Best 13" laptop?

[ghost recon88]

I'm looking at getting a 13" laptop while keeping the cost down. Both the Dell XPS M1340 and Studio XPS 13 look nice, but both are a bit out of my price range. I was thinking of getting an M1330 and doing the heatpipe mod on it to try and save the 8400m GS, but honestly I was hoping for something with a 128-bit video card (8400m GS, 9400m GS are all 64-bit). Does anyone make a 13" with a 128-bit video card in it? I don't have a preference whether it's a DDR2 or DDR3 machine.

 

[Decembermouse]

Memory bandwidth isn't as important as number of shaders and generation of the card. That sounds like a good option though if you can get one with those gfx cards. How much did you find them for?

 

[stipalgl]

To be honest, I'm not sure about any 13" laptop carrying a decent discrete graphics card although perhaps someone will prove me wrong.

There has been word of a Dell/Alienware model at 11.6" called the M11x (I know it's smaller than what you want) and it supposedly comes equipped with a G335M, which sounds fairly capable.

 

[ghost recon88]

It depends on what the rest of the specs are. I can get a fairly nice M1330 for $400 or so (8400m GS, 4GB of RAM, 2GHz+ CPU). The M1340 and XPS 13 however both run around $1000 for a loaded machine.

 

[jimhsu]

The market is open for a laptop that resembles the m11x (great discrete graphics, good battery life) in 13" and a less ... gaudy formfactor. The UL30VT/JT almost gets everything down, with the exception of somewhat weak discrete graphics. Come on people, get to work!

 

[Throckmorton]

Sony's SR will get updated soon.

Now it has ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 4570 Series graphics with 512MB VRAM available
http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/...specifications

 

[ghost recon88]

The market is open for a laptop that resembles the m11x (great discrete graphics, good battery life) in 13" and a less ... gaudy formfactor. The UL30VT/JT almost gets everything down, with the exception of somewhat weak discrete graphics. Come on people, get to work!

That UL30VT has decent graphics (2.5x better than the 8400m GS). Only thing is no optical drive and supposedly the screen is only average. Still though, it's a unit I'll look a little more into and for the price ($800) it's not bad.

The UL30JT (G310m and mobile Core i5) looks like it'll be killer, but with a rumored price of $1k that's again a little steep for me. Even the UL30VT is more then I want to spend.

Sony's SR will get updated soon.

Now it has ATI Mobility Radeon™ HD 4570 Series graphics with 512MB VRAM available
http://www.sonystyle.com/webapp/wcs/...specifications

That's a little out of my price range, that is once you add in a decent processor, upgrade the HDD to 7200RPM, and throw in the HD 4570 you get over $1k.

 

[Parasitic]

You could get a Dell Vostro 1320 from the Outlet. It has the 9300M GS if you picked the Nvidia option.

 

[Alienwho]

The UL30VT screen is fine. If you want even cheaper and an optical drive get the UL80VT. It's 14" as opposed to the UL30VT 13.3".

I will never miss the optical drive on my UL30VT though.

 

[nipplefish]

Don't bother with the M1330 if you can find something with a less-shoddy cooling system. Trust me on this one.

 

[Throckmorton]

That UL30VT has decent graphics (2.5x better than the 8400m GS). Only thing is no optical drive and supposedly the screen is only average. Still though, it's a unit I'll look a little more into and for the price ($800) it's not bad.

The UL30JT (G310m and mobile Core i5) looks like it'll be killer, but with a rumored price of $1k that's again a little steep for me. Even the UL30VT is more then I want to spend.



That's a little out of my price range, that is once you add in a decent processor, upgrade the HDD to 7200RPM, and throw in the HD 4570 you get over $1k.

5400 is good for a laptop harddrive. 7200rpm is for people who think "more is better". Do you really need to upgrade the processor? What do you need all that processing power for?