Some thoughts about this 17.3 Defiance II

[van Jurco]

Good morning!

This is my first post here on the forum so I would like to take the opportunity and say HELLO!

Also, I am curious about your thoughts on this Gaming Laptop Configuration that I just made.

Just before you could say "Why not buy a PC instead?" I would like to point out that this is meant to be only a temporary measure up until I will buy a more expensive PC with probably SLI config and water-cooling and at that point my wife will have this laptop as she is a gamer like me. At the moment I want to buy a laptop for mobility reasons first of all and secondly for gaming.

My budget is situated at maximum 1500 pounds and I wish to purchase this laptop in about 2 weeks from now!
I tried to make up the config going for maximum performance at the lowest possible cost and this is what I managed to achieve.

Some of my questions are:

1) What do you think of this config? Is there anything which I can add or remove? I forgot to mention that I already have a mouse and I will be buying later a cooling pad.
2) I was thinking about buying a second battery as I had this option available. How does that actually work? Is it just a replacement battery or will I just have double the energy at the same time?
3) I'm not sure about the A/C adaptor. I had to choose between 180W and 200W. Which one is best and why?

Have a good day!

Chassis & Display
Defiance Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Processor 6820HK (2.7GHz, 3.6GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM)
16GB HyperX IMPACT 2133MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 980M - 8.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12
Memory - Hard Disk
1TB WD BLACK 2.5" WD10JPLX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 32MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
M.2 SSD Drive
120GB INTEL® 540S M.2 6Gb/s SSD (upto 560MB/sR | 400MB/sW)
Memory Card Reader
Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)
Sound Card
Intel 2 Channel High Def. Audio + MIC/Headphone + SoundBlaster X-Fi MB3
Bluetooth & Wireless
GIGABIT LAN & KILLER™ WIRELESS-AC 1535 M.2 GAMING 802.11AC + BLUETOOTH 4.1
USB Options
4 x USB 3.0 PORTS AS STANDARD
Battery
Defiance Series 4 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (60WH)
Power Lead & Adaptor
1 x UK Power Lead & 200W AC Adaptor
Keyboard Language
DEFIANCE SERIES SINGLE COLOUR BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD
Operating System
NO OPERATING SYSTEM REQUIRED
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
NO OFFICE SOFTWARE
Anti-Virus
NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser
Google Chrome™
Notebook Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 2.0 MEGAPIXEL WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Gold Warranty (2 Year Collect & Return, 2 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£69)
Dead Pixel Guarantee
1 Year Dead Pixel Guarantee Inc. Labour & Carriage Costs (£19)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 4 to 6 working days
Quantity
1

Price: £1,468.00 including VAT and delivery.

Unique URL to re-configure: http://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/quotes/defianceII-17/w50aUHXeWf/

 

[van Jurco]

Anyone?

 

[Rendigore]

1) Your build looks very solid and will perform well for a laptop - I realise you stated that you need it for mobility but you could get a mini-pc of the same specs (performance-wise) for a third of the price; which is still fairly mobile.

2) The second battery is indeed a second battery; you have to take the primary one out and replace it with the secondary one.

3) A/C adapters aren't really too much of a problem when it comes to laptops and 20W will not make a noticeable difference.

Personally as you yourself have mentioned though; I would choose a desktop and save yourself a lot of money.

 

[van Jurco]

First of all, thank you very much for your reply. I really appreciate it. Second, I just want to say that I would choose a desktop later on but that will be maybe 2 years from now, I will spend probably double on it and as I said mobility is a key issue for me as I travel, not a lot but still and also if I would buy a desktop that will mean I will also need a monitor so I will exceed my budget. Anyway I will think about this as you made some valid points there. Thank you again.

If anyone else has something to add please feel free to do so.

Cheers!

 

[Flo]

Hi. If the intended use of the laptop is gaming, you won't need the 6820HK processor. I have the same laptop with the standard processor/gtx 970 and it is super fast. You could use the money towards a 250gb ssd instead. Other than that it looks good to me. No point in getting the second battery as you will have to take the back cover off in order to swap them. As for the charger, the 180W will do for the standard processor. If you want to keep the one in your quote then go for the 200W one.

 

[Rendigore]

Flo makes a good point about the processor - if it is solely for gaming most games do not make use of hyperthreading and therefore the i7 does not really benefit you over an i5 which is easily sufficient enough.

 

[Flo]

Flo makes a good point about the processor - if it is solely for gaming most games do not make use of hyperthreading and therefore the i7 does not really benefit you over an i5 which is easily sufficient enough.

The Defiance does not come with the i5 option. I was actually referring to the i7 6700hq which in my opinion is more than capable for everyday use and gaming. Downgrading the processor would help saving £30 which can then go into a bigger SSD as already mentioned.

 

[van Jurco]

Thank you so much about the idea with downgrading the cpu. I'm gonna definitely go on a 240GB INTEL M.2 SSD.

 

[Lez501]

If you can stretch your budget to £1,492 - I would install a Samsung SM951 256GB M.2 drive instead - about 3 times faster than the Intel one.