Laptop for light gaming and work

[AgentPaper]

I'm currently looking to buy a new laptop, which I intend to use mostly for work (aka: very light load), but also as a sort-of gaming rig for when I'm travelling.

I don't need to be able to run the latest and greatest games by any means, but something that can run most games on low-medium settings will be perfectly fine. Battery life is a plus, but not necessary as it will usually be plugged in and stationary. Similarly size isn't an issue, I'm fine with large/heavy laptops since it'll spend most of it's time on my desk.

What I do need, is something that can stand up to being used 8 hours a day without overheating or wearing down, and preferably will last a good few years of use. My current laptop is powerful enough for me, but has been getting worse and worse for heating concerns, to the point that I can't run it without a fan blowing on it constantly anymore.

What I'm currently looking at getting is an ASUS N56VJ-DH71. That has 8GB of RAM, and i7, and what seems to be a decent graphics card, which about fits my demands. I don't need the 1TB of memory (half that would do) but memory is cheap so that's fine. My second option is the Alienware 14, which is similarly powered, and from a brand I know better, but is of course more expensive. Besides that, my brother recently got a laptop from Mythlogic, which is supposedly also good, but from what I can tell a similarly-powered laptop there is a few hundred more than the ASUS.

So my questions are:
1) Is ASUS a good brand?
2) Are there any issues with this specific model that I haven't found?
3) Are these specs right for what I'm trying to do? If they're too high/low, what would need up upgrade/downgrade?
4) What alternatives other than the ones I mentioned are there?

 

[Ghan]

1. ASUS is a good brand, but typically you can find cheaper stuff to do the same thing.
2. The issue is that the graphics card is pretty much trash for that price range. Look here: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html
Notice that the 635M (as of this writing) is #131. I just found this deal today: http://slickdeals.net/permadeal/100...gb-ssd-8gb-ddr3-nvidia-gt750m-gddr5-2gb-win-8

The advantage of this machine is:
- SSD in addition to the 1 TB hard drive
- Haswell CPU (lower average power consumption and faster than Ivy Bridge)
- MUCH better video card. Notice the 750M ranks #70 on the list.
- $200 cheaper

It's an incredible deal and I'm surprised it exists. You do have to jump through the hoop of creating a Barnes and Noble discount account, but it doesn't sound too hard by looking at this page.

3. These specs aren't bad - you are definitely on the right track for what you want to do.
4. See above, and also:

This deal is nearly identical to the one above. Very very close:
http://www.logicbuy.com/deals/lenovo-ideapad-y510p-gaming-laptop/45553.aspx

Also:
http://www.logicbuy.com/deals/hp-envy-15-core-i7-laptop/14729.aspx
This might be a bit of a cheaper deal for you if you want. Check the graphics options available and see what's there. There is also a good bit of info on that site to read about each mobile card in the list.

I would generally advise to never buy an Alienware. They charge such a premium for those machines that it's a silly prospect. I have seen a few exceptions here and there, but that's generally how it is.

 

[The Helper]

I would go with what Ghan says

 

[AgentPaper]

Thanks for the tips. I'll be sure to keep an eye on all three of those, and look for similar things in case the deals go away before I decide to buy.

 

[Slapshot136]

Besides that, my brother recently got a laptop from Mythlogic, which is supposedly also good, but from what I can tell a similarly-powered laptop there is a few hundred more than the ASUS.

somehow I would guess it has a better graphics card and/or a SSD

 

[AgentPaper]

Ok, finally ready to actually buy the computer. I can actually go a little bit over 1k if there's a good deal that's worth it.

Looks like the only deal of the ones you listed is the last one, HP ENVY, which I'm using as my current go-to option. Are there any other deals like this that have come up in the meantime? I don't really know how to search for this kind of thing. I'm also kinda useless at figuring out which graphics cards are the best. I tried looking at the benchmark list you gave, but there's so much info there my eyes just kind of glaze over.

Edit: After looking around a bit more, I also found this:
http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/ideapad/y-series/y410p/?redir=y#customize
Which seems to have a slightly better graphics card, and is a bit cheaper. My only issue is that it only has 8GB of RAM, which while sufficient, is a fair bit below the 16GB I can get on the ENVY deal. However, it says that it is user-upgradeable to 16 GB.

So my question is, how difficult would to be to do that upgrade? And how expensive? I can't tell if the base model comes as 2x4GB or a single 8GB ram, if the former, I would need to completely replace them, which would cost more. If that is in fact necessary, would I be able to re-sell the two 4GB ram cards? How much could I expect to get for them?

Edit: Edit: Asked CS, it is 2x4GB, so I would need to replace both. Of course, I wouldn't need to do that right away, but I'd probably want to do so sooner rather than later.

 

[AgentPaper]

Ok, so after some more research, even with the cost of the two extra RAM sticks, the Ideapad is still cheaper than the ENVY, and with a better graphics card to boot. Upgrading the RAM also looks fairly easy, so that should be just fine.

So, all that's left is to confirm that I'm not missing something important here. From everything I can see, the IdeaPad looks like a good option, but then I'm by no means an expert so if I could just get a final confirmation, that would be excellent. If all goes well, I should be buying later today.

Edit: Actually, the really final thing I want to ask, is if it would be possible to hook up a second monitor to this laptop, or any other. This is actually something I've wanted to do, but haven't been able to. What do I need to be able to do this? Is there some specific hardware that I would need?

 

[Ghan]

The important thing here, I think, is the screen resolution. The HP has a full 1080p resolution screen, while the Lenovo only has a standard 1366 x 768 screen. HP is also slightly larger at 15" vs. 14".

You can also look at this 15" Lenovo: http://www.logicbuy.com/deals/lenovo-ideapad-y510p-gaming-laptop/45553.aspx

As for an external display, all three laptops have HDMI ports, so you just need an HDMI cable and a display that supports it in order to use one. It's generally really easy to set up.

 

[AgentPaper]

I had noticed the smaller display, but that one plus the RAM upgrade is over my budget. (The 1080p version is $999) On second thought, though, I'll probably go with the larger one and just leave off upgrading the RAM for now.

For the external display, I specifically want to be able to use the external display and the main display at the same time, IE running a video on one and a browser on the other. I was under the impression that you needed some specialized software and/or hardware to support that?

 

[Ghan]

Is there a specific reason you need 16GB of RAM? I think a laptop is perfectly fine with 8. More never hurts, but RAM prices are quite high right now, which makes an upgrade not particularly cost-effective.

Any graphics driver these days can support running two independent displays to increase your work area. It's just a setting in whatever graphics control panel you get (in the case of these laptops, the Nvidia control panel)

 

[AgentPaper]

Yeah, 16 GB was probably overkill anyways. I may end up upgrading later on anyways, but 8 is probably plenty.

As for the independent displays, that's very good to know. I was looking at some other options, and all of them seemed fairly expensive. I'll have to look around and see if any of the monitors at the office have an HDMI adapter, or if I need to buy one.

Thank you very much for all the help!