Xotic vs. Malibal Hard drive question for P151HM1

Hi all,

I guess this question is aimed more at the Xotic reps here but I was wondering if there's any particular reason that they don't offer smaller hard drives on the P151HM1 like Malibal does. I've finally decided on the NP8130/P151HM1 but I'm trying to make it as affordable as possible. I saw on Malibal that it's possible to dowgrade the 500gb HD to a 250 and knock around $35 off the price. Any chance that this can and/or has been done by Xotic?

Thanks much!

 

Best to email a sales rep or PM one of the xotic reps for fast response...

 

Unfortunately I don't have PM rights just yet. I need a few more "quality posts" to gain access PM ability.

 

please a 7200rpm 500gb at the least!!! with these models having just two bays, you dont want to waste one slot with 250gb to save $30 bucks! thats ridiculous !!! just dont buy one game or dont eat out once man!

 

LOL fair enough I suppose. I was planning to save some cash to get a SSD and then use external drives for documents, music, etc.... I see your point and at the same time, I feel like I can say that for anything...as it is now, I'll likely have to live on Ramen for a month or so

 

Hehe, make sure you buy the Ramen in bulk from Costco or Sam's Club then.

Keep in mind that you can always take your HDD and stick it in an external enclosure when you decide to swap in your SSD. I've used a $10 Rosewill USB 2.0 enclosure for my old laptop and it's perfectly fine. Since yours is a new machine, you could get a eSATA or USB 3.0 enclosure for $10-20 too.

Personally, for my new Sager I went the route of having a primary SSD (160GB) and a 500GB HDD in the optical drive bay. Anything less than 500 and I feel the sacrifice of an internal optical drive isn't worth it really. An external DVD drive can be had pretty cheaply right now. I got my Lite-On burner for $15 after rebate from Newegg.

 

Yea I already have an external DVD burner, which is why I don't feel worried about sacrificing the internal optical drive. Was planning on starting with whatever drive I get (whether it's the 500 or whatever) and waiting a bit to earn some more cash and then swap in an SSD. But I guess what you're saying is, I could keep the internal optical drive, swap the SSD and then use that HD externally?

 

Yeah, you can swap it out and stick it in an enclosure so that it functions just like any external hard drive you would buy.

Here's Newegg's 2.5" enclosure offerings:
Newegg.com - Computer Hardware, Computer Cases, External Enclosures, 2.5"

 

or u could be smart like me and buy a blu ray burner internal for $75, get the 500gb stock and a momentus xt hybrid 500gb on sale for $89!

Corilien : if you planned on getting a ssd , then we ll have to stress more to get the max hdd like 500gb or even 750gb and 2 months of ramen? I would do it

 

I've been hearing somewhat iffy things about the hybrids tho? Making random clicking or squeaking noises and so on?
I already have an external Blu ray player as well, so it seems somewhat unnecessary to get one in the laptop, burner or otherwise....

**Edit with additional question**
Also, are the upgraded wifi card and IC Diamond compound really important or are they forgo-able?

 

I've been using a 500GB Momentus XT Hybrid drive in my Inpsiron for the past six months or so. I think it is an amazing drive. It's by far the zippiest HDD I've ever owned for booting up and my most commonly used programs. As for the noises, I have noticed that a few times too, but have not heard them in a while. The drive is still going strong for me with no problems.

For my new Sager purchase, I would have gone with a Momentus XT without any hesitation if I did not opt for a dual-drive, SSD + HDD setup. Actually, the reason I did end up getting a real SSD at all was that I enjoyed my Momentus XT so much that I wanted more of this speediness.

 

This is what Malibal says about the wireless cards:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/sager-clevo/624253-sager-wireless-card-any-good.html#post8068232

As for thermal paste, I bought a tube of Arctic Cooling MX-4 and will repaste everything myself when I get the laptop. Looking at the manuals, these machines are very easy to open up and tinker with, so I will save $30 net by doing the repasting myself. From the numbers I've seen floating around, a good paste will reduce temps by 4-7C depending on the situation.

 

Thanks much! Not sure I trust myself to tinker without killing the thing but good to know.

And I know I'm kind of obsessing over trying to find a couple bucks savings here and there, but I was originally planning to keep the build to about $1000 and it's already snuck close to $1200. I'm trying to balance things like "Can I save on the HD now to get the wireless card and then add stuff later when prices go down?" That's one reason I'm planning to get 8GB ram at 1333MHz DDR3 - 4 SO-DIMM to save $50 even though both Xotic and Malibal have great free upgrades from the stock RAM. The way I've configured things now, it's about $1185 for the P151HM1 on either site. Malibal gives the free color calib. so I'm sort of leaning in their direction now...oh the joys of indecisiveness!

 

I know what you mean. I started out a month ago with an arbitrary budget of $1200. After a week, that was $1300. At the beginning of Thanksgiving week, I was operating with a limit of $1500. Fast forward through today, I've spent $1529 on the laptop itself and a post-rebate total of $200 on related items (SSD, external DVD burner, thermal paste, cables). That's some major budget ballooning right there!

Eh, I figure I extended the laptop's utility to me by about a year so I guess I'll easily recoup this extra money later on. I'll just have a much more constricted month of December right now, hehe.

 

Corillion its advisable to spend around $1500 so you get $100 off and with the cash discount you ll end only spending $1350 . Its a much better deal, dont buy hdds now man, just get the stock 500gb and get it a momentus xt2 later when the price drops! i got mine xt on blck friday for $89

 

Much as I'd love to take your advice, I really don't have the money to afford doing so. If you're willing to help me out with the extra couple hundred though, I'll gladly pounce on the deal

 

sell something, starve for 2 weeks, you cannot afford to pass the $100 off deal

 

Personally if you have the external optical drive just order it with whatever size data drive you need, and the hdd caddy. When you have money down the road buy a 120gb ssd and move the hdd to the optical slot. You don't want the hybrid hard drive if you plan to do ssd down the road as you won't really see a difference in the hybrid being used as a data drive. I stuck with the stock wireless and it has been fine to me. My thinking was that the main thing the upgraded wireless cards offer is speed, but my ISP is only 15MB so I won't notice if the wireless card can do 300MB. If you want to upgrade the wireless card later it's supposedly super easy to do it yourself, and I think it's about the same cost too. I didn't bother with the upgraded paste either. If I need to later I can buy a tube for 10 bucks and do it myself, but the stock paste seems to be doing fine. I spent 1100 on the laptop and then 140 on an ssd afterwards from newegg. It's easy to keep adding things here or there, but it sounds like you'd really be happy with keeping it cheaper.