New Samsung R710 (17")

The Samsung R710 is now showing up on some UK sites. It appears to be following Samsung's "touch of red" colour scheme.


More images here.

Extracts from the user guide giving an overview and the generic specifications are attached. There is a slot in the memory compartment for Intel Turbo Memory. Like the other recent Samsung notebooks, the Fn key is no longer occupiny the corner position on the keyboard.

Samsung appear to have taken some more weight off the chassis and claim a class-leading 3.08kg.

Three configurations advertised in UK are:

Next is

and top of the range, at the moment is

As we have seen with other Samsung notebooks, the Samsung UK office appear to be adverse to ordering configurations with the best GPU configurations.

In general, the Montevina chipset appears to be giving better power efficiency than Santa Rosa so we may see the R710 surpassing the R700's ability to run for 3 hours on battery.

John

 

Thanks for the informative post John. I almost purchased an R700 due to the £50 cashback offer but just cancelled before they dispatched it, at least I think I did, we'll see if it turns up tomorrow lol!

I might be better off waiting for the new "touch of colour" 710 range though I see you have some reservations about the GPU - is the 9300GS not that great? How much better is it then the 8400 in the 700?

Still no firewire connection! Strange decision to include bluetooth which is a lot less useful then firewire...and why on earth have they still have the speakers on the bottom which affects the sound output!

Turbo memory feature is interesting though, do many other laptops have this as well?

This is my first post so am still finding my way around the place.

I didn't really want to spend more than £500 on a laptop but the temptation to expand the budget is hard to resist, **** credit cards - I'm such a sucker for them By the way is the screen really 17.1" and does that extra 0.1 make much difference

 

The 9300M GS looks to be faster than the 8400M GS. See the table at notebookcheck. It will be fine for light gaming and will mean that there won't be too much heat or fan noise. The specs in the user guide list the 9600M GT as an option, which would interest the more serious gamers. However, past experience suggests that UK won't see that version but Germany probably will.

Bluetooth is easy to include / omit as a factory option. Firewire would probably end up being standard and add to the cost for the 90% of people who would never use it. An Express card Firewire adaptor should be available for those who need it. Personally, I would have liked to see a USB / eSATA combo port.

I wait to see how Turbo Memory 2 performs. Last year's version failed to impress.

John

 

Thanks for the very speedy reply! You must have been hovering over one of your numerous laptops. I probably don't need such a high spec pc - the only reason would be gaming use I suppose but it's so easy to talk yourself into the "it'll last longer" argument but if I was being sensible £400-£500 should really be enough...have yet to make up my mind.

 

The R710 AS 01 /02 and 03 are now also avalible on the Dutch shops.

However the 02 and 03 have 3GB DDR3 RAM

and they have also have a 9300M GS.

I just wonder, if there will be notebooks avalible with a 9600M GT wouden't it be possible to later upgrade from 9300M to 9600M? I know upgrating GPU's in noteboks is hard however I saw some sites that said it would be possible if the notebook uses a MXM slot for the GPU and knowing that the notebook basicly supports a 9300M GT I was wondering about that.

Wil the AS03 with 9300M also be good enouf to do some 3D desing once in a while so not just Photoshop but also jetCAD or 3DSMAX ?

And do you think spending €1000,- to this notebook would be a good deal? will the notebook be able to get me working for a couple years? (in stead of for instans a notebook that would cost €700,-?)

And is samsung a good brand for notebooks? on the Dutch marked they are new with notebooks so I have no Idea where to place then.. near Acer (then it would be good) our near Toshiba (then I wouden't like it so mutch).

Hope you can help me with this info.

 

According to notebookcheck the 9300M GS is a little faster than the 8400M GS. My guess is that it would be OK for your occasional 3D design, particularly since the R710's display resolution is modest compared to some of the high resolution workstations. It think it is the rendering which uses the GPU so that may take a little longer than for a top end GPU. However, CPU performance may also be a factor. The GPU has no significant effect on Photoshop or 2D CAD performance.

I can't comment on the possibility of upgrading the GPU. It is best to assume that it is not feasible until someone demonstrates that it can be done.

Samsung have been building notebooks for some years. They used to produce some excellent lightweight notebooks but have progressively moved to cenre of the market. In my experience they have not forgotten how to maintain quality. They do make their own products, which helps to maintain consistency across their range. This forum contains relatively few reports of problems. I would put them above Acer and Toshiba.

John

PS: I just nocticed this SE11 at notebook.de. It looks like the R710 with the 9600M GT.

 

I've had my eye on these laptops ever since they were announced.

They look great, are lightweight and a good spec without breaking the bank.

My line of work means that I need a 17" laptop with a mid range Nvidia graphics card that is easy to carry.

I used a Rock gaming laptop for 2 1/2 years before it went bang - it was great but battery life was poor and it weighed a tonne.

I'm in the UK and am disappointed to see all the UK machines only have the 9300M GS card NOT the 9600M GT card which I would much prefer.

My current laptop (Dell Vostro 1700) has a 8600M GT - would the 9300M GS be a step down?

I've also yet to see a model with WUXGA resolution (1920 x 1200) rather than WXGA+ (1440 x 900) - is there much difference - even when you throw in the Blu-Ray?

I would go for the Dell again, but there is no HDMI or DVI output and no Blu-Ray option which is the main selling point (along with the weight) of the Samsung.

I see that the German version has both the Blu-Ray and 9600 graphics, but a lower end processor - a 2.26Ghz P8400 rather than a 2.53Ghz T9400 - again - is there much difference?

Why can't they just make a low end machine and a high end machine rather than constantly comprimising - I guess it's a cost cutting thing and striking a balance.

I'd also really like a 25pin RS232 port - which is a factory option apparently - but given that you can't order from the factory how does one obtain it - can it be added after as the port is there and the mother boards will all be standard I guess?

I'd love to see an official or end user review - anyone know of any??

 

That's a few questions.

You can compare the GPU performance using this table at notebookcheck. However, the weaker GPU means better probably of good battery life since there a fewer transistors to leak power. Maybe the R710 with 9600M GT will come to UK sometime.

What was the display resolution of your old Rock? 1440 x 900 is a moderate resolution that is easy on the eyes and no so many pixels to be recalculated. WUXGA has nearly double the pixel count of WXGA+ so you need a GPU that's nearly twice as fast in order to give the same frame rates.

The R710 is I think, class leading on the weight. It builds on the R700 which was also light but I don't recall people complaining it was flimsy.

Serial ports are hard to find these days. If you need it on the road then there are USB - serial adaptors and if you don't need it on the road see docking station item 2348 at itcsales.

John

 

I really like this model.

If you look at the UK specs you can get this model with much better performance.

http://www.samsung.com/uk/consumer/...pe=rseries&model_cd=NP-R710-AS02UK&fullspec=F

For example:

17" WUXGA (1920x1200) SuperBright© Gloss
nVIDIA 9600M GT 512MB Dedicated Graphics


But where is the 4th USB slot?

 

Selling from £670ish ( http://www.google.co.uk/products?hl=en&q=samsung+r710&scoring=p&sa=N&lnk=next&start=10)

What do you guys think? By the way, is the chip 64bit?

 

There's no telling if/when the best specs will arrive in the UK. The people in Samsung UK who actually order the products from the factory have, in the past, gone for mid-range products.

As for the USB ports, look in overview.pdf (attached to the first post in this thread) and you will see one on the left, one on the right and two on the back. Quite a sensible arrangement IMO.

The new Intel chipset provides significant improvements.

The P7350 is part of the new Intel Centrino 2 CPU family. The details are here (and mentions EMT64).

John

 

Thanks a lot for the informative reply!

I bought a Samsung R70 last year for my sister, who was going off to university to study Engineering. I'm now thinking of giving that old Samsung to my younger brother, who is starting university soon (doing English and thus not requiring all the processing power needed for CAD etc.), and buying this new Samsung R710 for my sister.

Is it worth investing £670+ for this new laptop? Or should I rather pay £500+ for a another R70 ( or R700 as it is now known)? Here's a brief comparison:

(R710 vs R700)

CPU: T7350 2.0Ghz 3MB Cache (1066MHz) vs T5550 1.8Ghz 1MB Cache (800Mhz) (Edit: Our R70 came with a T7100, but I think the T7100/5550 are pretty much the same thing though)

RAM: 4GB vs 2GB

Graphics: 9300M GS vs 8400M GS

On the surface, the specs seem better, but is it worth paying an extra £170+ for what seems like marginally better specs?

Thanks.

 

Upfront I would point out that the R700 / R710 are 17" notebooks. The successor to the R70 is the R560 (see separate thread). Confused? Sometime since the R70, Samsung decided on a new numbering system where the first digit of the model number is the second digit of the screen size.

The R560 currently available has a spec which is an improvement over the R70, most noticeably for the GPU.

However, if there is no demand for heavy 3D graphics or gaming then the less expensive R510 with the new Intel GPU is worth a look. It has i mpressive battery run time.

John

 

Do you know if it is possible to buy a 9600M GT card and retrofit it? (ie replace the 9300M GS?) - that way I can at least purchase a high end UK model,.

 

You've already mentioned news of the SE11 having the 9600M GT graphics card, and this is the best option available for the 710. but if I were wanting to use the 710 with 3D CAD software such as Inventor/Solidworks/Catia would the 9300M GS card be suitable or would this not provide enough power to generate the images?

I'm a real newbie to notebooks and don't really understand all the information given in the GPU table that you've mentioned. Also how much better is the WUXGA screen to the WXGA+? And do you know anywhere that does the R710 with the serial port option?

Thanks

 

It's not something I would count on. If you really want the 9600M GT then you'll either have to waiting and hope that Samsung do bring this version or put your money elsewhere.

I'm confident that the 9300M GS can handle your CAD work, but will probably take longer than a faster GPU. If you are just doing a single static rendering then it will be fine. If you start zooming and panning on a rendered 3D object then it will be either slower or less smooth. Will your designs contain thousands of elements? The 9300M GS may be at the low end of this year's GPUs but is better than the 8400M GS, which is middle of range of last years offerings. etc..

The pixels on a WUXGA display are much smaller because there's a lot more of them (about 60% more IIRC). If your eyes can handle the small stuff (thinner lines, smaller default text) then you need to do less zooming and panning. At the same time, the higher pixel count will create additional rendering work.

As for the serial port, it's not obvious to me why Samsung thought it a good idea to consider including it. It's unlikely that the sales offices will order a version with that since it will push up the manufacturing cost to provide a feature that 99% of customers won't want to pay for. Something like eSATA is more popular these days. I've found a USB - serial adaptor has worked OK.

John

 

The SE11 doesn't have the T9400 2.53GHz processor, unlike the UK spec AS04 machine: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Samsung-R710-2-53Hz-Blu-Ray-Player/dp/B001E1KFMW - but then the AS04 only has the 9300 gpu.

I would say for CAD applications you really need the 9600. I currently have a 8600M GT and that is adequate.

 

Thanks a lot for the help so far, John! I think my question was a bit confusing though so I'll rephrase it:

Is it worth paying £670 for this new R710? Or do you think it's wiser to instead buy the older but cheaper R700 for £500, saving £170? Here's a brief comparison:



R710 vs R700

CPU: T7350 2.0Ghz 3MB Cache (1066MHz) vs T5550 1.8Ghz 1MB Cache (800Mhz)

RAM: 4GB vs 2GB

Graphics: 9300M GS vs 8400M GS



The laptop will be used by a (Civil) Engineering student who does not play games at all. As the graphics card is redundant in this context, are the higher CPU and RAM better enough to justify paying the extra £170?

Thanks.

 

One other possible consideration is that the R710 should offer a better battery time. However, I presume that portability and battery time are not key purchasing criteria and the computer will be largely deskbound, in which case the extra display real estate relative to the R70 will be welcome.

The R700 should do the job fine. Where are you seeing it for £500? Stocks seem to be disappearing.

John

 

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/143912

So yeah, the only difference is a slower CPU, older graphics card and less RAM, but for a savings of £170!

What do you think?

 

It's a bargain and fit for the purpose provided your sister is happy to have the bigger size computer (relative to the R70) in return for more screen size (and a numeric keypad).

I think that's clearout pricing when they are gone they are gone.

John

 

Initially, thanks John for your information - and in response to guypb's post is there really a massive disadvantage in using CAD software on the lower grade CPU? Would it make a considerable difference to performance as the P8400 has half the L2 Cache size.??

If it does make a big difference it seems i should be looking at a machine with the 9600M GT card (or similar) and a top end CPU, as I may in the future be needing to do FEA on the CAD software!

 

See this thread for some comments about the effect of the CPU cache size.

What are the recommended hardware requirements for the FEA software? I suspect the work is done in the CPU. At the moment, once you get above the P8400 the price increase for the incremental performance will only justify the cost of you are regularly going to need that extra performance. Also note that an increase of 15% in CPU speed (the best I would expect from going to from a P8400 to a P9500 will just mean that something would take 10 minutes on the slower CPU might be finished in 8 1/2 minutes.

John

 

The R710 is now showing as in stock at several UK retailers.

John

 

http://www.klick.ee/PublishedService?file=page&pageID=9&itemcode=019047

friend from estonia is considering buying this laptop its the r710 but it shows the 9600 its price is /10 so thats abotu 1599 bucks? worth it?

 

hi john,

i am interested to purchase the samsung r710 Intel® Centrino® 2 Processor Technology P8600 (2.4GHz) but i was actually interested in d sony FW11M first, now after i looked at the spec, think d r710 is gererally better,besides the display. do u konw the difference between the samsung 17”WXGA+ (1440 x 900) SuperBright© Gloss LCD TFT and the sony 16.4'' WXGA++ x-black lcd with double lamp? which one is better and how good is the samsung display?

i use the laptop mainly for entertainment, read comic, watch drama, flims and photos. good display is my concern.
also wondering whether the battery lasts or not. any disadvantage of this samsung r710 that u know of?
also when they talk about Processor Technology P8600 (2.4GHz) or T9400, what does the P and T stands for?

many thx ice

 

The displays used in the Samsung notebooks are usually good, but the Sony Xblack displays are usually very good.

There is also a Samsung R610 which has the extra wide (1366 x 768)16" display due to arrive early November.

The P series CPUs are rated at 25W maximum power and the T series at 35W. The former should give slightly better battery life and less fan noise.

John

 

Hi John

I've been trying to find any review on Samsung E172-Aura Dreja - P8400 4GB/320GB 17"WXGA+ GF9600MGT n VHP available in Germany but apparently it's not available anywhere else in the world. As far as I "understand" computers it has great parts for €999 as offered in Germany, but since it's my first notebook ever I am not sure what to think. Comparing this one to anything else it seems to be really cheap, but does it mean it is of worse quality?? Sorry if my questions seem to be silly, but I am no expert

Also, it is really not a problem to get this notebook from Germany, why are so many people opting for Samsung R710, even though it seems to be worse for about the same money?

Anyway, please tell me what you think, coz I'm really seriously thinking about getting this one.

Intel® Centrino 2 with Intel® Core 2 Duo Processor
P8400 (2.26 GHz/ 3 MB L2 Cache/ 1066 MHz FSB / Penryn 64 Bit)
4 GB DDR3-1066 SO-DIMM, 2x 2 GB
320 GB SATA-Festplatte 5.400 U/min
DVD-Super-Multi Double Layer
Display 17 Zoll WXGA+ SuperBright 1.440 x 900 Pixel (16:10)
NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT
512MB GDDR3 VRAM
HDMI, VGA

Thanks

 

Hello, not sure where to post this as I am really new :S

Im thinking of purchasing a laptop, and I was drawn to the Samsung black and red two tone range, and the 2 products I am looking at are the R710 and the R560. The R710 has the P8600 processor (2.4GHz), the 17" display, and GeForce GS9300 Graphics card (256 MB). The R560 has the P7350 processor (2 GHz), a 15.4" display, and a GeForce GS9600 (256 MB). I will be using the laptop for music sequencing applications, and for general university work... so is it better to go for the R710 with the larger processor but lower range graphics card, (but bigger display), or to comprimise with display size, and go for the lower processor with the more powerful graphics card?

Or is there even that much of a difference? Aside from the mentioned above, the rest of the specs are identical.

Any help would be appreciated!

 

Finally some interest about this laptop on the web. I was looking for some info about it quite a while and after i bought it - there you are

The machine is great. It's very quiet full-time (not part-time, like the others) and has a very nice keyboard. I would even say that it's better than in lenovo.

Got the AS03UK version with P7k processor and gf9300gs. I was planning to remove the pre-installed version of windows vista and do the windows xp sp3 install. But I was wrong! Windows Vista runs really smoothly, whole system runs very quick and the machine itself starts in about 10 secs (if you turn off the samsung splash screen in bios, might be faster). The 4 GB of fast 1066 MHz memory and a good centrino 2 processor will satisfy your student and multimedia needs surely.

As for the screen - I admit - it could be better. Don't get me wrong. It's great. The view is very clear and bright, colours are live and tasty but probably it will not satisfy your AutoCAD needs.

And finally the graphics card ;]

Someone asked about comparision to gf8600 gt . The 9300 gs is a bit slower but not much (if you are interested visit the GPU REVIEW website, type it in google). I must say that this laptop is a good platform for gaming. With 4gb of ram this 9300 gs has now 256 MB of its own dedicated and 1,5 GB shared from ram, which gives us some gaming possibilities.

Right now i got installed and im playing Tomb Raider, Dead Space, Call of Duty 5, Gears of War, Bioshock, Colin Dirt, Race Driver Grid and a few more.

I am a pro gamer and i was looking a while for a good machine to cover my fpp games passion. With its reasonable price and great build quiality (i mean it!) the samsung r710 is a great choice for your home.

Had to pay 800 as a overall cost of a laptop and package from uk to ireland.

p.s.: in the box you can find the vista home edition 32 bit system recovery disk and all the drivers

 

Thanks for these helpful comments.

for those who want more, the WUXGA / 9600M GT . Blu-Ray version of the R710 is also now available in UK.

John

 

Hi, I'm looking at purchasing the higher spec WUVGA version and am weighing this against a similarly specced model from the Sony Vaio FW series. What puts me off the Sony is the slower hard drive (4200rpm). Any thoughts?

 

Sony usually use some of the best displays, but Samsung usually give better value for money.

John

 

after following this thread I'm seriously considering buying the R710-AS03UK . has anyone seen any formal reviews of this model. i could not find any?

Paul

 

http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/Samsung_R710_NP-R710-AS06UK/version.asp?PID=

get it quick... 900 quid!

 

Hi,
Unfortunately I have only 250GB on my SamsungR710.
Unfortunately SamsungR710 haven't place for second HDD.
I'm think to replace HDD on 500Gb (possible HM500LI).
Is anybody changed HDD on the SamsungR710?

 

I haven't changed the HDD on the R710 but I have done so on other Samsung notebooks.

The easiest way is to get a new HDD and a USB enclosure and then follow this quick guide to cloning the HDD. Then turn the computer over, remove the screws for the HDD cover (front left corner of the notebook when upside down if I read this correctly), taken off the cover, swap the HDD, replace the cover and you are ready to go.

I am currently using the WD5000BEVT, which is reasonably quiet (it ticks and purrs, but no loud clicking) and is quite power efficient (so it stays cool).

John

 

John, thanks for the answer!
Unfortunately HDD with USB box it's not for me (it's not convenient for moving).
What is the better for SamsungR710 HM500LI or WD5000BEVT?
(I'm hear HDD 500Gb for laptops have't good result by power consumption and speed)

 

I think you are thinking of a desktop external HDD. The 2.5" external HDD enclosures are only slightly bigger than the disk itself and will easily fit in your pocket. It won't add significantly to your baggage and provides a home for your old HDD once it is removed from the computer. If you get an enclosure then you need one that takes SATA HDDs.

The HM500LI uses three platters and consumes more power and gives slower performance than the WD5000BEVT.

John

 

There are non of the centrino 2 versions around anywhere in the UK, has anyone seen any, looking at one for work for about £650

 

Which hardware are you looking for? There is a big gap between this and this.

The T3400 CPU looks to be very good value. 2.16GHz, 667MHz and 1MB cache, but 45 micron process so it is the same silicon as the Core 2 Duo series. There's a Chinese review here that suggests the T3400 has performance similar to the P7350. It may have T series power consumption which is higher than the P series, but you may find that that the CPU will undervolt well if the reason for putting the chip in the T3400 bin is the cache.

John

 

i think the t series will be fine, i have a t9600 in my 570tu and not bothered about power consumption too much. cheers

 

Has anyone been able to find the R710 AS06 model (with BluRay, 4GB RAM, P8600 and the GeForce 9600 card) for sale in the UK? I'm not used to shopping for laptops so have been using my normal desktop component online stores - none of them stock it!

Any suggestions for good UK stores to shop in would be appreciated.

 

Well here are a few:

http://www.saveonsamsung.com/Samsung_R710_452981.html
http://www.laptopsdirect.co.uk/Samsung_R710_NP-R710-AS06UK/version.asp?refsource=ldpgrabber
http://www.it247.com/Product/73-NP-...aign=pricegrabber&utm_medium=NotebooksLaptops

Perhaps others will have a better view on how good they are as retailers. Saveonsamsung are supposed to deliver promptly, but some have reported poor customer service. Laptopsdirect may have the best reputation of the three, but their pdi pixel check irritates me.