and I think the np5160 is the best price/performance/quality notebook of this generation. It plays any mainstream game on medium settings and plenty on high settings. See here: NVIDIA GeForce GT 540M - Notebookcheck.net Tech

Idk about the finish, but I don't think it has it. I know the np8150 does, which was a deal breaker for me. Rubberized on the touchpad is uber annoying, though many use a usb mouse so, I guess it doesn't bother other ppl as much. I went with the np8130 because I needed a portable laptop for gaming and I already have the cheap-o laptop I use now for internet & bringing to class. got it for $500 at Sam's club, I rag on it cuz it cant play any game AT ALL without lagging, but its held up for me for 2-3 years so far, I'm just dying to have a graphics card after years of graphics rejection. so I splurged on np8130 with 460m 1gb ddr5 sinfully good graphics, though for the games I play 540m would have sufficed.