Advice On Battery Life Of Enigma i7 Laptop? Intel i5 or i7?

H

henradical

Member
Hi every one :)

I have specked out a new laptop for myself (Enigma i7 / II) but I have a few questions about the processor and battery life.

I can't decide between a Intel i5 580M processor, or a i7 740QM. :confused:
My immediate choice was the i7 740QM as it has 4 cores instead of the 2 cores the i5 580M has, and it is only £6 more. However I read somewhere that the i7 drains the battery much more, and that it doesn't have integrated graphics, meaning I am stuck with the ATI 5650 graphics card when on battery which means it will go flat even quicker!

Could someone please tell me how many hours long roughly the i7 740QM is expected to last for on battery, and the same for the i5 580M???

I tend to do multitasking; video / audio conversions; video and image editing (sony vegas and photoshop); Light / Medium gaming. However I also use it for school and corsework (hense the question about battery life)
 
PCS

PCS

Administrator
Staff member
Welcome to our forums :)

Firstly, here's a review from another member. The battery life is mentioned here: http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?2235-Enigma-II-Review

There are also quite a few other threads discussing battery life here.

Here's some further information:

1. With normal settings, it goes into hibernation when it is 5% left of the battery. We measured the battery life from 100% to 5% when it hibernated.
Idle (50% brightness, wlan and bluetooth on): 3h 40m

2. DVDrip on vlc (50% brightness, wlan and bluetooth off, headphones with 50% volume): 2h 40m

3. 1080p, x264, DTS-HD audio on Media Player Classic (same as above): 2h 10m

It is actually possible to watch a full 1080p movie with standard length.
 
H

henradical

Member
PCS said:
1. With normal settings, it goes into hibernation when it is 5% left of the battery. We measured the battery life from 100% to 5% when it hibernated. Idle (50% brightness, wlan and bluetooth on): 3h 40m

2. DVDrip on vlc (50% brightness, wlan and bluetooth off, headphones with 50% volume): 2h 40m

3. 1080p, x264, DTS-HD audio on Media Player Classic (same as above): 2h 10m
Click to expand...

Sorry, but which processor was used here? The second link doesn't come back with anything!
If need be what are the chances of being able to buy a bigger battery eg. 9 or 12 cells instead of the 6 cells the Enigma comes with?

If not I might just wait until until the Sandy Bridge laptops come out as they have integrated graphics meaning longer batery life!
 
Last edited:
PCS

PCS

Administrator
Staff member
The specs were as follows:

Configuration:
~1920x1080 LED LCD screen
~Intel Core I5 540m
~320GB SATA 7200RPM
~4 GB ram
~Bluetooth
~Standard keyboard (not the one with sharp edged)

Unfortunately we do not stock larger capacity batteries, only spare 6 cell batteries.
 
J

joamea

Member
Enigma i7 experience

I've had my Enigma II with an i7 processor for over a month now and I have been more than impressed with the battery life compared to my previous laptop. Battery life is in excess of 2.5 hours. The only negative I'm finding is that the I'm getting soreness after extensive use of the keyboard, something I haven't had before with other laptops and other keyboards. There's a positive action, but the travel on the keys is longer.

Overall I'm very impressed with my new laptop and the screen is top notch. It runs Photoshop CS5 with ease.
 
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