~£700 gaming build (UK)

Hi guys, I would appreciate it if anyone had any views or suggestions on the following build:

• 15.6" 1920x1080 - model W150 (I think, I'm looking here.)
• i5 2410M (2.3GHz)
• 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 memory
• Nvidia Geforce GT 555M - 2GB
• Western Digital Scorpio Black HDD - 500GB, 7200rpm, 16mb cache

This comes to £682.00. I'll probably buy another 2GB stick of RAM for about £16.

I'm also considering either buying a 30GB SSD for £50 or upgrading to the i7 2630QM (2GHz) for £40.

Any thoughts or criticisms?

EDIT: it's for university work, and I would like it to be able to at least run Battlefield 3 and Skyrim.

 

I would recommend the i7 processor if you want to play Skyrim. the i5 will definitely be able to run it, but with the i7 it will run more smoothly, and at higher settings.

 

I couldn't find any evidence of Skyrim using 4 cores, got a source?

 

that seems good enough for a basic gaming laptop.
but I personal suggest that you take the 17.3'' one (if you dun really need to carry it a lot) coz the larger laptop should has a better heat releasing system, which means your cpu, gpu even mainborad would has lower temp. than a smaller one.

Actually I am not sure about the affect of laptop's size on releasing heat. better ask other people who has the laptop you want about that.

 

you wouldn't be able to run BF3 smoothly or at a decent enough FPS with your current build.

 

I could manage £40 for the 2630QM, but for the next card up it's another £200+ on the price.

 

have you seen the recommended specs for bf3? and also i played the bf3 alpha and it ran only slightly slower than bc2.

 

Ouch. I didn't see the option to add a different GPU other than the 555M. Is there another machine you're looking at?

 

On the same site, the next model up is this one. With identical specs but with a GTX 460M it's over £200 more. I've looked at Kobalt, Rock, XMG, RJTech, and tons more sites, and PCS looks the cheapest for me in the UK.

 

For £700 the 15.6" Optimus II is pretty good, i would get an i7-2630 and 6230 wireless though, comes to £715.

If you can wait and save up some more cash i'd go for the Vortex II 15 though, you'll get a vastly improved graphics chip and cooling system, will cost around a grand though.

 

check the benchmarks of those games running at Full HD, but i think at lower resolutions you'll be fine.

 

how are you getting those prices :S the configuration in the OP is coming to £745 for me.

EDIT: o wait, I'm guessing that's removing the OS.