Yet another NP9130 vs. 9150 thread.

So I decided to finally go for Clevo/Sager at the end of this month, after struggling with an Acer 5551G (Phenom X3, 5470), and their terrible CS. However, I still can't decide between the 9150 w/7970m, and the 9130 w/660m.

OK, after considering every option for a while (between brands, vga's, etc., and at least a couple of months, probably ), the biggest question I ask myself is "do I really need all the power the 7970m has to offer?". I don't have very high standards, actually. Will mostly be used for CAD (Solidworks), internet browsing and casual gaming, I'm happy if I can game at medium/high settings, with decent FPS. Of course even the 660m is more than enough for this, but I want to keep the laptop for as long as possible, at least 4 years, but of course the more the merrier. I'm not planning to upgrade, btw.

Apart form graphics cards, specs will be equivalent between both:

3610
15.6' stock glossy (will rarely use it outside, if anytime at all)
I'll get it shipped without ram, hdd and OS, as I already have spares from this Acer laying around.
Pricing will be around 1150€ for the 9130, and 1300€ for the 50.

Also, feedback about both adapters is appreciated. I'm a bit worried for both sides: if the 9150's larger 180w is too big and heavy to carry around, or if the 9130's 120w can actually provide enough wattage.

At this point, I'm leaning a bit more towards the 9150' 7970m (no surprise here, only 150€ more for more than twice the graphics power), but the 660m is still hovering around my head, for its lower TDP, and supposedly lower heat and fan noise.

 

I can tell you that the 120w power supply is not something I would consider to be portable friendly. Its thickness is about three DVD cases and about 2 centimeters short in length of the a DVD case. I can't imagine having to carry around 180w one.

 

As you would expect, the larger power brick is pretty big, but not so big you can't carry it around. The simple fact is the components need a lot of power. I'd say it's definitely worth going for the p150 as the price difference is small for such an increase in performance.

 

Unless you plan for heavy gaming or if backlighting is a must, go for the NP9150. The laptop and the power brick will be around 9 pounds, since the power brick is about 1.5 lbs alone... and it's about as big as a poland spring water bottle.

Does your CAD work require CUDA cores?

 

How does the adapter size compares to the usual 120w ones? I had a Toshiba 120w previously, and I had no problem carrying it around, although bigger than I would like.

awakeN, Solidworks relies on cpu mostly. Only a couple of features make use of the gpu. But in this case, I found amd cards actually do a better job here (when comparing FirePro vs. Quadro, not sure about Radeon vs. Geforce).

I don't plan for heavy gaming honestly. I'm more interested about lasting as long as possible. Backlight would be useful, as I use the laptop at night frequently. However, right now I have no problems. Even without backlight, the LCD itself can illuminate the keys no problem.

 

Something that came to my mind right now. Did anyone successfully undervolt the 7970 already?

 

With what you want to do I would go with the 9130. Save a bit of money.

 

Whether you get the 670 or the 7970, you aren't going to be playing on high settings with the same setup in a few years times.

As of right now, the 670 can manage most games on high settings. The more demanding games like BF3 will be medium-high. The 7970 can handle almost every game maxed out and can run BF3 on high-ultra. The 7970 will surely last longer, but the 670 is sufficient at the moment IMO and it really isn't worth the extra money for the 7970.

 

isn't worth the extra moneys... I would like to elaborate that the AMD 7970M is definitely worth the money right now, it is a HUGE step up from ANY past GPU, as the 670m is a rebrand of the 570m, it is using dated technology i.e Fermi, which uses the 40nm processing method while AMD is using a different technology they are still using the 28nm processing method i.e Pitcairn. That $100 extra will take you nicely over the next 2 years while the 670m will probably die out in the next couple of months when the new games come out for the holiday season.

I.E i hate playing games at 1080p and having to tone down the graphics, I like eye candeh! Plus smoother gameplay, more immersive environment, etc. etc.

You can undervolt the 7970m but you must flash the vbios in order for this to work, so yes, it can be done.

 

Well the 670m is out of question from the very beginning, since I can get the 660 70€ cheaper.

And now that I look at it, I forgot to mention which games I'll be playing. Hard to advise on something if you don't know what I'm doing, right? So, right now, the most demanding game I'm playing is...TDU2 (yup, no Crysis, Metro, and the likes), everything is set to low, but it works. Games I want to try? Probably (well...finally) ME3 and Skyrim. Nothing else planned so far, but you never know . However, I mod my games frequently, which might bump the necessary specs a bit.

So there you have it. As you can see, I'm very, very far from a heavy gamer, and that makes this a tough decision. Of course the 7970 is a complete beast next to the 660m, that performance boost is so hard to ignore, especially with such small cost increase, but the recent reports of the 7970, not overheating, but getting higher temps than everyone expected, are also worrying me a bit, next to thinking I might spend the extra 150€ getting the AMD card, and never make full use of it.

 

Hey guys, do you think getting the 9150 with 680 is overkill?

 

In terms of performance, it's similar to the 7970m, so no, but might be overkill in terms of price if nvidia follows past behaviour.

 

From what I can tell from the limited time i've been here:

Most would recommend the 7970 as it gives you more bang for the buck. The 680M might be better overall, but not worth the extra cash. However, there's the issue that the 7970 doesn't have any official drivers out yet (lead to less performance, but AMD should be fixing that soon with official drivers). Personally I like Nvidia for their driver support, but AMD for their great performance to price ratio.

Also do you do anything else other than game?

 

I need a smaller portable laptop with power vs. mine m17x-r2. I do all the normal stuffs.

 

You guys know how hot the 180w brick gets?

 

Not exactly thread related, more like a side question. As we all noticed, the 7970m runs hot, most people are having trouble getting it below the 70/80º when gaming, and the 90º mark at full load. I found a bit strange the older powerhog 580/675M gets a bit better results, from what I found: some reports of 60-something to 70-80 degrees at games, and around 85-90 at furmark/kombustor. One would think of the exact opposite, considering the 40-28nm difference. Any opinion on this? Drivers? Actual hardware limitation?