...to light up the comment panel with frustration over the screen resolution. 768p on an otherwise premium notebook is ridiculous. With a 15" form factor it is a complete disgrace. Let's hope apple sets the standard with a 2880x1800 macbook soon...and the rest of the world will follow.
Aye for once Im happy that there is an "i-wave" rolling over the world. The new i-pad has waaaay better resolution than this notebook. Its time to shape up or ship out for the companies that keep cramming crap screens into otherwise decent hardware.
Was a very interesting aticle though especially as it seems as if there are going to be new mobile chips coming from nVidia soon and AMD will have to follow.
"The new i-pad has waaaay better resolution than this notebook." OMG! Have you truly been taken in by the marketing? Yep. That high resolution ipad has increased DPI which means it might as well be 1280x720 when you actually want 'working' space.
Agreed wholeheartedly, though it's worth noting that this machine can't even keep up with its direct competitors. I don't know what it's going to take to get typical buyers to care about this, but maybe Apple ca do it.
It's wholly acceptable on an 11-12" format, borderline unacceptable in a 13.3" chassis, and ridiculous to have 1366x768 on a 15.6" format. No other way to put it.
I would argue that the new iPad has proven that it is completely unacceptable even in a 10-12" format. If a $500 iPad can have a high quality, high resolution screen, there is no reason a $2000+ high end ultraportable notebook cannot. I'm talking to you, Lenovo.
Yes, it is actually what keeps me in the T series rather than the X series. While the X panels are much higher quality, I can't work effectively with the pixel count.
Hoping for over 1000 vertical pixels in an X series notebook within a year.
I'd second this, but I'd be talking to Alienware, whatever fool is still putting glossy crap screens in the new Asus G75, and MSI as well.
A $1500 or more gaming laptop SHOULD REALLY HAVE A GOOD SCREEN when the top quality parts only add $100 to the total price.
Make it a frickin' option at least and see what kind of response you get. And I mean a REAL OPTION. Allow it to be added to the BASE MODEL, not ONLY TO THE $2500 version. Yeah, I'm talking to you fAlienware!!!
fAlienware LOL. WHY have I not seen it written like this before?!?
Hell, my old 15" laptop from 2002 had a 1400x1050 screen (and a buddy at the same time had one with 1920x1200, I don't think you can even get that anymore and no 1080 isn't as good)... It's ridiculous how laptopscreens only seem to get worse over time.
I have fond memories of the WSXGA+ panel in my Dell 8600, 1680x1050 in a 15.4in display was awesome. You could even get a WUXGA 1920x1200 panel as well.
That was 2003, yet this 1366x768 crap is still being offered today.
Very much looking forward to Apple pushing the envelope on laptop displays, the 1920x1200 display on my 17" Pro is good, but a res bump would be sweet. (and please offer a matte option...)
My Thinkpad T60P from five years ago has 1680 X 1050 15 inch panel, the one thing holding me back from replacing it is all the crappy panels that are going into laptops lately... For once I say Go Apple! I hope the new Ipad pushes manufactures to start putting better screens inyo there tablets and laptops.
I stopped reading after I noticed the resolution. It's time for this shit to end. Since LCDs took over we've been in a race towards the bottom - lower resolutions and worse and worse panels. I really hope the dick measuring contest in the smartphone and tablet space leads to more high and ultra high resolution IPS (and with time OLED) displays in laptops and desktop monitors. So few even offer a high res alternative these days.
Seriously. Is 1366x768 a good replacement for 1024x768? Sure. For 1280x800? No. Likewise, I'm fine with 1600x900 rather than 1440x900, and 1920x1080 instead of 1680x1050, but going from 1920x1200 to 1920x1080 is...well, it's just insulting.
Manufacturers: If you're really hell bent for leather on shoving wider screens down our throats, the least you could do is give us 2048x1152, which still fits into the single-link DVI spec. How about 2400x1350? It divides nicely into 1600x900 for gaming and other 3D applications, and still gives you that shiny high-res look for regular 2D stuff.
I suppose 2048x1280 or even 2048x1536 on a desktop monitor is just too much to ask...
This will depend on whether Windows 8 can deliver good hi dpi support, currently some applications break when setting the text size of text to other than default, and non apple laptops use Windows, so they're somewhat held back by compatibility issues. I believe Metro apps will adapt well with high resolution, but this is not the case with some desktop apps.
well, I found some, mostly utilities and apps that comes from manufacturers with the driver cd/downloads, that uses fugly UI, but because I need them to use the hardware... latest app I found that breaks is The Witcher 2 Configuration Tool
Well, some of us also just have good eyes... I have absolutely no problems using my acer AO522 netbook which has a 720p 10" screen. That comes to exactly the same pixel density as 1080p on 15". Actually I wouldn't mind if the pixel density got even higher, when Asus comes with their full hd 13" models I might be really tempted, if I have the money for it then.
That is pure madnes... Even if you go from 1M pixels to 2M pixels, this mean your framerate will drop down 50%... E.g. if you had 50 fps before it will end up near 25 fps. To talk about 5M pixels means you really have absolutely no clue about gpu's and games...
Of course you can lower the resolution of your game but, as anyone that ever tried this will know, if you move away from the native resolution screens become very ugly. Your better off playing native on a lower resolution than picking this resolution on a higher res panel.
When you have pixels that small, things actually scale quite well, so going to a lower resolution for a game is no big deal.
I agree that a 1680 x 1050 screen is great for mainstream gaming - it's a good compromise between having a nice big screen, and not too many pixels to push.
That's great, if you can't afford a video card, and I'm aware that not everyone can.
But let me tell you, gaming on a 30" 2560x1600 IPS screen is something to behold. Battlefield 3, Skyrim, Mass Effect 3, The Old Republic, all look and play amazing when driven by a pair of HD6950 2GB cards.
First of all we are talking here about mobile gaming... Even if you get an insanely expensive laptop with sli/crossfire you still wont have enough fps for a 30 inch screen with that resolution...
Furthermore crossfire results in microstutter so thats not an ideal solution, it pretty much ruins the game.
On pc gaming I once bought an 8800 GTS 640mb for 320 euro when it was just released (probablyt wrong priced should be 450 euro), 6 months later the 8800GT was introduced at half price. Since then I learned my lesson and got the gtx 260 for 140 euro (and got 90 back for the 8800gts), after that a gtx460 hawk for 165 euro. If you stick with your 1680x1050 panel you can run all games with AA without any problems for at least a year for about 50-60 (because each time you get 90-100 back for your old card). If I want to play bf3 on 1920x1080 I have to upgrade to a 560ti which would cost me 220 euro while resulting in the same detail settings and fps...
But you are so very wrong (and angry), young padwan.
The beauty of a 2880x1800 screen is that it scales perfectly down to 1440x900, which would allow it to be driven by a mid-class GPU for fast FPS-games, and you will not be able to see that there is any scaling going on. (There isn't - every pixel in the 1400-domain is just shown as four pixels). For serious use, you can cram in four times more information and text in the 2800-resolution. If you working with text, like programming, screen estate matters.
And you should ease up on the assumptions. I am an ex-fps-junkie, but I still care about framerate.
Double the pixels is half the framerate? Right, and there we stop taking you seriously... You read Anandtech yet you don't know there are lots of different possible bottlenecks and they are not all affected by resolution? Aside from that I agree, scaling isn't nearly as bad as people make it out to be on a proper high resolution screen. I've regularly done it both on laptops and on my 24" 1920x1200 display and if you can live with lower res I don't see how you can be so picky to whine about a bit of blurring from the scaling. Maybe if you play text-heavy games, but those tend to be less sensitive to framerate, so it works out nicely.
It is... I have an old Philips 17 inch TFT (25ms from 2003 so 9 years old!) as secondary monitor with 1280x1024. My main monitor is a samsung 2253BW (2008, 2ms), which is regarded as a high quality monitor. If I put the 2253BW on 1280x1024 (including black bars) you get about the same screen surface. The 17 inch is 27 cm height and the 22inch is 30cm. However the image quality is a LOT worse. If all you can run is 1280x1024 (gpu limited) than you are 100% better off with the old 17inch 5:4 panel as compared to downscaling the modern 22inch panel.
Besides gaming it is of course personal preference. Back in the day you could get a 1680x1050 22 inch or a 1680x1050 20 inch, or a higher resolution 22 inch. However this results in very small text on your OS forcing you to use larger icons which (in the old days) were not as pretty ^^. Small icons get annoying pretty quickly. Anyone that has been wearing contact lenses for some years will know what im talking about:D.
If you are talking about 5M pixels (the post that I replied to then I can assure you that you will be gpu imited and that scaling will be completely lineair...
ps since sandy brige its hard to be cpu limited with a single gpu ^^.
Yes, disgraceful. I have to agree. Lets hope that Apple also forces a return to the infinitely more logical 16x10 format for laptops. 16x9 is simply cost saving BS which I equate to skimping on the quality of the screen.
Make it 16x10, IPS, and I will gladly, GLADLY, kick the vendor an extra $150.
If they can put a 2560x?? IPS panel in a $500 iPad (not 3) then they can damn well do the same in $900 and up laptops.
All we need is ONE manufacturer to set the example, (and do it well for pete's sake, don't skimp on the keyboard to compensate), and the HUGE SALES will show all of the others that this is what they should have been doing all along.
If they would have put a 1600x1000 quality TN panel into THIS laptop, I would have been a buyer for $100 over list price. As is though, it is useless crapola to me.
Props for the mSata SSD and the EMPTY drive bay. Although, I'd prefer two fullsized bays and the ability to buy my own SSD and install it along with the crap HDD they would include.
Hey, if Asus can put a 1080P IPS Matte screen in an $1100 UX31A, then every other laptop maker sure as heck better start doing the same. It is just crazy that it has taken this long for the first quality laptop display to appear.
This one, or hopefully a G75 with a similar spec'd screen, is something I'm looking forward to buying in the near future. Not things like this acer with the low res, low spec screen.
You call this compelling? Trackpad sucks. COME on. That is one of the most important usability items on a laptop. If the trackpad sucks the notebook sucks. Screen resolution? 768P on 15.6" are they joking?
Also ditch the optical drive. I have a Lenovo 420s and replaced the optical drive with a second battery. I have the optical drive somewhere but I am not sure I would find it if I ever needed it.
Great move with the GT 640 absolutely. Also great move with the mSSD and harddrive bay. But else? M.
In the recent Dell XPS13 review, it had almost the exact same faults as this laptop and yet this one is somehow "compelling"? The trackpad and screen are two of the most important parts of a laptop, yet the poor screen doesn't even get a mention in the conclusion. Is the rest of the laptop good enough to overlook those deficiencies?
The author also seems to base his final judgement on a retail price of around $800, I'll tell you now there's no way it will be close to $800 a decent sized SSD and i7.
Hm, I didn't even get far enough to appreciate the price. 800 would be a good offer, but a 256GB SSD, and i7 and a Kepler GPU for 800? Sure. And the next iPad will be sold for a benefit price in Africa. M.
My wife is complaining about her laptop again and this is exactly the form factor she likes (thin and light but with optical drive) but the screen is so awful that I'm going to have to give it a pass. Almost everything else about this is awesome (6GB ram max is pretty weak but the mSATA SSD + 2.5 HDD is a great choice) and having an ethernet port and optical drive is a requirement for me, but the screen simply must be better than this or it's a complete waste of money to purchase.
I bought a lenovo T420s which is remarkably similar to this thing (thin light with optical, 14") but after receiving it and seeing how terrible that screen was, I'm going to hold out until either the laptop screens improve or tablets improve to the point where I can switch over completely to tablet use. That T420s is the last laptop with a crummy screen I'll ever buy.
Laptop manufacturers are going to lose their customers in a BIG way in a year or two when tablet hardware is capable of running a "real" OS, unless they can figure out a way to put nice screens in their laptops. I would have happily paid an extra $400 for my T420s for an upgraded screen, and I won't buy a replacement with a TN screen at ANY price. If that means I wait until the ipad 8 or whatever microsoft comes out with in a couple of years when their tablets are not much different than tiny desktops/laptops, then that's better than using one of these horrible screens.
It has 192, yeah. Interesting. But its in the same thermal envelope so who cares how many shaders there are, maybe they went AMDs route with less powerful individually but more numerous shaders.
It pretty clear that the CUDA cores in kepler cannot be directly compared to the ones in past generations. With the full GK104 being rumored to have 1536 yet nowhere near 3x as fast as a GTX580 (512 CUDA cores), plus this card with 384 and significantly less performance than the 192 based fermi card.
The mention of the 6650M in the Sony notebook should warrant an asterisk on all the GPU performance graphs. In those graphs there is nothing to differentiate or tell a reader that a built in 6650M will perform much better than a 6650M. We all know those graphs will be referenced and they imply that 6650M in a standard or non standard implementation will work
I can see clearly why NVidia likes your graphs because they're misleading.
The text has an explanation for the poor performance of the 6650M, and actually I have a 6630M review coming shortly where it outperforms the 6650M results, but there's still a large gap between it and the GT 640M.
The bigger issue is that AMD doesn't have a lot of compelling laptops using their GPUs, and even the ones that do go with AMD have other quirks. The Z2 has it in an external dock where performance (at least on the internal laptop display) is hindered by Thunderbolt bandwidth; the VAIO SE16 (which I'm reviewing right now) has the 6630M, but the manually switchable graphics and almost complete lack of driver updates is going to make it a tough sell for gamers. HP's Envy has the same problem with driver updates.
We've heard from AMD that they'll be rolling out a "unified driver" for all their switchable graphics laptops, but until (if) that happens you're basically asking for problems down the road. Optimus may not be perfect, but compared to the AMD alternative it sure feels like it. :-(
I understand what you're saying about your options. However, that still doesn't address the fact that your graphs do not express this is an exotic GPU implementation with additional contraints that are not normal, driver quirks or not. Keep mind you have lots of graphs and a very important bit of information hidden half way between them.
You're not new to the internet, you know the nature and power of these graphs and their interpretation on the web. I'm not surprised in the least bit NVidia loves your graphs and testing.
Anyway.... any indication about the heat from this NVidia mobile GPU being common thing with upcoming products? :)
They should have stuck at least a 1080p screen on it and 4 memory slots so you can stuff 16GB of memory in it :-P
I'm hoping the Macbook Air shows them how it's done too...and I hate rooting for Apple :-P Sony's Z2 looks great, but has the same memory limitations, and no Kepler GPU :-(
I would have thought that it was a hassle carrying around a few DVDs on your travels. Also, you can just rip it as an .iso or .img and VLC usually plays it just fine, no need to encode it. Little 64GB USB stick (they go cheap these days) and you have 8 or 10 movies with you at all times. But, your call of course. :D
It's b/c PC manufacturer's (Apple not included here) continue to put out so-so products like this, that I've been sticking with Netbooks for the past three years. Six years ago I had an Acer laptop. It was top of the line for back then. It still works. It has a real touchpad and two separate mouse buttons. The screen is washed-out now, but back then it was vibrant and responsive. As someone above stated "The touchpad and screen on a laptop are EVERYTHING. If those two suck, then the laptop sucks." I couldn't agree more. I'll stick with my Netbook for now.
Full stop, straight to the comments to enjoy some commiseration about the state of laptop screens. I never read an Anandtech notebook review article past the word "768p". Ever. If you want my readership and page clicks Anandtech you'll have to start shipping those substandard notebooks back and asking for something more worthwhile to review. Maybe the manufacturers will finally get the hint.
Totally agree. I think any laptop "reviews" with a 768p screen should begin and end with the the sentence:
Laptop XXX would have been reviewed but since it only has a 768p screen we did not feel it was worth our time to review and our readers time to read such a review.
Recommendation: wait for higher resolution laptop screens.
At that point we might as well just not review notebooks. The fact remains that 768p is the standard that has been forced upon consumers. All we can do is review what's available and continue haranguing manufacturers to fix the problem.
No, you silly clueless writer. At that point, laptop manufacturers get a clue, and release a good product for a change. Review sites do have that kind of power, didn't you know?
And as a sidenote, how does boycotting us help change the industry? We've been actively campaigning for better screens in notebooks since we started reviewing notebooks, I'm not sure how not supporting us is going to help the situation.
Oh my the screen is 768p? I would certainly hope that the screen is refreshed in a progressive manner! If my cursor were to start interlacing as I moved it around I would probably start a bar fight.
My point is, why would an unnecessary descriptor such as "progressive" get slipped into a laptop review? Man up, and display the screen pixelage, of course the laptop is going to display things progressive it wasn't a television designed in the 60s. Now if you were to stick a DVD in there, DVDs are encoded interlaced in most cases. Now what's happening? A progressive display of interlaced images? Better to just leave that out of the review.
Also, 1366x768 in a 15.6" laptop? What committee let that through? In an age where the iPad can end up with 2048x1536 pixels in a 10" screen for $500 they can certainly slip in a higher quality screen at the price they are currently at. Even if it is still a TN panel. I have a 14" Thinkpad with a 1600x900 display, at no point should a screen of larger size come with lower resolution.
I've been looking for a laptop to replace my aging Asus F8Va (which has a 14" 1440x900 screen), but every single manufacturer insists on using crappy 1366x768 screens. And I say crappy screens not just because of the resolution, but also because of the poor viewing angles and bad contrast.
I remember some older notebooks sporting 4:3 screen with at least 1280x1024 resolution. Then came the 16:10 craze and the screens started coming with 1280x800 resolution. Now we have 16:9 screens with 1366x768 resolution. What's next? 1440x600? 1600x400?
Having 768 vertical pixels feels so 90's. Come on! Even my old 19" Samsung CRT sm997mb, which was in no way top of the line, could diplay 2048x1536@60 (1600x1200@75, 1280x1024@85), and it was made in 2004. I know CRTs are different animals, but I think I made my point.
I'm not much into the "ultrabook" thing, but I prefer a 14" latop over the more common 15.6" form factor, and I want to play some games on it from time to time, so a dedicated GPU or a decent APU is required. I was considering the Lenovo y470p, which is a 14" laptop with Radeon HD7690, a very good port selection and a great price, but why does it come with a mediocre screen!
HP makes some decent laptops, the DV6 is interesting, and some of them have a 1080p screen option, but are 15.6" or 17"
Also, as some others said, why not ditch the optical drive and use the space for something more useful? An additional battery, some more ports, etc.
It's not the case that every company only offers 1366x768 screens, my current Vaio is approaching three years old for the model and has a 1600x900 13.1in screen and the model after it (now also retired) offered a 1080p 13.1in screen with decent colour and viewing angles. 13in higher resolution panels are trickier to find but 14in is fairly easy, there's quite a few other with 1600x900 panels.
I do love that in the comments as always people are saying how Apple will lead the way with high resolution displays despite Sony offering 13.1in 1080p panels for a couple of years now. As usual Apple are first to do something by being several years behind those that are genuinely at the front.
As for the why with mediocre screens, I would think it's obvious - most people don't care and won't pay for them. I don't agree with that stance but on supporting a large number of these crappy 1366x768 screens both at work and out of work laptops, not one person has every complained to me about the low screen resolution. It tends to be the other way round if anything, people tend to complain about my high resolution panels because they make everything too small.
Yes, Sony does make nice laptops with sometimes nice screens... The problem is that you pay through the nose for them. When a 500$ laptop offers enough performance for me, and the added cost for a decent screen would be about 50-100$, then why can't I get one of those screens unless I buy a 2000$ laptop? As for Apple, I don't think the majority of people saying that in the comments here are fanboys or even saying that Apple would be the first, but it does seem to be the case that whatever Apple does, other manufacturers copy. I'm not even saying that it's to Apple's credit as a technology company, it says more about their marketing department. I actually would never buy anything from Apple because I don't agree with their philosophy and most of their products and think they're a bunch of stuck up snobs (from professional dealings with them), but I would like it if they could jumpstart a trend to include better screens in laptops.
you have to compare with amd 6630m on a sony vaio SA. z2 has thunderbolt so is not a fair comparison in graphics card. Here I smell a NVIDIA propaganda, rather than a fair comparison of the graphic cards...come on!!!
Keep this in mind: Due to the much lower thermal headroom in a laptop you can't just stick in enough power to fire up 1080p displays on a laptop, either from the graphic's side or the power constraints (Remember that the iPad has a MASSIVE battery for the power consumption of everything minus display)
You can't just stick 4 580's on a lap. It's a compromise between costs to the user, mobility and performance. I do agree 1600x900 should be an standard but it's not possible until our graphic's card offer 6870 like performance on 10-20W power envelope
I had to log in to say this...looking at the results on the gaming performance page, it seems to me that this laptop is able to acquit itself quite well at 1600x900. Honestly, my next laptop will be 1600x900 at 15.6" (unless I need to get a really cheap machine for some reason) and if this model had a matte, 900p display, it would be on my short, SHORT list, especially given the pleasant experience I've had with my current Acer laptop.
There's really just no excuse for Acer (or anyone) to not put a higher-resolution display on a machine like this. I don't need (or want) 1920x1080, but I'll be damned if I spend more than $600 on a laptop that doesn't have at least 900 rows of pixels on the display.
I do agree 1600x900 are fine, but I can't get over a 700$ budget and I want to play games at least medium. HP + Llano + 7690 stays under that budget with 768, but doesn't have the option to 1600x900 other than 1080p and that would be too taxing, so it's unfair. It's a compromise: Want better displays on laptops? You need more power, thus, pay more, thus, lose markets. Most people won't notice a lot of difference unless you're a graphics junkie. You are niche users, not the mainstream market
Actually, I really wouldn't care what resolution a game rendered at as long as it ends up looking okay in the end. Render in 960x600 and upscale to 1440x900, or in 1280x720 or 1200x675 and upscale to 1600x900. I don't care, it's fine with me, as long as the scaling is decent.
But that's neither here nor there. I want a resolution with 900 rows for productivity reasons. Gaming is a secondary concern for me, but I will want to be able to fire up something more than classic Unreal Tournament or d1x-rebirth in my next laptop. Honestly, with Kepler and even Trinity nearly here, I suspect that GPU power is about to become a non-issue.
I was really disappointed in the Samsung Series 7...I thought it would be my perfect laptop, but what I read about it left a bad taste in my mouth. So I'll be watching for a thin(ish) and light(ish) 15.6"(ish) laptop with a 1440x900 or 1600x900 (or thereabouts) matte screen that can game reasonably well, whether that's with a Trinity APU or with a i7-3xxx paired with Kepler. I think a system like this could probably hit around $700 with a Trinity APU.
Trinity: Yes. If Llano is any indicative and even a 10% increase of power on both sides on the same TDP, it could handle it pretty well. Otherwise, 640M seems disappointing to say the least... Let's see how Kepler scales tho, since this is the smallest part I guess.
A 15" laptop with a 1366 x 768 screen? Why would Anandtech even waste its time reviewing junk like this?
No offense fellas, but I dont care if the company even PAID you to review this thing, you should say no, because it hurts your own brand as a tech media website, to review this dross.
Next time you have a laptop review I cant tell you I aint clicking, because you seem likely to waste my time....
imo I have had a couple 1920x1200 dell latitude d820/e6500 and 1440x900 14inch screen on d630 and recently an e6420 14" 1600x900 screen. Now 16:9 is something I didn't want but it makes watching movies better. Also as bad as 1366x768 is, it is liveable. 640m and 720p gaming will go very well.
I currently use an acer 5930g and I am on the process to upgrade to an i5 3317u m3 640m machine. Seeing this review it shows that is good enough and good as a cheap replacement for use for next 2-4 years.
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Bols - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
...to light up the comment panel with frustration over the screen resolution. 768p on an otherwise premium notebook is ridiculous. With a 15" form factor it is a complete disgrace.Let's hope apple sets the standard with a 2880x1800 macbook soon...and the rest of the world will follow.
Frallan - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Aye for once Im happy that there is an "i-wave" rolling over the world. The new i-pad has waaaay better resolution than this notebook. Its time to shape up or ship out for the companies that keep cramming crap screens into otherwise decent hardware.
Was a very interesting aticle though especially as it seems as if there are going to be new mobile chips coming from nVidia soon and AMD will have to follow.
/F
damianrobertjones - Thursday, May 16, 2013 - link
"The new i-pad has waaaay better resolution than this notebook."OMG! Have you truly been taken in by the marketing? Yep. That high resolution ipad has increased DPI which means it might as well be 1280x720 when you actually want 'working' space.
Confusador - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Agreed wholeheartedly, though it's worth noting that this machine can't even keep up with its direct competitors. I don't know what it's going to take to get typical buyers to care about this, but maybe Apple ca do it.piroroadkill - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
It's wholly acceptable on an 11-12" format, borderline unacceptable in a 13.3" chassis, and ridiculous to have 1366x768 on a 15.6" format. No other way to put it.kkwst2 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I would argue that the new iPad has proven that it is completely unacceptable even in a 10-12" format. If a $500 iPad can have a high quality, high resolution screen, there is no reason a $2000+ high end ultraportable notebook cannot. I'm talking to you, Lenovo.noeldillabough - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I have to agree with you, while I LOVE my X220, the 768p screen is a sore spot. Its beautiful, IPS clear etc, but not enough pixels.Next machine will be a high res 12" laptop with an ivy bridge and HD4000 graphics (discrete graphics cards on laptops are on their way out)
kkwst2 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Yes, it is actually what keeps me in the T series rather than the X series. While the X panels are much higher quality, I can't work effectively with the pixel count.Hoping for over 1000 vertical pixels in an X series notebook within a year.
JojoKracko - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I'd second this, but I'd be talking to Alienware, whatever fool is still putting glossy crap screens in the new Asus G75, and MSI as well.A $1500 or more gaming laptop SHOULD REALLY HAVE A GOOD SCREEN when the top quality parts only add $100 to the total price.
Make it a frickin' option at least and see what kind of response you get. And I mean a REAL OPTION. Allow it to be added to the BASE MODEL, not ONLY TO THE $2500 version. Yeah, I'm talking to you fAlienware!!!
fAlienware LOL. WHY have I not seen it written like this before?!?
kmmatney - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Hell - my old 15" laptop from 2005 had a 1280 x 800 screen. I'd take the extra 34 pixels over this 768p crap.Finraziel - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
Hell, my old 15" laptop from 2002 had a 1400x1050 screen (and a buddy at the same time had one with 1920x1200, I don't think you can even get that anymore and no 1080 isn't as good)... It's ridiculous how laptopscreens only seem to get worse over time.Mitch89 - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
I have fond memories of the WSXGA+ panel in my Dell 8600, 1680x1050 in a 15.4in display was awesome. You could even get a WUXGA 1920x1200 panel as well.That was 2003, yet this 1366x768 crap is still being offered today.
Very much looking forward to Apple pushing the envelope on laptop displays, the 1920x1200 display on my 17" Pro is good, but a res bump would be sweet. (and please offer a matte option...)
SnowCat00 - Saturday, March 17, 2012 - link
My Thinkpad T60P from five years ago has 1680 X 1050 15 inch panel, the one thing holding me back from replacing it is all the crappy panels that are going into laptops lately... For once I say Go Apple! I hope the new Ipad pushes manufactures to start putting better screens inyo there tablets and laptops.Mumrik - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Yup.I stopped reading after I noticed the resolution. It's time for this shit to end. Since LCDs took over we've been in a race towards the bottom - lower resolutions and worse and worse panels.
I really hope the dick measuring contest in the smartphone and tablet space leads to more high and ultra high resolution IPS (and with time OLED) displays in laptops and desktop monitors. So few even offer a high res alternative these days.
VoraciousGorak - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Yeah."...one of the most compelling notebooks we've seen yet..."
Screen Resolution: 768p
/me scrolls down to comments to complain, then hits Back button on browser.
Old_Fogie_Late_Bloomer - Friday, March 16, 2012 - link
Seriously. Is 1366x768 a good replacement for 1024x768? Sure. For 1280x800? No. Likewise, I'm fine with 1600x900 rather than 1440x900, and 1920x1080 instead of 1680x1050, but going from 1920x1200 to 1920x1080 is...well, it's just insulting.Manufacturers: If you're really hell bent for leather on shoving wider screens down our throats, the least you could do is give us 2048x1152, which still fits into the single-link DVI spec. How about 2400x1350? It divides nicely into 1600x900 for gaming and other 3D applications, and still gives you that shiny high-res look for regular 2D stuff.
I suppose 2048x1280 or even 2048x1536 on a desktop monitor is just too much to ask...
Malih - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
This will depend on whether Windows 8 can deliver good hi dpi support, currently some applications break when setting the text size of text to other than default, and non apple laptops use Windows, so they're somewhat held back by compatibility issues.I believe Metro apps will adapt well with high resolution, but this is not the case with some desktop apps.
danielkza - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I'm yet to find a single application updated on the last 5 years that messes up high-DPI, at least starting from Vista when I started using it.Malih - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
well, I found some, mostly utilities and apps that comes from manufacturers with the driver cd/downloads, that uses fugly UI, but because I need them to use the hardware... latest app I found that breaks is The Witcher 2 Configuration ToolFinraziel - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
Well, some of us also just have good eyes... I have absolutely no problems using my acer AO522 netbook which has a 720p 10" screen. That comes to exactly the same pixel density as 1080p on 15". Actually I wouldn't mind if the pixel density got even higher, when Asus comes with their full hd 13" models I might be really tempted, if I have the money for it then.Exchequer - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
It is clear you are NOT a gamer... I hace combined my gamign rig intentionally with a 1680x1050 screen, why? Because it MATTERS for your framerate.1024x768=768k
1280x1024=1.2M
1680x1050=1.76M
1920x1080=2M
1366x768=1M
Your talking about is 5M
That is pure madnes... Even if you go from 1M pixels to 2M pixels, this mean your framerate will drop down 50%... E.g. if you had 50 fps before it will end up near 25 fps. To talk about 5M pixels means you really have absolutely no clue about gpu's and games...
Of course you can lower the resolution of your game but, as anyone that ever tried this will know, if you move away from the native resolution screens become very ugly. Your better off playing native on a lower resolution than picking this resolution on a higher res panel.
kmmatney - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
When you have pixels that small, things actually scale quite well, so going to a lower resolution for a game is no big deal.I agree that a 1680 x 1050 screen is great for mainstream gaming - it's a good compromise between having a nice big screen, and not too many pixels to push.
airmantharp - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Did you seriously just say 1680x1050 for gaming?That's great, if you can't afford a video card, and I'm aware that not everyone can.
But let me tell you, gaming on a 30" 2560x1600 IPS screen is something to behold. Battlefield 3, Skyrim, Mass Effect 3, The Old Republic, all look and play amazing when driven by a pair of HD6950 2GB cards.
Exchequer - Saturday, March 17, 2012 - link
First of all we are talking here about mobile gaming... Even if you get an insanely expensive laptop with sli/crossfire you still wont have enough fps for a 30 inch screen with that resolution...Furthermore crossfire results in microstutter so thats not an ideal solution, it pretty much ruins the game.
On pc gaming I once bought an 8800 GTS 640mb for 320 euro when it was just released (probablyt wrong priced should be 450 euro), 6 months later the 8800GT was introduced at half price. Since then I learned my lesson and got the gtx 260 for 140 euro (and got 90 back for the 8800gts), after that a gtx460 hawk for 165 euro. If you stick with your 1680x1050 panel you can run all games with AA without any problems for at least a year for about 50-60 (because each time you get 90-100 back for your old card). If I want to play bf3 on 1920x1080 I have to upgrade to a 560ti which would cost me 220 euro while resulting in the same detail settings and fps...
Bols - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
But you are so very wrong (and angry), young padwan.The beauty of a 2880x1800 screen is that it scales perfectly down to 1440x900, which would allow it to be driven by a mid-class GPU for fast FPS-games, and you will not be able to see that there is any scaling going on. (There isn't - every pixel in the 1400-domain is just shown as four pixels). For serious use, you can cram in four times more information and text in the 2800-resolution. If you working with text, like programming, screen estate matters.
And you should ease up on the assumptions. I am an ex-fps-junkie, but I still care about framerate.
Finraziel - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
Double the pixels is half the framerate? Right, and there we stop taking you seriously... You read Anandtech yet you don't know there are lots of different possible bottlenecks and they are not all affected by resolution?Aside from that I agree, scaling isn't nearly as bad as people make it out to be on a proper high resolution screen. I've regularly done it both on laptops and on my 24" 1920x1200 display and if you can live with lower res I don't see how you can be so picky to whine about a bit of blurring from the scaling. Maybe if you play text-heavy games, but those tend to be less sensitive to framerate, so it works out nicely.
Exchequer - Saturday, March 17, 2012 - link
It is... I have an old Philips 17 inch TFT (25ms from 2003 so 9 years old!) as secondary monitor with 1280x1024. My main monitor is a samsung 2253BW (2008, 2ms), which is regarded as a high quality monitor. If I put the 2253BW on 1280x1024 (including black bars) you get about the same screen surface. The 17 inch is 27 cm height and the 22inch is 30cm. However the image quality is a LOT worse. If all you can run is 1280x1024 (gpu limited) than you are 100% better off with the old 17inch 5:4 panel as compared to downscaling the modern 22inch panel.Besides gaming it is of course personal preference. Back in the day you could get a 1680x1050 22 inch or a 1680x1050 20 inch, or a higher resolution 22 inch. However this results in very small text on your OS forcing you to use larger icons which (in the old days) were not as pretty ^^. Small icons get annoying pretty quickly. Anyone that has been wearing contact lenses for some years will know what im talking about:D.
Exchequer - Saturday, March 17, 2012 - link
"Double the pixels is half the framerate? Right, and there we stop taking you seriously...´`Maybe you should not only visit anandtech but also take a look at techpowerup...
http://www.techpowerup.com/reviews/Zotac/GeForce_G...
2560x1600 48 fps
1680x1050 85 fps
1280x1024 109 fps
If you are talking about 5M pixels (the post that I replied to then I can assure you that you will be gpu imited and that scaling will be completely lineair...
ps since sandy brige its hard to be cpu limited with a single gpu ^^.
JojoKracko - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Yes, disgraceful. I have to agree. Lets hope that Apple also forces a return to the infinitely more logical 16x10 format for laptops. 16x9 is simply cost saving BS which I equate to skimping on the quality of the screen.Make it 16x10, IPS, and I will gladly, GLADLY, kick the vendor an extra $150.
If they can put a 2560x?? IPS panel in a $500 iPad (not 3) then they can damn well do the same in $900 and up laptops.
All we need is ONE manufacturer to set the example, (and do it well for pete's sake, don't skimp on the keyboard to compensate), and the HUGE SALES will show all of the others that this is what they should have been doing all along.
If they would have put a 1600x1000 quality TN panel into THIS laptop, I would have been a buyer for $100 over list price. As is though, it is useless crapola to me.
Props for the mSata SSD and the EMPTY drive bay. Although, I'd prefer two fullsized bays and the ability to buy my own SSD and install it along with the crap HDD they would include.
JojoKracko - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Hey, if Asus can put a 1080P IPS Matte screen in an $1100 UX31A, then every other laptop maker sure as heck better start doing the same. It is just crazy that it has taken this long for the first quality laptop display to appear.Let me say it again.
1080P IPS Matte Screen
Just do it!
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Asus-to-release-the-Z...
This one, or hopefully a G75 with a similar spec'd screen, is something I'm looking forward to buying in the near future. Not things like this acer with the low res, low spec screen.
Review the UX31A next please Anandtech.
mschira - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
You call this compelling?Trackpad sucks. COME on. That is one of the most important usability items on a laptop.
If the trackpad sucks the notebook sucks.
Screen resolution? 768P on 15.6" are they joking?
Also ditch the optical drive. I have a Lenovo 420s and replaced the optical drive with a second battery. I have the optical drive somewhere but I am not sure I would find it if I ever needed it.
Great move with the GT 640 absolutely. Also great move with the mSSD and harddrive bay.
But else?
M.
nateclind - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
How about showing a little class and respect. You can definitely disagree, but go about it in a more constructive way.snuuggles - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
The tone of the op was somewhat ascerbic. The tone of -your- post is just weird... How, exactly, are they not being "classy?!"Try to be specific (as the op was).
weiran - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
His points are perfectly valid and constructive.In the recent Dell XPS13 review, it had almost the exact same faults as this laptop and yet this one is somehow "compelling"? The trackpad and screen are two of the most important parts of a laptop, yet the poor screen doesn't even get a mention in the conclusion. Is the rest of the laptop good enough to overlook those deficiencies?
The author also seems to base his final judgement on a retail price of around $800, I'll tell you now there's no way it will be close to $800 a decent sized SSD and i7.
mschira - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Hm, I didn't even get far enough to appreciate the price. 800 would be a good offer, but a 256GB SSD, and i7 and a Kepler GPU for 800?Sure.
And the next iPad will be sold for a benefit price in Africa.
M.
nissangtr786 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I reckon this has 20-50% less power then the full gt640m 2gb card as the 1gb gt640m is the LE version 15-20w card vs the 2gb gt640m 25-30w card.http://forum.notebookreview.com/gaming-software-gr...
See that forum and see the list of graphics cards and you will se it is pretty impressive for a 15-20w card.
Gideonic - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Nice ME3 reference ;)kallogan - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Kepler seems indeed to be a big step forward...flensr - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
My wife is complaining about her laptop again and this is exactly the form factor she likes (thin and light but with optical drive) but the screen is so awful that I'm going to have to give it a pass. Almost everything else about this is awesome (6GB ram max is pretty weak but the mSATA SSD + 2.5 HDD is a great choice) and having an ethernet port and optical drive is a requirement for me, but the screen simply must be better than this or it's a complete waste of money to purchase.I bought a lenovo T420s which is remarkably similar to this thing (thin light with optical, 14") but after receiving it and seeing how terrible that screen was, I'm going to hold out until either the laptop screens improve or tablets improve to the point where I can switch over completely to tablet use. That T420s is the last laptop with a crummy screen I'll ever buy.
Laptop manufacturers are going to lose their customers in a BIG way in a year or two when tablet hardware is capable of running a "real" OS, unless they can figure out a way to put nice screens in their laptops. I would have happily paid an extra $400 for my T420s for an upgraded screen, and I won't buy a replacement with a TN screen at ANY price. If that means I wait until the ipad 8 or whatever microsoft comes out with in a couple of years when their tablets are not much different than tiny desktops/laptops, then that's better than using one of these horrible screens.
Shadowmaster625 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Doesnt the 560M have just half that many cores? And it is faster? What is going on here?tipoo - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
It has 192, yeah. Interesting. But its in the same thermal envelope so who cares how many shaders there are, maybe they went AMDs route with less powerful individually but more numerous shaders.extide - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
It pretty clear that the CUDA cores in kepler cannot be directly compared to the ones in past generations.With the full GK104 being rumored to have 1536 yet nowhere near 3x as fast as a GTX580 (512 CUDA cores), plus this card with 384 and significantly less performance than the 192 based fermi card.
MarsMSJ - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
The mention of the 6650M in the Sony notebook should warrant an asterisk on all the GPU performance graphs. In those graphs there is nothing to differentiate or tell a reader that a built in 6650M will perform much better than a 6650M. We all know those graphs will be referenced and they imply that 6650M in a standard or non standard implementation will work
I can see clearly why NVidia likes your graphs because they're misleading.
mamisano - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I totally agree and glad that someone else feels the same way as me.JarredWalton - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
The text has an explanation for the poor performance of the 6650M, and actually I have a 6630M review coming shortly where it outperforms the 6650M results, but there's still a large gap between it and the GT 640M.The bigger issue is that AMD doesn't have a lot of compelling laptops using their GPUs, and even the ones that do go with AMD have other quirks. The Z2 has it in an external dock where performance (at least on the internal laptop display) is hindered by Thunderbolt bandwidth; the VAIO SE16 (which I'm reviewing right now) has the 6630M, but the manually switchable graphics and almost complete lack of driver updates is going to make it a tough sell for gamers. HP's Envy has the same problem with driver updates.
We've heard from AMD that they'll be rolling out a "unified driver" for all their switchable graphics laptops, but until (if) that happens you're basically asking for problems down the road. Optimus may not be perfect, but compared to the AMD alternative it sure feels like it. :-(
MarsMSJ - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I understand what you're saying about your options. However, that still doesn't address the fact that your graphs do not express this is an exotic GPU implementation with additional contraints that are not normal, driver quirks or not. Keep mind you have lots of graphs and a very important bit of information hidden half way between them.You're not new to the internet, you know the nature and power of these graphs and their interpretation on the web. I'm not surprised in the least bit NVidia loves your graphs and testing.
Anyway.... any indication about the heat from this NVidia mobile GPU being common thing with upcoming products? :)
Hulk - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
with the Super PLS screen.Help us Dustin Sklavos Kenobi, you're our only hope!
kenyee - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
They should have stuck at least a 1080p screen on it and 4 memory slots so you can stuff 16GB of memory in it :-PI'm hoping the Macbook Air shows them how it's done too...and I hate rooting for Apple :-P
Sony's Z2 looks great, but has the same memory limitations, and no Kepler GPU :-(
trajan2448 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I travel quite a bit and I always watch movies with my laptop. I hope they keep the DVD drive until there is some equivalent no hassle solution.noeldillabough - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Honestly say I haven't used an optical drive on laptops for years. Rip the movies to DivX or XVid and watch em on whatever device you like.trajan2448 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
For me thats a hassle.trajan2448 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Im traveling internationally and its much easier to buy a disc.Death666Angel - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I would have thought that it was a hassle carrying around a few DVDs on your travels. Also, you can just rip it as an .iso or .img and VLC usually plays it just fine, no need to encode it. Little 64GB USB stick (they go cheap these days) and you have 8 or 10 movies with you at all times. But, your call of course. :DMichaelD - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
It's b/c PC manufacturer's (Apple not included here) continue to put out so-so products like this, that I've been sticking with Netbooks for the past three years. Six years ago I had an Acer laptop. It was top of the line for back then. It still works. It has a real touchpad and two separate mouse buttons. The screen is washed-out now, but back then it was vibrant and responsive. As someone above stated "The touchpad and screen on a laptop are EVERYTHING. If those two suck, then the laptop sucks." I couldn't agree more. I'll stick with my Netbook for now.chrnochime - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
When is the embargo going to be lifted? Just waiting to find out if it's worth waiting for the GK104 or go with 7870.bji - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Full stop, straight to the comments to enjoy some commiseration about the state of laptop screens. I never read an Anandtech notebook review article past the word "768p". Ever. If you want my readership and page clicks Anandtech you'll have to start shipping those substandard notebooks back and asking for something more worthwhile to review. Maybe the manufacturers will finally get the hint.fic2 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Totally agree. I think any laptop "reviews" with a 768p screen should begin and end with the the sentence:Laptop XXX would have been reviewed but since it only has a 768p screen we did not feel it was worth our time to review and our readers time to read such a review.
Recommendation: wait for higher resolution laptop screens.
Dustin Sklavos - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
At that point we might as well just not review notebooks. The fact remains that 768p is the standard that has been forced upon consumers. All we can do is review what's available and continue haranguing manufacturers to fix the problem.Visual - Tuesday, March 20, 2012 - link
No, you silly clueless writer.At that point, laptop manufacturers get a clue, and release a good product for a change.
Review sites do have that kind of power, didn't you know?
Dustin Sklavos - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
And as a sidenote, how does boycotting us help change the industry? We've been actively campaigning for better screens in notebooks since we started reviewing notebooks, I'm not sure how not supporting us is going to help the situation.lcarsos - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Oh my the screen is 768p? I would certainly hope that the screen is refreshed in a progressive manner! If my cursor were to start interlacing as I moved it around I would probably start a bar fight.My point is, why would an unnecessary descriptor such as "progressive" get slipped into a laptop review? Man up, and display the screen pixelage, of course the laptop is going to display things progressive it wasn't a television designed in the 60s. Now if you were to stick a DVD in there, DVDs are encoded interlaced in most cases. Now what's happening? A progressive display of interlaced images? Better to just leave that out of the review.
Also, 1366x768 in a 15.6" laptop? What committee let that through? In an age where the iPad can end up with 2048x1536 pixels in a 10" screen for $500 they can certainly slip in a higher quality screen at the price they are currently at. Even if it is still a TN panel. I have a 14" Thinkpad with a 1600x900 display, at no point should a screen of larger size come with lower resolution.
Glock24 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
I've been looking for a laptop to replace my aging Asus F8Va (which has a 14" 1440x900 screen), but every single manufacturer insists on using crappy 1366x768 screens. And I say crappy screens not just because of the resolution, but also because of the poor viewing angles and bad contrast.I remember some older notebooks sporting 4:3 screen with at least 1280x1024 resolution. Then came the 16:10 craze and the screens started coming with 1280x800 resolution. Now we have 16:9 screens with 1366x768 resolution. What's next? 1440x600? 1600x400?
Having 768 vertical pixels feels so 90's. Come on! Even my old 19" Samsung CRT sm997mb, which was in no way top of the line, could diplay 2048x1536@60 (1600x1200@75, 1280x1024@85), and it was made in 2004. I know CRTs are different animals, but I think I made my point.
I'm not much into the "ultrabook" thing, but I prefer a 14" latop over the more common 15.6" form factor, and I want to play some games on it from time to time, so a dedicated GPU or a decent APU is required. I was considering the Lenovo y470p, which is a 14" laptop with Radeon HD7690, a very good port selection and a great price, but why does it come with a mediocre screen!
HP makes some decent laptops, the DV6 is interesting, and some of them have a 1080p screen option, but are 15.6" or 17"
Also, as some others said, why not ditch the optical drive and use the space for something more useful? An additional battery, some more ports, etc.
Johnmcl7 - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
It's not the case that every company only offers 1366x768 screens, my current Vaio is approaching three years old for the model and has a 1600x900 13.1in screen and the model after it (now also retired) offered a 1080p 13.1in screen with decent colour and viewing angles. 13in higher resolution panels are trickier to find but 14in is fairly easy, there's quite a few other with 1600x900 panels.I do love that in the comments as always people are saying how Apple will lead the way with high resolution displays despite Sony offering 13.1in 1080p panels for a couple of years now. As usual Apple are first to do something by being several years behind those that are genuinely at the front.
As for the why with mediocre screens, I would think it's obvious - most people don't care and won't pay for them. I don't agree with that stance but on supporting a large number of these crappy 1366x768 screens both at work and out of work laptops, not one person has every complained to me about the low screen resolution. It tends to be the other way round if anything, people tend to complain about my high resolution panels because they make everything too small.
John
Finraziel - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
Yes, Sony does make nice laptops with sometimes nice screens... The problem is that you pay through the nose for them. When a 500$ laptop offers enough performance for me, and the added cost for a decent screen would be about 50-100$, then why can't I get one of those screens unless I buy a 2000$ laptop?As for Apple, I don't think the majority of people saying that in the comments here are fanboys or even saying that Apple would be the first, but it does seem to be the case that whatever Apple does, other manufacturers copy. I'm not even saying that it's to Apple's credit as a technology company, it says more about their marketing department. I actually would never buy anything from Apple because I don't agree with their philosophy and most of their products and think they're a bunch of stuck up snobs (from professional dealings with them), but I would like it if they could jumpstart a trend to include better screens in laptops.
zepi - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
How about the battery life when gaming? Is it still a dismal 1 hour or so? How about when compared to let's say a Llano laptop?kmmatney - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Hey Acer! Do you want to stand out and be more like Apple? Then how about making a laptop with a 16:10 screen?HighTech4US - Wednesday, March 14, 2012 - link
Why exactly do manufactures chose slower and more power hungry GDDR3 over GDDR5?You would think the lower power and higher performance of GDDR5 would make it the obvious choice.
Is the cost of GDDR5 really so much higher than GDDR3?
ueharaf - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
you have to compare with amd 6630m on a sony vaio SA.z2 has thunderbolt so is not a fair comparison in graphics card. Here I smell a NVIDIA propaganda, rather than a fair comparison of the graphic cards...come on!!!
Kansja - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
Keep this in mind: Due to the much lower thermal headroom in a laptop you can't just stick in enough power to fire up 1080p displays on a laptop, either from the graphic's side or the power constraints (Remember that the iPad has a MASSIVE battery for the power consumption of everything minus display)You can't just stick 4 580's on a lap. It's a compromise between costs to the user, mobility and performance. I do agree 1600x900 should be an standard but it's not possible until our graphic's card offer 6870 like performance on 10-20W power envelope
Old_Fogie_Late_Bloomer - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
I had to log in to say this...looking at the results on the gaming performance page, it seems to me that this laptop is able to acquit itself quite well at 1600x900. Honestly, my next laptop will be 1600x900 at 15.6" (unless I need to get a really cheap machine for some reason) and if this model had a matte, 900p display, it would be on my short, SHORT list, especially given the pleasant experience I've had with my current Acer laptop.There's really just no excuse for Acer (or anyone) to not put a higher-resolution display on a machine like this. I don't need (or want) 1920x1080, but I'll be damned if I spend more than $600 on a laptop that doesn't have at least 900 rows of pixels on the display.
Kansja - Friday, March 16, 2012 - link
I do agree 1600x900 are fine, but I can't get over a 700$ budget and I want to play games at least medium. HP + Llano + 7690 stays under that budget with 768, but doesn't have the option to 1600x900 other than 1080p and that would be too taxing, so it's unfair. It's a compromise: Want better displays on laptops? You need more power, thus, pay more, thus, lose markets. Most people won't notice a lot of difference unless you're a graphics junkie. You are niche users, not the mainstream marketOld_Fogie_Late_Bloomer - Friday, March 16, 2012 - link
Actually, I really wouldn't care what resolution a game rendered at as long as it ends up looking okay in the end. Render in 960x600 and upscale to 1440x900, or in 1280x720 or 1200x675 and upscale to 1600x900. I don't care, it's fine with me, as long as the scaling is decent.But that's neither here nor there. I want a resolution with 900 rows for productivity reasons. Gaming is a secondary concern for me, but I will want to be able to fire up something more than classic Unreal Tournament or d1x-rebirth in my next laptop. Honestly, with Kepler and even Trinity nearly here, I suspect that GPU power is about to become a non-issue.
I was really disappointed in the Samsung Series 7...I thought it would be my perfect laptop, but what I read about it left a bad taste in my mouth. So I'll be watching for a thin(ish) and light(ish) 15.6"(ish) laptop with a 1440x900 or 1600x900 (or thereabouts) matte screen that can game reasonably well, whether that's with a Trinity APU or with a i7-3xxx paired with Kepler. I think a system like this could probably hit around $700 with a Trinity APU.
Kansja - Saturday, March 17, 2012 - link
Trinity: Yes. If Llano is any indicative and even a 10% increase of power on both sides on the same TDP, it could handle it pretty well. Otherwise, 640M seems disappointing to say the least... Let's see how Kepler scales tho, since this is the smallest part I guess.Osamede - Thursday, March 15, 2012 - link
A 15" laptop with a 1366 x 768 screen? Why would Anandtech even waste its time reviewing junk like this?No offense fellas, but I dont care if the company even PAID you to review this thing, you should say no, because it hurts your own brand as a tech media website, to review this dross.
Next time you have a laptop review I cant tell you I aint clicking, because you seem likely to waste my time....
akyp - Monday, March 19, 2012 - link
Stopped reading therenissangtr786 - Wednesday, December 26, 2012 - link
imo I have had a couple 1920x1200 dell latitude d820/e6500 and 1440x900 14inch screen on d630 and recently an e6420 14" 1600x900 screen. Now 16:9 is something I didn't want but it makes watching movies better. Also as bad as 1366x768 is, it is liveable. 640m and 720p gaming will go very well.I currently use an acer 5930g and I am on the process to upgrade to an i5 3317u m3 640m machine. Seeing this review it shows that is good enough and good as a cheap replacement for use for next 2-4 years.