Meet the Dragon, a Sager NP8255-S (Clevo P157SM) with GeForce GTX 780M

This is my first post here on NBR Forums, so hello everyone

After working with an HP laptop (named the Wyvern) for more than three years and finding it inadequate for most of today's games, I figured that it was about time to move on. I ended up ordering a Sager NP8255-S (aka Clevo P157SM) directly from Sager with the following specs:

• CPU: Intel Core i7-4800MQ, 4 cores (8 threads) @ 2.7 GHz with Turbo Boost up to 3.7 GHz
• GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 780M, 1536 Kepler CUDA cores @ 849 MHz max, 4 GB GDDR5 @ 5000 MHz effective
• RAM: 8 GB DDR3 @ 1600 MHz
• Display: 15.6-inch 1920x1080 Full HD matte display with 95% NTSC color gamut coverage
• Storage: 750 GB WD Black hard drive, 7200 RPM
• OS: Windows 8.1 Pro 64-bit

So far, I've been very happy with it. The Dragon performs spectacularly with some of the most demanding games out there, and there's plenty of performance for productivity software as well as development applications like Visual Studio. I added a 64 GB Plextor M5M mSATA SSD for caching, which helps with storage performance. (I still don't trust SSDs as boot drives, mostly because of concerns with firmware problems and data loss on power failure.)

If you read the service manual to the P157SM, you'll notice that two of the four memory slots are located underneath the keyboard, requiring a difficult procedure to access. These slots are not intended to be user-serviceable. The other two slots are user-serviceable, located beneath an easily-accessible cover on the bottom of the system. Fortunately, Sager put the 8 GB of memory beneath the keyboard, leaving the memory slots beneath the bottom cover open. This makes it easy to add 16 GB of memory for a total of 24 GB, and while the system theoretically accepts 32 GB, I can't see any reason why I would require more than 24 GB of RAM. I wouldn't want to have to remove the keyboard to add RAM.

Despite the extreme specs of this system, battery life for productivity and web browsing is reasonable at about 3-3.5 hours thanks to NVIDIA Optimus technology. In terms of portability, it is very thick and heavy for a 15.6-inch machine, but isn't overwhelming for me. It helps that this isn't a 17-inch monster

The following screenshot shows Crysis 2 running at 1080p with DX11 enabled, everything on Ultra, and with high-resolution textures. The left side of this image is from an attached 1440x900 monitor (via a Mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter) showing CPU and GPU load and temperatures. (Note: This screenshot was taken before the mSATA SSD was added.)



Price is US$2173 with 3-year warranty. This is pretty much the most powerful 15.6-inch laptop on the market today. For anyone who has the money and needs top-of-the-line hardware while remaining reasonably portable, this is the way to go.

--DragonLord

 

Thanks for the writeup! The RAM under the keyboard is actually pretty easy to get to, just looks intimidating at first glance. Just in case you find yourself wanting to upgrade further.

 

As for Windows 8.1, I realize that it's a love-hate thing. I have decided to go with Windows 8.1 Pro as my OS of choice, and I do not regret it at all. The Start screen is easy to use and makes accessing programs a snap. On my old laptop, I had to use a bunch of icons to open my apps. Now, I can keep the desktop clean and find my apps easily. I actually like the new tile-based Microsoft design language, and while the vast majority of my time is spent on the desktop, I don't see a solid reason to set the system to go straight to the desktop when I log on.

And because this is Windows 8.1 Pro, I get access to features like NTFS encryption, BitLocker Drive Encryption and Group Policy. While I have almost no experience administering business systems (for which these features are most relevant), I love being able to tweak the security settings. The Dragon is configured to require Ctrl+Alt+Del to log on so that I know for sure that a program isn't hijacking the logon prompt. I was also playing with BitLocker encryption on one of my flash drives, and it's nice to know that I can protect my data more easily than with Windows 8.1 (Core).

--DragonLord

 

Although I'd feel really bad if something went wrong, you might reconsider making your mSATA into your boot drive and putting programs like Office, etc on it.

I've been using a SSD for about 1.5 years as a boot drive and noticed that it uses significantly less power than a traditional HDD while also being much quicker. Typically before I got about 3.5 hrs of battery life but now I can get around 4.5 hrs (especially with wifi off).

If you think the keyboard RAM is daunting, look at some Asus G53 series videos. You have to practically disassemble the whole laptop to add HDDs.

PS: Congrats on the new laptop!

 

One thing about doing that on a 64gb drive, you'll want to be very careful not to fill it up. SSDs don't perform as well full and Windows itself will take up about half of the SSD with the updates installed.

 

Once you handle the 17 inch beasties you realise just how small the 15 inch ones are

 

A friend of mine has an ASUS ROG G75VW and says it weighs some 9 pounds. The shoulder bag he carries it actually feels heavier than my 15-20+ pound camera bag.

--DragonLord

 

Then imagine what the 6kg+ with two 330w bricks 9570 feels like ^_^

 

Not that I would ever acquire such a system. The whole purpose of a laptop is portability, and such a system is utterly non-portable. If I need the most powerful hardware available and portability is not a requirement, I would build a desktop from parts.

--DragonLord

 

It's all about requirements. The 9570 is more for putting in the car. But anyway yes the 15 inch machine you have is a great balance for many people