need help selecting a video card

[wvnurpu]

I am getting ready to purchase a new laptop and I'm not sure what processor and video card combination to get. I don't want the most expensive setup but want something that will play games like Crysis and Far Cry 2.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
Robert

Moved from Technical Forum Issues to SFF & Notebooks
-ViRGE

 

[Tristicus]

http://forums.anandtech.com/forumdisplay.php?f=23

 

[Schadenfreude]

text

looking for a more well-rounded notebook would probably be well served by the aforementioned GeForce GT 540M or Radeon HD 6500M/6600M. These will hang out between about $700 and a grand and notebooks using these chips are going to be fairly mainstream in form factor, so you won't be lugging a land monster around. Be forewarned, though, these GPUs are going to be inadequate for driving games at 1080p and may still struggle at 1600x900.

The serious gamer looking for an affordable machine should be gunning straight for notebooks with NVIDIA's GeForce GTX 560M. This, or AMD's Radeon HD 6800M, will be the bare minimum for gaming comfortably at 1080p, but honestly the GTX 560M is liable to be the sweet spot in offering the very best balance in form factor favoring performance before you start getting into the huge, heavy desktop replacement notebooks.

You're better off telling us:
- What your budget is
- Where you live (not street address, but country)
- When you'd need it by

And then we'd be able to come up with some recommendations for laptops - instead of dGPUs that go in laptops - as they typically come as a full package and some of the higher-end GPU systems are a bit harder to find.

 

[wvnurpu]

text



You're better off telling us:
- What your budget is
- Where you live (not street address, but country)
- When you'd need it by

And then we'd be able to come up with some recommendations for laptops - instead of dGPUs that go in laptops - as they typically come as a full package and some of the higher-end GPU systems are a bit harder to find.

I'm looking at getting a Lenovo Thinkpad Edge(14 or 15.6") for school and gaming. Was planning on getting it loaded with 4GB DDR3, 500GB HDD, i5 2.6 GHz. Only wanted to spend a max of $1200. Doesn't necessarily have to be able to handle Crysis but would like to be able to play some of the more recent first person shooters.

 

[Shmee]

on laptops, if you want to game, the video card will make a big difference. honestly, you will probably want at the least a GTX 460m or amd equivalent for the titles you mentioned. i plan on ordering a sager/clevo soon with a radeon 6970M and an i7 for about $1800. a good site is avadirect.com, looking to order from there myself.

 

[Brainonska511]

This might be of some use to you:

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html (Notebook graphics comparison chart).

 

[Schadenfreude]

I'm looking at getting a Lenovo Thinkpad Edge(14 or 15.6") for school and gaming. Was planning on getting it loaded with 4GB DDR3, 500GB HDD, i5 2.6 GHz. Only wanted to spend a max of $1200. Doesn't necessarily have to be able to handle Crysis but would like to be able to play some of the more recent first person shooters.

Sooooooo . . . you were thinking about picking up a laptop and then getting a GPU for it?

If your only performance concern for your laptop is gaming (as any post-1995 laptop will run a word processor fine), I'd suggest looking around some more, perhaps getting an Alienware or Sager? You should be able to find something decent and within your budget.

Doing a quick search, this looks like it might fit your bill, and it will run circles around the Thinkpad (for gaming purposes).

If you want maximum gaming for your buck (and have the space for it), I'd go with the gaming desktop + laptop as another poster mentioned; you can build a $650 desktop that'll outperform a $1400 laptop, and you can get a gaming-lite Llano laptop on top of that.

 

[wvnurpu]

Sooooooo . . . you were thinking about picking up a laptop and then getting a GPU for it?

If your only performance concern for your laptop is gaming (as any post-1995 laptop will run a word processor fine), I'd suggest looking around some more, perhaps getting an Alienware or Sager? You should be able to find something decent and within your budget.

Doing a quick search, this looks like it might fit your bill, and it will run circles around the Thinkpad (for gaming purposes).

If you want maximum gaming for your buck (and have the space for it), I'd go with the gaming desktop + laptop as another poster mentioned; you can build a $650 desktop that'll outperform a $1400 laptop, and you can get a gaming-lite Llano laptop on top of that.

WOW ! Thanks !
This helped tremendously !
Think I may buy the Sager NP5165.

 

[wvnurpu]

The info and links have helped tremendously !