why buy Sager?

I'm looking to buy a new laptop for college. since i'm going abroad, building a desktop isn't really an option so after some browsing, i've come down to two options the ASUS G55 and the SAGER NP9150.

I'm posting here because i want actual owners of Sager laptops to give me feedback regarding the quality of your systems and reasons why i should buy this over the Asus. Since i'd never heard of Sagers before i began searching for my new university laptop, i guessed it would be best for me to ask you guys...


I also have a few questions since unlike the Asus, i can't go to a local store and have a look at the Sager:

1. Is the 7970m worth the upgrade (or should i go with the gtx675)? does it have a lot of issues? what is enduro like? i'd really like to squeeze out the maximum battery life i can from my computer.

2. What is the build quality/reliability like? Being the primary (and virtually, only) computer for a university student, i can't have a computer that breaks down every now and then. (i know, reliability has a lot to do with how one uses the device, still what is the estimate?)

3. Is the cooling system more effective than the Asus? they both use twin fans etc. so how much difference will it make in the long run? (although this is hardly the most important of my concerns, is the fan noise bearable at full load?)

4. How long is the Sager expected to last? will the hardware be able to tackle games/programs for at least say another 3 years reasonably well? For those who have the older series laptops, how long have your systems lasted before they became too slow to be worth carrying around the weight?

5. What is the sound quality like? i've read mixed reviews...and can you get the reseller to take off the ONKYO branding? i dislike it for some reason :-/

6. What is the difference between the steelseries and stock keyboards?

7. Since i use the touchpad almost all the time except when i'm gaming, it is important to me...some people have described it as being terrible, is it at least acceptable to use?

8. Are the thermal compound, copper cooling, gamut screen etc. upgrades worth the money?

I know these are a lot of questions...i'm just terribly confused and i'll be grateful for all the help you guys lend towards making my decision

thank you,
A prospective Sager owner

Ps. i'd just love it if someone would spell out the CONS of the system...always good to know in advance

Also, is there any reason, i should take the NP9150 over the NP9130 other than the colored keyboard?

 

I haven't received mine yet, but here's what I know from the weeks of research I've done:

1) The 675m is an older generation card. Even though it has the "600" designation, it's really a "500" card. The 7970m is a new generation card and is on par with the fastest Nvidia card, the 680m. If you are serious about gaming, then yes, it's worth it if you can afford it. I also wouldn't necessarily count on upgrading just the card in the future. That seems to be more and more difficult as time goes by. Either card should idle down when just doing desktop tasks, so in theory the battery life should be about the same.

2) I don't have mine yet, but build quality is supposedly good. Nice and sturdy. Screens are generally decent to good as well. On this model, they are supposedly good.

3) Should be about the same in all areas, very similar design. Both use two fans: one for processor and one for video.

4) How long they last is directly dependent on the components inside. That's no different than any reseller. The key difference is that you can customize almost all the components when ordering and replace most of the components yourself. Not as many options as a desktop, but quite a bit better than your standard laptop.

5) The consensus is that the speakers range from "sucks" to "meh". Don't get your hopes up, from what I've heard.

6) Steel series is "chiclet" style, sager is not. Both supposedly have "ghosting" issues when gaming. Both have backlighting that you can control. Steel series gives you more custom color options supposedly. I've seen complaints abouth both, so I'd say it's a wash. One thing to note is that if you go with the steel series, the little icons/text for keyboard shortcuts will be inaccurate because it has teh MSI labels on it, and Sager uses different keys for things like "Volume Up" and things like that.

7) I can't really say. I was concerned about the "rubbery" texture of the touchpad on the 9150 though.

8) Depends on your knowledge, no, yes if you do video or photo work but not for gaming

The 9150 is geared more towards gamers and "power users". If you don't care that much about gaming, then the 9130 should be just as good.

 

I agree with everything PopeJamal posted. Though I have also not yet received my 9150, I've done a lot of research as well.

The main reason I went with the 9150 over the 9130 is the ability to replace the GTX 675 with a more powerful card. The GTX 670 in the 9130 is a pretty good card, but it won't be playing games on high for very long. Even if in a couple of years I am able to throw a 7970 in there to replace the 675 and get another 40-50% performance out of it, I felt that was worth it. Perhaps even if newer cards can fit, you could install something better.

EDIT: note that it is possible in the 9130 to do this, but it can be dicey and most resellers and Sager recommend not to.

 

So let me ask again, general opinion is Sager over Asus? (a little afraid of plonking down cash on a company i haven't heard much about )

also, since my biggest reason for buying the Sager would be that i can get a 7970, i'm a touch worried about the heat it produces...nearly all big companies tend to put the gtx660 at best in 15 inch laptops, will the 7970 cause too many problems?

finally, where would you recommend i buy from? i'll be in Toronto. i've heard that although xoticpc gives the best prices, the brokerage fees, taxes etc will add at least $200-300 plus should any problems arise, sending it back to them would end up being rather costly as opposed to simply buying the Asus from a big store...

i love you folks for helping me out, so looking forward to making a purchase soon

 

I would definitely get the Sager as it's performance is much higher at a similar price. Also as far as I know the ASUS gamer laptops don't have Nvidia's Optimus technology, so the battery life would be worse than the NP9150's for sure.

The 7970m is built on a new architecture as well and is very cool (just like the 6xx Nvidia cards), so I wouldn't worry about overheating.

Maybe you can check if there are any resellers in the country you're going to study in and buy from there to have local warranty. (I'm going to go to university to the UK and I'll be ordering it from a local reseller in advace so it's ready by the time I arrive .)

 

Exactly why i ask if Enduro is any good, if i get the sager, i get the 7970m

also i've heard there are driver issues, are they specific to programs/games or do they affect overall performance of the card in general?

i will be going to Toronto, intend to get it ordered before or as soon as i arrive as well

 

It's a brand new ATI card. As always, driver support is initially abyssmal at best.

Sent from my PG86100 using Tapatalk 2

 

Well, if you use a driver that works (no BSOD, etc) the problems are restricted to single games like BF3 FPS drops. Also Enduro is said to reduce the card's performance by a few FPS, but that's not very significant considering it's power and will obviously be corrected in later drivers. Also battery life will probably improve as well as they keep developing Enduro to be more efficient.

Oh, cool. I though you lived there and wanted the laptop before you began your studies that's why I mentioned this idea . I'm not very familiar with Canadian resellers, but I'm sure there are some.

 

1) Yes, get the 7970M
2) Very good. The laptop is very, very sturdy. Very.
3) I don't have an ASUS to compare it to, but the cooling system is effective. There is the problem with heatsink/fan alignment, but that can be somewhat fixed using the foil tape method. I put some tape on and I game at around 74-77 C.
4) The 7970M should be able to handle games for years. It won't be running BF8 on ultra settings, but you should be able to squeeze at least medium settings out for some time.
5) The speakers suck. However, I game using headphones, and the sound quality is excellent through them. The laptop just has a bad internal speaker.
6) Steelseries is chiclet and comes from the MSI laptops, the stock is just a regular keyboard. As the Pope said, the function keys will not match up on the MSI, which can be a big deal as volume controls, backlight controls, and other various things are done through the function keys. As for the quality of the keyboards, I find my stock keyboard to be great.
7) It is acceptable to use. The problem is that the rubber finish that is on the laptop covers the touchpad too (most laptops will make the touchpad a different texture). Your finger doesn't move perfectly as a result. I get most of my issues when trying to move my finger to the left or up. Moving right and down is easy. You can get used to it, though.
8) No. I have the stock paste and, as I said, I game at 74-77 C, which is very acceptable. Sager is also notorious for not even applying the thermal paste properly, so you may find yourself paying the $35 and then having to repaste anyway. If you want IC Diamond, I would recommend doing it yourself. A tube costs less than $10. The copper cooling upgrade is a waste of money. The higher gamut screens are nice, but if you are just gaming and doing schoolwork, you don't need one.

I preferred the Sager laptops over the ASUS ones when I was looking. They were cheaper, lighter, more powerful (7970M isn't in the ASUS laptops yet I believe), and more attractive. But especially cheaper.

The heat is fine. It runs as cool as my gaming desktop does. Remember, the maximum recommended temperature for the 7970M is something like 105 C, and I have never gone over 85 C.

Since you are in Canada, I'm not sure where you should buy from. I live in the US and bought from Xotic. No tax, no shipping, almost $150 total in discounts.

Enduro is fine. It is annoying that you have to set most programs to be power saving or high performance, but you only do that once.

There are some driver issues, but they are specific to certain games. For example, there is an issue where the card doesn't get high enough GPU utilization in BF3. It stays around the 60% mark. You get good FPS, 40-60, but if the GPU utilization was higher, the card could handle ultra settings with 60 FPS probably.

The performance overall is very good though, and it will only get better as AMD finally manages to release a good driver.

You won't need to worry about heat, I think.

 

Great, the hunger for power as won me over...i want the Sager

now i just need someone to refer me to a the XoticPc equivalent of Canada, with some decent discounting...and i'll be happy to proceed

cheers guys,
A soon-to-be Sager owner

 

My replies above in bold.

 

For Canadian Resellers, I went with reflexnotebook.ca, they were very nice and promptly answered all my questions prior to ordering. Shipping and all the other involved fees are free. You'll be able to get up to 3% in discounts and a $50 discount on top of that for being a member of this forum (you'll have to put their banner in your sig or avatar first).

The other option is Eurocom, their prices are like 30% higher than any of the competition's, but they do price matching. The thing is, that I wasn't pleased with their marketing at all. They ignored what I wrote in most emails and answered along the lines of "go place your order, how will you be paying?". Among other things they completely ignored my request to get the student discount they advertise. I also wasn't a big fan of a giant Eurocom sign slapped on the back of my machine, as opposed to the standard, small Sager logo. There are users on this forum though that purchased with them and were satisfied, so it's all up to you.

Hope that helped

 

ReflexNotebook.ca is where I got mine from, and I have no complaints about their service. They are also the cheapest in Canada.