Cool gaming laptop with 3 GPUs

[Vaudiofan]

I have just got to know that Toshiba launches laptop with three GPUs, The combined efforts of both companies resulted in Toshiba's most powerful gaming laptop to date featuring the new highly integrated GeForce® 9400M graphics processing unit (GPU) along with a pair of NVIDIA GeForce 9800M GTS enthusiast-class GPUs.
That laptop must be very cool for gaming. Wondering how can they manage that, and how to deal with the heat?

 

[yettitheman]

Wondering how can they manage that, and how to deal with the heat?

Mail order liquid nitrogen! They sell it in 2L bottles

 

[Seth=L]

Mail order liquid nitrogen! They sell it in 2L bottles

It's a computer on wheels!

GTA?

 

[Fuller]

Does the article mention the weight? I'm using a gaming laptop right at this moment with 2 x 8800gt cards in it and it weighs over 5kg. These things aren't technically laptops unless you want to loose all sensation in your legs after 10 minutes. There's also the heat issue...I've taken this apart and theres about 3kg of copper just sat over the whole base of the motherboard acting as a heatsink. It cools all components at once using three fans and a series of heat pipes / heat sinks leading to one big exhaust grill at the side. When it's been running a game for a while you could spit roast a whole hog from the exhaust fumes coming out of it.

The manufacturers also underclock the processors so the performance is no where near that of a multi-GPU desktop. But it's how they help to handle the heat.

 

[businessjeff]

this is something that really peevs me off, GAMING LAPTOPS!!

Thats like saying SPORTS BUS....

Honestly I have a computer from the 80's that will still out-perform any GAMING LAPTOP.


Portability cool, but laptops just dont run for crap. I guess if you got the money, but Id rather lug around my tower.

 

[Adam]

Honestly I have a computer from the 80's that will still out-perform any GAMING LAPTOP.

What 80's computer do you have, and what gaming laptops have you tried? I just find it hard to believe is all, unless you're running a Cray.

 

[emorphien]

Nifty. Dual GPU for gaming mode and integrated to get longer battery life. I've only got two GPUs in my T400

 

[Ito]

this is something that really peevs me off, GAMING LAPTOPS!!

Thats like saying SPORTS BUS....

Honestly I have a computer from the 80's that will still out-perform any GAMING LAPTOP.


Portability cool, but laptops just dont run for crap. I guess if you got the money, but Id rather lug around my tower.

That would be true several years ago, but not today. That doesn't change the fact that if you want to game, get a desktop, but that's not to say that gaming laptop suck. Don't know if you would want to lug them around, but they do their job, just not as well as a desktop.

 

[Vaudiofan]

Mail order liquid nitrogen! They sell it in 2L bottles

The chassis they use for their upper line laptops is massive...absolutely one huge laptop. Portable? Barely. It's really more of a desktop replacement.

 

[NicolasKL]

this is something that really peevs me off, GAMING LAPTOPS!!

Thats like saying SPORTS BUS....

Honestly I have a computer from the 80's that will still out-perform any GAMING LAPTOP.


Portability cool, but laptops just dont run for crap. I guess if you got the money, but Id rather lug around my tower.

Bullcorn. You can get an Asus laptop for 800 bucks with a 9600GS mobile that will run any game fine, albeit not at max settings. And I wouldn't even call that a gaming laptop, it's just a regular laptop that they shoved a discrete graphics card into. I played FO3 at medium-high settings while on Christmas break and it was great.

Personally I wouldn't bother shelling out 2 grand+ for a gaming laptop because when I am out of town and wanting to do a little gaming I just don't need to set all the graphical settings to max. But for casual/occasional mobile gaming something like my Asus works great.

 

[emorphien]

Bullcorn. You can get an Asus laptop for 800 bucks with a 9600GS mobile that will run any game fine, albeit not at max settings. And I wouldn't even call that a gaming laptop, it's just a regular laptop that they shoved a discrete graphics card into. I played FO3 at medium-high settings while on Christmas break and it was great.

Personally I wouldn't bother shelling out 2 grand+ for a gaming laptop because when I am out of town and wanting to do a little gaming I just don't need to set all the graphical settings to max. But for casual/occasional mobile gaming something like my Asus works great.

Agreed. I can play games just fine on my Thinkpad T400 if I switch from the integrated to the discrete ATI 3*** whateveritis video card. I can't have all the details turned up but it sure as hell does better than a desktop from the 80s would do

Of course my desktop is faster. It's also got twice as many processor cores (4), 3x the cache, twice the RAM (8gb) and twice the video memory. Interestingly the video card is actually older in terms of tech/generation/release date than what's in my laptop, it's just a 7950GT I bought used from a friend two years ago (i'll probably upgrade it this year if I see a good deal in the $150 range later in the spring or summer).