New laptop

[LittleGrizzly]

ok my 2nd attempt at making this topic so less chatty this time and more down to business...

http://www.currys.co.uk/martprd/stor...rmationSection

That seems to be the best bang for my buck, i can only buy my laptop from currys as i have £500 vouchers for currys...

I want the laptop mainly for playing newish games and watching movies... occasional web browsing

17" screen is a must
what does it mean by dedicated 3d card ?
must be able to play most new games out at the moment

any comments on the one i have choosen or anyone spotted a better one ?

[TosaInu]

Hello LittleGrizzly,

Laptops are not the first choice to play newish games on, though some can do fine.

A laptop is usually meant for mobile working, textprocessing, spreadsheet, mail, some presentations. So it doesn't have a tough graphics card. To slim down, it's even using part of the systems memory for graphics. Dedicated means it has its own video memory.

Wouldn't you rather use XP?
I have doubts about the graphics card.
If gaming is important and you don't want to invest a fortune, better get a desktop. You'll get faster parts for the same money and upgrading is easier.

[Kekvit Irae]

Tosa's right. Because the graphics card is integrated (read: dedicated), it will not be as powerful as modern graphics cards you will have to buy separately for desktops. Laptops are mostly for productivity use, not gaming.
For the most part, Vista is not that bad an OS, despite what people say about it, but for a laptop dedicated to gaming... it's still a bad idea. Especially for a laptop with only 2gb of memory. Because Vista is a memory hog, 3gb is suggested.

If you absolutely positively must have a laptop, I suggest you find something more powerful for your gaming needs.
http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/pr...n&s=dhs&~ck=mn

[CrossLOPER]

Laptops are not for games, especially not "newish" ones. I guess you can use that one for viewing movies, but you can't plug it into the TV for a better quality view. Also, I recommend going with XP if you get the chance.

[TevashSzat]

Well, it doesn't seem like the laptop will be able to play most of the new games coming out well. It can probably do well with older games, but don't try to install Crysis on it or something. As a rought guideline, expect to spend something like 1500 dollars for a half decent gaming computer which is about 1100 euro if my math is correct.

From what I have seen so far, stay away from the ATI laptops mainly because they have horrible video cards bundled with them. For the intel ones which have Nvidia cards, look for something like a 8600 or better. Don't be mislead by the 9200 ones, iirc, they are actually worse than the 8600 series

[Fragony]

Last year's games should do fine, but if you want to use it as a mobile gaming platform, games eat battery at maddening speed.

[Husar]

A dedicated graphics card is not an integrated one and I do not see any problem with Vista or Vista + 2GB RAM.
The laptop has a NVIDIA GeForce 8400M GT 256MB, that's not integrated and it's pretty much a low-cost dedicated card, could play some older games well but for newer games you can forget it unless you like low settings and a bit of lag.

[JR-]

the new nvidia integrated 9300M/9400M will actually be ok compared to low end dedicated graphics of yesteryear like the 8400GS.

but i wouldn't recommend anything less than a nVidia 9600GT or AMD 3670 if you want to do some gaming.

[LittleGrizzly]

Firstly i want a laptop simply for the ability to watch movies when im out, its something i have got used to from having a laptop the last 2 years and its essential really more so than the gaming so i will stick with a laptop

On vista... personally i would prefer XP, but the only seem to sell new pc's at currys with Vista so i was going to either try requesting XP instead or if they can't do that, theres a guide somewhere on here about downgrading vista to xp... would that save on computer resources or would it still eat up as much power as regular Vista ??

The newish games part wasn't exactly clear.... i don't expect the latest call of duty to work on it but less demanding newer games... TBH the newest game i currently own is RTW i don't expect i would want anything much more demanding than that....

Edit: it doesn't mention anything on the 3d card bar its dedicated and 256mb....

[naut]

The upgrade to XP would be a major bonus. Dell's Studio 15 and 17 are nice, and can run most older games very well and newer games decently (got CoD4 running well on almost full settings on my brother's Studio 17). Plus the actual machine as a whole is very nice. Only problem with Dell is they don't offer XP, (well they may do, but you'd probably have to request it).

Major problem I've found is that companies that provide XP with their Desktops/Laptops usually don't offer ATI graphics cards. This is incredibly tedious, since the incompatibility issues of nVidia with older games is notorious, (and the newest games I have are FM2008, CoD4 and Oblivion ).

[edyzmedieval]

For gaming I would recommend 2 choices - DELL XPS M1710 or DELL XPS M1730. I have the M1710 and I play M2TW almost on max with huge unit size. Watch out, the support for M1710 has been discontinued and in the future M1730 will experience the same.

For everything else, get the new Apple MacBook Pro. 17", it has everything you need, including a nVIDIA 8600M GT 512MB dedicated video card, which would give you the chance to play CoD4 for Mac without any problem at all.

[Husar]

The problem with Dell, if I read that correctly, is that he would throw 500 pounds out of the window.

[LittleGrizzly]

The problem with Dell, if I read that correctly, is that he would throw 500 pounds out of the window.

Yes, it basically has to be from Currys, PC world.... *finding voucher* Dixons or.... the link ? (is that a phone shop ?!) with my budget being 500 - 700

The COD4 thing, not something im expecting in my price range for a laptop.... especially because im looking for at least a 17" screen... i could probably make do with a 16" something.... something that could play ETW would be great... but the only new game i really had in mind was the new fifa or new pro evo... im pretty sure they're a little less demanding than COD4

Could someone clarify the vista issue.... if i use the downgrade to xp guide on here will that mean the os will only use up as much power as regular xp does ? (im not a big fan of vista in general from this laptop (my mums) and friends pc's... theres just too much crap...)

[naut]

For everything else, get the new Apple MacBook Pro. 17", it has everything you need, including a nVIDIA 8600M GT 512MB dedicated video card, which would give you the chance to play CoD4 for Mac without any problem at all.

I'd rather burn my AUS$4,499.00. Plus the extra money required for Leopard. I'd never, ever buy a Mac. (From the experience of friends who have the MacBook Pro it is prone to heat damage due to the metal case, which can reduce performance, cause injury and destroy the hardware. Also the metal case causes connectivity problems when trying to connect to some networks.)

Vista's not too bad, it's got some nice features, the best being ReadyBoost, which allows you to use a USB flash drive as the Virtual RAM, which really boosts performance and reduces fragmentation. Plus alot of the features are optional and easy to remove if you do a bit of Googling.

This Dell is nice, and they are currently offering money off for another 2 days.

I'd load up some screenies of the quality of game it can play.

[Hooahguy]

Hello LittleGrizzly,

Laptops are not the first choice to play newish games on, though some can do fine.

A laptop is usually meant for mobile working, textprocessing, spreadsheet, mail, some presentations. So it doesn't have a tough graphics card. To slim down, it's even using part of the systems memory for graphics. Dedicated means it has its own video memory.

Wouldn't you rather use XP?
I have doubts about the graphics card.
If gaming is important and you don't want to invest a fortune, better get a desktop. You'll get faster parts for the same money and upgrading is easier.

like mine.
my gaming computer is a laptop.

Dell Vostro 1500
XP
Geforce 8600 GTM 512mb
2 gb DDR2 RAM
2.00 ghz intel C2D processor

all this for only $830 (yes, a $300 rebate )

and i can play every PC game on the market....

[pevergreen]

Currently on Dell XPS M1530
Vista
8600
4gb DDR2 RAM
2.4 ghz dual core etc

Runs M2TW fine, COD 4 at 40fps and so on.

[Fragony]

due to the metal case, which can reduce performance, cause injury and destroy the hardware. Also the metal case causes connectivity problems when trying to connect to some networks.)

Thank you so much. I really needed a reason to feel good about my recent purchase of a regular macbook when these naughty's decided to introduce a new model 2 weeks later. Now I fall in love with it again.

[ICantSpellDawg]

most of the 2 gig memory laptops are running the 32-bit vista OS, so the memory hogging isn't as extreme. The price point is way too high.

for $480 after tax last month I got a:

Comaq Laptop
15.4 HD monitor
AMD Athalon x2 dual core processor (1.9 ghz)
Integrated G-force graphics
2 gigs DDRram2
160 gigs hard drive
Dual Layer DVD RW (not bluray though)
Windows Vista 32 bit

You are paying more than double that price for a blu-ray player, not even two more inches on the monitor and 90gigs of hard drive space. If you leave off the blu-ray you can buy an independent graphics card and plump up the RAM for even less money.

[TevashSzat]

I've been locking at laptops lately, and this definately catches my eye:

Toshiba Qosimo F55-Q503

Specs:

15.4" widescreen 1440x900
Intel® Core™2 Duo Processor T9400 (2.53GHz)
4 GB PC6400 DDR2 800MHz SDRAM
NVIDIA® GeForce® 9700M GTS
2 x 160GB 7200rpm (320 GB total)

All for a bit more than $1700, which, IMO, is a great value for what you get there......only downside is that its a bit heavy at 8 pounds, but seriously this much packed into a 15.4 laptop is hard to find. (the Alienware 15.4 laptop comes to mind, but that costs so much money at these specs, its not even funny)

The problem is that it doesn't really seem to be sold anywhere......anyone know of where it may be sold??

[TevashSzat]

Actually, scratch that, this seems to be the new one now:

ASUS G50VT-X1

15.4" widescreen 1336x768
Intel® Centrino® 2 Processor P8400 (2.26GHz)
4GB PC2-5300 DDR2 memory
NVIDIA GeForce 9800M GS graphics (Thats right, its a GS. From what I can tell, its is actually an underclocked 9800M GTS)
320GB SATA hard drive (7200 rpm)

All for $1250 right now from best buy....

[edyzmedieval]

Why do you guys insist so much on 15.4? I cannot live without at least a 17" inch screen. 19 inch is perfect, the only downside being - forget about carrying it around.

[LittleGrizzly]

I need at least 17" screen as well, after owning one a 15" screen is just far too small... saying that the TV i use most of the time is only like 15"....

[TevashSzat]

Why do you guys insist so much on 15.4? I cannot live without at least a 17" inch screen. 19 inch is perfect, the only downside being - forget about carrying it around.

Well....15 inchers are alot more portable. 17 inchers are at least 2 pounds or so heavier iirc and have horrendous battery life. With a 15 incher, you can get a sick ass gaming laptop that although a bit heavy, has half decent battery life and portability. 17 inchers, however, are just basically a desktop replacement and can't really do much of anything if you're somewhere without a table and a power outlet