New Samsung Series 7 NP700Z7C-S01US Laptop i7 3615QM 650m Review!

there is no way Samsung Series 7 that cheap from China. US$ 826.00. Dont waste your time and money.

 

The GPU clocks down to its un-turbo speed (745MHz) when it's running on battery. I just tested this with Battlefield 3. Went from ~45fps to ~40fps.

 

Beware: I was getting Samsung series 7 15" for just $450 (brand new, sealed) in Jan 2012. Seller was asking for WU only.

There are 100's of sites like this who sale counterfeit items. It's just a Trap

On Order page, payment methods are "Western Union" & HSBC Transfer

 

I would recommend using this, it will tell you what type of ram you need to buy. Use the Crucial System Scanner software to find out what type of memory is in your computer

I am pretty sure any of this Newegg.com - Accessories, Laptop Accessories, Laptop Memory, DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800), 8GB, ram will work in the laptop. Someone should confirm to see if I am right, I haven't looked up the exact ram that is on the laptop. I am kinda busy right now, but if I have a little bit of free time tomorrow I will double check.

 

Hi guys,

I'm using my 700Z7C a couple of weeks. One thing that I didn't like is the fact that the aluminum lid is not very stif. If you grab the edges of the lid and move them in different directions (one forward, one backward) it bends a lot like being out of plastic. Also I noticed, that because of this fact, the lid doesn't close perfectly. There is a little gap between the lid and the body when closed. If I look at a macbook its perfectly closed without any gap...

Pic: http://i.imgur.com/sOff0.jpg

They should have designed the lid more stiff and torsion-resistant.

Did somebody of you notice it?

 

nope. i dont have an issue with my lid....and there is supposed to be a gap between the lid and the body....thats why there is a rubber bumper at the top of the lid :-l

and i damn sure wouldnt pay another 800 bucks to have a lid that closes
like a macbook pro either.

 

I bought the Corsair Vengeance and installed it, booted up no issues. In fact CPUID shows 12G total, in dual channel, 665 DRAM Frequency, 9-9-9-24. No hiccups at all.

 

LOL good cuz it didn't feel right, just wanted to make sure. Best buy here I come!

Oh and for the owners of the laptop, I looked through the forum and found some stuff about this laptop I should be aware of when I get it, so just tell me if I'm wrong anywhere, or just add to it as you please:

1. The laptop tends to get warm mostly in the left region of the keyboard where the HDD is located,
2. The screen has a small chance of having stuck/dead pixels,
3. Taking the back off is a PITA, so I just need patience,
4. An SSD would definitely be a good choice seeing as 90% of you have done so,
5. The recovery CD will reinstall the OS, but not the drivers if I do a clean install of Win7 for the SSD. I can get the drivers from Samsung's site right?

So, how'd I do?

 

Quote: 1. The laptop tends to get warm mostly in the left region of the keyboard where the HDD is located,

The HDD is located under the left palm rest and puts out very little heat. With an SSD you will not notice any. The heat under the keyboard is from the CPU and GPU (CPU is just left of center under the letter keys).
I've tried out two of these with heavy load and there is only a slight/moderate amount of heat through keyboard. If you're gaming, put it on a cooler for some help. But this thing handles heat very well IMO. Skyrim on Ultra (no ambient occlusion - lighting mods are better) gets frames up in the 35-45 range and consistent temps around 75. Crysis 2, between 45 and 60fps gets things a little hotter but pretty much maxes out at 80 (mobo is highest temp). I live in a hot climate too so my ambient temps are not helping. All in all, this seems good for the hotter running Ivy Bridge line. It is the speaker grill that heats up the most as the exhaust is right behind it. Sometimes, after long gaming sessions, you can see heat marks on the screen but these go away quickly. It remains to be seen whether they will permanently damage the screen in the long term. As of now, they don't.

 

Returned my second 700Z7C as well, I can't live with the wireless isses. (poor range and loosing connection occasionally).

If that is fixed in an later version I'd not hesitate to buy it again, fantastic computer overall, that gets ruined by one small but critical flaw.

And bottom of screen and speaker panel gets scorching hot during heavy load since air is exhasted there, time will show if that damages the screen in the long run. Keyboard gets heated in the middle, but not enough to be a problem to me.

 

Is the wifi card replaceable?

 

Probably yes, but the bottom cover is a pain to get off (lots of screws and plastic tabs). But I fear it's the antennas thats the problems, not the card since it has an intel card and I've never had any issues with intel cards before. Actually I have replaced atheros/broadcom cards in my other laptops with intel cards to improve range/signal quality.

I didn't try switching card since I was afraid to leave marks on the bottom cover, making it impossible to return it for getting the money back. And since I'm afraid switching card won't solve the problem.

 

Oh man is it that bad? Jeeze, I know the previous model had wifi issues with the broadcom card but this one too -_-

 

This wireless issue is most likely a deal breaker for me. I was just about to pull the trigger, too. It has everything I wanted: large high quality matte screen, sweet backlit keyboard, good performance, with the bonus of good looks. Who knew that something so basic as wireless performance could be the difference?

 

No wireless problems here, anywhere in the house or yard. Reaches much further than my Dell XPS M1530..
Using an Asus "black diamond" router, 5ghz.

 

I don't have any wi-fi problems either, unless I put my laptop on a slope, then the wifi becomes weird.

 

Maybe there's another problem. Could it be software related? I called HP to ask about poor wireless performance on my wife's Pavilion dm1 and after they had me update the bios, the problem went away.

 

No wifi problem here. I've been using this laptop for 10 days without isssue and I've downloaded lots of movies/games in that time.

 

fwiw- no wireless issues here either.

 

No wifi problems for me either. I had it connect once EXTREMELY slowly to a router that was a few feet from me, but it fixed itself in a minute or so and I got full speed. Mighta been the routers fault, I dunno.

 

this is actually the first pc that I have owned where I didn't have wifi issues. My macs never had any issues on my network...pcs did....and it was part of my concern going back to pc but...this one has been a dream on wifi...connects to my airport extreme at 300 Mbps in places where my mac would only get half of that speed.

1 month...no issues.

 

Hi,

i'm happy with my samsung, but the runtime on battery doesn't feel right.
when im surfing with wifi and 70% brightness i only get around 2 - 2 1/2 hours of runtime. nvidia card isn't activated, so optimus seems to work.

i'm running at balanced settings.
an idea?

i made a fresh install, but i thnk i installed any important stuff.

 

Hallo,

about 2 weeks ago I bought this laptop and I am very happy with it so far. Now I am planning a replacement of the HDD. I have two affordable options and would like to know, which one you would recommend:

1. Samsung 830, 256 GB - price around 175 €.

2. Crucial M4, 512 GB - price around 345 €.

The Samsung 512 GB-version is around 510 € here in Germany, so this is a huge difference compared to the Crucial, which had a recent price decline.


I would like to know, which one is the better option, if 256 GB would be sufficient on long terms, which one is more reliabable and, if the Crucial would be compatible with the Samsung?

Furthermore, I think they are both SATA III devices, whereas the internal HDD is a SATA II. How will the read-/ write-speed be, compared to the manufacturer's data? And is it wort the replacement, because of the internal, little 8 GB SSD from Sandisc for enhanced boot-speed?

It would be very nice, if someoe could help and give me some advice.

Thank you very much!

 

I'm trying to install these drivers and I looked at the instructions, but I'm really not getting it...I'm sure its pretty obvious, but how are you supposed to extract the linked driver?

Ops this is the link.

 

The Crucial is compatible with our notebook here is Crucial's site:
512GB, 2.5-inch Solid State Drive, upgrades for Samsung NP700G7C-S01US Laptop/Notebook, CT3088940 from Crucial.com
I'm thinking of getting it too. On their site I can get it for $399.

 

I have an Crucial m4 on order as well. Price here: 512USD (3080NOK) Still well below other 512GB SSD's. Samsung 830 is ~760USD for example.

Don't have an laptop to put it in yet, but, I'm working on that part!

 

No wifi problems here. Much better than my old Dell Inspiron 1520.

Running the latest drivers if it matters.
--------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyone found a right angle adapter for the power unit?

Last question. Is the seal of gap between the top aluminium plate and the side plate the same on both the left side and the right side of the computer? I just noticed my left size is pretty much perfectly sealed where as my right side, by the two USB 2.0 ports there is a minor gap and it runs all the way up to the power button. Minor issue, but dirt tends to get stuck in there.
Anyone report this?

 

So I shipped this computer to my Mom's, where she doesn't have Wifi. She pluggs a ethernet cable straight from the cable modem to her PC. Anyway, I tried to plug that cable into the Samsung, and it won't get a IP address or connect to the internet. I brought my old Dell 1720 laptop, and when I plug the network cable it, I can surf the internet no problems. Any ideas?

(ps: I know it's bad practice to do this without a router)

 

It might be the driver, try updating it. Download it on the other computer, put in on a flash drive, and then install it on the samsung.

 

Now that you pointed it out, it is the same on mine. It might be the design of the laptop.

 

I just received my laptop and first impression is quite good. Screen seems to be ok, look is good, weight and size normal.

So how can I update the drivers? I think I have wi-fi problems, the speed os only 0.5 Mbps, should be atleast 6-7

 

Successful SDD install / HDD relocation! I'm super happy

Of course there were plenty of hick-ups inbetween, but where would the fun be without thinking you've destroyed the thing you are still paying for.. lol : )

So I put a Samsung 830 256 GB SSD where the main HDD was, and put the 1 TB HDD into this caddy

SATA 2nd HDD Hard Drive Caddy for 9.5mm Universal CD / DVD-ROM Optical Bay | eBay

My plan was for the bios to see the HDD on the CD slot, and allow me to boot from the recovery partition... nope. I ended up putting the DVD drive back temporarily, and installing windows from the Samsung disk.

** back up your samsung software with the recovery solution software to a disk and HDD ** It has every thing you need that is included in the factory install, and allows you to pick and choose, so none of those stupid cyberlink games were ever on my new SDD. It does all of it through the Easy software manager interface. Very cool. Everything works as it did when I bought it.

 

Umm.... Can you give me the steps you took to go through and install the drivers and everything into the SSD? LOL Yes I am a noob

 

So the very first step is to do the 'system software' backup via the Samsung recovery manager application before pulling your HDD out. From what I can tell, just downloading stuff from Samsung's website doesn't cover it all, so I think this is essential, but someone correct me if I'm wrong. So I just put that on an external HDD.

Then when your SSD is in, boot up with the Samsung windows CD that was included in the drive, and set the boot order in the bios so it's first.

I have been hearing about people having trouble with the integrated memory while installing Windows, but I did't. I just selected the SSD and off it went.

When you get windows up and running, just go to where you put the samsung software backup, run the EXE file. This will open the Samsung Software Manager that you are used to seeing. All the available programs that were installed on the PC when you got it are there, and available for install. I just did all the critical drivers first, CPU, video drivers, LAN, wireless, etc, and then moved on to stuff like the touchpad and Easy Setting Manager...

Good luck!

 

Hello all. I purchased this laptop and it is coming in tommorow.

I do have a couple questions though. when i was reading the first few pages of this thread i saw that it only had one drive bay, but later saw that someone had installed a second Drive bay. Can anyone tell me how to do this? i would love to be able to us a 128gb SSD for the main drive so that the system runs a bit smoother, but i would also like to be able to keep the 1TB drive that is has for Storage. and i've been seing mixed information about the memory for the 650m graphics card it has. I looked at Nvidia's site and it says that the 650m comes in either gddr3 or gddr5 versions. when i ordered it from best buy i asked them and they said it has Gddr3 memory for the graphics but i've seen many reviews stating that it had GDDR5. can someone clarify this for me? the exact model i ordered was NP700Z7C-S01US. I'm really hoping this laptop lives up to the expectations i've been hearing about for it. It's going to be replacing an i7 Sony Vaio F series that i got a couple years ago. it was nice and still runs fairly well. but in my opinion gets WAAAAY too hot for sitting on my lap... from everything i've seen this one has much better specs overal (though my vaio did have a Blu-Ray Drive).
Last question i have is i know the 650M supports 3d display but does the laptop itself feature 3d? wether it's through active glasses or not it would be great if it did.

Anira

 

For replacing the disc drive with a HDD, someone made a guide to do it with the 15in model of this, somewhere on this forum. The nvidia graphics is a GDDR5 and the laptop itself is not 3D.

 

Hi guys could you tell when is this laptop is going to hit canadian market ?

 

When I use Fn-F12 to toggle wireless off or on, the screen blanks out for a second or two, similar to what would happen when you change the resolution. Does this happen for anyone else?

 

Has anyone run the PCMark7 benchmark yet?

I would be most interested in the PCMark7 score. I use it for purchasing decisions, since it approximates most closely my usage pattern.

(The benchmark can be downloaded free: Download PCMark 7 - Complete PC test for Windows 7 | PCMark)

 

the screeb is just an O.K to you?! thought it was the best after seeing it in store today..and the speakers are truly amazing.. and ive own high end dell ips mintors and many pairs of high end headphones..

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I717 using Tapatalk 2

 

Are the arrow keys hard to use in games? I saw the pictures and found that the arrow keys are half-height and seem a little bit ugly.

 

I meant that it don't have those "yellow spots", but other than that the screen looks good, haven't compared side-by-side so I can't say nothing really yet.

Speakers are good, can't argue with that...

Wi-fi gets faster aafter few minutes, not a big problem with it I think...

 

Yes, it does for me as well. It turns both wifi off and bluetooth off.

People have reported that a SSD speeds up the delay found in the buttons. Not sure if this function directly is sped up though.

 

Hi all,

Picked up this laptop yesterday at BBY. I'm moving back to Windows from Mac after 9 years so be gentle... I need some newb help...

I have a new ssd arriving today (crucial 512mb) and I'm very unclear about how to reinstall windows and all of the Samsung software on the new SSD so it's back to an out-of-the-box setup. I like how the backlight, volume keys, etc work so I'd like to make sure it's just the same as the original factor install on the SSD.

Can anyone please help me with a quick step-by-step guide?

 

I have this posted on the previous page.. If you backup via the recovery manager, you get everything back, including the keyboard function keys and backlighting.

 

Thanks - I did that Samsung Recovery Solution and did the "System Software Backup" to a dvd. I was concerned though that it was only ~ 4,200 megs - So I'm guessing it's not everything I installed since I bought the laptop - just the core things that bring it back to out-of-the-box?

So the process is:

1. Use the blue Samsung Recovery disk to reinstall the stuff, then
2. Use the dvd I created via System Software Backup

??

 

Yep, that sounds right! I checked my samsung software backup folder, and here is the size on disk: 4,471,246,848 bytes

So

1) boot from the windows CD that you got with your laptop. You will end up with a completely bare bones windows 7 install. Yes I think it's blue

2) Run the EXE from your samsung backup file.

FYI, I did not reinstall express cache, still deciding what to do with that.

 

Let me clarify!!! this is ONLY factory samsung software. Nothing that you have installed...

 

Great - I'll give this a shot and hopefully it works. No problem with it being factory only stuff, I can reinstall everything.

As for expresscache - no idea what that is - let me know what you decide to do if installing it makes a difference and I may do the same.

Also - the door to that memory slot on the back is a real pain. I tried to take it off yesterday to see what's in there but I was sure sure it was going to break that I didn't... It's like it's glued to something in the middle of the door, and whatever it's glued to can slide. I can lift the part with the nub up, slide it, then take up the parts with the 2 hings/latch things.. but in the middle it's like it's glued to something. Did you experience that?

 

I did. Unfortunately you will experience this will the entire case removal. Honestly that door wont break. The middle part is just held on by two plastic tabs. Just pull with moderate force and it will pop off.... I was just as worried as you!