[Somewhat urgent] Powerful laptop required for Game Design. Related advice appreciated

[Furox]

Hey everyone. The topic says it all. I feel stupid I waited so long now, but I need to buy a laptop by the end of the month. My game design college course starts from the 1st of July.

I researched a bit about this already, and I've found that people have found the heavier, bulkier laptops reliable for such purposes. I wouldn't mind that at all. As it is a large, HD screen would be good for game and graphic design purposes.

If anyone has experience using desktops/laptops for such purposes, I'd love to hear that too.

I've already thought about the Laptop vs. Desktop thing, but if someone feels they have some experience to add, I'd appreciate that too. The main thing is I've never found computers at schools/colleges reliable, there is at at times some competition or waiting for the good systems, so its hard to rely on that + PC at home while in college. Also a laptop would be useful for taking down notes and stuff. I've always preferred typing to writing and have always dreamt of the day I would be allowed to use a laptop in class instead of relying on pen and paper lol.

Hope you don't mind, I posted in Tom's Hardware too and decided to use their format here too. Large amount of details, large thread. Expecting tl;dr.

1. What is your budget?
I'd like some recommendations about this too actually. Around 1000$ would be great. Upto 1500$ would be acceptable. 2000$ is the absolute max I'd agree to spend. I'm not too sure how much is required for my purposes.

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?
Not a very big issue. But I'd prefer a medium to large screen. I'd be OK with small too. So 15-17 inch or bigger would be good. I have no issues with carrying around a large, heavy laptop.

3. What screen resolution do you want?
Definitely full HD 1920 X 1080. Additionally, is a touch screen possible? Do hybrids come in powerful varieties? How much more would they cost?

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?
I think a desktop replacement laptop would suit me better. I'm ok with carrying around a large, heavy model. Though I will have to carry it around probably everyday.

5. How much battery life do you need?
The more the merrier. For the most part, not an issue.

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)?
Gaming is the secondary purpose. I'd say high simply because I'm assuming I'll require that much power if, in the near future, I intend to work with high quality games. But if I'm wrong about this and its possible to complete other tasks with less power, I'm ok with medium too. Just not low lol

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.)
Game design with Unity, GameMaker, and other stuff, Graphic and/or web design with Photoshop and similar software, some 3D modelling, though not the primary purpose.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need?
While researching, I found that people recommend a 128 GB or so SSD, just enough for installing software and stuff, and using a portable harddrive for the rest. I do not know why, some clarification would be appreciated.
If this is still the case, I do have a 2 TB portable HD already. In which case I could do with a SSD or HDD with low capacity.

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.
Nothing specific. I'm considering buying either online or from Singapore or Dubai, since electronics seem to be cheaper there. I have access to both countries since I'll be going to Singapore for college and my dad often travels to Dubai for work.

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop?
I honestly don't know what to expect. Atleast 3-4 years. Hopefully double of that. I don't see any reason to change anytime soon, atleast while I'm still a student, unless of course Laptops don't last that long, even high-end high-quality ones. I won't be overclocking or pushing it to the limit.

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ?
Not a priority. Anything works. Atleast DVD would be good, but I doubt I'll ever use it.

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons.

I know very little about brands. I live in India. I consulted the buyer's guide, and the recommendations included HP. I'm not too sure about HP, it seems like more of a consumer brand. I haven't used laptops in years. Been using a custom built desktop. Dell and Alienware seem like good brands to me, but I just know them because they're popular.

13. What country do you live in?
India. As previously mentioned, I can purchase online, or in India, Dubai, or Singapore.

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.
I'd prefer not to mix AMD and Intel. So no Intel processor with ATI graphics cards. I'm not sure if its a rumour or actually true that they don't mix well, but right now I've had a custom built desktop for 3 years with an intel processor and Radeon HD 66xx graphic card. I've had problems from the start. Sometimes, I'd notice everything would start lagging badly, and even the sound was laggy and discontinuous. I installed CPU-Z and noticed all the load was on one core of the processor. Tried lots of stuff, including reinstalling windows. This worked finally, but for some reason since then I'm stuck with 1440x900 resolution. Can't go full HD. And I was afraid of aggravating the old issue again if I tried to fix this one.
Opinions on high-end hybrids (touch screen) would be appreciated too. If its worth it, how much more it costs, etc.

Any information or advice you could give me related to medium to high-end laptops, laptops or desktops for game design/graphic design/modelling purposes, etc. would be appreciated.

Last thing, anything I should be waiting for? Any new technology about to come out soon that would either give a performance boost or reduce the price of older technologies? I've read rumour of the maxwell GPUs coming out soon, but thats all I know. I do not have enough technological knowledge to understand the significance of that. Also those rumours are there in form posts as old as January. So I'm not sure if they're any closer to being released. Any advice would be appreciated

Thanks

 

[seamon]

For your intended purpose, that is, game designing, you need a core i7 processor+a Nvidia Quaddro card for rendering.
This can make your life so much easier.
Nvidia Quaddro cards are special cards designed for rendering purposes and is the choice of professionals.
Don't buy a laptop in India. I suggest you buy it from Singapore.
First get a good base: Get from Aftershock PC-custom laptop manufacturers.

*www.aftershockpc.com/AFTERSHOCK X15S-V2/
This model has an MXM 3.0 slot.
Configure your laptop as you please.

Now for the quaddro card:
K5100(highest model):
NVIDIA Quadro K5100M N15E Q5 A2 8GB GDDR5 Video Graphics Card GPU Like 780M | eBay
Or the second highest model:
NVIDIA Quadro K4100M 4GB GDDR5 Video Graphics Card GPU N15E Q3 A2 | eBay
The first quaddro card link also has the tutorial on how to change your GPU.


BTW which college? NTU? NUS?

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Difference between Geforce and Quadro:
Geforce: Drivers designed for gaming.
Quadro: Drivers designed for rendering.

Hardware wise both are almost same.

 

[Furox]

Thanks for the info. I'll definitely look up the quaddro cards, but I'll probably double check I need them before investing in one. I'm not really sure at this point how much of what I'm going to do will require rendering. Does rendering a 3D game in Unity count as rendering too? Because using software like 3DS Max or something for modelling will be rare enough that I wouldn't invest in a quaddro just for that.

Any reason for using a custom built laptop? Won't it be more expensive? And there's no knowing whether the parts I choose will work well together. I did the same thing with this PC, and its working fine, but for example the Intel processor and ATI graphics card don't seem to work well together.


Ha, I wish. I was quite dismayed when I was told by multiple people including education counselors that both were quite out of reach. I'm pretty sure they only accept people who have a 12th grade score of over 95% or something. Even then its not a 100% thing. I was hoping they'd have their own entrance exams atleast. I didn't do well in my 12th exams, only got 81% overall. I lost interest in all but one of my subjects (Computer Science, duh) probably halfway into 11th. Its the reason I decided to move out of India. I was dismayed to find that those Singapore universities actually accept our scores. I applied to a private university there, easier to get into. SIM, Singapore Institute of Management. Also I think NTU doesn't actually offer a Game Design course.


Isn't a 4GB graphics card sort of overkill? I read some old suggestions by other people when I googled this, and some people suggested actually sticking to a 1 GB card and getting 16 GB of RAM. So shouldn't even a 2 GB graphics card be ok? Any reason you're suggesting a 4 GB one?

 

[seamon]

Alright, listen up.

Get a cheap quadro card if your professors recommend them, say K3100M(Quadro cards are much much cheaper at eBay than at Aftershock PC site). I don't think education level rendering will use much of the power of K5100M. You may need a quaddro card for some classes. You can do all your rendering in your own laptop while others scramble all over the campus for a workstation.
Don't compare custom laptops to PCs. All components of custom laptops are manufactured directly by OEMs such as Intel and Nvidia so they are guaranteed to work together. Aftershock PC double checks this before giving you your laptop.
Also, custom laptops are at least 20-30% cheaper than major brands such as Alienware, MSI etc.
1 GB graphic card is LOW END. Watch_Dogs can use upto 3 GB of graphic memory. Future games may utilize more(I am looking at you Witcher 3). Ram does not cost much but upgrading graphic memory is impossible. Get 16GB RAM if you want.
Just to be clear, the performance of a graphic card does not depend on graphic memory. It depends on the no. of shaders present in the card(you can google this up for detailed explanations).
eg. 2GB GDDR5 GTX 765M is almost 2x better than 4 GB GT 750M DDR3.
IMO get the Aftershock PC laptop suggested with core i7+16 GB RAM+GTX 880m(8 GB). This is easily the most powerful 15.6" laptop in the world an will serve you for a long time. It should be able to handle rendering pretty well too.
Look at this:
*www.aftershockpc.com/AFTERSHOCK X15S-V2/recm/
This fits within your budget.

 

[Furox]

I realize that, about the graphics cards, but I don't know enough yet to be able to tell what is better. I just assume that a higher VRAM is a general way to tell if its better. I guess GDDR5 is always better than DD3?

I don't keep very up to date with new technology I guess. I still find it easy to use my Radeon HD 1 GB gfx card and 4 GB RAM system. Assassin's Creed Blackflag worked fine, I assumed that was enough.

I'll look up SSD drives and MSATA. Don't know about that right now. Without that though, its still 20% beyond the end point of my budget I'll consider it for sure though, you seem like you know what you're talking about. Thanks for the help.

A few more questions, if you don't mind.
Is it possible to get a cheaper Quaddro from Aftershock?

Will a cheaper quaddro still outperform GeForce (Of the same price)? Or you mentioned the hardware is same, I guess it doesn't matter.

Quaddro will still work for gaming right? Or will there be a large difference?

I see two alternatives to aftershock -

Amazon.com : ASUS ROG G750JM-DS71 17.3-inch Gaming Laptop, GeForce GTX 860M Graphics : Computers & Accessories

This was recommended by someone at Tom's hardware, and was recommended recently to someone for gaming purposes too. Seems to have good reviews. Its powerful and WELL within my budget. If not this, would a slightly higher model from the same manufacturer work? Or do you strictly recommend Aftershock for its quality?

Also something I found when I googled quaddro -

HP ZBook 17 Mobile Workstation - Mobile Workstations

The second model here is also well within my budget. Again I guess HP isn't too reliable of a brand. I'd still like to know if you have something to say about it.


Do you have personal experience with Aftershock? I'm assuming they're very good at providing high end products that work well. And provide good customer care. I think small firms with good reputations tend to treat their customers very well. I've had good results dealing with such people/firms, but not with such a large amount of money involved.

In all of these, including Aftershock, will RAM be the only upgradable component?

 

[seamon]

Let's see:
GDDR5 is always better than DDR3.
About AC IV, go to options then graphics and try changing all of them to ultra. Tell me the result.
A 128 GB SSD+1 TB normal HDD is recommended. Use SSD for storing Windows and HDD for everything else. Your computer will NEVER, I repeat, NEVER hang.
You can only get a quadro for their advertised price from Aftershock.
Quadro will outperform Geforce during rendering. Geforce will outperform Quadro during gaming. It's as simple as that.

ASUS ROG 17" is NOT recommended for college. It's much better to get a desktop instead of that. You will find it extremely difficult to lug that 17" laptop around campus due to sheer size and weight alone. The college desks are usually quite small. It will leave you no space to keep books etc. Soon you will find yourself keeping that laptop in your dorm than carrying it around campus.

A good ZBOOK 17 tends to get pretty expensive. Lowest end should cost around 1.5L. Once I asked for a quotation for a model with core i7+Quadro K5100M+8 GB Ram+Good screen and they quoted me 4 lakhs for it.


When looking at graphics card, look at model no. GTX 880M>GTX 870M>GTX 860M etc. In the high end, each consecutive model is nearly twice better than the previous one.
PS:GTX 880m can max out all current games easily.

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Also something I found when I googled quaddro -

HP ZBook 17 Mobile Workstation - Mobile Workstations

The second model here is also well within my budget. Again I guess HP isn't too reliable of a brand. I'd still like to know if you have something to say about it.


Do you have personal experience with Aftershock? I'm assuming they're very good at providing high end products that work well. And provide good customer care. I think small firms with good reputations tend to treat their customers very well. I've had good results dealing with such people/firms, but not with such a large amount of money involved.

In all of these, including Aftershock, will RAM be the only upgradable component?

I was talking about prices in India. Nvidia K610M is a very low end card. You money will literally be wasted. You won't be able to play games at all on that laptop.
Get a GTX 870m if you are tight on budget from Aftershock. That is a pretty good card too.
I don't have personal experience with Aftershock but if I get a chance to study at NUS/NTU next year then I may buy a laptop from them. Reviews about them seem pretty good.
You can upgrade everything(except motherboard) in a Aftershock laptop but mind you, upgrades other than RAM are not cheap.

 

[Siddhartht]

I realize that, about the graphics cards, but I don't know enough yet to be able to tell what is better. I just assume that a higher VRAM is a general way to tell if its better. I guess GDDR5 is always better than DD3?

I don't keep very up to date with new technology I guess. I still find it easy to use my Radeon HD 1 GB gfx card and 4 GB RAM system. Assassin's Creed Blackflag worked fine, I assumed that was enough.

I'll look up SSD drives and MSATA. Don't know about that right now. Without that though, its still 20% beyond the end point of my budget I'll consider it for sure though, you seem like you know what you're talking about. Thanks for the help.

A few more questions, if you don't mind.
Is it possible to get a cheaper Quaddro from Aftershock?

Will a cheaper quaddro still outperform GeForce (Of the same price)? Or you mentioned the hardware is same, I guess it doesn't matter.

Quaddro will still work for gaming right? Or will there be a large difference?

I see two alternatives to aftershock -

Amazon.com : ASUS ROG G750JM-DS71 17.3-inch Gaming Laptop, GeForce GTX 860M Graphics : Computers & Accessories

This was recommended by someone at Tom's hardware, and was recommended recently to someone for gaming purposes too. Seems to have good reviews. Its powerful and WELL within my budget. If not this, would a slightly higher model from the same manufacturer work? Or do you strictly recommend Aftershock for its quality?

Also something I found when I googled quaddro -

HP ZBook 17 Mobile Workstation - Mobile Workstations

The second model here is also well within my budget. Again I guess HP isn't too reliable of a brand. I'd still like to know if you have something to say about it.


Do you have personal experience with Aftershock? I'm assuming they're very good at providing high end products that work well. And provide good customer care. I think small firms with good reputations tend to treat their customers very well. I've had good results dealing with such people/firms, but not with such a large amount of money involved.

In all of these, including Aftershock, will RAM be the only upgradable component?

HP, par se, is a reliable brand, and though ZBooks are little toned down compared to their predecessors, they are still enough. Thunderbolt connector, easy maintenance are plus points. Dell Precision systems are good for rendering too(but the pricing scheme which Dell uses for them is totally unjustified). You can just buy a clevo based custom notebook with a decent non quadro card, and it will suffice, why ? Because Quadros are just rebranded geforces with hardware locks and more "stable" drivers. (Think, why 750M in a Macbook pro works so efficiently ?). It doesn't matter, if the host software can utilize a Quadro K5100M well, it might just be able to use a GTX 880M equally well.
And as for the Indian scenario, Top end Alienware model > Zbook 15/17/Precision M4K/6K series(models available in India)

 

[Furox]

Although I enjoy gaming, I usually only play a few "new" high-end games a year. I'm more into weird stuff. Like retro games. Indie games. I enjoy some big-company titles. I won't mind if I can only run them on high and not on ultra. I can live with that.

Is size the only argument you have against ASUS Rog? Because I wouldn't really mind lugging around a few extra KGs if it saves me a lot of money. A large screen would be really useful for graphic design too. I'm into that too. As for desk space... You make a valid point. But I think considering only 2 of my subjects in 3 years are math related, and the rest are computer science, I don't think I'll need a pen and paper. I can type everything.

Alright I won't bother holding back and pretending I'll upgrade later. Its a waste of money.

Will I face any problems if I just get 128 SSD and use a portable 2 TB hard drive? Because I already own one. Good one too, imo. WD My passport. Well the one in aftershock is free anyway so I guess I won't save anything that way lol.

I don't really care if the model is available in India, I'm sure I'll be able to find it in Dubai or Singapore instead.

I'll look up clevo custom laptops.


I guess you mean 750M with macbook works well? I'll consider GEForce too.


As someone who is not too technically informed about Computer hardware (Meaning I know the basics of the major parts, but I don't know about small details), I guess I can trust Aftershock to deliver a perfect product to me? Especially if I choose your initial configuration?

Can I expect the same from other custom laptop options like clevo as mentioned by Siddharth?

 

[seamon]

HP, par se, is a reliable brand, and though ZBooks are little toned down compared to their predecessors, they are still enough. Thunderbolt connector, easy maintenance are plus points. Dell Precision systems are good for rendering too(but the pricing scheme which Dell uses for them is totally unjustified). You can just buy a clevo based custom notebook with a decent non quadro card, and it will suffice, why ? Because Quadros are just rebranded geforces with hardware locks and more "stable" drivers. (Think, why 750M in a Macbook pro works so efficiently ?). It doesn't matter, if the host software can utilize a Quadro K5100M well, it might just be able to use a GTX 880M equally well.
And as for the Indian scenario, Top end Alienware model > Zbook 15/17/Precision M4K/6K series(models available in India)

ZBOOKs are BS. Just look at lowest model. It has Quadro Z610M which is equal to consum GT 720M. It costs 1L 10K.
Quadro uses special Nvidia drivers designed specially for rendering so all laptops with such a card(competent one and not K610M) is guaranteed to render well.
He's not buying in India.

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Although I enjoy gaming, I usually only play a few "new" high-end games a year. I'm more into weird stuff. Like retro games. Indie games. I enjoy some big-company titles. I won't mind if I can only run them on high and not on ultra. I can live with that.

Is size the only argument you have against ASUS Rog? Because I wouldn't really mind lugging around a few extra KGs if it saves me a lot of money. A large screen would be really useful for graphic design too. I'm into that too. As for desk space... You make a valid point. But I think considering only 2 of my subjects in 3 years are math related, and the rest are computer science, I don't think I'll need a pen and paper. I can type everything.

Alright I won't bother holding back and pretending I'll upgrade later. Its a waste of money.

Will I face any problems if I just get 128 SSD and use a portable 2 TB hard drive? Because I already own one. Good one too, imo. WD My passport. Well the one in aftershock is free anyway so I guess I won't save anything that way lol.

I don't really care if the model is available in India, I'm sure I'll be able to find it in Dubai or Singapore instead.

I'll look up clevo custom laptops.


I guess you mean 750M with macbook works well? I'll consider GEForce too.


As someone who is not too technically informed about Computer hardware (Meaning I know the basics of the major parts, but I don't know about small details), I guess I can trust Aftershock to deliver a perfect product to me? Especially if I choose your initial configuration?

Can I expect the same from other custom laptop options like clevo as mentioned by Siddharth?

All right listen up, you are extremely confused now.

You are saying that you don't mind lugging a 17" laptop around campus is because you have never done it earlier. Trust me you'll hate it pretty soon. The classes are going to be far apart and you have to move it every 1-2 hours. These laptops are not meant for that. They are meant to be kept on your desk forever. You can google this up(17" laptop vs 15" laptop for college). Both ASUS and Aftershock laptop has the same resolution so working space will be same.

Don't hold back, you'll just waste money.

128 GB internal space is too low, 1 TB additional HDD is suggested. It does not cost much.

Buy in Singapore.

By your post, it looks like you are confused with Nvidia Nomenclature. Nvidia has 2 lines of graphic cards in the mobile segment. GeForce and Quadro. GeForce is meant for gamers while Quadro is meant for professional rendering people. Geforce cards start with GT and higher ends with GTX and then comes a number. XXX. The first X denotes generation. The next 2 XXs denotes its relative performance. The higher, the better.

eg. GT 820M-->low end 20k laptops
GT 840M--->mid end 40k laptops.
GT 830M--> no laptop uses this as of yet.
GTX 850M---->mid end-->60-70k laptops.
GTX 860M--->upper mid end--->90k laptops.
GTX 870M---> high end---> 1L+ laptops.
GTX 880M--->ultra high end--->top laptops.

GT 750M is equivalent to GT 840M.

Next is Quadro. Quadro cards have almost the same hardware as Geforce but they have different drivers which focus on rendering efficiently. These drivers are not good for playing games.
Names start with K and then the next 3/4 nos XXXX determine relative performance. When compared to Geforce,

K610M=GT 820M.
K1100M=GT 830M.
K2100M=GT 840M.
K3100M=GTX 850M
K4100M=GTX 860M
K5100M=GTX 880M


Next up, Clevo DOES NOT make or sell laptops. They make and sell laptop barebones only to OEMs/Resellers(they won't sell one to you). Think of barebones as cabinet+motherboard combos. There are companies known as Clevo resellers who take these barebones, fit them with RAM+CPU+GPU+HDD etc and then sell them to you. Aftershock PC is a Clevo reseller. Singapore has only Aftershock PC which sells Clevo customized laptops.

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TL;DR and IMO Go for the "recommended" Aftershock laptop I gave you the link to.

 

[Furox]

Yeah I read up on Clevo laptops. It might have been a good choice if I was in US. Xotic and some other resellers seem popular and reliable. Plus on xotic and one other website I would've saved about 20k INR. Same configuration as the Aftershock. And I didn't realize Aftershock used Clevo. Thanks for the info.

I googled a lot of the things I was confused about last night, less confused now. Looked at other brands and Clevo resellers too. Only a few in US were cheaper than this. ASUS with same 880m GFX card is costlier. Seems like a good option now.

Last thing, whats the battery life like? I'll google it too, but if you have some info about that, I'd like to know. Because I probably won't have a power point in class lol. Might be able to get one if I'm for example working on something in a lab, but probably not in classes/lecture halls.

Thanks for the advice, both of you.

 

[seamon]

Yeah I read up on Clevo laptops. It might have been a good choice if I was in US. Xotic and some other resellers seem popular and reliable. Plus on xotic and one other website I would've saved about 20k INR. Same configuration as the Aftershock. And I didn't realize Aftershock used Clevo. Thanks for the info.

I googled a lot of the things I was confused about last night, less confused now. Looked at other brands and Clevo resellers too. Only a few in US were cheaper than this. ASUS with same 880m GFX card is costlier. Seems like a good option now.

Last thing, whats the battery life like? I'll google it too, but if you have some info about that, I'd like to know. Because I probably won't have a power point in class lol. Might be able to get one if I'm for example working on something in a lab, but probably not in classes/lecture halls.

Thanks for the advice, both of you.

Xotic PC is the best reseller in the world.
Gaming laptops' batteries don't last very long.

 

[Siddhartht]

[MENTION=248727]seamon[/MENTION], for ZBook, you are just not paying for the GPU, although I accept they are little overpriced, but the support and the hardware in general makes for it, and I was just telling the sad typical Indian scenario with that comparison(Alienware vs other)

Now let me explain my side, I currently own a simple HP DV6, and am saving for a laptop. My task involves lots of simulation and rendering, so yeah, I am sort of acquainted with the professional field. What I currently do is to use a Workstation(mine, which I upgrade regularly) with a Quadro to offload all the computationally intensive task, and later take the result from it. I would have recommended same for Furox, but since I don't know if game development software allow such explicit offloading and distribution of workload like mine do.

As for Asus, if you are planning to upgrade the laptop in future, be aware that they don't use standard MXM design for their GPUs, making them virtually impossible to upgrade. Although, if you have a strong back, and some Do It Yourself enthusiasm, you can use an external gpu using the supplied thunderbolt port.
Clevo barebones have a good reputation for being highly upgradable and customizable, but don't expect them to last long if handled roughly, unlike other mobile workstation manufacturers, they don't use metal alloys for primary construction.
In the end, their is no "perfect" laptop which will fulfill all of your requirements,you can always opt for higher weight for increased cooling and stability, light laptops for mobility, expensive ones to confirm with standards, or just follow your mind, so you don't regret later.

 

[seamon]

I read that even though Clevo laptops don't have a metal chassis, they are pretty damn durable. Their durability is sometimes compared with legendary Lenovo Thinkpad class of business laptops.
I also agree, a Quadro will be a great help to Furox. MXM Quadros are pretty cheap on eBAY.

 

[Furox]

Look at it this way, from what I can tell only custom laptops like from Aftershock would have an easily upgradable GPU. And they do not seem to provide any cheap/stock GPU options. So I'll have to spend a lot on their GPU + get a Quadro no matter how cheap. I think I'll get a 870/880 for now. I think I'm going with aftershock after all. The reviews of their brand seem good. They have a good sale that'll save me a couple hundred $ until Sunday. I'm still undecided between 880/870. I just don't want buyer's regret I guess. I don't want to feel guilty spending too much. Although I agree a lot with the idea that holding back in a way is more of a waste of money than buying something too powerful, since it'll last longer for me, I'm not sure if an 880 is necessary. I don't think I play full HD latest games enough to justify buying the 880. Then again its costing me 2800 SGD or so anyway, another 200 does't make much of a difference.

 

[seamon]

Look at it this way, from what I can tell only custom laptops like from Aftershock would have an easily upgradable GPU. And they do not seem to provide any cheap/stock GPU options. So I'll have to spend a lot on their GPU + get a Quadro no matter how cheap. I think I'll get a 870/880 for now. I think I'm going with aftershock after all. The reviews of their brand seem good. They have a good sale that'll save me a couple hundred $ until Sunday. I'm still undecided between 880/870. I just don't want buyer's regret I guess. I don't want to feel guilty spending too much. Although I agree a lot with the idea that holding back in a way is more of a waste of money than buying something too powerful, since it'll last longer for me, I'm not sure if an 880 is necessary. I don't think I play full HD latest games enough to justify buying the 880. Then again its costing me 2800 SGD or so anyway, another 200 does't make much of a difference.

GTX 880m is almost twice faster than GTX 870m. Hope this helps.