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Gamer-approved laptop recommendation thread
- Thread starter dLMN8R
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I would call them and say "I have a 30% coupon that doesn't work, and without it the laptop is out of my budget. I really want to pick one up today. Are there any other discounts available?"
Remember, a salesperson just wants to shift units. Always ask for a bargain! For example, I'm about to order my new laptop from LBO but they don't offer the cheaper 2630QM CPU. I emailed and asked for it, and they said yes. It will save me $100.
Remember, a salesperson just wants to shift units. Always ask for a bargain! For example, I'm about to order my new laptop from LBO but they don't offer the cheaper 2630QM CPU. I emailed and asked for it, and they said yes. It will save me $100.
No worries, and good luck. 
In other news my, order is in. Woo!
http://www.logicalblueone.com.au/store/449-clevo-horize-p150hma-ati-gaming-notebook-.html
In other news my, order is in. Woo!
http://www.logicalblueone.com.au/store/449-clevo-horize-p150hma-ati-gaming-notebook-.html
ElectricBlanketFire
Member
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
What games do you want to play and at what settings?ElectricBlanketFire said:
ElectricBlanketFire
Member
SapientWolf said:
Truthfully, I'm not sure. I've never been huge into PC gaming but I'm looking to "catch up."
I've haven't played anything released after Half Life 2. That includes Portal/anything Orange Box.
...
.....
I know.
The biggest reason I need a new laptop is because I'm going to be doing some freelance design work and I needed a non-work issued lappy.
SapientWolf
Trucker Sexologist
Yeah, that thing will play Source games max'd out without any issues.ElectricBlanketFire said:
It seems that it's a decent lap for the price. The reviews have been positive. The res is a little low for a 17 inch and the 3 hour battery life sounds a little skimpy, but if that doesn't bother you then go for it.
ElectricBlanketFire
Member
ElectricBlanketFire said:
I went ahead and got this one. Should be here on Tuesday.
This will be my first non-worked issued computer since 2006.
Yes sir I did. It came up to $2,009 shipped.Sew said:Hope it's all good man, no hurry for internet stuff when health needs attending to. Did you get your order in yet?
The eCheck clears tomorrow, so now it's 6 to 7 business days for the building, then an extra 4 to 7 b.days because I ordered a premium screen upgrade.
So I'll be happy if I receive it by May 1st. It'll be sooo worth it though. The 6970M is 2.5x faster than my current GTX 260M.
Also, I have some people testing the 6970M's overclocking ability. Stock clocks are 680/900, so it needs to reach 775/1000 to match the desktop 6850 from which it's based. Some are hitting 860/1200! So the 6970M is running faster than the 6850. Crazy.
It's a bit faster than the 9800 GT, so yes.rhfb said:
See above. It and the GT 555M are pretty close to equal. Both very decent cards.Elixist said:
Risk Breaker
Member
Just some quick questions... is Packard Bell, in general, a good brand? Heat, build quality, battery life? Better, worse, or on par with Acer? And when compared to Asus?
Also, a GT540M with i5 would be more than enough to play UE3 games on low-mid settings at around 720p? What about a GT320M with an i3? I say UE 3 because I don't want to play cutting edge new games at 60fps with everything on high or things like that, just something that will run modern games from around 2004-2006 like Bloodlines without any framerate/antialiasing problems with the ocassional newer things like New Vegas, Portal 2, Mass Effect which shouldn't be too demanding, things like that. Just something decent.
Thanks.
Also, a GT540M with i5 would be more than enough to play UE3 games on low-mid settings at around 720p? What about a GT320M with an i3? I say UE 3 because I don't want to play cutting edge new games at 60fps with everything on high or things like that, just something that will run modern games from around 2004-2006 like Bloodlines without any framerate/antialiasing problems with the ocassional newer things like New Vegas, Portal 2, Mass Effect which shouldn't be too demanding, things like that. Just something decent.
Thanks.
The Shadow
Member
Coverly said:
I had to cancel my original order because my CC company denied the charge. Why? Because the billing address and shipping address had differing zip codes.
By the time I called them, the coupon code didn't work naymore but they were able to reorder the same configuration with a 9-cell battery and 8gb ram for $955 after tax an shipping. I was strangely ok with the earlier mix up.
BoobPhysics101
Banned
Just wanted to make GAF-top users aware: in Windows 7, there's a really annoying issue with Core i(3, 5, 7) series relating to core parking; Core parking is where Windows detects that not all cores are necessary, so it shuts them down. This works great in theory to save power etc. But what happens (not sure of the percentage rates but I'm assuming it's common) is that core parking goes on the fritz, parking and unparking cores like hot potatoes.
I noticed my Core i5 laptop had 'microstuttering', which was easily detectable while scrolling through web pages; it'd pause for just a fraction of a second while scrolling... it's hard to explain, but 'microstuttering' really is the best term for it. It's subtle but incredibly annoying once you figure out it's happening. Anyways, after doing some research, I realized it might be core parking issues. Checked my Resource Monitor.. sure enough, one or twice every second Windows 7 was playing 'core parking musical chairs' and constantly parking/unparking my cores seemingly at random.
If you want to check for yourself whether your Core Parking is on the fritz, go to Start, search for "Resource Monitor", go to the CPU tab, and watch the individual processor graphs on the right side. Next to each CPU you may see the words 'parked'... and if your Core Parking is going crazy, you'll see them being parked and unparked every second. Which brings me to...
The Fix
- Go to Regedit
- Select Edit > Find... and find this key: " 0cc5b647-c1df-4637-891a-dec35c318583 "
- Within this key, there is a value called: " ValueMax " This value represents the % number of cores the system will park
- Change the value of " ValueMax" to 0 so that, it matches " ValueMin "
- You will have to find the key a few times and repeat the process for each time it is found - the number of instances will depend on the number of power profiles in your system. To do this go back up to Edit > Find Next. (I had 3 instances of this key in my registry.)
- Do a full shutdown and power-off and cold-re-start.p=
After applying the fix, I rebooted and... god damn, so much smoother! No more annoying, subtle pauses! No more core parking musical chairs. It made a huge difference in system responsiveness.
Hope this helps anyone that has weird microstuttering/responsiveness issues and can't figure out why. Note: This only seems to affect Intel CPU's from what I can tell.
I noticed my Core i5 laptop had 'microstuttering', which was easily detectable while scrolling through web pages; it'd pause for just a fraction of a second while scrolling... it's hard to explain, but 'microstuttering' really is the best term for it. It's subtle but incredibly annoying once you figure out it's happening. Anyways, after doing some research, I realized it might be core parking issues. Checked my Resource Monitor.. sure enough, one or twice every second Windows 7 was playing 'core parking musical chairs' and constantly parking/unparking my cores seemingly at random.
If you want to check for yourself whether your Core Parking is on the fritz, go to Start, search for "Resource Monitor", go to the CPU tab, and watch the individual processor graphs on the right side. Next to each CPU you may see the words 'parked'... and if your Core Parking is going crazy, you'll see them being parked and unparked every second. Which brings me to...
The Fix
- Go to Regedit
- Select Edit > Find... and find this key: " 0cc5b647-c1df-4637-891a-dec35c318583 "
- Within this key, there is a value called: " ValueMax " This value represents the % number of cores the system will park
- Change the value of " ValueMax" to 0 so that, it matches " ValueMin "
- You will have to find the key a few times and repeat the process for each time it is found - the number of instances will depend on the number of power profiles in your system. To do this go back up to Edit > Find Next. (I had 3 instances of this key in my registry.)
- Do a full shutdown and power-off and cold-re-start.p=
After applying the fix, I rebooted and... god damn, so much smoother! No more annoying, subtle pauses! No more core parking musical chairs. It made a huge difference in system responsiveness.
Hope this helps anyone that has weird microstuttering/responsiveness issues and can't figure out why. Note: This only seems to affect Intel CPU's from what I can tell.
BoobPhysics101
Banned
Risk Breaker said:
Both systems will destroy almost every single game pre-2008 (Except Crysis).
Go for the i5 with GT540M though... the 540M is much better than the GT320M when it comes to modern games. The GT540M is close in power to my 360M GTS, which runs just about every game (including Crysis 2) at high settings with smooth framerates. Plus the GT540M should overclock really well.
Risk Breaker
Member
BoobPhysics101 said:
Thank you for your answer man. Yeah, I didn't want to spend much and wasn't looking for a powerful laptop, but I've just seen this Packard Bell that sounds awesome... If I can afford it I'll choose the GT540M/i5 as you suggested, there is this one store that's selling it for only 550!! Agh if only I had the money already. Otherwise the difference is 150, maybe a little bit too much.
I'd like to have another opinion if possible
. Packard Bell with i5-480M, 4GB DDR3, GT540M 1GB. Yay or nay? I can't find any reviews because (as usual) the product name is only for Spain and there aren't any laptop review sites in Spain. The model is this: PACKARD BELL TK85-JO-481SP. I'm asking in case someone here has a similar model or something. Thanks again.
What's the best budget gaming laptop? Ideally not much more than £500-600. I bought a budget i3 one and it is shit in minecraft, so will probably make that my wife's and get another one for general family/kids use
Really only needs to run minecraft very well. 15" Screen will be fine. Good battery life a bonus
Really only needs to run minecraft very well. 15" Screen will be fine. Good battery life a bonus
BoobPhysics101
Banned
Risk Breaker said:Thank you for your answer man. Yeah, I didn't want to spend much and wasn't looking for a powerful laptop, but I've just seen this Packard Bell that sounds awesome... If I can afford it I'll choose the GT540M/i5 as you suggested, there is this one store that's selling it for only 550!! Agh if only I had the money already. Otherwise the difference is 150, maybe a little bit too much.
I'd like to have another opinion if possible
I can't find any reviews because (as usual) the product name is only for Spain and there aren't any laptop review sites in Spain. The model is this: PACKARD BELL TK85-JO-481SP. I'm asking in case someone here has a similar model or something. Thanks again.
The Packard Bell with i5-480m + GT540M is similar to what my Asus G60JX has (i5-430m + 360M GTS), so I'd say for the money that's a pretty good deal.
Packard Bell is a sub-brand of Acer, and Acer makes good stuff (their gaming laptops are very good compared to their low-end stuff), so I think it'd be a solid purchase.
P.S. My i5-430m overclocks from 2.2 Ghz to 3.2 Ghz and my 360M GTS goes from 550/1323/1800 to 620/1650/2050... the GT540m overclocks even further than that so if you're into overclocking, an extra 10-20% FPS is just a few clicks away. Stock clocks in the GT 540m are 672/1344/1800 so I'm sure you can hit 800/1750/2000 with no problems at all.
If you can, make sure the GT540m in that laptop has GDDR5. The GDDR5 version of the GT 540m is much faster than the GDDR3 version.
BoobPhysics101
Banned
mrklaw said:
Try checking out the Packard Bell that Risk Breaker mentioned above.
Risk Breaker
Member
BoobPhysics101 said:
I can't find any info online nor in the Packard Bell website, but if I go to the store where they sell it I'll ask for some specs paper. Maybe even download GPU-Z if they have a working connection and I'm allowed to. The only other Packard laptop with a 540M that I've found was using GDDR3 though, so I'm not too optimistic. It's still better than nothing, specially considering those great overclocking capabilities. Keep in mind I'm using an AMD Athlon@800mhz with 512mb of slow ram, almost anything will be glorious for me.
Giolon
Member
So, I'm looking at the 13" Sony Vaio Z line that features a 1GB GeForce 330M video card and pre-Sandy Bridge Core i5 processors (~2.5 Ghz, dual core).
I like to hold onto my laptops for about 3 years. Does anybody know how those specs will do for me with gaming? These days I mainly play WoW, LOTRO, and Civ V, though I may want to run Dragon Age on it.
I like to hold onto my laptops for about 3 years. Does anybody know how those specs will do for me with gaming? These days I mainly play WoW, LOTRO, and Civ V, though I may want to run Dragon Age on it.
Kenka said:
I'd put the GT 540M and AMD 6650M at the upper range of what you can safely fit in an 11" notebook. A GDDR5 enthusiast GPU is out of the question, until the 28nm die shrink comes in Q1 2012.
On the other hand, I do believe that Dell/AW was too conservative with the GPU in the M14x. The GT 555M is nice and all, but the notebook it's helping to replace (R.I.P. M15x) had GPUs (GTX 460M and AMD 5850M) which were significantly faster. I guess the M17x R3 is the true M15x successor, but there are those who refuse to carry a 17" monster, even though the R3 is essentially the same size as the M15x.
A knowledgeable person I know says Dell dropped the M15x, simply because they could no longer claim to have the "Most Powerful 15 Inch Notebook." Keeping up with Clevo is impossible, unless your engineers can also figure out how to put a 100W GTX 485M in a smallish form factor.
The GT 330M is mediocre, by yesterday's standard. I guess that's all I can say.Giolon said:
WoW = fine
LOTRO= fine
Civ V = fine for min, less that half the power of the recommended GPU
But, the Z isn't exactly built with gaming in mind.
Giolon
Member
Ok, the Z's no good for gaming. Then can someone recommend a good approx 13-14" gaming laptop?
My most important factor is screen resolution (1366x768 isn't going to cut it, 1600x900 is necessary at the least). The next most important factor is weight. I've got a 15" Dell Inspiron that's served me fantastically for the last 3 years but it weighs almost 7lbs (with the extended battery, 6.5lbs w/ regular battery). Something under 4lbs would be ideal, which is why I was looking at the Z.
If it's absolutely necessary, I can consider a 15", but again the weight is very big concern. Over 5.5lbs is probably a dealbreaker. I realize that perf/weight are pretty much at odds with each other.
My most important factor is screen resolution (1366x768 isn't going to cut it, 1600x900 is necessary at the least). The next most important factor is weight. I've got a 15" Dell Inspiron that's served me fantastically for the last 3 years but it weighs almost 7lbs (with the extended battery, 6.5lbs w/ regular battery). Something under 4lbs would be ideal, which is why I was looking at the Z.
If it's absolutely necessary, I can consider a 15", but again the weight is very big concern. Over 5.5lbs is probably a dealbreaker. I realize that perf/weight are pretty much at odds with each other.
BoobPhysics101
Banned
K.Jack said:
Could you put my post about Core Parking + fix in the OP of the new thread? I think everyone with a gaming laptop and Core i series needs to read it and check whether their core parking is functioning correctly. It makes a huge difference, and can even give an FPS boost (your CPU won't perform as well if the cores are parking/unparking repeatedly).
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