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Forum: General Discussion

Topic: great deal on this laptop! Thoughts? - Page: 1

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geposted Tue 01 Jul 08 @ 2:31 am
Looks allright. Personally i'm not a Centrino-fan, but with a limited budget i'd go for it. :)
 
yeah, the only downsides I can find (and they're small ones) are the somewhat weak processor, the HD rpm speed, and the fact that it's loaded with 64 bit vista, but from what I've been reading on here the solution to that is to just uninstall the OS and reinstall 32bit vista. Does anyone out there own one of these laptops, or even one with the same components? What can you tell me about them?
 
I bought the 6860 FX and your getting a great deal now is the time to get it. I will tell you this I use TCV and a firewire soundcard and had alot of problems at first and didnt think I would ever get this laptop to work with virtualdj. If you dont know anything about DPC Latency then get familiar. I was experiencing audio drop outs and pops and clicks with this laptop and when I used the DPC Latency Checker noticed high spikes and nothing seemed to make them go away. I tried both 32 and 64 bit vista which both come with the laptop and had no luck. I installed Windows XP and a different video card driver and things worked smooth. It definetely has more than enough power to handle virtualdj graphically but will take some serious tweaking and playing around with to get it working.
 
Yikes you're speaking total greek to me :( I'm not sure what TCV or DPC are. Am I getting in over my head?
 
lol TCV= time coded vinyl its used to control the mp3's if your using turntables. DPC well i dont know how to really explain this one but from my understanding certain device drivers such as the driver for the nvidia graphics card take longer to respond to the computer which could result in audio dropouts or poor audio sound. you might not experience this with your setup but just making you aware of what too look for if you do. I have the exact laptop model from bestbuy and do have it working with virtualdj which I beleive is what your asking. I am able to run videos onto another monitor and mix them with no problems. I have not tested this in a professional environment but must say my bedroom dj setup isnt cheap ;)
 
lol yeah I'm dumb....I realized what TCV was about a minute after I posted that.
 
Philthy-

The specs on this lappy look good.

As you've already heard, the Centrino is optimized for power-saving in the mobile environment so you may loose performance there. Fortunately, this model is packed with RAM and the 8800 series NVidia video card should handle a good part of VirtualDJ video functions.

Don't stress the 5400 RPM hard drive. It has been said time & time again that the 7200rpm drives get overly hot, due to the high rotation speeds of the platters, etc. As long as you run Defrag on a usual basis, you should stay in the clear.

Just wondering, but what does "Up to 512MB discrete GDDR3" mean? Either it has the dedicated memory or it doesn't?! I wonder if there is 256mb dedicated and an option to borrow system memory for the additional 256. I'd definitely check into that.

Vista 64-bit. A good part of the sound card manufacturers are producing 64-bit drivers, but I'm not quite sure if VDJ will run. Can someone verify yay or nay on this?

For $1100, I can see why this one caught your eye!

Just go over it with a fine comb and ensure it will meet all of your needs (present & future!)

-=Woody=-
 
Woody,

Thanks for helping set my mind at ease a bit! I think the "up to 512" bit is something screwy that best buy put on their description...if you go to gateway's site, follow the links to retail laptops, and check this one out, it states that it has 512 GDDR3 discrete video memory. So my main concern is the 64 bit vista at this point I believe....

yeah the price certainly caught my attention...I'd been looking at this one before, but they just knocked $250 off the price!
 
What's wrong with a Centrino? That's a Core2Duo processor. Should haul ass.
 
@philthy..since you have been using VDJ since August of 07 perhaps now it is time to buy a fully licensed version of VDJ also.....It would be worth the investment...hope to see you as a PRO user soon...
 
I haven't been using vdj at all. I registered as a user on this site to gleam information in preparation for when I did make the switch over, which is going to be this summer. Stupid automatic message trying to make me feel inferior. lol
 
Ok, just off the phone with best buy..they tell me that this does not come with the 32 bit version of vista, and I would have to purchase a new copy at $240, which completely negates the price drop. How bad is 64 bit really? and how long till the drivers catch up?
 
hey, i need to know what lap-top can i buy for virtualdj,,,,, helpppp....
 
You look at the minimum requirements and get something above that... So simple. For audio, the requirements dont have to be that high. For videos yes...

You can get a great deal from the dell website. They sell referbished laptops for good prices. I already bought 2 of them. I only get the ones that say " Certified Referbished " I bought a Dell 1501 inspiron 64 X 2 2.0 ghz dual core with 2 gigs of ram and 256 mb video card 80 gig hd for 540. It comes brand new in the box.. you can get extra warranty to if you want.

http://outlet.us.dell.com/ARBOnlineSales/topics/global.aspx/arb/online/en/InventorySearch?c=us&cs=22&l=en&lob=INSP&s=dfh
 
Caliente how is the vid performance with that one
 
I assure you that the Gateway P-6860 FX comes with both Vista 64/32 bit installation CD. The 64 bit is whats installed but you can use the CD thats in the box to load either one. The CD is just for the OS so you would need to have the drivers handy which you can get from gateway. Go to notebookreview.com and there is a whole section on nothing but this laptop and alot of users to help you out. I will try to post a video by Thursday of this laptop in use with the demo version.
 
apparently the hercules rmx supports 64bit, so hopefully (key word there) I won't have to worry about changing the OS.
 
I wouldnt use a 64 bit system for dj use. Most Dj programs dont support that. When your dj ying, you want something stable.


The video card for my Dell 1501 is a " ATI Radeon Xpress 1150 256MB HyperMemory " I havent dj yed videos with it yet but i would like to. I downloaded Microsoft HD videos and they look amazing..
 
DJkapitalkev.....I just picked this lappy up and am curious as to what you did to it other than removing the 64 bit and installing the 32 bit (good call by the way, it definitely came with both!) I'm gonna leave the 64bit on for now and see how it performs once I install cue and puchase/hook up a hercules rmx, but I'm still curious as to what you did to optimize performance. I'm totally new to both the virtual and laptop world, though I know how to use the install/uninstall programs function to remove the bloatware that comes on the laptop. If you have an email I'd love to contact you, otherwise if you would be so kind as to post what you needed to do on here I'd truly appreciate it!
 
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