<p>Hi,</p>
<p>I am basically looking for a laptop with the Nvidia 8600M GT graphics card with 512 mb dedicated video memory. I can’t find the Dell one which everyone is saying has that card anywhere. Does anyone know of a reasonably priced laptop that has this graphics card?</p>
<p>Thanks.</p>
<p>It’s a fairly high-end graphics card. You can get a Dell with the following for $924+tax+shipping.</p>
<p>SYSTEM COLOR Jet Black edit
PROCESSOR Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T5750 (2.00GHz/667Mhz FSB/2MB cache) edit
OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition SP1 edit
HD DISPLAY Glossy, widescreen 15.4 inch display (1280x800) edit
**VIDEO CARD 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3450 **edit
MEMORY 3GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 edit
HARD DRIVE 160GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM) edit
INTERNAL OPTICAL DRIVE 8X Slot Load CD / DVD Burner (Dual Layer DVD+/-R Drive) edit
WIRELESS NETWORK CARDS Dell 1397 Wireless-G Card edit
BATTERY OPTIONS 56 Whr Lithium Ion Battery (6 cell) edit
SOUND OPTIONS High Definition Audio 2.0 edit
FINGERPRINT SCANNER Integrated Finger Print Reader edit
KEYBOARD Back-lit Keyboard</p>
<p>
He said he wants 512 MB graphics RAM, not 256 MB.
What size? You can get an HP Pavilion dv9700t in that price range with the 8600M GT, but its 17": [Buy</a> an HP Pavilion dv9700t series notebook PC from HP](<a href=“http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=notebooks&a1=Category&v1=Entertainment+powerhouse&series_name=dv9700t_series]Buy”>http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/shopping/computer_can_series.do?storeName=computer_store&category=notebooks&a1=Category&v1=Entertainment+powerhouse&series_name=dv9700t_series)</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies guys. These are some good choices. srunni is there a difference between 8600 GT and 8600 GS (the one in the HP)? Also, for screen size, the cheapest size.</p>
<p>
Oh, my bad. I didn’t see that it was a GS. Yes, there’s a difference, but it’s pretty small - the GT is better than the GS.</p>
<p>
Well, the problem here is that the 8600M (GS or GT) is a pretty high end card for a laptop. You’re more likely to find it in desktop replacement (i.e. 17") laptops than in a more mainstream (i.e. 15.4") laptop. A 15.4" is usually cheaper than a 17" laptop, simply because the screen is smaller without the components needing to be miniaturized (which is why laptops under 14.1" in screen size are more expensive). However, I don’t know how hard it would be to find a 15.4" laptop with the 8600M GS/GT.</p>
<p>Why do you want a laptop with this card anyway? Are you planning to game with it? If so, you’re probably going to need to spend more than $1000 if you want to play any new games at a decent framerate with the graphics settings at medium or high.</p>
<p>Yes I plan on gaming with it, but primarily only Flight SImulator 2004. I won’t have time for other games in college. Basically pre 2006 games.</p>
<p>the 256MB 8600 GT in the dell 1530 is better then the 512MB 8600 GT found in other laptops. </p>
<p>The one in the M1530 has DDR3 RAM on the card while the one with the 512MB of RAM has DDR2 RAM, so for best performance the Dell with 256MB of RAM would actually do the best.</p>
<p>just because one has DDR3 doesn’t automatically make it better… games have also yet to take advantage of the way DDR3 works, and since he’s not playing any new games, any performance boost will be minimal. what’s more significant is that if he wants to run whatever games he plays at high resolutions, he’ll need 512MB. and on the flip side, if he doesn’t run his games at 1440x900 or something, what’s wrong with 256?</p>
<p>as for GT vs GS, there’s more than a “small” difference between the two…</p>
<p>edit: after poking around for benchmarks, an 8600 with DDR3 is indeed better, but that would be comparing it to a DDR2 version with the same amount of memory, so whether there really is a noticeable improvement is still up in the air. as for the 8600GS, it got annihilated in a benchmark vs. the GT, according to a benchmark on notebookreview.</p>
<p>Games don’t tak advantage of the way DDR3 works, DDR3 has faster clock speeds than DDR2, with overclocking you can achieve about the same results if you OC your DDR2 card.</p>
<p>Also the NVidia 9500 GS has 512 MB and is in between the DDR2 and DDR3 8600 GT cards, so that cold also be an option.</p>
<p>Actually, just having GDDR3 ram -does- make it better. Games don’t have to be specifically programmed to take advantage of GDDR3 ram. 512mb versus 256mb ram offers little to no performance boost, as the buswidth is the bottleneck and GDDR2 can’t take advantage of all 512mb even under testing conditions where i would be attempted because of limitation of the GDDR2 architecture.</p>
<p>A 256mb GDDR3 card will offer around a 30% increase over a 512mb GDDR2 card in most cases.</p>
<p>I’d say 512mb ram would only offer performance boosts over a 256 in very high resolution (UXGA and up) texture intensive games, while the benefit of GDDR3 over GDDR2 is very noticeable in everyday use.</p>
<p>Also, GDDR3 is a lot more overclockable than GDDR2 if you’re into that stuff.</p>
<p>also, 512 would be very useful if you plan on using multiple monitors.</p>
<p>tbh, a 512mb 8600m gt is not that much better than a 256mb 8600m gt card. So, look for laptops which have 256mb, it might lower the price of the laptop to your range.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies again. Does anyone know where the Dell inspiron laptops with the 8600M is available? How come Dell doesn’t sell it anymore?</p>
<p>CMU that’s not true in this case. The 8600m GT 512mb is GDDR2 ram, and the 256mb card is either GDDR2 or GDDR3 ram. The 256mb GDDR3 version offers very noticeable performance boosts over the 512mb (GDDR2) card.</p>
<p>Obviously the GDDR2 512mb will offer a very slight performance boost over the 256mb GDDR2, but the GDDR3 256mb trumps all the other versions of this card.</p>
<p>Note:Nvidia -DOES- offer a 512mb GDDR3 card which would offer a very slight performance boost over the 256mb GDDR3 card, but that specific card is only offered on Macbook Pros which would run way over the OP’s $700-$1000 limit.</p>
<p>you wont need 512 mb if you’re only running pre 2006 games</p>
<p>Here you go man,
[Newegg.com</a> - ASUS F8 Series F8Sp-X1 NoteBook Intel Core 2 Duo T5750(2.00GHz) 14" Wide XGA 3GB Memory DDR2 667 250GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3650 - Laptops / Notebooks](<a href=“http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220303]Newegg.com”>http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834220303)</p>
<p>$1000, and has a 1 GB HD3650.</p>
<p>Please disregard all your nvidea bias, because in almost all benchmarks the 3650 is the faster of the two. (laptop benchmarks)</p>
<p>If youre really bent on the 512 mb 8600GT though… here you go</p>
<p>[Newegg.com</a> - Acer Aspire AS5920-6574 NoteBook Intel Core 2 Duo T8100(2.10GHz) 15.4" Wide XGA 3GB Memory DDR2 667 250GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT - Laptops / Notebooks](<a href=“http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834115458]Newegg.com”>http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834115458)</p>
<p>$950 with a slightly faster processor than the one above. Although, kkei08 is right in that 256 mb gddr3 is better than 512 gddr2, especially because a laptop under $1000 will never have a screen with resolution high enough to take advantage of the extra memory.</p>
<p>Thanks for the replies again. I think I found a good deal on a Dell but I am still thinking about it.</p>
<p>I need on some urgent input before I order a dell 1720 for $774 (not including tax):</p>
<p>Intel® Core 2 Duo T5850 (2.16GHz/667Mhz FSB/2MB cache) </p>
<p>Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition SP1 </p>
<p>2GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 at 667MHz (plan on upgrading to 4gb on my own)</p>
<p>256MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8600M GT (don’t know if DDR2 or DDR3)</p>
<p>160GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM) </p>
<p>56Whr Lithium Ion Battery (6 cell) </p>
<p>Thanks for any quick feedback.</p>
<p>Well the card would be DDR2 RAM, but it looks like a good deal.</p>
<p>Ok I ordered it. When do Dell.com custom built orders usually come? A</p>