Looking for a $1200-$1500 Gaming Laptop

[JueYan]

Hi guys; I've noticed SD tends to focus on very cheap low-end laptops, but was wondering if you guys could help me choose a gaming machine.

I'm looking for a $1200 to $1500 gaming laptop, preferably with a 15" to 16" screen. I will be gaming and would like at least two hours of non-gaming, wireless-on battery life. I'm upgrading from a 7900 GO GS at 1920x1600, so I'd like a respectable resolution... at least 1440x900, say. I basically want to run current-gen games at native res at medium. Say... COD4, Borderlands, maybe Crysis on medium-low.

I'm seriously technically challenged, so I don't know what sort of specs I should be looking for. For example, notebookcheck has a list of video cards by rank, but I don't know how much RAM or CPU I need to unbottleneck the very expensive graphics card.

So far, the most attractive notebook I've found is this ibuypower machine for $1369:
Battalion 101 M865TU
* 15.4" 16:10 Wide Screen 1680x1050
* 1GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260
* Intel® Core™ 2 Duo P8700
* 4GB DDR3-1333 Memory
* 320GB 7200 RPM SATA HDD
* 8x Dual Format DVD±R/±RW Drive
* 7-in-1 Media Card Reader/Writer
* Windows 7 Home Premium

I'd appreciate any advice on where to find a machine/ more information. I've searched the forum, but would appreciate it if you point out any helpful threads I may have missed.

Thanks!

Edit

This looks nicer, and cheaper, at $1250, from Newegg [newegg.com].

15.6" ASUS G Series G51Vx-X3A NoteBook
Intel Core 2 Duo P8700(2.53GHz)
4GB Memory
320GB HDD 7200rpm
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 260M - Retail
Windows 7

[JueYan]

(bump) Didn't get any replies since last night, so here's what I'm leaning towards now:
Asus G51J-A1 15.6-Inch Gaming Laptop [buydig.com]

15.6" HD (1920x1080) Display
Intel i7-720QM (1.60GHz Quad-Core); Processor
4GB RAM DDR3
640GB 7200RPM (320G x 2) Hard Drive
NVIDIA GTX 260M 1GB VRAM DDR3 Graphics Card
SuperMulti DVD Burner
802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi
Bluetooth 2.1
Integrated Camera and Microphone
Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Illuminated backlit keyboard for ease of use in the dark
EAX Advanced HD 4.0 audio technology

$1409 with potentially 3% CB

The i7 looks very tempting. Any thoughts?

[buckcm]

I'll post. It's good, but I honestly don't know about the i7 @ 1.6 ghz. Just seems slow. The video card is good. My friend has a an Athlon X2 @ 2.2 with a 9600M video card. It does well on CoD4 and would probably be fine on lower settings for Crysis. Think of something more along the lines of this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Pro...6834220566. Wait for a good deal if you can. The gaming laptops are indeed few on here.

[Xerloq]

Quote from buckcm : I'll post. It's good, but I honestly don't know about the i7 @ 1.6 ghz. Just seems slow..

Seriously? The i7 will walk all over the Athlon x2 and the Core 2 chips. It's not all about clock speeds anymore.

In any case, the i7 will automatically overclock itself to 2.8 GHz if necessary, which sort of kills the clockspeed argument anyway. I vote for the G51J.

http://ark.intel.com/Compare.aspx...7006,43122,

[zeth006]

Quote from Xerloq : Seriously? The i7 will walk all over the Athlon x2 and the Core 2 chips. It's not all about clock speeds anymore. In any case, the i7 will automatically overclock itself to 2.8 GHz if necessary, which sort of kills the clockspeed argument anyway. I vote for the G51J. http://ark.intel.com/Compare.aspx...7006,43122,

True that. The i7 is currently one of the more powerful processors around. Even the Q9000 mobile processors lag by about 10-15% in benchmarks when all cores are utilized.

[JueYan]

Thanks guys for the help. I pulled the trigger on the Asus G51J-A1 15.6-Inch Gaming Laptop... $1399. I don't see a comparable machine with the GTX-260 and i7 processor anywhere else under <$1600. The first 40ish places I checked were out of stock, so I guess this is a good buy.

15.6" HD (1920x1080) Display
Intel i7-720QM (1.60GHz Quad-Core); Processor
4GB RAM DDR3
640GB 7200RPM (320G x 2) Hard Drive
NVIDIA GTX 260M 1GB VRAM DDR3 Graphics Card
SuperMulti DVD Burner
802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi
Bluetooth 2.1
Integrated Camera and Microphone
Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Illuminated backlit keyboard for ease of use in the dark
EAX Advanced HD 4.0 audio technology