The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Will this laptop game decently?

    Discussion in 'Gaming (Software and Graphics Cards)' started by Fewmets, Oct 8, 2007.

  1. Fewmets

    Fewmets Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    1
    Messages:
    167
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    Been posting my specs around these forums, trying to decide on what latop to purchase, and I'm heavily considering the 15.4 inch screen Inspiron from Dell:

    PROCESSOR Intel® Core™ 2 Duo T7500 (2.2GHz/800Mhz FSB/4MB cache)
    OPERATING SYSTEM Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium Edition
    SYSTEM COLOR Jet Black
    DISPLAY Glossy, widescreen 15.4 inch display (1280x800)
    VIDEO CARD 256MB NVIDIA® GeForce® 8600M GT
    MEMORY 2GB Shared Dual Channel DDR2 at 667MHz (I will upgrade this to 4GB as soon as I get it, assuming I can - this is to save some cash)
    HARD DRIVE Size: 320GB SATA Hard Drive (5400RPM)
    INTERNAL OPTICAL DRIVE CD / DVD writer (DVD+/-RW Drive)
    WIRELESS NETWORK CARDS Dell Wireless 1390 802.11g Mini-Card
    BLUETOOTH AND WIRELESS USB Built-in Bluetooth capability (2.0 EDR)
    INTEGRATED WEBCAM No Webcam Option
    BATTERY OPTIONS 85Whr Lithium Ion Battery (9 cell)
    SOUND OPTIONS High Definition Audio 2.0

    I'm not going to game heavily on this computer, but will I be able to run a couple of games decently well with these specs? It's not a priority at all, but I am curious (new games, e.g. Gears of War, Assasin's Creed, etc.) Obviously not maxed out, but on reasonable settings.
     
  2. wickeddeus

    wickeddeus Notebook Geek

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    96
    Likes Received:
    3
    Trophy Points:
    16
    Should be fine on reasonable settings.
     
  3. Amol

    Amol APH! NBR Reviewer

    Reputations:
    1,832
    Messages:
    1,850
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    55
    8600GT is the top end mid range card. Should be a good performer, and be able to run a lot of games. AFAIK, you should have no troubles. BTW, don't get 4GB RAM because Windows will only see 3.25 - just get it with 1GB RAM and do an aftermarket upgrade and add a 2GB.
     
  4. kickace

    kickace Notebook Deity

    Reputations:
    71
    Messages:
    1,054
    Likes Received:
    8
    Trophy Points:
    56
    if you use windows 64bit, it will see all 4
     
  5. Gilliann

    Gilliann Notebook Consultant

    Reputations:
    38
    Messages:
    163
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    get the min amount of ram from dell and buy replacement ram from newegg, you'll save a bunch of money
     
  6. HTWingNut

    HTWingNut Potato

    Reputations:
    21,580
    Messages:
    35,370
    Likes Received:
    9,878
    Trophy Points:
    931
    ditto on the hard drive.
     
  7. Odin5578

    Odin5578 Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    21
    Messages:
    542
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    30
    You could downgrade the CPU to a 2.0GHz and save some money, as your vid card will be the bottleneck in gaming. Though that's a person preference. Get a 7200 RPM hardrive. You have a very powerful system listed you'll do good. The system you have listed is just a little more powerful than mine (CPU) and I can run any game I've tried. I get a little stuttering in Oblivion but a high Frame rate so it handles the game well, I can play Quake Wars on high settings with a frame rate of 28-31 (it's capped at 31). Good system in my opinion.