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Question

Best Laptop For College(Computer Science)

by Jul 16, 2015 7:19AM PDT

General Questions

1) What is your budget?
1200$

2) What size notebook would you prefer?
15" or 17"
3) Where will you buying this notebook? You can select the flag of your country as an indicator.
USA(Boston)

4) Are there any brands that you prefer or any you really don't like?
Nope

5) Would you consider laptops that are refurbished/redistributed?
I'll prefer a new one.

6) What are the primary tasks will you be performing with this notebook?
Coding(Visual Studio), Running VM's, Playing games, Daily productivity and multimedia stuff, Might start working with Unity 5 and Unreal engine 4 in the future.

7) Will you be taking the notebook with you to different places, leaving it on your desk or both?
Both

Cool Will you be playing games on your notebook? If so, please state which games or types of games?
Battlefield 4, Crysis 2, Bioshock Infinite, Farcry 4

9) How many hours of battery life do you need?
2-3 hrs on normal usage(Battery is not the most important thing)

10) Would you prefer to see the notebooks you're considering before purchasing it or buying a notebook on-line without seeing it is OK?
Online purchase would be ok

11) What OS do you prefer? Windows (Windows 7 / Cool, Mac OS, Linux, etc.
Nah i have a Win 8.1 license so antyibng is ok

Screen Specifics

12) From the choices below, what screen resolution(s) would you prefer?
I preferred UHD but it seems there are too many scaling issues and stuff that a FHD screen now would be the best option.

13) Do you want a Glossy/reflective screen or a Matte/non-glossy screen?
No preferences here.

Build Quality and Design

14) Are the notebook's looks and stylishness important to you?
Nope

15) When are you buying this laptop?
August 1st week

16) How long do you want this laptop to last?
4 years

Notebook Components

17) How much hard drive space do you need? Do you want a SSD drive?
Ill prefer a ssd over an HDD but if its an hdd would really like to have another bay to put the SSD but if not ill replace the hdd in future with SSD.

1Cool Do you need an optical drive? If yes, a DVD Burner, Blu-ray Reader or Blu-Ray Burner?
Not much of an issue.

I've done some decent searching(i've put in a lot of time) and have now got more confused.. So many options everything with some compromise or the other.

I've got the MSI GE62 Apache-082 or 276[1099$],MSI GE72 Apache-027 or 078 or 235,[1199$], Lenovo Y50(4 gig 960m,16gb ram)[1099$], Asus Rog GL551JW-DS71[1050$],Asus Rog GL551JW-DS74[1150$],Asus Rog G751JL-DS71[1200$], Acer Aspire V15 and v17 in consideration.

I'm just totally confused now. In terms of cooling nothing here comes close to Asus Rog G751JL-DS71 also it has the 965m which is good but it has a non removable battery,a crappy speaker,also sata 2 2nd drive. The MSI ones look pretty neat but not soo good build quality compared to the Asus,loud fans,and pretty bad looks(not a major issue),Acer seems to have wifi issues and i've been told to keep away from them considering after sales support,the Lenovo seems a pretty good offer nothing major against it except the stupid sshd and not having the option to install a second drive.

So please advice which one is the best option all around? Have i missed some contender ?Let me know.

NOTE:
I'm from India.My relative will get it for me from USA so international warranty is a must. So please don't suggest Sager or Clevo because they have no service centre in India.I'm joining college this year and would like to have it till college is over.And considering the requirements i really don't know what topics or interests i'll end up with after 2 years so a powerful lappy now will get me past the hunger for power later!

Discussion is locked

7 Posts
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Answer
You found a nice list.
by Forum moderator Jul 16, 2015 7:31AM PDT

Any on that list will do the task but and this is a big one, go over your list on the warranty. My bet is that your list will narrow down to one.

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What would you pick from the list?
by Ashwin_K Jul 16, 2015 9:05AM PDT

Ahh.. I'm actually on it.Mailing most of the companies as many don't have live chat. Any recommendations in those bunch?

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The office supplied me with a y510p
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jul 16, 2015 2:14PM PDT

If I were to replace it I'd consider the y50.

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Update Regarding Warranty
by Ashwin_K Jul 17, 2015 6:48AM PDT

A small update about warranty guys:
MSI: Provides 2 years warranty by default, but only the first year is international second year is USA only so to be clear i'll get 1 year international warranty.
Asus: 1 year international warranty by default
Lenovo: 1 year international warranty by default(They call it IWS) and there is an option to extend it to 3 years which costs 175$ in USA i have to confirm them if i'll be able to extend my warranty in India(Here it costs 5k for the extended warranty).
Acer: Yet to get the reply.

So it seems most of the options in my list seem to stay. Pick the best out of it guys really need your help.

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Can't pick it for you.
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jul 17, 2015 7:52AM PDT

The term "best" would need a long definition then creating a spreadsheet to give weight to each feature then arrive at a score. For me I'd get the y50 but that's because the y510p has worked out so well. Just one HDD replacement so far.

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Thanks for the reply!
by Ashwin_K Jul 20, 2015 9:41AM PDT

I've zeroed in on 3 models.
1. Lenovo Y50(15.6" screen,16gig,960m with 4gb vram,3 years warranty)(1088$)
2. Msi Ge72 Apache-027(17.6" screen,16 gig, 965m 2 gig, 1 year warranty)(1190$)( A free SteelSeries Gift - Siberia V2 Headset-MSI Gaming Edition)
3. Asus Rog G751JL-DS71(17.3" screen,16 gig,965m 2 gig,1 year warranty)(1190$)

Even though the Lenovo Y50 has a smaller screen and less powerful gpu and no expansion slots for ssd it makes up for it with the price and warranty.This laptops seems to have a solid everything else(Keyboard, Sound ,etc)
Even though I did check the Msi Ge62 series but it seems that they have a lot of heating issues(fan running crazily and stuff) so the 17.3" version with good cooling, 3 m2 slots for ssd, and with a headphone seems to be a very good offer.
The Asus almost same in every aspect with the MSI Ge72 one except one expansion slot and supporting up to 32gig ram expansion(Ge 72 is 16 gig max) (But i don't think i'll need anything more than 16 gigs..). It Seems asus support is better and beats the MSI in build quality, cooling.

So its like a tie between these three.Should i opt for a longer warranty or for higher specs and bigger and better display? If so the Asus or MSI?

But the 3 year warranty makes me look back at the Lenovo again! Help me!

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Here...
by r. proffitt Forum moderator Jul 20, 2015 9:52AM PDT

The lenovo gets an edge for your reason and that we are getting pretty good bang for the buck and they are working out quite nicel.

The ROG is a gamer's model that my son owned a few years back. Plus marks to Asus for making spare parts easy to get. My son wore out 2 keyboards on it and it was nice to replace it and not lose the laptop. This is not writing the keyboards are bad, but you can wear these out.

ABOUT HEAT. All gaming laptops today can get hot. We must put them on cooling pads, and keep up the 1st of the month canned air routine. The most complaints come from those that expected these to work without this item or maintenance.

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