Should I return this MSI C2Duo?

Recently purchased this MSI laptop for $630 CAD and have been using it for a week. Have 1 more week to return it. Was wondering if there is something coming down the pipe that would be in my price range max $800 CAD. Do not do gaming but a separate video card and a large hard drive is always nice.

 

Hmm you could do and then wait for one of the more uprated models, but then again it depends how popular models are in your area too!

Good luck with whatever you choose though, check out some CES coverage in off topic and somewhere in the MSI section.

 

True here we have Best Buy and Future Shop (owned by Best Buy) for big box electronics stores. Also have no experience with MSI service and even if its available in Canada. Have never used MSI motherboards in any computers I have built either usually use Asus.

Also suffering from information overload here looking at all the CES stuff.

 

Well about 3 years ago i discovered all my pcs i run are MSI boards, and most my gpus are also MSI branded (even in my present laptop since its a gt725 rebrand.)

MSI are a very reliable make and i believe the service is top quality too, you never see people posting about how terrible their experience has been so haha, but yeah you've got a few days, you'l find what you want to do soon enough .

 

One of my work mates just got this exact laptop. Personally I don't think you'll get anything better for such a small amount of money.

The processor does let the side down a bit though Other than that, I think its a pretty solid choice.

 

A couple of things about the laptop that I don't like (order of importance highest to lowest):

1) No availability of eSata or 1394 ports to allow me to back up any of the 500GB hard drive. I would have to use USB which isn't known for speed. I can not remove the hard drive out of the laptop for 2 years without breaking the factory warranty seal on the bottom cover.
2) No ExpressCard slot
3) Win7 32 bit installed so that 1GB of RAM is unseen
4) No HDMI port
5) Apparently the recovery DVDs for Win7 rely on using the recovery partition on the existing hard drive to reinstall Windows7, This means if the hard drive packs it in there is no way of reinstalling Windows7. Can anyone confirm this?
6) nit picking on location of 2 of the 3 USB ports on rear of laptop rather than on the side where they are more accessible.

What is also frustrating as heck is to fine a laptop aorund $800 that has a separate video card along with 1) and 3) in a C2D. Think its impossible in Canada.

 

Newegg Canada has the MSI GX633. It has esata and hdmi and a dedicated GPU for 770 CAD. Only thing you might not like is that it has a AMD CPU...
http://www.newegg.ca/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834152158

 

Wow thanks for the research. Yes the AMD cpu is something I would not want if at all possible. Why is the CX600 that I have come with a 2year warranty whereas this one is 1 year warranty. Anyone know if MSI has a warranty depot in Canada so that the laptop does not have to be shipped to the USA in case it needs repairs?

 

Do not know if this is the right place to post this but its regarding a possible replacement for this laptop. Noticed a distributor has the Fujistu AH550 avaiable for about $140 more for an i3-330m. No idea of the complete specs for this laptop port wise. FUjitso has an offere to extend the 1 yr warranty to 3 years for free.

 

That's the best I could found for the specs: http://www.onhop.ca/catalog/product/10859379

 

Just realized that ca.msi.com only has 32bit version of drivers so appears that for some unexplained reason they do not want someone from installing their own Windows7 64bit to make use of the 4GB of RAM this laptop comes with.

 

>.> The 32 bit drivers from the cd work just fine under 64bit. The only drivers you would even have to install after a fresh vista install are the cir drivers and the memory card reader drivers. I think your looking at laptops that are really beyond your needs and only add mediocre gains in performance. If it was me I would sink the extra 200$ into a nice solid state hdd.

 

I can not use a SSD in this laptop for 2 years since breaking the seal on the bottom hatch to access the hard drive would void my 2 yr warranty.

 

>.> Msi's policy has always been that users can upgrade the hdd and ram on their own, call them and they will send you another sticker.

 

Any idea whether in fact the recovery DVDs created via the included is the complete Win7 install that can be used to install the o/s on a new hard drive should the current one fail or does it rely on the recovery partition on the hard to function?

 

They will work if the hdd fails, you can also make a backup system image at any time to put on a new hdd using windows 7 system recovery tool.

 

Wondering why then does MSI even bother with the sticker since apparently the end user can remove them with out penalty to the warranty terms.These types of stickers on desktop computers went out of favor about 10 yrs ago.

 

I decided to test out the bluetooth that I thought this laptop has. Well there is no bluetooth manager in the systray (even though I was darn sure it was there when I first got the laptop) and no amount of trying options in the installed bluetooth apps on the laptop could bring the systray icon back. I made sure none of the buttons in the upper right corner if the laptop (near the screen were for the bluetooth). So I looked again at Future Shop Whitebook whose links on the page for downloading drivers sends you to CX600 model's page on MSI.

My question is why would bluetooth software be installed on this computer if it did not have bluetooth and is there any other way to determine whether in fact it does have a bluetooth device? Device manager shows a Bluetooth RFCOMM device enabled.

 

yes by opening it.

 

Double click on the RFCOMM in device manager , it should give you the name/make of your bluetooth adapter etc.
e.g see pic

 

It shows Unknown.

 

I have 2 days to return this laptop and sadly I am leaning to doing that. The points I previously mentioned in this thread as well as the apparent non existance of bluetooth in this laptop.

 

According to MSI's website Bluetooth is optional ..
I think that's the best thing to do. If you can wait a little while , there's some new machine coming around the corner

 

Ya guess I was imagining a bluetooth systray icon when I first got the laptop. Jiust hope that I am not going to regret returning the laptop as it is now $70 more than what I paid for it and being in Canada the selection is not as diverse as that in the US.

 

Why did you get it in the 1st place ? as it seems to lack everything you want from a pc .. Didn't you checked out the specs ?

 

The reason I did was that the original specs showed that it had eSata but that was erroneous and was corrected after I purchased it online during boxing day sale here. It was not available in the store.