Notebooks at Bestbuy, $1600 to spend, recommendations?

[Ebolax]

To make a long story short, I had a POS compaq laptop that Bestbuy has finally agreed to replace. So I've got 1600+tax to spend on a new laptop at best buy, although I do have money saved so I'd say 2000 or so before tax is the limit. My primary concern is graphics, secondary is memory, tertiary is hdd speed. I don't really have an opinion as per AMD vs Intel but faster the better provided that it won't scorch my flesh when I try and use it as an actual laptop. Battery life would be nice but it'll spend most of it's life plugged in, it should be able to play a movie (1.5-2 hours long) when I'm flying or what not.

The big thing I'm going to base my decision on is the graphics capability (as in games), from what I know there's no way to change the graphics card in a laptop... right? I also really want a 5400rpm hdd.

I can't stress how much I wish I could buy a laptop somewhere besides Bestbuy, like a sager but I don't think that's a possibility. Given the restriction of buying at bestbuy I found these laptops listed on their website;

The Gateway 7426GX-In the price range and has a Mobility Radeon 9550, but only 64MB on the video card. 100GB disk but no mention of it being 5400 or 4200rpm. Does have 1GB of memory and a DL dvd burner. Mobile A64 3700+ processor is cool but I'm not sure if it's something outstanding.

HP Pavilion zv6007us-Lower on price, has a A64 3200+ (not mobile A64 which scares me). 512MB of memory, 100GB disk @ 4200rpm which I'm not thrilled with. It however does have a ATI Radeon Xpress 200M IGP with 128MB dedicated to it.

There's also a couple of Sony Vaio's with GeForce Go 6200 chips but they're higher in price, doable but not ideal.

So as far as BestBuy's laptop solutions go, which would you go with?

How do the Mobility Radeon 9550 compare to the 200M vs the GeForce Go 6200?

Last question, BestBuy sells HP laptops but they don't list the zd8000 on their page which looks quite nice. Any thoughts on the possibility of getting BestBuy to order this laptop for me since they're an HP vendor?

 

[JBird7986]

I've got a slightly older eMachines model of the Gateway (A64-M 3400+, 80GB HDD, 768MB RAM (upped personally from 512MB), and single layer DVD+/-RW) from last June. Seeing as how I can't find any data on an MR9550, I'm willing to bet it is the same chip as my MR9600, which also has 64MB RAM. If it is, there is enough power in the thing to move at clear FPS on HL2. Barely, but it runs. At any rate, I love my laptop, it is no desktop, but it does everything I ask of it.

 

[Ebolax]

That's encouraging as the more info I'm finding the more I'm leaning towards the Gateway. I'm not really thrilled about the 4200rpm disk but that's easily replaceable if needed.

And from what I've read the M9550 is the same as the M9600. Like you said, this isn't a desktop replacement but I'd like it to be flexible and not constraining like my old Compaq was.

 

[fbrdphreak]

The Radeon 9550 is an underclocked 9600. For gaming, I think the Gateway 74xx series are the best Best Buy has. Only thing I would pick above that is an X600 or X700, but I don't think they offer anything that has that.

Go for the Gateway 3700+ w/1GB RAM & DVDRW. Since you have extra money drop in one of the new 100GB 7200RPM drives from Seagate or Hitachi.

 

[JBird7986]

Yeah, like I said, I love my laptop. I get around 2:30 battery life and it remains a powerhouse laptop on or off the wall.

 

[Mike01]

The 7426gx is the most powerful laptop available at best buy.

The MR9550 is, like others have said, an underclocked 9600. It's very easy to overclock using ATITool (free download) and runs at 415/215 reliably (for a few hours at a time when playing games).

It gets 40fps in HL2 video stress test and 26fps in Aquamark 3.

It's not anywhere near the top mobile video card available, but if you play games more than you run benchmarks it will be fine.

The A64 3700 is a powerhouse. I do video editing and it helps a lot, as does the Gig of ram.

The 4200RPM HD is not slow. The data density (100GB) makes up for slower rotation and you get just over 30MB/sec transfer rate, which is very respectable for a laptop HD.