New Laptop

[Pandalink]

Hey guys, I'm looking to purchase a fairly high-end laptop, primarily for gaming. Although I realise a desktop is better for this, for reasons I won't go into here it needs to be a laptop.
In short, what are the most important things I should look for in such a device? I know nothing about processors, for example.

Any help would be most appreciated.
Cheers.

[Matt Murdock]

Here're the minimums you should look for it, if you wish to run ANY game.

Intel i5 quad core processor
4GB RAM
512 Graphics
64 bit compatibility so the RAM can be upgraded in the future.

Those are the minimums ^^

Now if you want a today's better than average one go for
i5 processor
1GB Graphics
8GB RAM.

Don't waste the money on i7 as it has been proven i5 is better for gaming, 1GB graphics is a must for games like GTA4 and newer games. Also I'd recommend you purchasing a laptop cooling pad for better ventilation, as I use a laptop for gaming too, and the only problem I ever had was dust in the fan, and no proper ventilation, which made games like GTA 4 too laggy and almost impossible to play for me.

[TheRock]

I'd suggest that you look for some HP Pavilion G7 model, they are beasts.. many come with i3, 4gb and quite powerful gpu's other come with i5.. and there are a few with pretty decent prices! But stay away from Acer, Lenovo or Toshiba!!...

[Goodandy.]

Build you own computer. Nothing challenging, allows you to pick the top notch things for a lower price.

[Pandalink]

Based on keeping the thing for as long as possible, I was mainly looking at the very high end graphics cards (including those with 2GB of memory).
I have no idea about the processor though, what does it all mean? :conf:

But stay away from Acer, Lenovo or Toshiba!!...

How come?

[Goodandy.]

Acer is very good. Rock is just hating cause it is American.

[Batta]

8GB RAM.

Don't waste the money on i7 as it has been proven i5 is better for gaming, 1GB graphics is a must for games like GTA4 and newer games.

8gb of RAM are quite useless if you're not going to run heavy photo/video editing or running extremely heavy programs..

I suggest to "waste" money on an i7 if you can.. i5 are "better for gaming" just because they are cheaper and give quite better perfomances comparing to i7's price (performance/price)..
You would also appreciate i7's speed in almost everything

[Gandalf]

When choosing a laptop consider more than the first specs.
If you are going to use it more than 1 or 2 hours a day, get a good "business" laptop rather than a "consumer" model. Reason is that laptops are not always built for being used 8 hours daily for a long period of time.
Currently the HP business line or Toshiba are good choices that are widely available.
Aces/ Asus are purely consumer and might only just outlast the warranty.

If you have unlimited budget, check for "Gamer laptop"....

[Salmonella]

Acer is very good. Rock is just hating cause it is American.

I am fairly unexperienced with laptops, but I do know Acers are pretty crappy, especially when it's about cooling and chassis.


If I were you, I'd also look for some laptop with an i5, but don't make the mistake to get a cheap i5 model, I'd go with the best i5 model there is for laptops, because even then, they won't be as expensive as the i7 models. For graphics I really don't know what to recommend in laptops... Something with enough of VideoRAM, I guess... The most important thing in a laptop is cooling, so you should try focus on that, if there are specialized chassis focusing on cooling.

[Batta]

Oh, I forgot to say something about graphics that Sal remembered me!

Don't just watch a graphics card memory.. there are models with 1gb that can be extremely different in performance..

e.g. if you're looking for a nvidia graphics card, check the Cuda cores as well.

[Pandalink]

8gb of RAM are quite useless if you're not going to run heavy photo/video editing or running extremely heavy programs..

Well, I already have 8gb of RAM in the one I have now, to be able to run multiple development programs at the same time (specifically: photoshop, UDK, 3ds Max) which are all (especially UDK) fairly memory intensive.

The most important thing in a laptop is cooling, so you should try focus on that, if there are specialized chassis focusing on cooling.

This was one of my main areas of concern, actually.

I'm actually looking into my options concerning my current machine, since I'm fairly sure the GPU is the primary bottleneck. Will report back.

[Fuzzy]

The Asus ROG laptops are designed for heavy duty tasks and gaming and they have one of the best cooling I have seen on a laptop, you should definitely check them out

[Salmonella]

Don't just watch a graphics card memory.. there are models with 1gb that can be extremely different in performance..

e.g. if you're looking for a nvidia graphics card, check the Cuda cores as well.

True, but I didn't say anything about that because I really don't have much to say about laptop GPU models; I don't even know one model.

Cuda cores aren't that important if you're not into modeling stuff, so don't worry -too- much about them.

[LoHi]

True, but I didn't say anything about that because I really don't have much to say about laptop GPU models; I don't even know one model.

Cuda cores aren't that important if you're not into modeling stuff, so don't worry -too- much about them.

Companies often mislead their customers with large memory numbers in bad cards.

[Salmonella]

I wouldn't call it misleading, but yes, there are a lot of cards both in the laptop and desktop industry, with loads of video RAM, and lack of actual performance. But once again, I don't know any laptop videocard models.