I ordered a Dell Precision M90 Laptop

I recently picked up a Dell Precision M90 Laptop from the dell outlet. It has a Nvidia Quadro fx 2500M video card and I was a little worried I would have issues with gaming, but after some research, the 2500M is apparently identical to the 7900GTX so I went ahead and bought it. Wow, I am impressed. I tend to stay at least one generation behind state of hte art so that I can always get the best value, and with this laptop I definietly got a great deal.

Specs:
Core2Duo t7200 2.0Ghz 4MB L2Cache 666 Mhz fsb
2GB DDR2 666mhz Ram
80GB 7200 RPM hdd
Nvidia Quadro fx2500M 512MB DDR3
Intel PRO Wireless 3945ABG
17" Matte LCD 1400x900


Gaming is much better than on my Inspiron which had an x1400 video card. The 7900 series is the top of the line gaming model from early 2007, and because it was the fastest and greatest thing it can still play modern games at medium settings. And it flies at anything released in 2007.

The m90 itself isn't built for mobility, or for long battery life, its sole purpose is to pack as much power into a notebook computer as is possible and still be able to technically call it a laptop.

The 9 cell Lithium Ion battery runs for about 2 hours with the video in miser mode. With the video at full power, that time almost halves to just over an hour.

The M90 is equipped with two fans; one that cools the CPU and GPU, and the other just for the GPU. Yes it gets that hot. at idle, the fx2500 sits at 60c and under load, it jumps to 75-80c. I've found that running vsync in games really helps to keep the GPU cool since it lowers the load on the gpu while it waits for the next frame rendering request.

The case is solid, it is made out of an aluminum-magnesium-alloyish type material that really screams firmness. the LCD is rock hard in comparison to the Inspiron's flimsy plastic.

The keyboard is roomy, and keys are responsive without being overly firm, very quiet, but the center of the keyboard near the top tends to get hot from the graphics card that sits directly underneath.

Overall, a very good buy at $800. The only thing that I didn't like about this laptop was the vista ultimate that came preinstalled. So I promptly removed it and installed XP Pro. As it is now, I am running stock drivers and 3dmark05 net the following:




And here are the detailed specs for the notebook.