Laptop
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Hey guys what would be the best specs for a laptop for daily work and gaming?
closed account (N36fSL3A)
A decent i3 or higher CPU. I'd go for around 4-8 gigs of ram, and definitely avoid and intel based GPUs (Which are sadly common in laptops).
closed account (3qX21hU5)
| and definitely avoid and intel based GPUs (Which are sadly common in laptops). |
Could you elaborate on why to avoid them please? Also do you mean all intel GPU's or just onboard ones?
Anyways depends on really what type of gaming you are into.
The key things to look for are these
A decent CPU (The new Haswell CPU's look very nice or go for a Ivy bridge) probably i5 or i7 from intel.
Really should have a SSD. My recommendation is to buy a laptop without one if you can then just upgrade the current HD to a SSD after words because the manufacturer will overcharge you by a bunch.
Make sure it doesn't have a on board GPU (IE it isn't using the GPU that is built into the motherboard).
Screen resolution.
And lastly build quality and any extra's you want.
Personally I really like either the Razer Blade Pro if you can fork out 2 grand + cash or the Leveno X1 carbon ultrabook.
closed account (N36fSL3A)
I'd say onboard. They're crap because from all the onboard GPUs I had they were slow as hell for MINECRAFT.
closed account (3qX21hU5)
That is because they aren't really made for gaming though the new Intel 4000 can handle games like Minecraft pretty well.
Though if you are wanting to play more demanding games like Crysis or Skyrim or whatever you will need a dedicated GPU.
Though if you are wanting to play more demanding games like Crysis or Skyrim or whatever you will need a dedicated GPU.
Gaming as in minecraft, battlestations pacific, maplestory
Capable of running rendering software smoothly like Blender and ProDesktop
Capable of running rendering software smoothly like Blender and ProDesktop
If you're doing rendering you're going to want some solid (fast and plenty of it) ram and a good multicore cpu.
Those games should work well on a basic graphic card. (Well, Minecraft and Maplestory will, don't know the other one)
Those games should work well on a basic graphic card. (Well, Minecraft and Maplestory will, don't know the other one)
Are these specs enough for good performance gaming and rendering?
System features
Operating system Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64
Processors
Intel® Core™ i7-3610QM Processor
- 2.3GHz, 6M Cache
- Max Turbo Frequency 3.3 GHz
Chipset Mobile Intel® HM55 Express Chipset
Memory
Memory, standard 4GB DDR3 1333 MHz SDRAM
Storage
Hard drive description 750GB-5400rpm HDD
Graphics
Graphics NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 630 with 2GB DDR3
Expansion features
Ports - Three USB 2.0 ports
- USB 3.0
- HDMI™ port with HDCP support
ODD 8 x Super Multi-Dual
Speaker Altec Lansing® Speakers
Dimensions and Weight Weight 2.2 kg (with 6-cell battery 5200mAH)
Display 14" HD Color Shine (LED)
Dimensions 34.8 x 24.2 x 2.95 ~3.48 cm (W x D x H)
System features
Operating system Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64
Processors
Intel® Core™ i7-3610QM Processor
- 2.3GHz, 6M Cache
- Max Turbo Frequency 3.3 GHz
Chipset Mobile Intel® HM55 Express Chipset
Memory
Memory, standard 4GB DDR3 1333 MHz SDRAM
Storage
Hard drive description 750GB-5400rpm HDD
Graphics
Graphics NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 630 with 2GB DDR3
Expansion features
Ports - Three USB 2.0 ports
- USB 3.0
- HDMI™ port with HDCP support
ODD 8 x Super Multi-Dual
Speaker Altec Lansing® Speakers
Dimensions and Weight Weight 2.2 kg (with 6-cell battery 5200mAH)
Display 14" HD Color Shine (LED)
Dimensions 34.8 x 24.2 x 2.95 ~3.48 cm (W x D x H)
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closed account (S6k9GNh0)
The graphics card might be a bit weak... although it'll really jack up the price if you want better.
closed account (3qX21hU5)
CPU - Very nice should be able to handle most things you throw at it. For more info on it you can check out here http://www.cpu-world.com/CPUs/Core_i7/Intel-Core%20i7-3610QM%20Mobile%20processor.html
RAM - Good choice on the 4GB only. That should be plenty enough for your purposes.
HardDrive - I would look at getting a SSD for your next upgrade on your laptop since they will increase your performance by a huge amount. Though realize that unless the laptop supports 2 bays for hard drives you will have to give up that 750GB of storage for the SSD. If you choose to do this you might wanna look at the 250GB or even the 500GB SSD's though they are quite spendy.
GPU - I agree with computerquip it might be on the low side, but considering you aren't really going to be playing any graphics intensive games (At least it didn't sound like it) it should be able to handle most things just fine.
Misc. - Good number of USB ports is nice (1 USB 3.0 and 3 USB 2.0), HDMI so you can plug in a monitor to it.
Screen - You didn't provide much information on the screen, but I would recommend going with a IPS display and make sure you have a good resolution! Anything below 1600x900 I wouldn't touch though ideally you will want 1920×1080.
Other things to think about - Some other things to consider when you are buying is the build quality. Does it use good materials? The keyboard. How does it feel and what is the spacing like? Keyboards are important specially for programmers like us. Weight and battery life specially if you are going to be lugging it around everywhere.
RAM - Good choice on the 4GB only. That should be plenty enough for your purposes.
HardDrive - I would look at getting a SSD for your next upgrade on your laptop since they will increase your performance by a huge amount. Though realize that unless the laptop supports 2 bays for hard drives you will have to give up that 750GB of storage for the SSD. If you choose to do this you might wanna look at the 250GB or even the 500GB SSD's though they are quite spendy.
GPU - I agree with computerquip it might be on the low side, but considering you aren't really going to be playing any graphics intensive games (At least it didn't sound like it) it should be able to handle most things just fine.
Misc. - Good number of USB ports is nice (1 USB 3.0 and 3 USB 2.0), HDMI so you can plug in a monitor to it.
Screen - You didn't provide much information on the screen, but I would recommend going with a IPS display and make sure you have a good resolution! Anything below 1600x900 I wouldn't touch though ideally you will want 1920×1080.
Other things to think about - Some other things to consider when you are buying is the build quality. Does it use good materials? The keyboard. How does it feel and what is the spacing like? Keyboards are important specially for programmers like us. Weight and battery life specially if you are going to be lugging it around everywhere.
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Maybe take a look at the asus N series. It's their multimedia laptop.
http://www.asus.com/us/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/ asus N550JV
http://www.asus.com/us/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/N550JV/
It's not up on their site yet, but the new haswell version is coming out soon. It is a little bit pricey though.
http://www.frys.com/product/7701398?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG
http://www.asus.com/us/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/
http://www.asus.com/us/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/N550JV/
http://www.frys.com/product/7701398?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG
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closed account (1yR4jE8b)
| Good choice on the 4GB only |
4gB in this day and age is laughable, 8gB should be minimum -- and I would go 16. I have 8gB in my iMac at work, and 16 in my personal Macbook Pro and the difference is significant.
closed account (3qX21hU5)
| 4gB in this day and age is laughable, 8gB should be minimum -- and I would go 16. I have 8gB in my iMac at work, and 16 in my personal Macbook Pro and the difference is significant. |
I see really no need for him to have more then 4GB of RAM. I currently have a game like minecraft running, chrome with about 6 tabs, sublime text, GIMP editor and my IRC client running and I am sitting at a steady 1.2GB RAM used... Hell I could probably open another game and not top 2GBs.
With 16GB your most likely will never come close to using that much and it would be just overkill and a waste of money in my opinion since most laptops will charge you anywhere from a extra $250 to $400 bucks just for that 16GB of RAM.
I can maybe agree with 8GB but definitely not over that. The point is he wouldn't really see much of a speed increase for the money and it could be much better spend on other aspects of the laptop to give a much greater speed increase (Like a SSD, or a better CPU or GPU). Also RAM is very easy to swap out even on laptops so it wouldn't be that big of a deal to plop in two 4GB sticks instead of the 2GB ones if he found he was maxing out on RAM later on and it would be much cheaper then buying it direct from the laptops manufacturer.
At least that is my opinion on the matter.
I have only 5 GB of RAM (1x4 GB and 1x1 GB) and I can run games like The Witcher 2 with the graphics on the highest settings with no trouble. Funnily enough I actually get a better framerate in TW2 with the graphics on maximum than I do on Skyrim with the graphics on High (the next setting up being Ultra High). There's Bethesda QualityTM software for you...
I am intending to replace the 1 GB DIMM with a 4 GB one eventually, but there's no rush, and I can't see it making all that much difference, honestly. I already close most programs when I play hardware-intensive games anyway, both to save memory and processor time.
I am intending to replace the 1 GB DIMM with a 4 GB one eventually, but there's no rush, and I can't see it making all that much difference, honestly. I already close most programs when I play hardware-intensive games anyway, both to save memory and processor time.
closed account (1yR4jE8b)
I'm probably I'm just jaded from my personal experience.
At work I have full build-processes and test suites that take more than 4gB on their own. I even on occassion have to do database queries and process records that large. Factoring in all of my VMs,usually 3 or more running at once, IDE, my web browser with 20+ tabs and 8gB just barely gets me by on most days. More often than not, I'm hitting my swap. I'm getting a new iMac at work when Mavericks comes out, and my boss is splurging on 32 gig workstations and investing in a couple 64 gig Mac Pros to offload some of those test suites and larger builds.
My wife is a 3d animator, and when she's rendering things at home 8gB she says is her prefered bare minimum -- at work they have a render farm though.
At work I have full build-processes and test suites that take more than 4gB on their own. I even on occassion have to do database queries and process records that large. Factoring in all of my VMs,usually 3 or more running at once, IDE, my web browser with 20+ tabs and 8gB just barely gets me by on most days. More often than not, I'm hitting my swap. I'm getting a new iMac at work when Mavericks comes out, and my boss is splurging on 32 gig workstations and investing in a couple 64 gig Mac Pros to offload some of those test suites and larger builds.
My wife is a 3d animator, and when she's rendering things at home 8gB she says is her prefered bare minimum -- at work they have a render farm though.
closed account (3qX21hU5)
I'm personally the same way with my desktop I went all out with 32gb of 1866 RAM not to mention a bunch of other things on that computer that I went overboard with lol. But oh well everyone got a hobby I guess that they spend money on and one of mine just happens to be building powerful computers.
But usually for everyday use most people will get by fine with 4gb. But as you have mentioned it really all comes down to what you will be doing and running.
But usually for everyday use most people will get by fine with 4gb. But as you have mentioned it really all comes down to what you will be doing and running.
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