Hi halco,

I've also been looking at gaming laptops recently, so hopefully can offer a little bit of insight at least.

The specs you listed should be very adequate for any current games, and most future games if you're willing to dial back the graphics a little bit. That being said, the most important thing will be the graphics card - that's what will make or break your laptop gaming experience. As a result when you're speccing the machine try to make the compromises you need in other areas, like RAM or HDD size/speed and get the best graphics card you can.

A 128gb SSD is fine for a primary drive and you should be able to get several games installed on that without any real trouble win Win 7.

If you're customizing the machine as much as I expect I wouldn't worry about models and when they come out. The price of components is constantly decreasing, and that should be reflected in most manufacturers prices. Not something you should worry about unduly.

In terms of what manufacturers I like, I was planning to go for Alienware, or possibly the new Razer Blade. You might also want to look into Digital Storm and Acer.

Good luck, and please let us know what you decide and how it turns out!
JB