Sager 5620 Reviews? Opinions?

[DOOM]

Hey guys...

I heard about the Sager 5620, and it looks pretty cool and has a great price. Does anyone know of any online reviews for it? Any personal experience? Where could I go to try one out (e.g. Best Buy, Fry's, etc.)???

I am interested in gaming, but primarily I want to do development.

Thanks in advance

-DOOM

 

[lakedude]

I've got one and I like it. I would by another one.
It does have some drawbacks, it is heavy, it sucks the live out of a battery in around an hour or less (depending on throttle setting), and mine is just a little slower then the Area51 in 3dmarks. This may be due to software or Alienware may put out a better machine, I can't tell yet. I may put xp on it and see if that makes a difference. Even so the price is so much cheeper that a few percent in 3dmarks is worth it to me.

The Clevo, Vision (from Tiger Direct), Pro-star, and Area-51 are all very similar machines. They all have the same case, MB, and Vid Card. There may or may not be a quality difference in ram, hd, display (mine is nice), battery and optical drives, between these brands. My combo drive and HD are made by Toshiba and cd-rom is made by Samsung.

I think the Sager is a good desktop replacement for the money. Other brands are lighter. If you want a mobile CPU check out the 5650, it is the same unit as the 5620 except it comes with a true mobile CPU. If you go 5620 make sure to get the next gen .13 cpu.

Give me fuel, give me fire, give me that which I desire.

 

[DOOM]

I don't mind the weight and the battery life. I will be using it as a desktop replacement/companion, and when I am away, I can just throttle down the power consumption, right?

I would like to play games and watch DVDs on it... does it have a standard video out (RCA jack) or just S-Video out? What is the sound like?

Do you know the spindle speed of the drive? I am looking for something fast. I guess the fastest made for laptops is 5400, am I wrong?

Finally, do you have any ideas where I could test drive one of these things? They didn't have it at the Best Buy I went to. What about CostCo, Fry's, etc.?

Thanks for your help!

-DOOM

 

[lakedude]

svid only. Check out <A HREF="http://www.svideodotcom.com/svideoadapter1.html" target="_new">http://www.svideodotcom.com/svideoadapter1.html</A> for a $20.00 adapter that will give you composite from svid. I have one from an old vid card.

Or check out <A HREF="http://www.s-video.com/svrca1in.html" target="_new">http://www.s-video.com/svrca1in.html</A> for a shortie.

Sound is fine, never hooked up the 6 channel optical fiber out. I don't like the software only volume control. If you are trying to be quiet the damn "windows" boot sound comes on before the volume control has any affect.

My hd is slow (4200rpm) but I'm pretty sure you can upgrade if that is a concern.

Never seen one anywhere but on the net or Computer Shopper. If you were around I'd let you check mine out.

Check out what folks are saying about the other similar machines I mentioned as they are well similar.

Give me fuel, give me fire, give me that which I desire.

 

[Skull_Angel]

I'm pretty sure you can get a Sager 5620 with a 5200 rpm HD now. Alienware offers them now and as Lakedude said, they are similar machines. If you get at least 512 MB of RAM you wouldn't have to worry too much about the slower HD speed except for gameload times or very large file accesses.

If you get the XP OS (which it looks like you should if you want the best ATI drivers) then look around on driver heaven or maybe the Compaq or Alienware websites for drivers.

From what I read on different computer sites the newest ATI drivers can give you a few hundred more points on 3dMark2K SE and up to 25% more fps depending on the game than the previous generation. Don't know where you can find a 5620 in a store though.