Anyone do a barebones laptop?

[blueswitch]

I was wondering if anyone had any experience with buying a barebones laptop? I was kind of looking at Asus or MSI because it's hard to find laptops with decent video chipsets. Do you get more bang for your buck out of a barebones laptop or no?

[corpsejockey]

Dell Inspiron 9300 (gaming), Asus z71v (girlfriend's work/light gaming laptop), MSI ms-1016 (built for no better reason than having some ddr1 and a hdd in the junk drawer).
9300 (refurb) 1.7ghz dothan @ 2.26ghz, x300, dvd -r/w, 1Gb ram, 80Gb hdd - $1250
z71v (all used parts) 1.6ghz dothan @ 2.13ghz, 6600 go, DVD/cd -r/w combo, 512mb ram, 40Gb hdd- $900
ms-1016 1.73ghz dothan, integrated video, DVD/cd -r/w combo, 512mb ram (ddr1), 30gb hdd - $590

I would have to say that the Asus may have been the best bang for my buck. The 9300 may have been over kill for my needs, but I do game a little and used it to replace my desktop (I still need to upgrade the gpu). The MSI is great, but an unfair comparison for value. It would not have been nearly as cheap if I had not just gutted a broken tablet pc I got for free for the ram and hdd. I also used the dothan 740 I swapped out of the Dell for a pin modded 735. I guess if you factor that in, the MSI cost almost as much as the Asus. Also note that the Asus was all used parts from ebay.

Edit - The Asus ram came from the 9300 when I upgraded
Also, did you exchange that optical drive yet? If you have not, they are on ebay right now for $40.

[Airpizza]

Barebones are better value imo. ANd it lets you customize the laptop to your exact needs.

Dells are too expensive, hp's and alienwares seem to be a good price if you are going to get one from a manufacturer.

[deathstar13]

Barebones are better value imo. ANd it lets you customize the laptop to your exact needs.

alienwares are too expensive, hp's are junk ,and Dell seem to be a good price if you are going to get one from a manufacturer.
fixt for truth.

[Elif Tymes]

Meh, Dell 9300's are pretty dang cheap, and can do the entire "barebone" experience.

I tore mine down from a 1.6Ghz X300 to a 2.13Ghz 6800 Ultra Go with 1.5Gb of RAM.

[dvandervelde]

I built from an MSI MS-1012.

[deathstar13]

I built from an MSI MS-1012.a question for you guys who do barebones.
do you or can you get as many options for video card upgrades as the dell 9300 gives you?

im not sure but doesnt each card have to be designed for each particuler laptop and not universal like desktops?

[Stedeman]

Each model yields deferent levels of upgrade ability, and often within in each models life this is known to change. For instance; my Dell 4000 has different motherboards, one allowing for a 1Ghz chip and one an 850Mhz chip. The only way to be sure is to do good, hard research prior to ordering. This way you order with the correct minimum levels to yield the core components you want for upgrading.

[blueswitch]

for you barebones builders how solid and compact do they feel? I was at bestbuy checking out laptops and for example the Toshibas and HP's cases feel solid and like every square inch was used, no hallow feeling when you tap on the wrist rest. Dvanervelde how do you like that MSI, their barebones look pretty slick to me, I like the idea of knowing a name brand mobo is under the hood with the MSI's and Asus laptops.

[fight556]

Built up an Asus Z70va for myself about a month ago, been using it pretty much daily, feels quite solid to me and with very minimal lcd flex (I can close it using just one side of the screen and it doesn't flex). Got a 2.0 p-m, 2 gigs ram, 128MB x700, and a 60 gig hdd in it.

[dvandervelde]

Dvanervelde how do you like that MSI, their barebones look pretty slick to me, I like the idea of knowing a name brand mobo is under the hood with the MSI's and Asus laptops. I love it. It is very solid. It is very small and light (12.1 inch screen), 5 hours of battery, has a quiet fan, and runs very cool. It is not a gaming machine, but the GMA900 graphics do totally fine for everthing else.

[blueswitch]

ok after doing some pricing and spreadsheeting Im really liking the MSI barebones. Im looking at these 3 barebones with the parts below..what do you guys think?MS-1022 (http://www.msicomputer.com/NB/product_spec.asp?model=MS-1022)
MS-1032 (http://www.msicomputer.com/NB/product_spec.asp?model=MS-1032) MS1029 (http://www.msicomputer.com/NB/product_spec.asp?model=MS-1029)

CPU: 1.73ghz P-M 533fsb, 1.8ghz Turion MT-34
HDD 80gig WD 5400
256x2 DDR333 Rosewill

I haven't ruled out the 1022 because I prefer the 14" over the 15" size...but the videocard is alot less for pretty much the same price.

can't decide between going for the Pentium M platform or the Turion. I have loved AMD in my desktop builds for years however I know the M is a good little processor. I don't know what video card is better between the two the 6600 or the x700. I kinda prefere nvidia as of lately for desktops. The price difference between all three of these is literally $40 on the 14" and $20 difference between the 15"

[DumbstixLars]

I like the MSI 1032, but I was looking at the ASUS Z71V and they both have the 6600 go in them but the Z71V says it has a 6600 GO PCIe where as the other one doesn't. So I assume they aren't the same video card? Right now I'm saving up to replace my old Latitude PII (posting from it now) with something I can game on. I like the look of the 1032, too bad I can't find an AMD laptop with Nvidia video cards.

[Tebore]

By Around March Asus is going to release new Barebones on the Napa Platform (Yonah Dual Core).

You might want to wait for that, 2.0ghz Dual core 667FSB with a Radeon X1600 Asus Z6Ja. It's pretty amazing performer and battery life is outstanding. Benchmarks showed that it killed a 3.8P4.

[blueswitch]

unfortunatly I can't wait until march...besides I'm sure the Duo's will be out of my price range anyway. Do you guys think these laptops can run WoW alright? I had looked at some of the Asus laptops as well but could seem to find as much information on their barebones nor any well known etailers that carried them. One customer review said they overheat

[Tebore]

The overheating problem was only in one of their ultra portables.

Gear2play and c9tech are well known etailers that sell them. The Z70Va is solid and with the X700 it's faster than the 6600go.

[blueswitch]

The overheating problem was only in one of their ultra portables.

Gear2play and c9tech are well known etailers that sell them. The Z70Va is solid and with the X700 it's faster than the 6600go.

you think the X700 is faster than a 6600 go? I was looking for benchmarks but it's hard to find for mobile cards. X700 still dosen't support shader 3.0 though does it?

[Airpizza]

If i were you i would wait for the 7x and 1x to show their force in the barebones world, if you can wait.

One VERY big thing about nvidia (Not very sure about ATI) is their MXM platform. That allows you to upgrade your video from generation to generation.

Someone please correct me if i'm wrong in saying ati does not use mxm.
Deathstar you corrected my post? Musta worded something wrong?

Blueswitch get ddr400. If the notebook says ddr333 get a different one :)

[Tebore]

you think the X700 is faster than a 6600 go? I was looking for benchmarks but it's hard to find for mobile cards. X700 still dosen't support shader 3.0 though does it?

I don't think, I know it's faster. Benchmarks place the X700 at nearly 3000 points in 3Dmark05 while the 6600 is only good for about 2200-2500.

[blueswitch]

well after alot of debating back and forth I pulled the trigger on a MSI MS-1029 and went with a Turion MT 1.8ghz 1mb L2. 512 Corsair DDR333, 80gig Samsung 5400 RPM 8mb, although after ordering everything I think I just realized the barebones doesn't come with integrated Wifi...does anyone know?...plus I did find an MSI internal wifi card on pcworld.com and it was like $32 bucks which I thought alittle steep...even if it does have bluetooth.

[DumbstixLars]

All the sites I've been to, you have to select the internal WiFi if you want it. $32 is about right.

[blueswitch]

Imean $32 isn;t alot but considering the exact same lappy with a pentium M has built in wifi....MSI should have thrown one in for the turion package...especially since it;s slightly more anyway

[Stoanhart]

I got lots of bang, for a lot less buck.

I got the z71v, used the 400->533 FSB jumper trick on a 1.6Ghz P-M. I got the pentium for $99 on eBay. Put it all together, and it ran flawlessly. I was even able to undervolt the CPU at 2.13Ghz.

If you ordered the equivalent system from alienware at the time that I bought it, it was something like $2300 US before shipping and tax. In CDN, that comes to a final price of about $3136.39. I paid $1700 Final.

DEFINATELY WORTH IT!

[blueswitch]

Well atleast I'm getting bluetooth out of the deal for having to by the card. I'll post some benchmarks and a short review when my lappy parts get here and assembled.

[Tebore]

I've heard about the MSI card with BT it's range is slightly worse than the Intel Cards. If you've used Atheros cards or any high power card (>100mW) you'll realize how bad the range really is.

If you want to upgrade WiFi in the future keep this in mind, Napa won't use the old Mini-PCI interface it uses something derived from PCI-E, and Atheros based WiFi cards are some of the best on the market.

[blueswitch]

worse than intel?...I hope not I heard Intel Pro is pretty bottom barrel. I used to have a Belkin PCMCIA based card in my old lappy before it was stolen...that worked prety good. I didn't really see an assortment of 3rd party mini-pci cards so I just grabbed the one that was made for the laptop

[Tebore]

Good so you have heard about Intel being bottom of the barrel. I didn't want to say it out at the beginning.

Yeh the range is slightly worse because it has to support BT. Only slightly, I'd say on Par with Intel, search over at Notebookforums you might get a better answer. I was looking at WiFi with BT cards and this was one that popped up and there's word from people who've tried it says it's on Par or worse than Intel.

[blueswitch]

BT?....I assume thats the actually chipset...well I guess I'll just have to see...I didn't really have another option to go 3rd party on a mini-PCI did I?

[DumbstixLars]

I assumed BT = Bluetooth.

[Tebore]

Yeh BT=Bluetooth.

[Stoanhart]

I was all excited about bluetooth when I got my laptop, but got a little USB BT transceiver instead, so I could move it to my PC. I though it would be cool to just be able to transfer stuff to my phone without having to get the data cable.

It turns out BT sucks. Copying a few MP3s to my phone took ages. So I looked it up online. Apparantly that's normal, because most phones use BT to emulate a modem, so it is essentially 56k dialup speed, because BT is a 10 year old technology. I have lost all enthusiasm for it :( Datacables all the way! :D

[blueswitch]

humm thats kinda dissapointing I;ve never used bluetooth before.....age doesn't always matter ethernet has been around since the 70's....I was thinking that would be cool for my cell phone too....or even for a bluetooth wireless mouse...wouldn't need a USB pog for it to work that would be cool although IM not sure if you can do that or not

[Stoanhart]

It would probably be fine for a mouse.

you are correct on the ethernet thing, but ethernet has been expanded since its beginings. The first ethernet cards were most certainly not gigabit. Hoever, modem development stopped when phone lines limited speed to 56k.

You can get somewhat faster transfer with some devices, that do not emulate modems. I think 40-50 KB/s is the max. Howevever, my phone (motorola e398) does emulate a modem :(

[josh478]

how cheap are 'barebones' laptops? i mean, can i pick up a case/shell for like under 250?

[Stoanhart]

no, not usually. The case/shell includes a decent LCD, battery, motherboard, carrying case, and a bunch of other stuff. My shell was $915 cdn, and my motherboard had an integrated 6600Go, so its pretty good.

[adriana]

been looking at barebones myself. is there anything like the light as the dell 710m or the 630m but with the option of upgrading graphic card? im not really a gamer and didn't plan to play game on my laptop but it would cool every now and then to play on it.

[josh478]

why call it barebones and a 'good deal' if they are more then i paid for my laptop new? just kinda doesnt make sense to me. wish someone would sell case/lcd only.

[adriana]

was reading about asus and now im really interested in the Asus Z70VA and the Asus Z63a!!!

[lilxvietxboi]

I just got and built my z63a, its freaking sweeet. I love it to peices. Its running..

Pentium M 735 1.7ghz -> Pinmodded to 2.23ghz @ 1.2V (800mhz @ .7V)
(@ 800mhz) 37 Degrees Idle | 47 Load
(@ 2.23ghz) 44 Degrees Idle | 54 Load
1GB OCZ DDR2 PC4200
60GB Western Digital 5400RPM

[Stoanhart]

yeah, P-M's rock sooooo much. They just blow everything else out of the water. Mine goes to rock bottom .7v at 800Mhz as well. You actually have a few degrees lower load than me, even though mine only goes to 2.13 (1.6Ghz stock).

Still - i use other peoples notebooks, and they are like space heaters at idle! I can't even feel any heat at idle, and only a bit from the back vent at load and a slightly warm spot on the KB over the chip.

Get Pentium-M!!!

[lilxvietxboi]

Well, I attribute my lower temps due to arctic silver 5. I installed that stuff before even turning on the computer for the first time and on the chipset too. I feel heat coming out of my vent when idle at full speed, but nothing at 800mhz. But at least I know its transfering heat away from the CPU fast :)

Pentium M's rock!

If you want gaming, get either an ASUS Z71V(nVidia 6600) or ASUS Z70V(X600) or a more expensive Z63a which is the ASUS W3V(X600) but for a much higher price.

If your going for pure office work/portablilty/school. ASUS Z63A all the way, its just a w3v without the dedicated graphics card and without a alluminum brushed lid(which is freaking sexy btw).

[Stoanhart]

I am using AS5 as well, and I modified the heatsink by creating a better connection surface between the sink and the heatpipe with AS Adhesive (Front page mod). Oh well, you are using a different laptop than me, maybe you just have more fins or something. Either way, temps are low, so i'm happy with it.

[lilxvietxboi]

Maybe your right. Haha, I was looking at your signature, we almost have the exact same stuff. Except my vid is a X800XL instead of a 6800GT, I was debating between the two when I purchased that system. And I was debating on whether to go wit the Z71V or Z63A. I choose Z63A, because if I wanted to game, I would just use my desktop. My laptop is just for portablilty :)

Asus -> best laptops ever.
Don't they make the Viao's and Apple G* series books too?

[custom90gt]

not to thread jack, but does anyone know if you can get a barebones W3V? If so, any idea what socket it uses (478 or 479)?

[lilxvietxboi]

No you can't get a barebones W3V. Its an ASUS ensamble unit(preconfigured). W** series denotes ASUS ensamble builds. Z** denotes custom builds, whiteboxes/barebones.

You CAN get a Z63A, but it doesn't come with a dedicated graphics. Yes I know, it would be perfect if the Z63A had the aluminum brushed lid and a dedicated graphics chip.

[custom90gt]

No you can't get a barebones W3V. Its an ASUS ensamble unit(preconfigured). W** series denotes ASUS ensamble builds. Z** denotes custom builds, whiteboxes/barebones.

You CAN get a Z63A, but it doesn't come with a dedicated graphics. Yes I know, it would be perfect if the Z63A had the aluminum brushed lid and a dedicated graphics chip.

well thats a bummer... Thanks for clearing that up for me. I am curious though, do you have any suggestions for barebones that are around 14 inches with a dedicated gpu? TIA

[lilxvietxboi]

I'm not so sure about whiteboxes that is 14" w/ a dedicated GPU. The reason is that 14" is really insuffiecient to cram everthing you need into a laptop, somehow the W3V does it but I look at my Z63a now and don't know how they cram on in there. I'll go do some research, if I can find a good one, I'll post it. Notebookreview/Notebookforums may be useful for you if your looking to research on laptops. I know I found them very useful.

[adriana]

should i wait til asus comes out with teh dual core then buy it? wouldn't the price drop by then. i want Z70VA

[lilxvietxboi]

Depends on if you can wait. I didn't want to as I found I just needed a laptop quick for school. I don't regret my decision for buying now as Duo offers me only a little more and we don't know how the new chips will run compared to the dothan. Why pay more when you can pay less for the same type of thing.

Then again, I havn't researched that much into centrino duo/dual core mobile chips. Its your choice really.

[custom90gt]

I'm not so sure about whiteboxes that is 14" w/ a dedicated GPU. The reason is that 14" is really insuffiecient to cram everthing you need into a laptop, somehow the W3V does it but I look at my Z63a now and don't know how they cram on in there. I'll go do some research, if I can find a good one, I'll post it. Notebookreview/Notebookforums may be useful for you if your looking to research on laptops. I know I found them very useful.

Hey thanks for helping me out, let me know if you find anything out. I have another question for you, how can you tell what cpu socket the asus laptops have? I want to order one on ebay for cheap, but I dont wanna get a 479 if I need a 478...
TIA

[Tebore]

I wish Intel would allow Core Duo Pentium Chips to work in Sonoma or Caramel platforms nothing's changed, and I wouldn't mind running at a slower bus.

[Tuan209]

Hey Guys,

Im new to this barebone thing, but where are some good sites to purchase barebone lappys?

Thanks
Tuan

[Icedfire101]

Hey Guys,

Im new to this barebone thing, but where are some good sites to purchase barebone lappys?

Thanks
Tuan

head over to http://www.notebookforums.com/ and do some research on what laptop you want, and then from there you can decide who to buy it from