Another XoticPC Review!

So, my previous laptop was an Asus G50Vt-X1, which I got in 2009. It's specs are Core 2 Duo P8400, 4GB DDR2 RAM, and a 9800M GS with 512MB of GDDR5 ram, and a 1366x768 display! Needless to say, it's been time for an upgrade for quite a while!!

I beat around the bush quite a bit, embarking on a project, creatively called "Portable Desktop," where I was trying to use some tricks like using a pcie riser card to fit the majority of the components into the footprint of an Xbox 360. That attempt failed and I used that as my main pc for a while, transferring the components into the Cooler Master Elite 110, which I do NOT recommend if you plan on tinkering a lot, these are not easy to work in and definitely lean more toward "set it and forget it" builds.

It's actually been about two years since I was first thinking of getting a new laptop, but then switched direction and did those mini-ITX shenanigans. Mini-ITX is still my favorite PC form factor, and I will certainly make another attempt at the Portable Desktop, but I realized a laptop is still where its at for portability, and I was pretty sure that technology had caught up and 1080p gaming on most titles, especially the 8 year old Red Alert 3, would be more than adequate with a 970M.

I originally thought I wanted a 17.3", but when I saw the great price for a Sager NP8640/Clevo P640RE, I realized that 14.1" would be better and besides, I preferred smaller, which is why I went with mini-ITX, so why would I go with a larger laptop? And I couldn't resist the price, at $1066 for a 970M!

As far as ordering and everything, my experience was basically the same as this guy's; I made an account on June 1, waited to order for five days for some reason, then ordered on the June 6. Went to Phase 2 on June 8, shipped the next day, and received it on the 17th!

It ended up being a little more expensive, as I bought a WD Black 1TB, but didn't realize the HDD bay only accepted 7mm drives! So I finally got a 2TB Seagate drive. It's great, have enough storage for almost all of my steam games, and I don't notice any loading time difference due to it being 5400 RPM instead of 7200 RPM. Not sure why I didn't check the manual; I guess cause Clevo's manual download page is not the easiest to find and the manuals contain more than one model sometimes. But that's ok, I'll use the WD Black as a portable dump drive.

I bought an Everki Studio to fit with the slim theme, and now use the laptop mostly in a "Battletop" configuration; on a monitor stand with two other monitors.

Could use some cable management of course, but other than that, this is my final setup until I build a new desktop. Ok well, I intend to build a chair and move those power bar functions onto it, but other than that yeah, final setup.

TL;DR: Laptops have become powerful enough to play all the games I play. I went with Sager because its one of the few brands that allow you to change certain components. XoticPC had a great price on the NP8640, so I went with them and was not dissappointed!

Also, shout out to Emily.M, who helped me in the chat! For whatever reason I was not able to rate the conversation.

PS: I noticed you don't have an accessories page, I was wondering about how to buy a second power cord? Obviously I should have done that at configuration, but I only realized that I needed one after I had my everything configured.

Thanks,

LC

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Another XoticPC Review!