My new vortex IV laptop finally arrived Saturday. PCS had a mix up at their warehouse and it was marked as 'waiting for dispatch' 3 days early. So after I paid for 5 day dispatch it actually took about 8. However it was worth the wait... the spec is below with a basic review:
Unpacking:
The big outer box had a nice big dent in the side but the inner box was fine, and so was all the kit. The laptop itself has a brushed metal effect on the top which I really like, which is repeated on the touchpad. It is unbranded on the top which I also like, kind of a 'sleeper' look. It is heavy, about 4.5kg, but feels very solid.
The power pack is HUGE but what do you expect. Windows 7 Professional boots up to login screen in about 10 seconds, and once you've logged in there's no waiting around before you can use the system. I'm SO glad I got an SSD for the OS.
The screen is matte (I hate gloss screens) and the resolution is brilliant.
Drivers:
The only driver I had to install was the hotkey driver for the backlit keyboard. PCS cocked up a bit with the driver disk they sent me, as it apparently isn't compatible with my OS
so I just grabbed the driver from their website, no bother.
Devices:
The fingerprint scanner was really easy to get going. I enrolled my fingerprint without any problems and it's so much easier using it to log in. My old laptop has one but the software was rubbish and I never bothered using it in the end.
The keyboard is really nice to use, the main enter key is tiny but I am getting used to it. The backlit keyboard is actually really cool as you can split the keyboard into 3 sections and choose colours for each. I have it like that permanently. The touchpad feels good enough, but I don't use it.
The Onkyo speakers are very very good, I don't use them often as I game with a headset but they are loud with a pretty decent bass response considering it's a laptop.
Payday 2:
I can run Payday 2 on the highest settings apart from anisotropic filtering which cannot be higher than 8x or the system completely crashes (hard reboot). I am also wondering if this is caused by a Windows update, as it stopped crashing after I changed the filtering to 8x AND I downloaded a new update. Who knows, it works now and looks great so I'm not bothered.
DayZ:
DayZ runs fine on high settings in all departments, and 100% rendering resolution. I lose a few FPS in cities but that happens to everyone. I'd be interested to get a more demanding game to see how it performs, but that will have to wait.
So to briefly round it up so far (notice the cons are trivial at worst!):
PROS
1) Awesome performance (I will get FPS numbers if possible)
2) Brilliant speakers
3) Nice finish on the chassis and it looks good
4) Excellent keyboard
5) Fingerprint scanner actually works
CONS
1) Driver disc was for the wrong OS
2) It is heavy
3) Huge power pack
4) Power adaptor plugs into the back not the side
5) Dispatch problems with PCS
Well worth the money overall, I didn't want a desktop for quite a few reasons and I'm chuffed to bits with this machine.
Unpacking:
The big outer box had a nice big dent in the side but the inner box was fine, and so was all the kit. The laptop itself has a brushed metal effect on the top which I really like, which is repeated on the touchpad. It is unbranded on the top which I also like, kind of a 'sleeper' look. It is heavy, about 4.5kg, but feels very solid.
The power pack is HUGE but what do you expect. Windows 7 Professional boots up to login screen in about 10 seconds, and once you've logged in there's no waiting around before you can use the system. I'm SO glad I got an SSD for the OS.
The screen is matte (I hate gloss screens) and the resolution is brilliant.
Drivers:
The only driver I had to install was the hotkey driver for the backlit keyboard. PCS cocked up a bit with the driver disk they sent me, as it apparently isn't compatible with my OS
so I just grabbed the driver from their website, no bother.Devices:
The fingerprint scanner was really easy to get going. I enrolled my fingerprint without any problems and it's so much easier using it to log in. My old laptop has one but the software was rubbish and I never bothered using it in the end.
The keyboard is really nice to use, the main enter key is tiny but I am getting used to it. The backlit keyboard is actually really cool as you can split the keyboard into 3 sections and choose colours for each. I have it like that permanently. The touchpad feels good enough, but I don't use it.
The Onkyo speakers are very very good, I don't use them often as I game with a headset but they are loud with a pretty decent bass response considering it's a laptop.
Payday 2:
I can run Payday 2 on the highest settings apart from anisotropic filtering which cannot be higher than 8x or the system completely crashes (hard reboot). I am also wondering if this is caused by a Windows update, as it stopped crashing after I changed the filtering to 8x AND I downloaded a new update. Who knows, it works now and looks great so I'm not bothered.
DayZ:
DayZ runs fine on high settings in all departments, and 100% rendering resolution. I lose a few FPS in cities but that happens to everyone. I'd be interested to get a more demanding game to see how it performs, but that will have to wait.
So to briefly round it up so far (notice the cons are trivial at worst!):
PROS
1) Awesome performance (I will get FPS numbers if possible)
2) Brilliant speakers
3) Nice finish on the chassis and it looks good
4) Excellent keyboard
5) Fingerprint scanner actually works
CONS
1) Driver disc was for the wrong OS
2) It is heavy
3) Huge power pack
4) Power adaptor plugs into the back not the side
5) Dispatch problems with PCS
Well worth the money overall, I didn't want a desktop for quite a few reasons and I'm chuffed to bits with this machine.
Last edited:
