Portable Workstations (laptops on steroids)

Alienware has a $700 off now on their Quadro notebook...i.e. the Clev Chassis (Boxx, Alienware, Hypersonic, Sager...all the sam chassis/motherboard/LCD)

The Alienware with the $700 should be several hundred less than a

identical Boxx configuration

Reply to
haulin79
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I looked at the Alienware, and as a company they looked highly gamer oriented, enough to scare me away when buying something for CAD. I went with Boxx because they are pretty much focussed on 3D modeling, and understand what you're talking about. In fact, someone else pointed out that Boxx uses SolidWorks to design Boxxes. The Alienware stuff reminds me of Batman body armor. Their tech support is called "AlienAutopsy". Gives me the jitters.

Hypersonic also seems to be a game box company. For $450 Hypersonic will give your laptop a cute paint job, and even paint your mouse to match ;o) Hell, I could probably get the picture of the busty broad with the polar bear that's on the side of my 1978 conversion van painted on my laptop! Hypersonic was also the only one to allow you to order without a preinstalled OS. I asked the folks at Boxx and they gave me the standard party line. Plus you can get an additional Gb of PC4200 ddr2-533 RAM for only $187. Pretty good deal.

Sager and Eurocom allow you to select a processor with 2Mb L2 cache, the others only 1 Mb. Boxx, Hypersonic and Eurocom allow you to select up to 4 Gb RAM, the others only 2.

All configured the same, built from the same Clevo chassis, here's how the pricing works out (after rebates):

Eurocom $4224 Boxx $3949 Sager $3395 (after $500 rebate) Alienware $3376 (after $600 rebate) Hypersonic $3241 (no rebate or paint job)

Two weeks ago when I placed the order, the rebates weren't there... Anyway. Knowing what I know now, I would likely go with the Sager with the bigger L2 cache. One sure way to find a sale is to actually put your money down on something.

Reply to
matt

I really don't understand this phenomenon. Who gives a rip what your computer looks like. I needed a fan to cool the memory in one of my machines and borrowed one from my son. I was embarrassed because the fan was illuminated with blue LEDs. My son just spent the better part of a day sanding the paint off his case so he could paint it something "cool". He is learning a little about computers too, but the emphasis is on looks, not performance. At school he had to take Informatics which appeared to be a course in using MicroSoft Office without really learning anything substantive.

Lets start an Engimatics school. You get a white shirt, tie, pocket protector, .5mm mechanical pencil, a Starret 6" rule, "Be>

Reply to
TOP

At meetings, all must wear dark pants, preferably brown polyester with a plain long sleve shirt, sleeves buttoned down. And a wide tie at least

20 years old.

$450 for a paintjob on a laptop seems, well, pointless to me. But then so do those mufflers that make little Hondas sound like a bad lawnmower. I guess I'm just too old to understand.

Reply to
matt

after Aquarius comes the age of fluff....

Reply to
neil

Why not go the whole nine yards, and wear a Full Cleveland?

Reply to
Art Woodbury

The priciest of these boxes (the Eurocom) was reviewed in the latest Desktop Engineering. The author seemed to be unaware that this platform is purchased from Clevo and that there are other less expensive options available.

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Reply to
matt

Yeah, I saw that too. The Eurocomm must be the most expensive of all the places you can get that same configuration. That kind of article is typical since most likely, Eurocomm is an advertiser.

Most computers made by these "CAD Workstation Manufacturers" (or more appropriately "Assemblers") use stock, motherboards, cpu's, cooling, memory, power supplies, etc, inside a pretty custom box. It must be in their specific component combination, assembly, and testing that you get the reliability and performance...and high price.

I think some like Boxx, Eurocomm, Tristar even tell you which motherboards they use. But of course, most here are paid to design stuff, not build PCs. I like to do both :)

Reply to
haulin79

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