rustypixel
Rustypixel
join:2001-03-23
Old Bridge, NJ
clubs:  
| Laptop for games?
I don't know if this is the right forum for this question (probably not), but I'll ask and let the mods decide.
I'm looking for a couple of suggestions for a laptop that will be able to handle resource hungry FPS games. While i'm not what you'd call a serious gamer, I do like to play once in a while and want something that will allow me to run the games in all their glory. And yes, money is an object. Perhaps the best I can get for about 1K or less?
I'm partial to HP's but any and all suggestions will be looked at.
Thanks in advance.
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Out of my mind and out of control! |
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beatsnpieces
join:2007-12-17 | You won't likely find a laptop that can "run the games in all their glory" for under 1K. With some clever shopping you might build a desktop for that price but a laptop to do that will likely run $1500 and up. |
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Bling
join:2002-05-10
Chicago, IL | reply to rustypixel
Best Buy has an Asus gaming laptop for $999.99. The G50Vt-X5. The specs look decent for the price. The video card should be able to handle most current games at full resolution. |
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Harddrive
Premium
join:2000-09-20
Norwich, CT
| reply to rustypixel
here's a nice HP from Newegg. 17" screen, Blu-Ray optical drive, 9600GT with 512Mb DDR2 VRAM.
$1,149.99 then a $50 MIR.
»www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···34147919
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I've come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass and i'm all outta bubblegum. |
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chucky5150
Divers do it Deeper
join:2001-11-03
New Iberia, LA
clubs:
| reply to Bling
said by Bling  :Best Buy has an Asus gaming laptop for $999.99. The G50Vt-X5. The specs look decent for the price. The video card should be able to handle most current games at full resolution. I have this very laptop. It's a nice one.
My second g50 as my first one got replaced for bad RAM.
»www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp···44029168
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Member of the US Air Force since May 7th, 2002 To March 29th, 2005
"You sneak up behind yourself and remove your pants before you realize what's going on." KOL |
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tim_k
Buttons, Bows, Beamer, Shadow, Kasey
Premium
join:2002-02-02
Stewartstown, PA
 ·Millenicom
 ·WildBlue
| reply to Harddrive
I got a model a little above that one. »www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a···34147785
Big & heavy, but sweet.
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RIP my babys Buttons 1/15/94-2/9/07 & Beamer 7/24/08, Buttons, Buttons video, Beamer
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ender7074
join:2006-11-21
Saint Louis, MO
 ·AT&T Southeast
| reply to rustypixel
This is the one I have. It runs pretty much everything, except Crysis but no suprise there, in max settings. I'm playing World in Conflict, Left 4 Dead, World of Warcraft, along with using it with Adobe Creative Suite 4. It runs like a charm and has an extra bay for an additional hard drive if you want one. I love the thing. Oh, also has a 9800 series video card and not the lower 9600s. Great buy for the price.
»www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp···43606827 |
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longstreet
join:2004-11-14
Plano, TX
4 edits | reply to rustypixel
I recommend gateway (the laptop @Ender linked) for a mid range gaming laptop as well. It's unbeatable for the price ($1150 wow!)
They have this same kind of model but they update it every couple of months . . .the new one has a 'u' in the model name.
I think they have the best bang for the buck combinations . . .by far.
And they come with a 9800M GTS .with 1 gig of vram . .which blows away the other video cards offered on all the other brands mentioned above. (since games are GPU intensive . .this should be the most important component when considering a gaming laptop purchase)
If money is an object, this really is the best choice if you can spend $1150 |
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Don69Fire
Premium
join:2006-12-28
Danville, WV | but with the gateway. can i upgrade the video card ot memory. what can you change on it??? if any... |
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longstreet
join:2004-11-14
Plano, TX
| It's a centrino 2, which means memory can go up to 8 gig. Most laptops don't include an ability to upgrade like a desktop, I've heard of hard drive, memory and CPU upgrades for this model, although they aren't necessary.
I don't believe the video is upgradable, as is the case with most laptops.
Upgrades, if any, are discussed on notebook reviews .com, there's a lengthy thread about the gateway machine there. |
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ender7074
join:2006-11-21
Saint Louis, MO
·AT&T Southeast
2 edits | reply to Don69Fire
said by Don69Fire :but with the gateway. can i upgrade the video card ot memory. what can you change on it??? if any... You can definitely upgrade the memory. There are a few panels on the bottom that can be removed. I popped mine open and found pretty much full access to a good part of the board, the memory and a few other things. The video card I dont know about but by the time that this card needs to be replaced, you might as well replace the whole thing. Also, this has 4 gig of DDR3 ram. You're not going to need to upgrade past that if all you want to do is game. Oh, and one other panel to pop off has your hard drive bays. One is full and the other has space for a 2nd drive. I'm pretty sure that the board will do RAID too but I havent got a 2nd drive for it yet. Honestly, it gives a lot more access to the guts than most other laptops I've had.
Just for an example of speed, I render 3d animations and images in Maya. On my old laptop (Athlon 64 machine, single core) the render of a particular pic took 15 minutes. On my desktop (quad core, 4gb ddr2 800) the render took 1 minute 58 seconds. On this laptop the render took 1 minute 35 seconds.
Gaming, I get pretty much the same framerates as my desktop, and the desktop is no slouch with the quad core, 4gig ddr2 800, and a GeForce 8800GTX. I play WoW, World in Conflict, and Left 4 Dead on both and can tell zero difference with max settings. |
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Don69Fire
Premium
join:2006-12-28
Danville, WV
| ok. i just got "Dell XPS 2.8GHz M1730 Extreme SLI Laptop"
my question is this. if i want to upgrade it some later down the road. what all can i do. btw i got it for $2k. was $3.7 on dells site. but here are the items i might want to upgrade later. and if you have suggestions, please let me know...
RAM: 4GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM 2 Dimms, 667 MHz
HardDrives: 640GB (2 x 320) 5400RPM High Pro SATA HDD
(how do i put these in raid and does it really help anything???)
Video Card: GPU - Dual 512MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(R) 8800M GTX with NVIDIA(R) SLI(TM) Technology
can i go to a faster ram? bigger video card? Solid State Drive? things like that. |
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chucky5150
Divers do it Deeper
join:2001-11-03
New Iberia, LA
clubs:
| Ram: maybe
hard drives: yes
video card: no
That's the short and skinny to it.
Can't really do much to laptops.
But that sounds like a nice lil rig you got there.
Have fun with it.
About Raid, that would depend on your BiOS. I'm sure some fast googling will get your answers on that. Personaly I like having my hard drives just normal.
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Member of the US Air Force since May 7th, 2002 To March 29th, 2005
"You sneak up behind yourself and remove your pants before you realize what's going on." KOL |
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Don69Fire
Premium
join:2006-12-28
Danville, WV
| i just found this web site. it talks about overclocking the processor. dell mentions it on their web site. supposedly this laptop is built just for this. and the video cards can be swapped out. what is the deal about laptops only recognizing 4gigs of ram. is that true????? anyone???? here is the link on the review:
Intel Core 2 Extreme Mobile X9000 on the Dell M1730
»www.legitreviews.com/article/743/1/
Overclocking The X9000 Processor
»www.legitreviews.com/article/743/2/ |
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ender7074
join:2006-11-21
Saint Louis, MO | reply to rustypixel
The laptop will recognize as much ram as the motherboard that is in there will recognize. If the board only does 4 gig then thats it. |
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C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
 ·Verizon FIOS
1 edit | reply to ender7074
The Gateway definitely looks good, but I think it's fair to say that I'd been burned too many times with Gateway products and services to want to give them any more of my money in the future. It may be $1150, but then you have to figure in sales tax (obviously), but also the cost of a long warranty plan for the thing, which from best buy would be like $350 if you want 3 years and Accidental Damage coverage.
So, what other alternatives are there for a really good, game-worthy notebook that doesn't cost more than it would to get a used car? |
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longstreet
join:2004-11-14
Plano, TX
2 edits | reply to rustypixel
I would say that generally, extended warranties are a bad idea and a waste of money.
If you don't use it, you don't get the money back.
But if you have a problem after the initial warranty period (1 year), board fries, hard drive goes out . .it's not going to cost you nearly the amount of the warranty to fix.
The most expensive part is the screen, which would cost nearly as much as a new laptop to replace. Everything else is sub $200 to fix.
Don't drop your laptop, go without the extended warranty and you'll most likely end up saving money and having a great machine.
I wouldn't buy a warranty that's nearly a third of the price of the machine. It's hard to justify spending that money when in most cases, you'll never even use it, and if you do, it won't be nearly that expensive to fix. |
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C0deZer0
Oc'D To Rhythm And Police
Premium
join:2001-10-03
Davenport, FL
·Verizon FIOS
| You don't understand.
I've been through a LOT of gateway products. And nearly all of them I have ended up cursing myself for not having had the extended warranty.
My own first desktop with them is a prime example. Literally EVERY single piece in that machine had to be replaced at least once; some (like the hard drive) as much as eight times before finally determining the thing a lemon and refunding me (most) of my money.
Or in a more recent example, the current display I have from them won't work on Vista over DVI or not even the desktop running XP with an ATi card. My best guess is that it's an issue with their half-assed HDCP implementation on the monitor FUBAR'ing everything else. But Gateway only gives a ONE-year warranty on their displays. And now I'm stuck with this piece of *expletive*.
I have been up and down and all through the seven circles of hell with their tech support and their "Executive Response Team" when I finally have had enough and have to submit a complaint with the BBB about their contempt and arrogance. |
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Krisnatharok
0311 Scout
Premium
join:2009-02-11
Sterling, VA
| said by C0deZer0 :You don't understand. I've been through a LOT of gateway products. And nearly all of them I have ended up cursing myself for not having had the extended warranty. My own first desktop with them is a prime example. Literally EVERY single piece in that machine had to be replaced at least once; some (like the hard drive) as much as eight times before finally determining the thing a lemon and refunding me (most) of my money. Or in a more recent example, the current display I have from them won't work on Vista over DVI or not even the desktop running XP with an ATi card. My best guess is that it's an issue with their half-assed HDCP implementation on the monitor FUBAR'ing everything else. But Gateway only gives a ONE-year warranty on their displays. And now I'm stuck with this piece of *expletive*. I have been up and down and all through the seven circles of hell with their tech support and their "Executive Response Team" when I finally have had enough and have to submit a complaint with the BBB about their contempt and arrogance. Not to diss you at all man--I feel for someone with a crappy product because I've been there with a Compaq--but it makes me feel good about building my own out of quality parts. |
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longstreet
join:2004-11-14
Plano, TX
2 edits | reply to C0deZer0
It sounds like you've had an unusual experience with them. Maybe you got one of the 'lemons' as you've put it.
One bad display doesn't spoil the bunch.
Sorry to hear it.
This is my first gateway laptop, I've had it for nearly a year, with no problems. It's been a rock.
Obviously, some of their previous products were hit and miss.
I did a ton of research first to root out any potential flakyness . .(as I was too aware of the possible quality of the machine being an issue, I never thought i'd buy another big brand computer, having built countless desktops) |
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