Urgent! Black Friday gaming laptops?

The Game Room
1

Need a good really low-budget laptop that will play most games. Have been told by a friend that his $500 laptop w/ integrated graphics plays all games, including Fable, Fallout 3, and BioShock. I need opinions on these two laptops. We’re leaning towards the HP which has a decent graphics card but shared memory.

If you don’t recommend these, can you recommend any that are going on sale for about $500?

http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=10528884

HP Pavilion 15.6" g60-121wm Laptop PC w/ AMD Sempron SI-40 Processor

Display Type: 15.6" TFT
Widescreen Display: Yes
Max Resolution: 1366 x 768 ( WXGA )
Processor
Processor: AMD Sempron SI-40 / 2 GHz
Cache Memory
Type: L2 cache
Installed Size: 512 KB
Storage
Hard Drive: 160 GB - Serial ATA-150 - 5400 rpm
RAM
Installed Size: 3 GB / 4 GB (max)
Technology: DDR2 SDRAM
Configuration Features: 1 x 1 GB + 1 x 2 GB
Optical Storage
Type: DVD±RW (±R DL) / DVD-RAM
Networking
Data Link Protocol: Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g
Wireless LAN Supported: Yes
Video
**Graphics Processor / Vendor: NVIDIA GeForce 8200M G shared video memory (UMA) **
Audio
Features: Altec Lansing speakers
Audio Input: Microphone
Operating System / Software
OS Provided: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium
Software: Microsoft Internet Explorer, Adobe Acrobat Reader, Microsoft Works, AOL Instant Messenger, muvee autoProducer, HP QuickPlay Software, HP Photosmart Essential, CyberLink DVD Suite, HP Total Care Advisor, Norton Internet Security 2008 (60 days subscription), HP Smart Web Printing, Microsoft Office 2007 Student and Teacher Edition (60 days trial), HP Help and Support Center
http://www.walmart.com/catalog/product.do?product_id=10528882

Toshiba 15.4" Satellite L305D-S5897 Blue Laptop PC w/ AMD Turion 64 X2 Dual-Core Processor TL-60

Display
Display Type: 15.4" TFT
Widescreen Display: Yes
Max Resolution: 1280 x 800 ( WXGA )
Processor
Multi-Core Technology: Dual-Core
Processor: AMD Turion 64 X2 mobile technology TL-60 / 2 GHz
Chipset Type: AMD M690G
Data Bus Speed: 800 MHz
Features: HyperTransport technology
Cache Memory
Type: L2 cache
Installed Size: 1 MB
Storage
Hard Drive: 250 GB - Serial ATA-150 - 5400 rpm
RAM
Installed Size: 4 GB / 4 GB (max)
Technology: DDR2 SDRAM - 667 MHz
Configuration Features: 2 x 2 GB
Optical Storage
Type: DVD±RW (±R DL) / DVD-RAM - integrated
Read Speed: 24x (CD) / 8x (DVD)
Write Speed: 24x (CD) / 8x (DVD±R) / 4x (DVD±R DL)
Networking
Data Link Protocol: Ethernet, Fast Ethernet, IEEE 802.11b, IEEE 802.11g
Wireless LAN Supported: Yes
Video
**Graphics Processor / Vendor: ATI Radeon X1250 **
Audio
Audio Input: Microphone
Operating System / Software
OS Provided: Microsoft Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit Edition
Software: Adobe Acrobat Reader, Toshiba ConfigFree, CyberLink PowerCinema, Google Toolbar, Toshiba Speech System, Sun Java 2 Runtime Environment, Skype, Toshiba Assist, Toshiba Disc Creator, WildTangent Game Console, Toshiba Extended Tiles for Windows Mobility Center, Toshiba Value Added Package, Ulead DVD MovieFactory 5 for Toshiba, Face Recognition software, Toshiba DVD Player, Microsoft Works 9.0, LoJack for Laptops, Microsoft Office 2007 Home and Student Edition (60 days trial), Norton 360 (Trial)

2

I have not used either of those laptops, but my guess is a solid no.

This is what Fallout 3 lists as MINIMUM graphics requirements:

Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 256MB RAM (NVIDIA 6800 or better/ATI X850 or better)

A quick google search gives a 2001 3Dmark score for the ATI Radeon X1250 vid card of 6586.
Compare that to a 2001 3Dmakr score for the Nvidia 6800. 15556

Try in google: (“yourgame name” minimum requirements) than whatever vid card returns try (“vidcard” benchmark). This will give you an idea if your desired games will play.

3

Cheap. Gaming. Laptop.

One of these three words does not belong, sorry.

4

For reference, here’s a good chart showing graphics card hierarchy

You’ll notice that the Xpress 1250 and the 8400M are both about 6 rungs lower than the requirements for Fallout 3 (6800/X850)

5

For what it is worth, my dad was asking about a cheap gaming laptop and this is about the best I could find for “under” a grand. Can anyone beat that?

6

Another friend is running her Fallout 3 on a NVIDIA Go 6200. Not perfectly but pretty good, according to her. So how is that compared to the X1250 & 8400M?

7

Thanks for that lead! And I second the request!

8

Your friend is lying to you. Either that or she’s blind. While it’s technically possible that all these cards will run fallout 3, the best you’re ever going to be able to hope for is a slideshow at 640x480 resolution, without shadows or lighting, and terrible textures. They aren’t supported cards at all, so there is no way to even guarantee that.

Seriously, there is no point playing something like Fallout 3 with the cards you are looking at. You’d get much more enjoyment out of playing Fallout 1/2, or any other decent quality game released before 2003 or so. They’d all look more impressive too.

If you really want to play games like this, you have 3 options:
A. Double your budget for a laptop.
B. Buy an Xbox360. For less than $300, you’d get 10x better visuals than the $500 laptops you’re considering.
C. Build your own desktop PC. A system like this will absolutely blow a $1000 laptop out of the water.

9

My friend wants to if anyone has actually experienced integrated graphics or are just going by you’ve read. She doesn’t understand how her friend can run all games off of a fairly low-level Gateway laptop.

10

Last time I used integrated graphics was five years ago. Ditched it right after buying Need for Speed: Underground because I couldn’t see my car and heard from EA that drivers for that chipset were no longer supported.

11

Personal anecdote: My dad bought Bioshock (he saw some good reviews in the newspaper about it) to play on his recently purchased Dell desktop, with integrated graphics. He talked to me about his frustration with it, all he could see in the beginning of the game was some flames, blackness, and a blinking red light. He didn’t know where to go or what to do.

I was a little puzzled by this, because I had already played the game on my Xbox360, and I thought it was fairly obvious. But once he mentioned “integrated graphics”, I knew immediately what was wrong.

As it turns out, because of his integrated graphics, he wasn’t able to see that the game starts you out in the middle of the ocean (his computer didn’t display the water), or the fact that the blinking light he was referring to was attached to the wing of an airplane (his computer didn’t render the plane). His computer also didn’t display the giant tower that you were supposed to swim to.

I had him play it on the Xbox360, and immediately knew what to do. The difference was night and day. Again, big improvement from only being able to see flames, blackness, and a blinking red light to being able to see the ocean, burning airplane, and a giant tower.