Gaming Laptops

[gstar1975]

Has anyone got any advice on buying a Gaming Laptop entry level?

Minimum system requirements:

Processor: Processor (AMD): AMD FX 6350 Processor or (Intel): Intel Core i5 6600K Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphics card (AMD): AMD Radeon™ HD 7850 2GB Graphics card (NVIDIA): NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 660 2GB

[Dublin_Flyer]

I don't think there's many of the forum that would be into gaming laptops, but the forum at tomshardware.com https://forums.tomshardware.com or the pcmasterrace subreddit https://www.reddit.com/r/pcmasterrace would be better places to ask. Tomshardware would be 1st choice, pcmasterbuilds is way more desktop orientated.

[Kai]

Has anyone got any advice on buying a Gaming Laptop entry level?

Minimum system requirements:

Processor: Processor (AMD): AMD FX 6350 Processor or (Intel): Intel Core i5 6600K Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphics card (AMD): AMD Radeon™ HD 7850 2GB Graphics card (NVIDIA): NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 660 2GB

Sounds like you need it for Star Wars: Battlefront 2 and such?

If so, AAA games like that would likely run like ass at low quality settings and low framerates, would not go below the recommended requirements if possible, those would generally be the actual "minimum requirements" for a good experience.

Like Dublin_Flyer said, can't go wrong with Tom's Hardware advice. Might be a good idea to wait for Black Friday and go with a budget or value option instead, since entry level works better with less demanding games.

[gstar1975]

Has anyone got any advice on buying a Gaming Laptop entry level?

Minimum system requirements:

Processor: Processor (AMD): AMD FX 6350 Processor or (Intel): Intel Core i5 6600K Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphics card (AMD): AMD Radeon™ HD 7850 2GB Graphics card (NVIDIA): NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 660 2GB

Sounds like you need it for Star Wars: Battlefront 2 and such?

If so, AAA games like that would likely run like ass at low quality settings and low framerates, would not go below the recommended requirements if possible, those would generally be the actual "minimum requirements" for a good experience.

Like Dublin_Flyer said, can't go wrong with Tom's Hardware advice. Might be a good idea to wait for Black Friday and go with a budget or value option instead, since entry level works better with less demanding games.

How did you guess that? Yes its for my son. Thanks for your answers I will take a look at both those forums.

[Kai]

Has anyone got any advice on buying a Gaming Laptop entry level?

Minimum system requirements:

Processor: Processor (AMD): AMD FX 6350 Processor or (Intel): Intel Core i5 6600K Memory: 8 GB RAM
Graphics: Graphics card (AMD): AMD Radeon™ HD 7850 2GB Graphics card (NVIDIA): NVIDIA GeForce® GTX 660 2GB

Sounds like you need it for Star Wars: Battlefront 2 and such?

If so, AAA games like that would likely run like ass at low quality settings and low framerates, would not go below the recommended requirements if possible, those would generally be the actual "minimum requirements" for a good experience.

Like Dublin_Flyer said, can't go wrong with Tom's Hardware advice. Might be a good idea to wait for Black Friday and go with a budget or value option instead, since entry level works better with less demanding games.

How did you guess that? Yes its for my son. Thanks for your answers I will take a look at both those forums.

Just based off those minimum specs, since those will struggle to properly run modern games. Black Friday deals should offer some great value in the upcoming days and weeks so perfect timing for that. I'm not into laptops but decent graphics card is key, something that has an RTX 3050 or 3060 for example should last a good while.

As for the games themselves which can get quite expensive, the best value is a subscription service from Microsoft, the best one in gaming called Xbox Pass for PC at just $9.99 per month (don't need Xbox for it). They have all the Star Wars games due to their deal with EA, along with a large game library, and since Microsoft keeps buying game studios they just put everything new in there soon as it's released.

[Crazyskier]

Sounds like you need it for Star Wars: Battlefront 2 and such?

If so, AAA games like that would likely run like ass at low quality settings and low framerates, would not go below the recommended requirements if possible, those would generally be the actual "minimum requirements" for a good experience.

Like Dublin_Flyer said, can't go wrong with Tom's Hardware advice. Might be a good idea to wait for Black Friday and go with a budget or value option instead, since entry level works better with less demanding games.

How did you guess that? Yes its for my son. Thanks for your answers I will take a look at both those forums.

Just based off those minimum specs, since those will struggle to properly run modern games. Black Friday deals should offer some great value in the upcoming days and weeks so perfect timing for that. I'm not into laptops but decent graphics card is key, something that has an RTX 3050 or 3060 for example should last a good while.

As for the games themselves which can get quite expensive, the best value is a subscription service from Microsoft, the best one in gaming called Xbox Pass for PC at just $9.99 per month (don't need Xbox for it). They have all the Star Wars games due to their deal with EA, along with a large game library, and since Microsoft keeps buying game studios they just put everything new in there soon as it's released.

I subbed for a month to try this on my new gaming desktop and though I found the games library is limited, it was a great way to access some AAA titles.

Generally I steer away from gaming laptops as the cooling in such a limited space is limited and frame rates suffer in my experience. I swear by my water-cooled ray-tracing current rig where I've been recently testing the closed beta Diablo 4 and playing Warcraft and POE. If you have the space, I'd recommend going the desktop route as it's also more modular with the ability to insert newer / more RAM and GPU, etc over time.

CS

[Kai]

I swear by my water-cooled ray-tracing current rig where I've been recently testing the closed beta Diablo 4 and playing Warcraft and POE.

Ray tracing is just a marketing gimmick, don't fall for it, even next gen GPUs can't really run it yet without sacrificing too much performance, needs a few more years, and not much of a feature yet anyway if vast majority of players can't notice the difference, so game devs don't really bother at this point.

Only now 4K at higher frames is getting unlocked with next gen, it will no longer be a gimmicky feature that butchers your experience with a paltry 30-60 fps.

[Crazyskier]

I swear by my water-cooled ray-tracing current rig where I've been recently testing the closed beta Diablo 4 and playing Warcraft and POE.

Ray tracing is just a marketing gimmick, don't fall for it, even next gen GPUs can't really run it yet without sacrificing too much performance, needs a few more years, and not much of a feature yet anyway if vast majority of players can't notice the difference, so game devs don't really bother at this point.

Only now 4K at higher frames is getting unlocked with next gen, it will no longer be a gimmicky feature that butchers your experience with a paltry 30-60 fps.

I disagree there. The Ray-Tracing is absolutely discernible in Wow on Ultra settings, though I only run a 32'' curved 1440p (2k) screen with 144Hz refresh and G-sync rather than a full 4k.

CS