Help me with my birthday present

[Joycie]

My 30th birthday is fast approaching and I have a gaming itch I severely need scratched. I have a budget of up to £2000 but to be honest I don't think I need to be spending that much for what I want. What I want is speed, stability & still be relevant 3-5yrs time. I would sacrifice graphics for processing power, I basically want to press a button and a screen to load instantly and loading screens to take no time at all. I play Total War flat out and I’m really excited about playing Rome II on a super fast gaming laptop. I also play Sim City, Football Manager, any management/strategy game for that matter. I don't play games like Crysis or Bioshock on the laptop so that's why I don't need amazing graphics per se, but I would like to be able to play Rome II on the highest settings. I’m stuck between two specs and would love some help in weighing up the pros and cons of each….

This is the first & cheapest option...

Chassis & Display
Optimus Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-3840QM (2.80GHz) 8MB is 3rd gen i7 still relevant?
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS 1600MHz SODIMM DDR3 (2 x 4GB) would upgrading to a 16gb help with processing speed?
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 660M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11 would this be good enough for most games?
Memory - Hard Disk
240GB KINGSTON HYPERX 3K SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 555MB/sR | 510MB/sW)
2nd Hard Disk
750GB WD SCORPIO BLACK WD7500BPKT, SATA 3 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit w/SP1 - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Laptop Cooling Stands
Xigmatek Talisman D2012 Notebook Cooler, upto 17.3 inch (£15)

Price: £1,335.00 including VAT and delivery.

Here's the second spec & a bit flashy, probably too flashy for me....

Chassis & Display
Vortex Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4700MQ (2.40GHz) 6MB would I be better trading in graphics for a better processor?
Memory (RAM)
8GB KINGSTON HYPER-X GENESIS 1600MHz SODIMM DDR3 (2 x 4GB)
Graphics Card
2 x NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 765M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11 I know I probably don't need this but will it not help for future games?
Memory - Hard Disk
240GB KINGSTON V300 SSD, SATA 6 Gb (450MB/R, 450MB/W)
2nd Hard Disk
500GB WD SCORPIO BLACK WD5000BPKT, SATA 3 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit w/SP1 - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Laptop Cooling Stands
Xigmatek Talisman D2012 Notebook Cooler, upto 17.3 inch (£15)

Price: £1,663.00 including VAT and delivery.


So what do you guys think? Anything you see as unnecessary? Would anything in particular give either that extra bit of pace? Are there any builds you would particularly recommend for me?

Cheers in advance guys.

 

[mantadog]

Is a desktop out of the question?

For the rest of this reply I will presume it is, but if it is possible a desktop would be better.

Out of the 2 build I would go for the Vortex, but I would go for a better GPU if your looking for it to last 3-5 years. The 780m is probably your only choice to be honest.

Here is what I would get.

Chassis & Display
Vortex Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4700MQ (2.40GHz) 6MB More than enough horsepower for your needs, anything more is not worth the price hike
Memory (RAM)
4GB SAMSUNG 1333MHz SODIMM DDR3 MEMORY (1 x 4GB) Was supposed to be 8GB +£30 to the quote price below
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 780M - 4.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11 Laptops struggle vs desktops when it comes to gaming so really for 5 years worth of gaming you need to get as much GPU as you can afford.
Memory - Hard Disk
180GB INTEL® 520 SERIES SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 550MB/sR | 520MB/sW) The specs on these intel drives are amazing, I would go for intel is you can stomach the cost
2nd Hard Disk
500GB WD SCORPIO BLACK WD5000BPKT, SATA 3 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
8x SATA DVD±R/RW/Dual Layer (+ 24x CD-RW)
Memory Card Reader
Internal 9 in 1 Card Reader (MMC/RSMMC/SD: Mini, XC & HC/MS: Pro & Duo)
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING Also forgot to upgrade this, well worth it. +£9 to quote
Sound Card
Intel 5.1 Channel High Definition Audio + SPDIF/MIC/Headphone Jack
Bluetooth & Wireless
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® N135 802.11N (150Mbps) + BLUETOOTH
USB Options
3 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT AS STANDARD
Firewire
1 X 1394a FIREWIRE PORT
Battery
Vortex Series 8 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (5,200 mAh/76.96WH)
Power Lead & Adaptor
1 x UK Power Lead & 230W AC Adaptor
Operating System
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit w/SP1 - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365
Anti-Virus
BULLGUARD INTERNET SECURITY - FREE 90 DAY TRIAL
Keyboard Language
INTEGRATED BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD WITH NUMBER PAD
Notebook Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 2.0 MEGAPIXEL WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Intel Anti-Theft Technology
FREE 90 Day Intel Anti-Theft Trial - Prevent Data Access upon Theft
Insurance
1 Month Free Laptop Insurance inc. Accidental Damage & Theft
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 9 to 11 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £1,528.00 including VAT and delivery.

Unique URL to re-configure: http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/quotes/vortexIV-17/7I_kxPWw9_/#

Seeing as that comes out much cheaper i'm not sure what I missed out but it's definatley worth a 780m if you can afford it. What exact configurator did you use?

 

[Joycie]

180GB INTEL® 520 SERIES SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s (upto 550MB/sR | 520MB/sW) The specs on these intel drives are amazing, I would go for intel is you can stomach the cost

Thanks for the advice

Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-4700MQ (2.40GHz) 6MB More than enough horsepower for your needs, anything more is not worth the price hike

I thought getting as close to 3GHz would future proof it?

4GB SAMSUNG 1333MHz SODIMM DDR3 MEMORY (1 x 4GB) Was supposed to be 8GB +£30 to the quote price below

I keep hearing 8gb is more than enough, excuse my ignorance but it isn't that much more for the 16gb ram & I thought that bit more ram would help with my strategy games where a lot is going on at any one time?

 

[keynes]

I thought getting as close to 3GHz would future proof it?

Performance depends on the CPU not clock speed.

I keep hearing 8gb is more than enough, excuse my ignorance but it isn't that much more for the 16gb ram & I thought that bit more ram would help with my strategy games where a lot is going on at any one time?

As far as I know gaming wise you won't get any benefits between 8gb and 16gb RAM.

 

[mantadog]

Upping the clock speed might help a little bit, but the cost of doing so is prohibitive. It works out nearly £120 for an increase in clock speed to 2.7Ghz that is £120 for a 12% speed boost and really you will be better saving that £120 in a jar for your next laptop. The next step to 2.8Ghz is £150 for a 4% boost, it just gets worse from then. Unless you have more cash than brain cells then you are best to stay with the 4700QM,

On the RAM, i'm still gaming on 4GB and although I don't have the latest titles i'm yet to max it out. I suspect when I get round to the latest titles I could do with a little more but 8Gb is going to be plenty for a good long time. Even if you had 16Gb in the system, most games wouldn't take any notice of most of it because they simply haven't been designed to take advantage of that much RAM due to the fact only a few per cent of systems have it.

 

[Joycie]

cheers for the info guys. yeah think I'll just stick with the i7-4700MQ and save my money.

what would be better... 1 x 8gb 1333mhz ram or 2 x 4gb 1600mhz???

 

[mantadog]

I don't think it makes much difference, but I always prefer to have 2 sticks. Something to do with being able to access each stick independently always crops up in my head, but I don't think it matters anywhere in the real world.