After having a fairly basic laptop for 2 years, I finally broke down and ordered myself a new laptop. I did a little bit of searching and finally decided on an HP dv8000t.Here's my rig:
Intel Core Duo T2300E (1.66 Ghz)
17" Widescreen
Geforce Go 7600 256 Mb
1 Gb DDR667
80 Gb sata hard drive (5400 rpm)
DVD +/-RW with Lightscribe
PC card, Expresscard, 4 USB, Firewire, 6 in 1 card reader, etc.
There's also room for a 2nd hard drive (though it won't run RAID 0).
Some benchmarks (default-4x/8x high quality):
3dMark03 8381-4350
3dMark06 2248-1830
HDTach - random access 18.8ms
avg read 28.6 Mb/sec
burst speed 107.1 Mb/sec
I've played Pacific Fighters and Splinter Cell Chaos Theory (at 1440x900 resolution, 2x AA, 4xAF) and they look darn good. I haven't tried Battlefield 2 or Half Life 2 yet, but I'll let you know how they run.
So far, I'm pretty happy with this purchase. Anyone looking for a new notebook should give HP's website a peek.
Oh, did I tell you that it only cost $1200 after rebates and free shipping?
