New Vortex II 17

M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
Just received the new laptop, everything looks great. I won't have time to actually try it out until thursday but will write up a short review when I do.

For now, could I just ask what documentation I am suppose to receive with the laptop? It has the manual and Win7 booklet (with DVD) but there is no sign it is actually from PCSpecialist, I was expecting a receipt and I thought I read they all come with a PCSpecialist booklet of some sort. Should these things come in the package? It's fine if not, just want to make sure I'm not missing anything.

Also, I order a spare power adaptor but the two adaptors are different sizes: FSP180-ABAN1 and FSP220-ABAN1 (this one is 2-3cm longer brick). Which is the correct one?

Beyond these minor things, I am extremely pleased with PCSpecialist for their very swift service and I'm sure once I get the machine running it'll be stunning.
 
M

Mulligan

Silver Level Poster
Here is a quick review of my new P170HM (Vortex II 17) and the experience of using PCSpecialist.co.uk. Included are some 3DMark results, I'm not sure what half of them mean or if they are good but would love to hear your thoughts on them.

(This review is cross posted at Notebook Review Forum > Resellers Feedback Forum > PCSpecialist.co.uk)


Vortex II 17 (P170HM)
17.3" Glossy Full HD LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Intel® Core™i7 Quad Core Mobile Processor i7-2720QM (2.20GHz) 6MB Cache
8GB SAMSUNG 1333MHz SODIMM DDR3 MEMORY (2 x 4GB)
2GB AMD® Radeon® HD 6990M - DirectX® 11
120GB INTEL® 510 SERIES SSD, SATA 6 Gb/s
750GB WD SCORPIO BLACK WD7500BPKT, SATA 3 Gb/s, 16MB CACHE (7200 rpm)
8x SATA DVD±R/RW/Dual Layer (+ 24x CD-RW)
INTEL® CENTRINO® ADVANCED-N 6230 inc BLUETOOTH


The Vortex II 17 is much bigger than anticipated, I've always had 17" machines but this one looks larger than average, luckily it does not weigh as heavy as it looks. The design is satisfyingly simple, no ridiculous flashing lights or crazy zigzags, though, of course, this is just my personal preference. The stock glossy screen is clear and bright, I had wished for the 90% gamut screen which is unavailable at PCSpecialist but the 72% is more than adequate.

The chiclet keyboard is generally well spaced and responsive. The direction keys are in a slightly different position from my previous HP but I’m sure I’ll adjust in time. As often mentioned about the P170HM, the touchpad surface is not smooth enough and the rubber texture is a very odd choice. I also found myself accidently clicking, by tapping the surface of the touchpad, a lot more frequently than other machines. But since I rarely use the touchpad I simply turned it off (Fn+F1). The finger print reader is a nice touch, not essential but I guess it saves the 3 seconds of typing in the password. Swiping individual fingers can also be used to open applications or specific websites, I haven’t really utilised this but could be useful.

The performance has so far been beyond what I hoped for. The SSD makes everything open instantly, and I never thought I’d see the day when iTunes was actually quick. I've down no optimising of the SSD at this point except install and run the Intel SSD utility. I’ve yet to really push it with games but Left 4 Dead 2 and Oblivion both run seamlessly at max settings. I’ve never run 3Dmark tests before so not sure if the scores are good but here they are:

3DMark11:
Score - P3548
Graphics Score - 3257
Physics Score - 6869
Combined Score - 3371
GraphicsTest1 - 15 FPS
GraphicsTest2 - 15 FPS
GraphicsTest3 - 20 FPS
GraphicsTest4 - 9 FPS
PhysicsTest - 21 FPS
CombinedTest - 15 FPS

3DMark06:
Score - 19522
SM2.0 Score - 7930
HDR/SM3.0 Score - 8765
CPU Score - 5719
GT1 - Return To Proxycon - 65 FPS
GT2 - Firefly Forest - 66 FPS
CPU1 - Red Valley - 1 FPS
CPU2 - Red Valley - 2 FPS
HDR1 - Canyon Flight - 90 FPS
HDR2 - Deep Freeze - 84 FPS

The only score that jumps out as obviously terrible is the CPU scores from 3DMark06, I’m not sure if this is expected but 1-2 FPS seems horrendously slow, is this normal? While there has been some chatter about the 6990M GPU getting very hot, I’ve found idle temperature to be around 47C and max temperature of 76C when gaming, this is with stock thermal paste and the 203 heat sink. I’ve yet to come anywhere near needing it but the ability to manually put fans at max (Fn+1) is a great feature.

I had been working on the assumption that the 5-7 day delivery suggested on the website was very optimistic. But then before I knew it the machine was built, tested and QAed, arriving in my hands on the 5th working day after order, speedy for a custom build. There was one very minor error in the order. I ordered a spare power adaptor and the wrong spare was in the package. But the main power adaptor was correct so I could still use the laptop. Upon being informed of the mistake PCSpecialist responded very quickly to offer a replacement adaptor and will be refunding me the postage costs of returning the incorrect one, was very pleased with how swiftly and straightforwardly they dealt with this. When ringing the technical support to ask a question, I was kept on hold for less than 30 seconds and the person I spoke to was very helpful, friendly and knowledgeable (Sorry I forget his name).

Both the machine and service from PCSpecialist.co.uk deserve very high praise for a top quality product at a competitive price and excellent customer service, I couldn’t be happier.
 
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