Newbie question about Z71V

edrisk · Post by **edrisk** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 3:37 pm

Hi, I'm new to the forums. Over the past few months I've been looking into getting a barebone gaming / graphics laptop. I'm currently a systems intregrator and I need a laptop to build and maintain my website and do some gaming on the side. I'm also considering selling these notebooks sometime in the future. I had a few questions:

1. Is the Asus Z71V is dual channel DDR2 or single channel DDR2?

2. I've read about overclocking the Asus Z71A by buying a 400 MHZ processor and just flipping some dip switches to get it to 533 ... esseinatally a 33% speed boost. Can this be done on the Z71V as well?

3. What kind of warranty does ASUS offer? 1 year ... 2 year? Some sites that offer prebuild Z71V offer a 2 year warranty, just curious.

4. Any specific issues or concerns with the Z71V? Are there better choices for a laptop chasis around the same price?

I've taken apart and fixed countless laptops over the years, this year alone I've fixed about 120 laptops (Dell, Compaq, HP, Sony). So I'm not too worried about the installation.

Thanks in advance.

infinitevalence · Post by **infinitevalence** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 4:18 pm

edrisk wrote:Hi, I'm new to the forums. Over the past few months I've been looking into getting a barebone gaming / graphics laptop. I'm currently a systems intregrator and I need a laptop to build and maintain my website and do some gaming on the side. I'm also considering selling these notebooks sometime in the future. I had a few questions:

1. Is the Asus Z71V is dual channel DDR2 or single channel DDR2?

2. I've read about overclocking the Asus Z71A by buying a 400 MHZ processor and just flipping some dip switches to get it to 533 ... esseinatally a 33% speed boost. Can this be done on the Z71V as well?

3. What kind of warranty does ASUS offer? 1 year ... 2 year? Some sites that offer prebuild Z71V offer a 2 year warranty, just curious.

4. Any specific issues or concerns with the Z71V? Are there better choices for a laptop chasis around the same price?

I've taken apart and fixed countless laptops over the years, this year alone I've fixed about 120 laptops (Dell, Compaq, HP, Sony). So I'm not too worried about the installation.

Thanks in advance.

Welcome to the forums!

1. single channel DDR2
2. Yes, and if not you can use a wire like i did. Get the 730 or 735 to do this.
3. 1 year but you can buy extended warranties up to 3 years total.
4. Honestly i would look at the W3, its lighter and gets better battery life, you will have to do the wire mod because it does not have the dipswich to change the fsb. It comes with a x600 moble and is under 5lbs with a 14.1" LCD. I have the little bro to that that does not have the GFX card and i get killer battery life (9hrs) using the second battery and lots of power. For graphics its not to bad, i edit video and do photoshop as well as dreamweaver on it. Its not huge but i would rather the portability over large screen any day.

And just so you know, putting either laptop together will take about 15min, its super fast and super easy.

edrisk · Post by **edrisk** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 5:07 pm

Well I don't really care about the weight as long as I can get decent battery time and superior performance. I don't travel that much so I can usually just plug it in if needed.

Right now I'm considering either the Z71V (if I can overclock the thing to give me the best bang for my buck) or the ASUS Z83V which has a X700 128MB ATI Card and from what I can tell a dual channel DDR2 memory and a 17" WXGA display. It's going to cost me a bit more of course but I can't find a site that sells just the chasis. Right now I'm trying to get a hold of ASUS to see if they will sell directly to me (since I have a retailer's license).

Also would I need to get a Pentium 730 400MHZ or would 533MHZ be okay?

Thanks.

infinitevalence · Post by **infinitevalence** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 5:12 pm

Well if you need some help i can get them from Amax at a decent price so as long as you pay for shipping and cost i can get you a deal

Z71V $725.90
Z83V $1,010.20

edrisk · Post by **edrisk** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 6:02 pm

Actually I just registered for an account from AMAX. Been meaning to do it for the past month since the prices that my current distributer (D&H) are too high atm (they sell Z71V for 740 where I can buy from a online reseller for as low as $720).

Their registration process was alot less painful than other distributors out there, D&H form was about 9 pages long.

Now I just need to decide if the bigger screen, TV tunner and X700 are worth the additional $300.

Looking at the prices for Pentium M CPUs I can get a 400MHZ 1.6 for about $150, if I can get this overclocked to 2.1 with the Z71V I'm definately going that route.

Thanks for you help infinite. Much appreicated.

Post by **Apoptosis** » Mon Nov 07, 2005 6:18 pm

Welcome to the forums and some of the questions you asked didn't get answered correctly.

1. It is single channel DDR2 when 1 memory module is used. It both memory DIMMS are used it runs in Dual Channel DDR2. You wnat to run dual channel.

2. Yes, you can do a FSB mod to overclock like this if you want to.

3. Asus offers a one year warranty and personally that is enough time as most gamers will flip this notebook when the dual core processors come out.

4. Battery life isn't great, but most gamers are going to plug in at their final destination. I like the Matte screen, but some gamers don't.

I personally own the Z71V and have been using it now for nearly four months. All is well and I am happy with the build and gaming performance of the 6600 card with desktop drivers. When gaming the battery life is 1.5 to 2 hours, which isn't bad. Look at my other threads on the forums about the battery life.

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