Inspiron 8600 vs ??? (Looking for alternatives)

Archived from groups: comp.sys.laptops (More info?)

Hi everyone,

I'm in the market for a new notebook computer, and I have my sights
set on a Dell Inspiron 8600 WSXGA.

From what I've read, it's a top performer with excellent battery life.

I've been going to retail stores and researching online to find the
8600's closest competitors, but it is next to impossible to find
similarly priced models with a 128 meg ATI 9600 video card.

I'm a game player too, so my mindset is that it's better to get the
128 meg video card now as the 64 meg will eventually be phased out
anyway.

Can 64 meg cards outperform the 128 meg ATI?

What other notebook models should I be looking at?

Finally, I've read that the 8600 has some visual ghosting in fast
paced games. I have an Inspiron 8000 now with a 15" screen (SXGA).
Does the 8600 have a sub-par screen compared to the Inspiron 8000 - or
is it more or less the same?

Regards,
NSP

Archived from groups: comp.sys.laptops (More info?)

powerbook?
"Benjamin Gawert" <bgawert@gmx.de> wrote in message
news:2p3i88Fgf2n1U1@uni-berlin.de...
> NSP wrote:
>
>> I'm in the market for a new notebook computer, and I have my sights
>> set on a Dell Inspiron 8600 WSXGA.
>>
>> From what I've read, it's a top performer with excellent battery life.
>
> Yes. A friend of mine has an 8600 and is very happy with it - and he's a
> hardcore gamer...
>
>> I've been going to retail stores and researching online to find the
>> 8600's closest competitors, but it is next to impossible to find
>> similarly priced models with a 128 meg ATI 9600 video card.
>
> I can't remember of any competitors in the class of the 8600 with Radeon
> Mobility 9600 128MB and Widescreen display. Of course there are other
> widescreen notebooks around (i.e. HP nx7010) but they all have a slower
> gfx.
>
>> I'm a game player too, so my mindset is that it's better to get the
>> 128 meg video card now as the 64 meg will eventually be phased out
>> anyway.
>>
>> Can 64 meg cards outperform the 128 meg ATI?
>
> Yes, of course. Video RAM size says _nothing_ about the gfx performance.
> What decides gfx performance is the video chip (GPU), what type it is,
> what
> clock rate (core/memory) it has, and what memory interface (64bit, 128bit
> etc) it offers. Video Memory becomes important for storing large textures
> in
> the fast video memory instead of swapping out to main memory, but even the
> fastest notebook gfx is hardly capable of using large textures at high
> resolutions with high frame rates, so basically 64MB would be more than
> enough. But then, You only can oder the 8600 with 128MB gfx (at least here
> in Germany)...
>
>> What other notebook models should I be looking at?
>
> With P-M, Widescreen and fast gfx, there AFAIK is none...
>
>> Finally, I've read that the 8600 has some visual ghosting in fast
>> paced games. I have an Inspiron 8000 now with a 15" screen (SXGA).
>> Does the 8600 have a sub-par screen compared to the Inspiron 8000 - or
>> is it more or less the same?
>
> The first generations of the widescreen displays (mainly used in the
> predecessor 8500) showed ghosting and some burn-in effects, but that's
> over.
> The 8600 of my friend shows no ghosting and no burn-in effect. The display
> quality is average, though, not comparable with IBM Flexview or any of the
> other IPS panels. But it's a good display, and good enough for gaming...
>
> Benjamin
>

Archived from groups: comp.sys.laptops (More info?)

Alienware? No personal experience but their magazine ads claim they are the
best! pricey though (like a powerbook...)
"Benjamin Gawert" <bgawert@gmx.de> wrote in message
news:2p5ae7Fh6qalU2@uni-berlin.de...
> j647 wrote:
>
>> powerbook?
>
> Denomination of a notebook series from Apple, with PowerPC CP and MacOS
> operating system. Great computer, but hardly the best system for gaming...
>
> Benjamin
>