Archive for May, 2010

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HP coupon code (valid through 7/31/10)

Friday, May 7th, 2010

New Coupon:

$25 off your online order of $125 or greater at the HP Home & Home Office Store. Use coupon code: SVMB39487. Offer excludes ink, toner, All mini laptops, All Compaq, All G-series laptops, p6300z, p6310t, s5305z, s5310t, Officejet J3680, LaserJet P1102w, Personal Media drives, Pocket Media drives, SimpleSave drives, brands: Beats, Logitech, Linksys, Flip, Microsoft, Adobe, and Norton. Maximum 1 redemption per person or address. Not valid with other promotions, Friends & Family, or HP Academy. Combinable with instant rebates. Restrictions apply. Products and support acquired by Customer under these Terms are solely for Customer’s personal use and not for immediate resale or sub-licensing. For complete conditions, see “Coupon Information” in the “Customer Service” section at www.hpshopping.com. Coupon valid through 7/31/10.

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Laptop graphics card comparison: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870, 5850, 5730, 5650, 5470 and Nvidia GeForce GTX 480M, GTX 285M, GTX 260M, GTS 360M, GT 330M, 310M

Thursday, May 6th, 2010

My last compilation of laptop graphics card benchmarks is too old, so here you have the new version. I’m only covering the last generation of graphics card, and only the most common ones: if the graphics card you are looking for is not here, go to Notebookcheck or use Google (look for the 3DMark Vantage Performance score of the card for a quick comparison). Some remarks:

  • I know, the tables at Notebookcheck are much more informative, but can be confusing and some info is lacking. I think this presentation is more useful for many people.
  • 3DMark Vantage is a synthetic benchmark. It gives you an approximate idea of the performance of a graphics card, but actual gaming performance of a card can be quite different. It’s better to compare ATI vs ATI or Nvidia vs Nvidia, because many games are better optimized for a brand or the other.
  • Crysis benchmarks on High settings (1024×768) are included. Crysis is not a very current game, but it gives you a good idea of the ability of a card to play current games at high settings (remember that 30 fps is generally considered as smooth gameplay). But some newer games, such as Metro 2033, are more demanding (have a look at the comment about quality levels of Metro 2033 in the Yougamers review).
  • I have only included single card configurations, mainly to keep things simple, but also because the contribution of the 2nd card is very variable depending on the benchmark/game, driver version and so.
  • Bottom line: get at least a Nvidia GeForce GT 330M if you plan to play games, or a GTS 360M or faster if you are serious about gaming.

Feel free to post comments to add your experiences and other relevant information (preferably with links to the sources!).

Are you interested on laptops sold in Spain? Go to the Spanish version.

Gaming on Laptops

Graphics card 3DMark Vantage Crysis High (1024×768) Buy featured laptops
Nvidia GeForce GTX 480M 9277
 62.3 Sager NP9285
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870 8292
 56.1 Sager NP8690, Alienware M17x
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870 (Asus, MSI) 7467
 Asus G73JH, MSI GX740
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5850 (GDDR5) 6957
 MSI GX640
Nvidia GeForce GTX 285M 6498
 50.3 Sager NP8690, Sager NP8120 (SLI)
Nvidia GeForce GTS 360M (Toshiba) 5765
Toshiba Qosmio X505
Nvidia GeForce GTX 260M 5686
 41.9 Alienware M15x
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5850 (GDDR3, Acer) 5221
 Acer Aspire 8943
Nvidia GeForce GTX 260M (Asus) 5084
 39.3 Asus G60J
Nvidia GeForce GTS 360M (Asus) 4670
 Asus G51JX
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5730 3623
 Asus N61JQ, Asus N71JQ
Nvidia GeForce GT 335M 3191
 25.2 Asus N82JV, Alienware M11x
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650 3190
 23.0 Acer Aspire 5740G
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4670 2947
 26.0 Dell Studio XPS 16
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650 (Vaio E) 2786
 20.0
Nvidia GeForce GT 330M 2700
8292		 23.0
Nvidia GeForce GT 230M 1982
 18.7
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5470 1238
 13.6
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570 (GDDR3) 1175
 11.9
Nvidia GeForce 310M 1131
Nvidia ION 2 696
 6.3
Intel GMA HD 285

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HP coupon code for laptops (from May 3rd 2010)

Monday, May 3rd, 2010

New Coupons:

Save up to $400 in instant savings using $200 coupon code NBSP29657 + Instant Rebate ($0-$200 depending on model selected) for the purchase of customized HP Pavilion dv8t Quad, dv7t Quad, tm2t, ENVY 15 & ENVY 13 configured at $1,499 or greater at the HP Home & Home Office Store. Offer limited to the first 400 coupons redeemed. 1 redemption per person or address. Not valid with other promotions, HP Academy, or HP Friends & Family. Restrictions apply. Combinable with instant rebates. Products and support acquired by Customer under these Terms are solely for Customer’s personal use and not for immediate resale or sub-licensing. For complete conditions, see “Coupon Information” in the “Customer Service” section at www.hpshopping.com.

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Save up to $500 in instant savings using $300 coupon code NBSP336958 + Instant Rebate ($150-$200 depending on model selected) for the purchase of customized HP Pavilion dv8t Quad, dv7t Quad, and tm2t configured at $1,399 or greater at the HP Home & Home Office Store. Offer limited to the first 1,350 coupons redeemed. 1 redemption per person or address. Not valid with other promotions, HP Academy, or HP Friends & Family. Restrictions apply. Combinable with instant rebates. Products and support acquired by Customer under these Terms are solely for Customer’s personal use and not for immediate resale or sub-licensing. For complete conditions, see “Coupon Information” in the “Customer Service” section at www.hpshopping.com.

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Laptop reviews: Apple Macbook Pro 13, Asus N61JV, HP Elitebook 2540p & 8440p, Samsung NB30…

Sunday, May 2nd, 2010

Laptop reviews of the week:

Other interesting links:

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