Please help me check through this spec!

[johnymuss11]

Hi, This may be an odd one but I hope some of you will understand,

Backstory: I am currently living away from home and this will be like this for some time but I will return home for occasional holidays, this means I will want a laptop. Unfortunately I am also on a tight budget £800-£900 mark.

What I want to do with it? It will probably be used for a few things. Home office work, media streaming. and spots of medium to intensive gaming.
For example: Company of Heroes 2, Men of War Assault Squad 2, FO NV, FO 3,4, Skyrim, Dead Island and Kerbal Space program. And the very occasional spots of Arma 3, (although I already know this may be a small stretch too far!) And although I have no plans in the near future for this, Battlefield 3, 4, 1 (odd bunch of games I know just the best games in my steam library atm.)

Current Spec I am looking at: Optimus VII 17.3" (I want a big screen mobility is not a big issue here (but a desktop is still out of the question))

Chassis & Display: Optimus Series: 17.3" Matte Full HD IPS LED Widescreen (1920x1080)

Processor (CPU): Intel® Core™ i7 Quad Core Processor 6700HQ (2.6GHz, 3.5GHz Turbo)

Memory (RAM): 16GB HyperX IMPACT 1600MHz SODIMM DDR3 (2 x 8GB)

Graphics Card: NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 960M - 2.0GB DDR5 Video RAM - DirectX® 12

Memory - Hard Disk: 1TB SERIAL ATA II 2.5" HARD DRIVE WITH 8MB CACHE (5,400rpm) (STORAGE IS NOT AN ISSUE I PLAN TO BUY AN SSD SOMETIME)

DVD/BLU-RAY Drive: Ultra Slim 8x SATA DVD±R/RW/Dual Layer (+ 24x CD-RW)

Memory Card Reader: Integrated 6 in 1 Card Reader (SD /Mini SD/ SDHC / SDXC / MMC / RSMMC)

Thermal Paste: ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND

Sound Card: Intel 2 Channel High Def. Audio + SoundBlaster™ Cinema 2 (SOUND IS NOT AN ISSUE)

Bluetooth & Wireless: GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® AC-8260 M.2 (867Mbps, 802.11AC) + BLUETOOTH (WIFI IS NOT AN ISSUE)

Operating System: I want to install a copy of Windows 7 on here, or perhaps windows 10 but don't want to splurge on it. I have never used Linux or any other free operating system before, is this a viable option? or even a good one?

Disclaimer: I understand this may be an odd one but this is under very special circumstances and if I could I would definitely get a desktop but it just is not viable. Please do not rip into me, Cheers!


Many Thanks in advance for any answers.

John

 

[Oussebon]

If at all possible I'd recommend waiting for January when the GTX 1050 ti for laptops is expected to launch. It should offer much better performance and probably still be within your price range.

The GTX 960M is weaker than a GTX 750 ti. That's not good for BF1, Skyrim Special Edition, or FO4.


Note that the FO4 one is on the medium preset, not ultra like most benches of games.

 

[johnymuss11]

If at all possible I'd recommend waiting for January when the GTX 1050 ti for laptops is expected to launch. It should offer much better performance and probably still be within your price range.

Hey Oussebon,

Thanks for the swift reply,

Do you know if this will be available for the current chassis I am looking at

Thanks again.

John

 

[Oussebon]

It's likely the chassis will be refreshed for the new GPUs (and indeed CPUs that are also expected to launch in Jan). This is a good thing as it means they might have more modern features like DDR4 RAM and USB 3.1 / type C.

But I imagine the chassis will look much the same - plain black, elegant and understated. A lot of mid range Clevo chassis are like that and the Optimus I got in 2012 looked not all that different.

 

[johnymuss11]

It's likely the chassis will be refreshed for the new GPUs (and indeed CPUs that are also expected to launch in Jan). This is a good thing as it means they might have more modern features like DDR4 RAM and USB 3.1 / type C.

But I imagine the chassis will look much the same - plain black, elegant and understated. A lot of mid range Clevo chassis are like that and the Optimus I got in 2012 looked not all that different.

Great. And the Chassis would be refreshed straight away? I could buy this at the end of January say?

 

[Oussebon]

I could buy this at the end of January say?

That's 'crystal ball' territory. But the CPUs and GPUs are expected to be launched at CES (~8th Jan) and I would imagine it won't just be a paper launch. We saw leaked GTX 1050 ti benches a while ago now and the mobile GPU seems to be very similar to the desktop one - and we've seen actual reviews, not leaks, of the Kaby Lake desktop CPUs.

I imagine Clevo will have chassis ready with the new products pretty much immediately.

So being able to place an order around the end of Jan sounds quite likely to me. But of course that is just my opinion.

 

[johnymuss11]

Great thank you so much. I really want SOMETHING desperately but I can wait for this.

I will keep this open if I have anymore questions but not now Cheers

John