Pros: the specs are very nice for the price, plus the turbo option makes the cpu that much better. has a numpad, plus some nice touch sensitive buttons. 2.0 mp camera, bluetooth.

Cons: the function key [Fn] is switched with the ctrl key. not a huge thing, but it annoys me a lot while trying to play games. Because it has a numpad, things are kind of scrunched, such as the backspace and left shift. But i'm sure I'll get use to those. considerable bleeding on the bottom of the screen, but its only noticeable with dark images.

Other Thoughts: I dont really see why people make a deal out of the keyboard flex, I have to be looking for it to notice it and be applying considerable pressure. I suppose the low screen resolution could be a con, but nothing very bad in my opinion. I wish they would've made the numpad scrunched, rather than the rest of the keyboard. I ran the video stress test on CS:S with everything on high, and 4x AA and got 220 avg fps.

Pros: 1. Under $1200
2. Nvidia 9800m GS
3. 4 gigs of ram
4. Moderate battery life
5. Turbo/ Eco mode
6. Very fast
7.Free backpack

Cons: 1.Keyboard flex
2.Vista 32 bit
3.Speakers aren't loud. (that is what external speakers and earphones are for.)

Other Thoughts: This is a great Laptop, worth every penny. But, I also have some questions. Im wondering if I install windows 7 on this laptop would the turbo or eco button still work or is it just for vista? And my friend recently bought this laptop 1 month before I did and he wanted to reinstall/ reformat with vista 64 bit. He did that and now he's saying that his partitions are messed up. Anyone know why?

BTW I would recommend this laptop to everyone, very fast performance for a $1200 gaming laptop.

Pros: Amazing all around laptop.
-Comfortable to use. Very sleek design
-Fast, able to play games on more then decent settings.
-Also usable for my college needs. And is exactly what I was looking for.
-I've got to admit the turbo button is a nice little feaure to have as well as the ECO settings.
-This laptop produces very little heat even when on for several hours though I havn't gotten to extensively test for gaming just yet.
-AMAZING price for such specs.

Cons: 32 Bit
Recovery Cd's vs an actual OEM sytem cd/dvd.
My wrist occasionally taps the touchpad while typing and throws off the flow of things though I'm sure there is probably a little utility to take care of that.

Other Thoughts: The recovery cd thing is huge for me. MSI instructs you to make your own recovery cd's with discs that they provide. There is also a recovery partition on your drive that it comes with. I wasn't aware that reinstalling with a retail set of discs would be incompatible with an OEM cd key while trying to do a fresh format/install. The recovery discs don't work if the recovery partition isn't there and I couldn't use my cd key. Calling Microsoft they essentially wanted me to pay for a new key which I thought was ridiculous because I wanted to have 64 bit and get rid of some bloatware and this would cost me a new key.

Issue was resolved with a friend of mine whom bought a 10 user license key and allowed me to use it.

Overall great laptop and recommended buy to anyone but be careful with how you change their partition setup because it could give you a lot of headache.

And of course Newegg got it here in a day :]

Pros: Its A great laptop for a cheaper price. the thing i like about this laptop is the turbo mode it really actually boost the cpu and apps go sky rocket fast. great buy from new egg always fast. can handle most of the early ga
mes until now especially GTA IV, Crysis. Just press that TURBO and your on the way.

Cons: the flexible keyboard.

Pros: - Sleek
- Runs Cooler than my old HP with a 8600m gs
- Turbo Mode Works nice
- Manual buttons for wifi/bt/cam help in conserving energy
- Included bag is great
- I've tested Bioshock, TF2, Overlord, Demigod, The Last Remnant with the HIGHEST settings and the max resolution supported and I notice no lag at all.
- Even with turbo mode on, the laptop doesn't get too hot.
- I don't know if MSI fixed it but I don't notice the keyboard flex others have mentioned. The keyboard does flex about .1 mm when I push down hard but it feels and looks solid.

Cons: - Speakers feel a little shallow
- The fan being on the right side does get warm and noticeable if you keep your hard near, but being in Canada where our winters are cold is a welcome!
- Dedicated volume/mute/touchpad buttons would have been nice instead of using the function (fn) key.
- At least 3 or 4 USB ports would be more convenient.
- The power cord plugging into the laptop doesn't sit tight, if you move it a bit the plug will come out a little (about half a centimeter) but the plug still makes a good electrical connection with the laptop socket. Probably designed this way but when I'm not running with a battery I worry sometimes if I have the laptop on my lap whether or not I will accidentally unplug the power plug even with the slightest trip of my legs/feet.

Other Thoughts: For $1200 this laptop is well worth it if you're into gaming, all you need is an external HD connected with eSata and you have a powerful mobile production station as well.

I wouldn't worry so much about the 218US or the asus x5 if you want something cheap price-wise but loaded feature-wise.

Pros: I get a high amount of fps when playing most games like COD 4 and 5 and GTA 4 and also more. Excellent looking laptop, free bag is pretty good too :D.
The right side vent didnt bother me that much at all since my playing position is unique with the cooling fan on the bottom of my laptop.

Cons: The magnet on the laptop which closes it might mess a little with the harddrive but no problems at all right now.

Pros: Solid build all the way around, looks great too. It's amazing what you can get on the cheap now a days! Plays games very well and runs anything you can throw at it. Worth the money hands down.

Cons: Comes with Vista 32 instead of 64. Unlike most other people that love dead OS's like Windows XP, Vista is a killer OS, always has been (poor misslead people out there) but with the hardware included, running a 32bit OS isnt worth it.

So I just upgraded it to 64bit and all is fine :D

Other Thoughts: Nothing really, I love it all the way around. No issues at all so far and of course Newegg got it here right on time as always. Highly recommended.

Pros: I'm coming from a Macbook Pro 15 which I could not stand. I fell for the hype and moved to the macbook last year. Anyway, this laptop is amazingly fast.. can multitask like the best of them.

- Plays games amazingly well on all high settings.
- Downloading binary newsgroup files, watching a movie on VLC, browsing the web, and installing left ford dead 4 at the same time without any hicups.
- Lot of ports, hdmi, etc etc etc.
- I personally have no issues with the keyboard. Takes some getting use to (the shift key is small).. but no problems with flexing as other reviews suggest.
- Yada yada yada.. read the cons.

Cons: - My wireless router which works on several other computers in the house including the macbook was not compatible with vista. I tried everything - finally gave in and bought a new router ~$50.. not the laptops fault, but still a pain.
- the vent on the right side blows some serious hot air.
- keyboard, due to the not normal layout, takes some getting use too.. took me about 2 days

Other Thoughts: overall a 5 star laptop.. the router thing was a huge pain. I ended up installing vista x32 to try to get it to work. will not upgrade to windows 7, hopefully no issues there.

I recommend doing a fresh install to get rid of the bloat and the computer runs 100x faster.

Pros: I bought this laptop mainly for the graphics card and it works great. I've played Assassin's Creed, GRID, Left 4 Dead, etc... all relatively new games with no issues.

Cons: There is a vent on the right side of the laptop that blows hot air on my hand when I use a mouse. Would be nice if you could pick which side this vent is on since I never have my hand on the left side.

Pros: Graphic card: 9800m GS is about the equivelant of a 9600GT desktop graphic card. Extremely fast
Processor: at first it is 2.26ghz, but when i set the overclock to 20% in BIOS it jumps up to 2.71ghz in turbo mode.
RAM: When i got this laptop i upgraded to windows 7 beta 64bit to utilise all 4gb RAM, and to upgrade the video driver that wasnt updating in vista. im now using dual boot
7200RPM, loads games very quickly
Has a great look. feels sturdy. People complain about the keyboard flex but i don't even notice because i dont smash the keyboard when i type

very fun to bring to friends house to play, in any situation


crysis 1280x800 no AA, all very high is 14-24 FPS
high=20-35FPS
medium=40-60fps
low=80-120fps

unreal tournament 3 everything MAXED out 1280x800= 40-60 fps(with vsync on)

Left 4 dead, everything maxed out, 1280x800 = 55-60 fps, with vsync on

devil may cry 4 dx10 benchmark, everything max, 1280x800, c16xAA/AF, 45-90fps

Cons: heat is rather high when in turbo mode. can feel the heat from pretty far away. no artifacts so far though

webcam doesn't work properly even when i first used it, before i made any changes to the system

Other Thoughts: excellent bang for buck