What should a gaming College student get?

[AftershockPC]

Actually I'm using a NP 9150 now and the battery life w/o running any multimedia application and with medium brightness goes up to 3.5 hours or so for me, so you should be pretty safe for a single class. You could probably push that up to maybe 4hrs + if you put it down to low settings? That being said, I invested in a second adapter to put in my office so I don't have to lug the thing around (I usually shuttle between home and office, and will only carry it if I'm heading somewhere else).

Charging time is pretty quick, I never really keep track of the time taken though so can't really comment. I could try it later in the day and update you if no one else has answered that :P

[ralchevd]

Oh, and about how long does it take to charge 0 to 100%?

Depends on the battery, my macbook loads for about an hour.

[Willingo]

It'd be nice to know, Aftershock, but don't go out of your way to find out. That's a much better battery life. Thank you. How do you like the NP9150? What are you most disappointed about?
Thank you rachel, that gives me an idea.

[AftershockPC]

I'm really happy with the NP 9150. Tbh, there isn't much I'm disappointed about it. Maybe except having to change drivers a few times for the 7970m, as the original drivers were pretty bad. The latest releases are pretty good though, but I'd say the 7970m upgrade for the 9150 are not for people who don't like to tinker You can stick to the older cards like the nvidia 675m if so though.

Edit: Just a quick update it's about 1 hr and 10 min or so since I started charging and its up to 96 % already that's while watching a movie. (starting was around 6-7 %)

[tommytomatoe]

I went from 0% dead battery to fully charged. I've been in the library for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Im doing some hardware changes and drained the battery the other day. Finally got around to setting everything back up and now it is fully charged.

Internet is faster at university library than my house so I come here to use internet sometimes. Also, I have a free copy of Windows 7 enterprise that is activated via the university's DNS. I just made a 70gb partition for windows just now. Figured I'd do a a little gaming since steam has some good sales right now, and no steam on linux yet.

Sent from my EVO using Tapatalk 2

[Willingo]

Awesome, great guys! I heard the AMD drivers are not that great? If it is easy to explain, what is a driver, and how much trouble would the 7970 make for me, bring a beginner at this stuff and all. Gtx 675 or AMD 7970?

[Willingo]

Actually, I bet that I could find some threads discussing 675 vs 7970. I'd still like to hear your opinions, though, seeing as how you both understand where I am at this point.

[jrfox87]

Actually, I bet that I could find some threads discussing 675 vs 7970. I'd still like to hear your opinions, though, seeing as how you both understand where I am at this point.

These links will show you benchmarks for the 675m and the 7970m and give you a better idea of the performance difference between the two.

NVIDIA GeForce GTX 675M - Notebookcheck.net Tech

AMD Radeon HD 7970M - Notebookcheck.net Tech

[B3RL1N]

Go with a Clevo/Sager all the way :-)

You'll be happy with all the performance potential you have at your disposal for the offset of additional weight/medium battery life (2-2.5 hours).

However, if weight is a real issue any laptop with 650m will play most games more than fine. Not sure about 640m, so I can't comment until I look it up. I say go for 650m minimum if you plan on gaming.

Sent from my EVO using Tapatalk 2

Well damnit, here I am looking for a new laptop and who should I find?

When you're not hiding out on XDA and MikMik, is this where you go?

----

Since Willingo has made his decision, I figured I'd post here for a question.

Thar be dragons ahead:

I've been battling with the concept of building a gaming laptop or a new desktop for little over a month now. It's gotten to the point where I'm going insane.

My current computers are a 2007 iMac Intel Core 2 Duo w/ ATI 2600 HD 256MB and a first generation Intel Atom EeePC 1000HA netbook. Needless to say, I'm in dire need of an upgrade. I'm going to be honest, I'm a tad bit weary of upgrading from OS X and going back to Windows. I use XP on regular basis on my netbook and previous to that, I was a 14 year user of Windows 98/XP/7. So I don't hate Windows or anything, I've just grown accustom to OS X. I received my iMac when my cousin (who can afford to) upgraded to a 2010 i7 iMac. I hated it at first, but it grew on me. The issue? Macs are stupid expensive and the only OS X based product I'd ever buy is an Air, because most Windows based solutions are the same price/more expensive. (I'm not a fan of paying extra for a form factor though)

So I personally need both a desktop and a laptop. My iMac works for 90% of what I do, mostly web/programming based work with some photoshop here and there. Now for the other 10%, I use to do a lot of video editing, such as Premiere and After Effects; doing either of those on my iMac is a painful process, especially when rendering at 1080p. Yesterday I was sorting through about 1,000 12MP photos and capped out my processor for about 3 hours, which was a grueling process. The only upgrade I can do to my iMac is swap out the HDD for an SSD. A graphics card upgrade is stupid expensive ($600 for something outdated) and that doesn't solve the CPU issue. (I already have capped out my RAM, so that's no-go - I just need a new computer)

Next to that, my netbook is pretty much a year past its end of life. The only thing I can do is add a SSD so applications boot quicker, but its limited to SATA II and the Atom processor is a massive bottleneck.

So, why is this driving me so crazy?
- I need a new desktop, but I also need a new laptop.
- I like OS X and am a little hesitant about going back to Windows.
- I'd like something for gaming, preferable top of the line, but I don't really need a gaming machine per say, I just want to play GW2.
- Also, if I decide to build a desktop, I need to sell my iMac and purchase a new monitor.
- The deal is my iMac works for me "most of the time." So do I really need a new desktop?
- I also go to College and would like something portable, but worst case scenario I always have my netbook for taking note, even though the screen/processor blows.

Now, my BIGGEST concern when it comes to laptops, is thermals. On my last gaming computer I went through two video card in 8 years. I can see me wearing out a video card in a laptop in probably two years. (I'm looking forward to GW2 as is OP) For this reason, I'm interested in MXM capable laptops. The problem is, there are VERY few MXM laptops. Sager makes the bulk of them and the only other laptop I'd consider with MXM is the ASUS G75VW, which is quite pricey. This way, if I burn out a video card, I can just buy another for $400. (Upgrading would be another story)

As far as video cards go, I want Kepler, Fermi can suck it. 40nm my * expletive.* The only Kepler cards I'm interested in are the 650m, 660m and 680m. The 680m is out of the question, but I'm not paying $400 for a mobile graphics card. And neither the 650m and 660m come in MXM form. Although I oddly enough found the Eurocom Neptune to have a 660m 1GB card. (Don't know if its MXM or soldered onto the motherboard) - I can't link to it because Eurocom uses a really terrible design for their website. - Also, Eurocom is really expensive. So other than nVidia, there's the 28nm ATI 7970M, which, while having really flakey driver support, is a great deal for $200. (Sounds like a huge Enduro problem though) I was incredibly interested in the Sager NP9150 for the longest time but started to give up on it after I read a lot of people with sporadic thermal readings and bad ATI graphics support. Most people are doing some crazy and thorough mods to max out their cooling. I'm not scared to open up my laptop, but I'd rather not have to void my warranty off the bat. - I honestly just want the 660m in MXM, but I'm living a pipe dream at this point in time.

If I reluctantly skip out on the MXM card and shoot for the 660m, I'm between the Lenovo Y580 and Asus G55VW. The Lenovo Y580 has next to no reviews and a questionable thermals rating. The Asus G55VW has great reviews, awesome thermals (8*C cooler than 9150) / (is also freaking heavy, 7 lbs+ due to the heatsink) but no Optimus. (WHY!?) - But then I have the fear of burning out my graphics card and ending up with a $1400 paper weight. Versus a $400 fix.

So, I've yet to find the "perfect" laptop, which will probably never happen. But the Sager NP9150 is quite close. Although I also would like the G55VW because of its amazing thermal properties, but it lacks MXM. Although I need to be really careful with my assumption of problematic thermals on the Sager, because it's the minority with problems that seems to speak the loudest on the forums. Although, the problems seem to be very real and affects a decent ratio of users.

SO. (Again) With that aside, if I dipped out on the laptop and just built a desktop, I'd end up spending $2100. (With a GTX 680 and a $400 Shimian WQHD monitor) But I'd sell my iMac and make $700/$800. So it'd cost me about $1400 give or take. (taxes) A Sager would cost me more ($1600?) after Hardware mods (7970m + second HD bay in place of CD drive and other misc) - The only issue is, if I buy a desktop, the I'm stuck with my netbook for a laptop and I loose the comfortability I've had with OS X for these past 3 years. I was thinking about buying a Clambook for my HTC EVO LTE, which comes out in Q4 '12. But that's pretty much netnook status, minus the screen real-estate I'd be getting. Or, perhaps I buy a Macbook Air in 2013 with a Haswell processor. Perhaps they will have FHD screens by then. (About thats another $1400 I'd have to spend) This way, if I pick up C++ and want to work with iOS, I don't have use a virtual machine to develop apps. But again, I'd truly miss OS X. (Yes I know about Hackintosh. There's no GTX6XX or HD4000 support)

All in all, this is mainly a person choice. So with all that said:
- Do I need a laptop right now? No.
- Will I need one in the near future? Most likely, yes.
- Do I need a new desktop right now? 3/4ths of the time, no, not exactly. But it'd be really nice.
- What's my main purpose for a new desktop/laptop. Mostly gaming. (It's sad, but that's the main reason. I haven't played a PC game in 4+ years I'm 5x better on a PC FPS than console.)
- Do I want to switch back to Windows from OS X? No.
- But can I afford Apple Tax? Most certainly not.
- Could I dual boot Windows (Gaming) and Linux (Everything else?) Yes, but Linux would require Wine for CS6 and I don't know how well OpenGL would work.

My best bet is to keep my desktop and buy a gaming laptop. But they don't last very long and I'd be nice to have some ultra portable like an Air. But I should probably just buy a new desktop and purchase a new monitor. (The monitor being a whole other story)

TL:DR
- Can someone please just call me an idiot for not wanting to upgrade from OS X to Windows 7? 4 years ago I'd be ripping on someone who made a post like this a new one, crying "get a new desktop noob." Although the ecosystem has changed since then. I've been drawn in by the cult of Mac.
- And I don't need a laptop right now, but I probably do need a new desktop; should I hold off on the laptop and build a gaming desktop, combine the two into one, or just buy a gaming laptop?
- Thermals? I'm really concerned about them. We're talking 10*C either way. I know 90*C is when I should be concerned, (Although at that point its manufacturing/thermal paste error) but the cooler, the better. (Regardless of optimum heating temperatures, less heat = less tear)

And yes I know I talk a lot.

[Willingo]

I'm interested to hear more about the thermal side of the NP9150 as well