New Laptop help

[Cryptic]

Hi Guys,

Shortly going to be looking into buying a new laptop and need some advice.

Will be used for general netflix/daily browsing but need the ability to smoothly run software compiler/visual studio.
If possible in price range be able to do relatively decent with gaming but doesn't need to run cutting edge games as I will be looking into a stand alone gaming desktop in the near future aswell.
Also any suggestions on docking stations and cooling stands for the chassis picked would be really appreciated as when at home I want to use a two monitor set up with external keyboard and mouse.(Not part of the price for this build just needing some guidance if possible)

I am also updating my home office space so all parts below are included in the price guide.

Budget: £1800 - 2000

Must have's:
15.6" prefer but don't mind 17" chassis if it works out better for my setup
Minimum 1TB storage
16 or 32 gb ram
A processor and graphics card which can carry out the above (i7 7700GQ and 1050 Ti roughly stand out to me but I don't doubt there may be better combinations in the price range)
Need Win 10 OS home 64 bit and Office Home & Student license
2 monitors
GT Omega chair

Thanks for anyone's time who reads over this and for any responses in advance

 

[keynes]

For your budget I would suggest the octane with the i7-7770k and the GTX 1060.

 

[JDA1982]

If you can stretch to just over £2,00, this spec costs £2,062: https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/octaneIII-17/Fm9FGBnRn5/

Chassis & Display
Octane Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-7700k (4.2GHz) 8MB Cache
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE 2400MHz SODIMM DDR4 (1 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060 - 6.0GB GDDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1, G-SYNC
1st Hard Disk
1TB WD BLACK 2.5" WD10JPLX, SATA 6 Gb/s, 32MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive
NOT REQUIRED
Memory Card Reader
Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
AC Adaptor
1 x 330W AC Adaptor
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Thermal Paste
ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Sound Card
Intel 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Bluetooth & Wireless
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® AC-8265 M.2 (867Mbps, 802.11AC) +BT 4.0
USB Options
4 x USB 3.0 Ports + 2 x USB 3.1 Type C Ports
Battery
Octane Series 8 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (82WH)
Keyboard Language
OCTANE SERIES BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD WITH NUMBER PAD
Operating System
Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
Microsoft® Office Home & Student 2016 (1 License)
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)


Stand-Alone Monitor
ASUS VP228TE 22" LED DISPLAY
Notebook Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Gaming Chair
GT Omega PRO Racing Office Chair - Black Leather
Webcam
INTEGRATED 2.0 MP FULL HD WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 6 to 8 working days

For an extra £112 (£2,172 total) you can add a 256mb Samsung SM961 M2 SSD which I would do if you can afford it, and have the OS installed on that along with any main programs you use and programs. That will will significantly speed up the startup and loading times of anything installed on that drive.

 

[Oussebon]

If you're going to get a beefy desktop in the near future as well you may consider sticking to the Optimus chassis with its reasonably decent dGPU and 7700HQ:

Chassis & Display
Optimus Series: 15.6" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU)
Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Processor 7700HQ (2.8GHz, 3.8GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM)
16GB Corsair VENGEANCE 2400MHz SODIMM DDR4 (1 x 16GB)
Graphics Card
NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1050 Ti - 4.0GB GDDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1
1[SUP]st[/SUP] Hard Disk
1TB SLIM SERIAL ATA III 2.5" HARD DRIVE WITH 128MB CACHE (5,400rpm)
M.2 SSD Drive
256GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 1400MB/W)
Memory Card Reader
Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
AC Adaptor
1 x 120W AC Adaptor
Power Cable
1 x 1 Metre Cloverleaf UK Power Cable
Thermal Paste
STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING
Sound Card
Intel 2 Channel High Def. Audio + SoundBlaster™ Cinema 3
Bluetooth & Wireless
GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® AC-8265 M.2 (867Mbps, 802.11AC) +BT 4.0
USB Options
1 x USB 3.0 PORT (Type C) + 2 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Battery
Cosmos VI Series 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
Keyboard Language
SINGLE COLOUR BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD
Operating System
Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence
Operating System Language
United Kingdom - English Language
Office Software
FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365
Anti-Virus
BullGuard™ Internet Security - Free 90 Day License inc. Gamer Mode
Browser
Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)


Notebook Mouse
INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Webcam
INTEGRATED 1MP HD WEBCAM
Warranty
3 Year Standard Warranty (1 Month Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour)
Delivery
STANDARD INSURED DELIVERY TO UK MAINLAND (MON-FRI)
Build Time
Standard Build - Approximately 6 to 8 working days
Quantity
1

Price £1,136.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/optimusVIII-15/MJZADMh70Q/

---

An Octane with a 7700k, GTX 1060, and similar storage would be:
Price £1,677.00 including VAT and delivery

Unique URL to re-configure : https://www.pcspecialist.co.uk/saved-configurations/octaneIII-15/vJYh4SRjXG/

But I'm not sure it's worth it if you're about to get a desktop anyway.

 

[Cryptic]

Hi Guys,

Sorry for the late reply been on a business trip and had limited access via my work laptop.

Thanks for the suggestions they have helped me roughly decide what I want to do regarding my laptop.

Although I will be looking into a top spec desktop soon for gaming I am still looking to have this laptop to be a relatively high spec build aswell.

I am currently looking at two potential set ups:

Chassis & Display Proteus Series: 15.6" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Processor 7700HQ (2.8GHz, 3.8GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM) 32GB Corsair VENGEANCE 2400MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060 - 6.0GB GDDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1
1st Hard Disk 2TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA 2.5" SSHD - UP TO 5X FASTER THAN HDD!
M.2 SSD Drive 256GB M.2 2280, SATA 6Gb/s (546MB/R, 477MB/W)
Memory Card Reader Integrated 4 in 1 Card Reader (SD/SDHC/SDXC/MMC)
AC Adaptor 1 x Proteus Series 230W AC Adaptor
Power Cable 1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Thermal Paste ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
Sound Card Intel 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Bluetooth & Wireless GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® AC-8265 M.2 (867Mbps, 802.11AC) +BT 4.0, vPRO
USB Options 1 x USB 3.0 PORT (Type C) + 2 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT
Battery Proteus Series 8 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (5,200mAh)
Keyboard Language PROTEUS SERIES 15.6" BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD WITH NUMBER PAD
Operating System Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence
Operating System Language United Kingdom - English Language
DVD Recovery Media Windows 10 (64-bit) Home DVD with paper sleeve
Office Software Microsoft® Office Home & Student 2016 (1 Digital License)
Anti-Virus NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Stand-Alone Monitor ASUS VP228TE 22" LED DISPLAY
Notebook Mouse INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Gaming Mouse Pad Razer Vespula Gaming Mouse Mat (Dual Sided)
Gaming Chair GT Omega PRO Racing Office Chair - Black Leather
Webcam INTEGRATED 720P 30 FPS HD WEBCAM


and the second being:


Chassis & Display Defiance Series: 15.6" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Processor 7820HK (2.9GHz, 3.9GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM) 32GB Corsair VENGEANCE 2400MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 16GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060 - 6.0GB GDDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1, G-SYNC
1st Hard Disk 2TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA 2.5" SSHD - UP TO 5X FASTER THAN HDD!
DVD/BLU-RAY Drive NOT REQUIRED
Memory Card Reader Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)
AC Adaptor 1 x 230W AC Adaptor
Power Cable 1 x 1 Metre UK Power Cable (Kettle Lead)
Thermal Paste ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND
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 3 x USB 3.1 Type A, 2 x USB 3.1 Type C AS STANDARD
Battery Defiance Series 4 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (60WH)
Keyboard Language DEFIANCE SERIES RGB BACKLIT UK KEYBOARD
Operating System Genuine Windows 10 Home 64 Bit - inc DVD & Licence
Operating System Language United Kingdom - English Language
DVD Recovery Media Windows 10 (64-bit) Home DVD with paper sleeve
Office Software Microsoft® Office Home & Student 2016 (1 Digital License)
Anti-Virus NO ANTI-VIRUS SOFTWARE
Browser Microsoft® Edge (Windows 10 Only)
Stand-Alone Monitor AOC 18.5" E975SWDA LED TFT - 1366 x 768, 5MS, D-Sub, DVI-D
Notebook Mouse INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Gaming Mouse Pad Razer Vespula Gaming Mouse Mat (Dual Sided)
Gaming Chair GT Omega PRO Racing Office Chair - Black Leather
Webcam INTEGRATED 2.0 MEGAPIXEL WEBCAM

Neither stand out to be to be glaringly better than the other in terms of ability to perform resource heavy tasks which will be about 50% of the day to day use for me so unsure how to decide which will be better for me.

 

[Oussebon]

The Defiance has gsync, which is a bonus for gaming.

Stand-Alone Monitor AOC 18.5" E975SWDA LED TFT - 1366 x 768, 5MS, D-Sub, DVI-D

This is a really low resolution for these days. From a productivity point of view, 1080p is a lot better. Even the 1080p monitor you have in the other spec would be better, though I'd always recommend 24" unless there physically isn't the space to fit one.

M.2 SSD Drive 256GB M.2 2280, SATA 6Gb/s (546MB/R, 477MB/W)

Pretty much any of the other SSDs would be better. You should probably be looking at the PM961 or SM961, since they are much, much faster relative to the modest cost increase.

Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Processor 7820HK (2.9GHz, 3.9GHz Turbo)

This CPU is £140 more than the 7700HQ. That's £140 for 100MHz, and the ability to overclock (though I assume you won't be overclocking).

The 7700HQ is itself about £100 more than the 6700HQ.

The precise cost impact of the CPU can vary in the configurator depending on the spec, but that's the impact it had when I entered the above. The performance difference between those 3 CPUs might best be described as "modest", especially in view of the price. An Octane with the same spec as above (same storage and RAM as the Defiance you specced) but with an i7 7700k would be about £120 more, but provide almost triple the multithreaded performance gains.

Some very quick napkin maths: http://i.imgsafe.org/5991c9e9e9.png (I would insert the image, but the website isn't letting me do that right now...)
based on these benchmarks: http://tinyurl.com/lhuujn3
The TL;DR is that the 7820k gives by far and away the lowest performance increases per £ you spend above the basic 6700HQ that the Defiance III comes with, whether you're looking at the 7700HQ or the desktop CPUs in the Octane. How you spend your £ is ofc your choice, but I wanted to make the point of how truly terrible value the 7820k is compared to, well, anything else you could buy. That's not to say there is never a place for it, but that the cases where it's a best-buy will be few and far between.

 

[Cryptic]

Thanks for your help and detailed information Oussebon much appreciated.

So in comparison with the Defiance build from above(I assume this was the better of the two) would I be better off with the below build:

Chassis & Display Octane Series: 15.6" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Processor i7-7700k (4.2GHz) 8MB Cache
Memory (RAM) 16GB Corsair VENGEANCE 2400MHz SODIMM DDR4 (1 x 16GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060 - 6.0GB GDDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1, G-SYNC
1st Hard Disk 2TB SEAGATE FIRECUDA 2.5" SSHD - UP TO 5X FASTER THAN HDD!
M.2 SSD Drive 128GB SAMSUNG SM961 M.2, PCIe NVMe (up to 3100MB/R, 700MB/W)
Stand-Alone Monitor Samsung LS24D330HSX/EN 24" LED monitor

I drop from 32 to 16 GB memory for the octane but apart from 1 task I will require alot of multitasking for 16GB should be enough and I can prioritise the 16gb and the SSD solely when I am running visual studio. And I have added a better monitor along the lines from your suggestions above. This build is made assuming that the octane can make better use of the 7700k processor with this type of configuration.

 

[Oussebon]

This build is made assuming that the octane can make better use of the 7700k processor with this type of configuration.

but need the ability to smoothly run software compiler/visual studio.

Someone better qualified than me might comment on this but as far as I know, compiling will benefit substantially from the CPU's extra horsepower:
http://techreport.com/review/31366/amd-ryzen-7-1800x-ryzen-7-1700x-and-ryzen-7-1700-cpus-reviewed/11
http://www.hardware.fr/articles/956-13/compilation-visual-studio-mingw-w64-gcc.html
http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=article&item=ryzen-1800x-linux&num=5
So the only CPUs that are a lot better than the 7700k are powerful ones with 8 cores and 16 threads that you're not going to find in many (any?) laptops.
I believe, looking at other comparisons, that the 6700HQ would perform on par with the 3770k - thus the Octane's 7700k may be ~30% faster than the Defiance's 6700HQ in that French Visual Studio benchmark, for example, taking just under 5 minutes to compile whatever they were compiling, vs 7 minutes.

Thus if you're not going for something mid-range like the Optimus (which has an i7 7700HQ and will therefore be as good as the Defiance or Proteus for compiling) in order to save money, and you're willing to drop ~£250 on upping the Defiance's CPU in the spec you proposed above, then going for the Octane with the 7700k does make a lot of sense since it gives you the biggest performance boost for your cash.

16GB should be enough

The Octane does have 4 slots for the RAM so should you ever decide you want more, adding another couple of sticks should be viable.

Note that if going for the Octane, that chassis comes with the options of WD Black drives. They only have max 1TB capacity, but there is space for 2 of them. A pair of WD Blacks is £34 more than a single 2TB SSHD. The Blacks would likely be a good deal faster in general use as they are 7200rpm drives rather than 5400rpm. With the OS and your main programs on the proper SSD, there's arguably less of a case for having an SSHD as secondary storage.
Though granted having one single drive that is a bit cheaper than a pair of WD Blacks has cost and simplicity in its favour.

I would just say again that the Octane and Defiance might be viewed as desktop replacements (the Octane very literally so, it has desktop CPUs) so do make sure you're happy spending ~£5-600 more than if you were going for the Optimus, shortly before you buy a powerful gaming desktop anyway.

 

[Cryptic]

Thanks for your time and advice it's much appreciated.

I think if I go down the laptop path for now I will go with the octane chassis with something like a setup similar to above.

I have posted two desktop ideas I have put together to help me decide which I would benefit most from.