Sager NP6110 Or Sager NP9130 For Music Production

Heyy i'm looking to get a new Laptop soon for music production, i keep hearing that if i want a powerful long lasting machine that Sager is the way to go,

i have a budget of about $1500, i'll only be gaming on it just a little bit from time to time(CoD:Mw3/Battlefield 3 Ect) mainly it will be my music production computer, i work out of 3 different studios so im going to have to carry it around some time so portability is important but not a deal breaker.

Mainly im going to be using things like Pro tools, Ableton, cpu hungry vst plugin's, FL studio, Mixing software & Avid software

i'd love to get the Np6110 due to the portability & it having a hdmi output so i could plug it up to a external monitor for more screen real-estate if i needed it but at the same time i would like something that i can have for at least 3 to 4 years and something that will be able to handle everything i would throw at it which is what brought me to the Np9130.

both seem like they can get the job done but which one do you think would be better for what i want to use it for?

 

I think you'll want the NP9130. Playing BF3 is pretty demanding and doing it with a higher resolution external monitor makes it even moreso. It's also the more futureproof option. The NP6110 is fine for now, will even run BF3 at its native resolution, but in 3-4 years it may have some trouble. If portability is more important than gaming power, since you say you don't game that much anyway, then NP6110 no doubt.

Personally, I have the 6110 and I love it, but I don't play demanding games nor did I expect it to keep up with games gracefully for many years. It does play everything out today at high/ultra settings though.

 

Niceeee, does it run hot after using it for awhile? & about how long would u say that the battery lasts?

 

portability is important but most important is being able to keep up with the cpu hungry music apps

 

It runs warm all the time, but I haven't seen it get hot. It idles at a higher than average temperature but when the load ramps up it does a good job of keeping it under control. The NP9130 also keeps things cool pretty well (my brother owns one). The fans on the NP9130 get louder than the NP6110.

The battery on the NP6110 lasts only about 3-4 hours unfortunately. It's not better than the NP9130. It's around the same or might even be worse actually.

Both machines can use the same CPU's, so they'll be equally viable there.

So the NP6110 has the NP9130 beat in fan noise, price, and portability. The NP9130 has it beat everywhere else. Even though the NP9130 is more powerful, the NP6110 is still quite the little powerhouse.

 

I think your decision will depend on whether you value portability or future proofing more.

The NP9130 is a little more future proof with the potential to sport 32 gb of RAM. It also has a mSata port as well the ability to turn your DVD drive into a third hard disk bay. This would come in handy if you have want to house all your sample libraries in one place.

Presently, both machines will do a spectacular job at handling any music software but the NP9130 will offer you greater flexibility when you want to upgrade in the future.

Also, you might look into buying an extended warranty regardless of which laptop you buy if your intention is to keep it for several years.

Over the last few weeks, I've run into the same dilemma but ended up picking the NP6110 for portability. I travel via public transportation, and having a smaller laptop enables me to stick more things (cables, midi controllers, audio interface) into my backpack.

Hopefully this was helpful.

 

Does anyone know how DPC latency is with either laptop? Nvidia's drivers have caused severe latency in the past that has made audio recording at low latencies nearly impossible.

Google it if you don't know what I'm referring to; a search for "nvidia dpc latency" will get you reports dating back for several years now. It's possible that you could get around any issues by temporarily disabling the discrete GPU, though.

If there isn't a good way around said issues and you plan on recording live audio, you may want to look into something with an AMD GPU.

 

It's way better but I cannot tell how much better as I've haven't touched the 600-series.. only the "older" 500-series