i have both options running.
hardware dongle, and network licence, I'm looking at setting up internet served licence (in case of emergencys) ed harris apparently has that running.
we are using it along side dell p4 1.8 with quadro 2 cards, whilst i have yet to load up the laptop with texture / geometry intense (its just new) scenes, it does perform reasonably.
It must be due for a significant price drop shortly, as the m50 is due, and i expect the quadro 4 go will be slick.
remember to get an extra battery as they eat power. Also its my first laptop, so im still struggling with the screen, both refresh rate and colour variation based on the viewing angle, which incidently is significantly different from the centre to the edges of the screen.
built in firewire is all good, i imagine most machines have that now, although we were caught out by some portable hard drives that were designed to draw their power from the firewire port. ONLY ON THE LARGE 6 PIN CONNECTORS found in the back of desktops. so i carry around extra adaptors that wont work in other countries......
on the whole though im very impressed.