Questions for NP5760 owners... :)

I will order my NP5760 soon and would like to hear opinions about a couple of issues from you fine people who own one...

A) What is the chassis made of? I know the lid is brushed aluminium (*drool*), but the rest of the case?

B) Does the keyboard have any noticeable flex?

C) Considering its size and weight, do you still find it "lap-able" so to speak?

D) Does anyone have it with 1900x1200 resolution? I am probably going for this one and I'd like to hear opinions vs. 1680x1050.

Thanks, guys and girls.

Peace,
C.

 

To start, I would highly suggest reading Kilim's review.
http://www.notebookreview.com/default.asp?newsID=3017&review=Sager+5760

I really like the keyboard, it does not have any flex that I notice. the keys are very responsive. And having a numpad is great.

Although it is under 10 pounds, unlike most desktop replacements, I wouldn't consider it very "lap-able". It is big, and the most important fan intake would end up blocked by your right leg. Not good.

I got the 1680x1050 screen, and I love it. It's the perfect size in my opinion. Still lots of screen real estate, and I don't ever have to squint to read anything.

 

Thanks for the observations, Elminst, especially about the fan intake on the bottom. Much appreciated. I did indeed read Kilim's review and refer to it several times.

Any more opinions?

Thanks,
C.

 

you want the 1920x1200 because it will be ready for true High-Definition standands when the Blu-Ray and HD-DVD drives are avaible on these notebooks.

the standard for HD will be 1080p which requires the resolution of 1920x1080.... which the PS3 games were set at during this years E3 Expo.

-Gophn

 

Yes, I had considered the superior HD-readiness of the 1900 resolution... though I hadn't considered the PS3 issue. I don't think it's possible to run console games on a laptop's screen, though? Or is it with external aides?

Thanks,
C.

 

He was just making a comparison with the HD standard and what will support it.

 

Ah, I see.

C.

 

A) What is the chassis made of? I know the lid is brushed aluminium (*drool*), but the rest of the case?

Some kind of plastic

B) Does the keyboard have any noticeable flex?

Not on mine

C) Considering its size and weight, do you still find it "lap-able" so to speak?

I find it easy to transport but I wouldn't want to carry it every day on long distances unless I had a backpack notebook bag.

 

Thanks. Ordered yesterday. Can't wait!

C.

 

Cool! 1920 or 1680?

Honestly, I think I would have chosen the 1680 if it was available back then. It was, but on a lower end model (From Eurocom). 1920 is quite small, espcially if you want an external set of peripherals and some kind of laptop stand, where the screen ends up a little far. But it's nothing a couple settings in Windows can't fix lol.

It's just that in some of my dev tools, the fonts settings are completely ignored. owch my eyes lol. I've even used the magnifier a couple times. Maybe i'm getting old lol.

Worst case i'll buy an external LCD soon for when I work with an external kb and mouse.

Otherwise, all 5760 owners simply love their machines .

 

I went with WUXGA+ as I work with large spreadsheets and audiovisual presentations. And, of course, gaming. Also, I am interested in the HD possibilities both for digital TV and especially DVD/HD-DVD/Blue-Ray. Home entertainment is quite important, so... yeah. WUXGA+ it is.

lol Good luck with your eyes. I believe there are third-party softwares that magnify what's on the screen, without having to use Windows' magnifier.

C.

 

I didn't realize the lid on the NP5760 was brushed aluminum. It just went up a few points for me...

I'm sure you'll love it. Almost bought one myself.

 

Thanks. I'm sure I'll love it, myself. I'll be out of the country until early September so I'll have to wait until then but it's good to know I'll find it waiting for me in all its glory. :d

C.

 

I too have been struggling with the decision to purchase an NP5760. I've done a lot of research and on paper it appears to be the best fit between what I want in a laptop and what is available on the market today. But I have a few questions:

1) It appears that you can purchase a 2nd HD bracket that will let you run a 2nd HD in the optical drive bay. Will BIOS settings let you specify the 2nd HD as the bootable drive?

2) Does this machine support booting from USB drives?

3) The manual says that running 8 channel audio requires plugging in the center/subwoofer speaker out into the microphone in (pink plug). It doesn't talk about running in 5.1 mode. I'd like to be able to use my 5.1 surround headphones with a microphone (for gaming). Is this possible, or is the microphone plug disable for mic-in use while using anything other than 2 channel stereo mode? (sorry if this question is confusing).

4) If I purchase WUXGA, can I run resolutions lower than 1920x1200 if I choose, or is it stuck in 1920x1200 all the time?

5) My biggest concern is driver support and BIOS updates. Is this why folks decide to purchase from one distributer over another? I was thinking that I should purchase directly from Sager to eliminate this concern, but I hear that support from discountlaptops is really good. And, what about powernotebookd? Any thoughts?

6) What are your thoughts about waiting until this laptop ships with Merom? I hear when that happens there shouldn't be much of a price difference.

 

Not sure why you'd want to do this. It's possible to set it up as raid, so I don't see why it couldn't be bootable.

As all recent systems does. But I did not try it.

There is a total of 4 jacks on the laptop. 2 on back, 2 on the sides. The beauty with this new Realtek chip is that YOU specify what output you want where. From what I see in my control panel, you loose the mic starting at 6 spkrs, but you could choose to loose the sub, for example. See pic (sorry some labels are french, but you'll get the idea... See I chose 8 spkrs, but I kept the mic and sub).

You can run it lower, but output is not as beautiful. You better stay at max and increase font size. I changed all systems fonts so it displays Century Gothic and it's quite readable, even from a certain distance. But don't worry; if you use your LCD close enough it's not a concern. You can also consider buying a lower res LCD if you plan working from home. As for gaming, all my 1920 games looks georgeous.

All distributors disitribute the same products, so drivers and BIOSes come from Clevo, not the distributors. I bought in Canada, so I don't know about support from these.

Quite small performance gain, but it's there. If you want it now, buy it . Don't torture yourself lol. Ref: http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2808&p=1

 

In response to #5:

Buying from Sager direct is an option but will usually cost you more, and limit your configuration options.
Buying from a reseller will give you more configuration options, and in many cases, additional support options, along with a lower price. It's the same machine regardless, so service and support are what should make your decision.
PowerNotebooks and Discountlaptops both have exquisite customer service and get rave reviews from customers both on this forum and on www.Resellerratings.com
I bought my 5760 from Powernotebooks and couldn't be happier.
The only support I've needed from them is I was missing a screw on the bottom panel. I emailed PN, they called Sager and 3 days later I got a little package with not one but 3 extra screws.

 

Great reply. Thank you for the carefull, detailed, response.

Well, my current notebook (a Dell) has a tray-based HD. With an extra tray I'm able to slide out one and swap in another HD in qabout 2 seconds. I've found this handy for testing alternative operating systems and for creating fresh boot images on a seperate HD without any downtime on my 'production' drive. I'm a geek, I know, but to me this is a useful feature. With the 5760's main HD not as easy to swap, I figured if I could boot off of the 2nd HD I could enjoy the same convenience even though the primary HD isn't as easy to swap as with my current notebook. I really have no desire for raid on my notebook.

Thanks for the info on how the audio software works. I'm still concerned that I won't be able to enjoy the full benefit of my 5.1 surround headphones and my microphone at the same time. But, I've endured worse hardships before.

The link you left was informative, but left me thinking that Merom laptops could start popping up on the web any day now. I know they won't become available until a couple of day's after I order my core duo version, but I'll probably wait another week before ordering anyway.

 

Well, that about says it. Actually, I've heard others saying the same thing about both Powernotebooks and Discountlaptops. I think the trick is to actually call and speak with a salesperson, and not to just order through the webpage.

Well, I'm getting closer. I know the laptop I want and I've got it down to two vendors. Now, if I could just find my checkbook.

 

Well, I sort of knew what you want to do - i'm a geek too. Honestly, i'm not sure if anynone here have 2 HD in their 5760, but I don't see why you couldn't do it. I would strongly advise that you only buy 1 or 2 brackets - no HDs, as the resellers will overcharge for HDs. For the HDs look on newegg for example.

Oh and about Merom, you're right, probably 2 more weeks and we'll see them coming. It worth the wait.

 

Yep! I saw Merom notebooks on Dell's site yesterday. It's only a matter of time now, so I'll wait.

 

I'd say if you're a mediaphile, the larger reso would be sweeter.

I for one am a gamer. I play high end games like FEAR and Oblivion. I play Obliv at 1680x1050, and let me tell you, even with this mondo video card, any higher resolution than that would make it choke. I had to tweak a few settings to get the framerate into a more playable range. Newer games will absolutely murder your video card if it tries to run them at higher than 1680x1050.

 

Well, I'll be getting the notebook in six days, so... when it's here, we'll find out. Yes, I don't expect to play FEAR/Oblivion/Prey at native 1920 with all filters on, but it's good to have that option for slightly older games. Thanks for the input!

C.

 

Well some tips for Obliv.

There's a tweak in the ini that dosnt seem to be very widely known. You can shut off the wind effects on the ground grasses, so they dont sway in the wind. That's one of the big slowdowns in the game and most people turn off the grass. I found the tip while seaching for a way to do that.

Secondly, I managed to turn in anisotropic filtering in the video drivers with minimal impact. At these resolutions, AA is a moot point, but texture filtering makes a world of diffrence. Also, look up the tweak guide at tweakguides.com so that you can turn on Oblivion's dual processor threaded components.

^^

 

Unless you NEED the real estate for many windowed apps, 3d or compositing, or watching HiDef movies, the WUXGA res will strain your eyes as far as text reading is concerned, unless you use apps that easily zoom in/out.

 

Well, I've had this notebook for a week now and I'm getting quite used to WUXGA--so much in fact that the desktop of my ThinkPad X21's is starting to look REALLY small and cluttered. I'm sooooo glad I went for such a high resolution.

C.