Custom lappy v Currys - Opinions

[Jonnyash]

Hi All,

I am wanting to spend around £850.00 on a laptop that I can play the latest games with (note that I am not anal about ultra high settings). I went to Curry's and spied a Samsung Series 5 for around that price.

I have now put together a custom Optimus 17.3" weapon and want some opinions as to how much better this is (I know it will be but by how much?). Here are the specs:

Chassis & Display Optimus Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-3630QM (2.40GHz) 6MB
Memory (RAM) 12GB SAMSUNG 1600MHz SODIMM DDR3 MEMORY (3 x 4GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 660M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 11
2nd Graphics Card NONE
Memory - 1st Hard Disk 750GB WD SCORPIO BLACK WD7500BPKT, SATA 3 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
2nd Hard Disk NONE
RAID NONE
1st 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 ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND (£9)

Thanks!

 

[Jaydea]

Lets put it this way; The Samsung will NOT be able to play games. The Optimus will be able to play most games near maxed out fluidly.

And since you actually want to play games, the Samsung shouldn't even be a consideration for your purchase.

 

[tom_gr7]

Lets put it this way; The Samsung will NOT be able to play games. The Optimus will be able to play most games near maxed out fluidly.

And since you actually want to play games, the Samsung shouldn't even be a consideration for your purchase.

lol, haha well said.

 

[Toxophilix]

I saw the specs for the Samsung in the other thread you posted in. The forum mods may delete the link as it's to a competitor site, but having seen it I have to say that it seems quite cynically designed. I think the significant parts are:

i7-3610QM
This is basically the same CPU as the 3630QM in your Optimus, just 100 MHz slower. You wouldn't really notice that in gaming. However, the 3610QM has been more or less superseded by the 3630.

NVIDIA® GT650M
This is a good GPU for lower screen resolutions. I have one in the Inferno I'm typing on and it's quite capable at my 1366 x 768 resolution. At higher resolutions it will struggle. (Well, let me qualify that. There are two versions of the card, one with DDR3 memory and one with GDDR5. The latter will handle higher resolutions better but is more expensive. As the Currys link doesn't mention which is included I would bet that it's the DDR3 version.) But then again ...

Screen - 1600 x 900
... the Samsung doesn't have 1080p resolution anyway. That's a very significant difference on a 17" laptop. You really want full HD at that screen size. The Samsung spec strikes me as a 15" spec inflated to 17" without the upgrades (in screen resolution and GPU) necessary to maintain graphics quality (this is what I think is cynical).

1 TB SATA II 5400 rpm
Slow hard drive. I think they wave the "1 TB" at people and hope they won't notice the other number.

So in summary the Optimus spec will give you better performance at higher resolution (one that is suitable for the screen-size) and significantly faster disk storage.

Oh, and you'll get knowledgable support from PCS (and quite possibly from this forum). Currys/PCWorld, not so much. Ratings on Trust Pilot:

PC World : 2.5
Currys : 3.5
PC Specialist : 9.4

 

[mdwh]

It's hard to say without seeing the spec, Series 5 covers a lot of different models. Samsung do have laptops more geared towards gaming, though not at that price range AFAIK. In general, I've found that mainstream shops/brands only seem to cater for gaming at the high end (at least £1000, often more like £1500). PCS offer better customisation, so it's easier to get something that is optimised for gaming at lower price.

 

[Pagey]

I certainly have to agree with everyone for going with the Optimus IV, it's a very capable laptop for it's price, (coming from a contented user.)

Tox: Not sure why PCW and Currys have separate scores, they're actually one company now.

 

[SmokeDarKnight]

I certainly have to agree with everyone for going with the Optimus IV, it's a very capable laptop for it's price, (coming from a contented user.)

Tox: Not sure why PCW and Currys have separate scores, they're actually one company now.

Currys staff get extra points because most of them can tell the difference between a washing machine and a PC. If there was a washing machine in PC world i'm not sure if the same could be said