Decent gaming laptop?

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Ravenpoe

Ravenpoe

I searched the other laptop threads, but I didn't see any mention of GAMING on a laptop.

Now, when I hear gaming and laptop in the same sentence, I usually laugh, but I've been looking lately for a decent gaming machine I can take with me on the go.

The ability to run modern games at maxed out settings isn't important, I have my desktop for that, but how much would I be looking to spend for a laptop that can, let's say, run WoW at a good rate, or run modern games on low to medium settings?

I'd like to keep it between $500-$700, but I'm flexible if there's really that big of a benefit to going a bit higher. Of course, being able to go cheaper is always a boon.

So, anyone have any advice on what to look for?
 
Bones

Bones

wow is possible, other games maybe not so much....you need a system with a descrite graphics solution number one, and be willing to either wear a backpack battery or be tethered to the wall.
 
Dave

Dave

Staff member
The biggest problem you'll run into is that good games take a graphic card. Cheap ($500-700) laptops do not have cards. So you'll either have to spend more or buy a cheap one with the capacity to have a video card and then buy the video card separately.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
You're in luck, Raven - I just found a decent one for myself, and it actually can play games fairly well (though not many on max detail settings), and it's cheaper than one might expect. The Asus K50AF-X1, on amazon now for $610. It's got an AMD mobile GPU.

It's no replacement for a solid gaming desktop, but you can play games on it.
 
Hylian

Hylian

I bought a MSI GX710-400A laptop a little over a year ago and I only paid about $700 for it. Sadly I do not believe they make that particular model anymore but still MSI laptops are fairly cheap for what you get.
 
Jay

Jay

No, he said he wants to run World of Warcraft on a 500 to 700$ laptop on moderate settings. It's not going to happen on that tight budget. I got a $750 laptop for my fiancee and it runs Plants vs Zombies with some difficulty but it's an incredibly durable little Toshiba laptop. Do you plan to PVP? Or be in zones with a lot of people playing at the same time? Your laptop will be useless simple because you tried to save a few bucks. He'll need to spend more or wait until a company is getting rid of stock and the prices falls. Newegg is solid, it'll provide him an opportunity at one time or another. And for the love of God, don't buy Asus.

If you can up your budget to 900 or so, you'll be cooking. Try to lower your budget on other things to find a few bucks available.
 
J

Jiarn

Can't say I'm familiar with trying WoW on a laptop, but I run all Popcap games and stuff like Torchlight with little to no difficulty on a 4yr old laptop with 2gb of RAM in it. I can't imagine that the one listed in Baerdog's link would have trouble doing the job.
 
Jay

Jay

Torchlight is a fantastic game and is a rare example of well created game. WoW is not. It's a beastly game that takes a lot of system resources to run. In zones with many people, effects, congrats on getting owned while your laptop chugs along rying to watch up. Popcap games don't require much neither. Guess what, solitaire runs on my laptop as well. :)
 
Hylian

Hylian

For the short time I played WoW I played it on my laptop and it ran just fine and I only paid $700 for the laptop.
 
figmentPez

figmentPez

Staff member
Jay said:
And for the love of God, don't buy Asus.
Click to expand...
What is wrong with Asus? I love my Eee 1005HA, and my monitor, and my dad has an Asus desktop he's happy with. The only thing I've ever been disappointed with from Asus was a TV-tuner card, and I don't think they make those anymore.
 
SpecialKO

SpecialKO

If you turn down most of the settings to low, you should be able to play WoW just fine on a $500-700 laptop. You're not going to be able to play much else newer, though, short of casual games.

A friend of mine installed and played WoW on his netbook, just to see if he could do it. It sure wasn't ideal but it was workable (though not for raiding).
 
Dave

Dave

Staff member
In the immortal words of Bob Uecker: "Juuuuust a bit outside!"

Only this time it's the price range and not a strike zone.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
I was playing WoW on my OLD laptop that only had an intel onboard generic video card. Don't give me this "you can't play wow for under 700 dollars" thing. You could play WoW on a 500 dollar laptop 5 years ago.
 
S

Soliloquy

Yeah, WoW is Designed to be played on crappy systems. That's one of the reason's its so popular.
 
Jay

Jay

Thread: Decent gaming laptop? - Negative
Unhelpful post with no reasoning given. If you're going to be so negative at least back up your opinion.


How about having the balls and posting this instead of using anonymous responses? I thought the purpose of forums is to actually you know, converse. Read my posts, try to understand, if you don't ask me to elaborate. Don't be a bitch.

---------- Post added at 02:46 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:44 PM ----------
Chazwozel said:
I found a great gaming laptop that keeps up with most desktops: The Dell Online Store: Build Your System
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Dell gaming rigs are pretty awesome. However, they're no where close to the price tag Ravenpoe is looking for. I saw a $2500 worth gaming rig once, I wanted to hold it tight, kiss it and name it... all within 5 seconds.
 
GasBandit

GasBandit

Staff member
Jay said:
Thread: Decent gaming laptop? - Negative
Unhelpful post with no reasoning given. If you're going to be so negative at least back up your opinion.


How about having the balls and posting this instead of using anonymous responses? I thought the purpose of forums is to actually you know, converse. Read my posts, try to understand, if you don't ask me to elaborate. Don't be a bitch.
Click to expand...


That was the most bitchful calling of bitch I've ever witnessed. Maybe if you don't want them to do that, you should stop acting like a little bitch, bitch.
 
Jay

Jay

Hylian said:
Asus is actually a really good laptop for reliability

Click to expand...
I strongly doubt that chart. Where did you get that from anyways?


What about customer service? Back in the day, I had an Asus video card with fan issues. It took them well over 5 months to send me a replacement after countless emails and calls to their tech support… which was ultimately defective out of the box. My friend had a similar experience as we bought our cards from Newegg a few years back when they had a huge blowout sale on these cards. Customer service is very important to me, what if something goes wrong? You never know.


With Toshiba and Dell I can attest when an issue happens, you report it, they send you the replacement parts within 24 hours as well as a tech if needed if you need to replace an essential part.
 
S

Soliloquy

May I just say that if you get a laptop for gaming, don't get a Vaio. Those things overheat like no other.

Cooling pads help though. sometimes.
 
Ravenpoe

Ravenpoe

Thanks for the replies everyone, except Jay, but I long ago decided he is my antipoe.

As I already stated in my post, I know gaming on a laptop, and gaming on a budget, don't go together. I was looking for a place to start, and to see what was available. I'm not looking to max out crisis on this thing, my desktop does that just fine.

Thanks for the help, those links from gas and baer were really helpful.
 
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