New PC Gamer

[marlin29311]

Hey all - i just bought a new laptop that has some decent specs (never had a comp capable of running anything decent, now i do!) - I got a lenovo T500 with-

Core 2 duo @ 2.53ghzVista UltimateATI mobility radeon 3650 256MB2GB RAM160 GB 7200 RPM HDD

I'm looking for what games I could possibly run on this machine that are somewhat new and good looking, but I dont need to run the games at insane resolutions - just something playable.

I like to play games like starcraft, C&C, Final Fantasy 7, etc.

Any recommendations?

[OldmanPurdy]

You would probally like Company of Heroes its only like $20 now and it should be able to run decent on low - mid detail settings with that rig.

[MinisterofDOOM]

There's really not much you shouldn't be able to run right now. You'll just have to run the shinier stuff on low settings.

You chould be fine running C&C 3 and it's expansion. Supreme Commander, too.

For comparison, I'm running:AMD Athlon 64 at 2.4 MHZ (so single core, yours is dual)Radeon HD2600 XT 512 MB2GB RAMWindows XP

I don't have DX10 support with XP, you do with Vista.I'm single core, you're dual.

You should be able to run just about anything, it's just a question of how much shiny eye-candy you can turn on.

[marlin29311]

Good to know...thanks!

[C-Kwik]

You might consider a RAM upgrade if your laptop supports an easy upgrade. It's pretty cheap and since your're running Vista, it might be advisable. I purchased 4GB for my HP laptop a month ago for $75 and recently, got the same RAM for my mom's new HP laptop for $50 (both at Fry's). Vista is a resource hog. I've never compared Vista to XP directly on similar systems, but looking at the resource monitor on my computers, Vista is taking a minimum of about 1 GB by itself. Here's what I see:

Work DesktopCore 2 Duo 2.6 GHz4 GB RAMVista 64RAM usage with internet explorer and AIM up at idle ~1.5GB

Home Desktop3.2 GHz P43 GB RAMVista 32 UltimateRAM usage with AIM and internet explorer at idle ~ 1.1 GB

Laptop2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo3 GB RAM (actually 4 but chipset is limiting usable RAM to 3; wierd since the BIOS and a portion of Windows sees $GB, but can only address 3 )Vista 64 UltimateRAM usage with Internet Explorer and AIM up at idle ~ 1.18 GB

Mom's Laptop2.0 GHz Core 2 Duo4 GB RAMVista 64 UltimateRAM usage with Internet Explorer up at idle ~ 1.20 GB

Sidebar is running on all 4 systems.

I can't recall how much XP was using on my laptop or home desktop before I upgraded them but both only had 1GB each before and they ran pretty smoothly. My mom's laptop was noticably slower with only 1GB before I upgraded it to 4. The work desktop has a higher usage, but I speculate much of the difference is due to some OE HP software embedded in the OS. It runs fine for now and I'm too lazy to go in and dig it all out. Especially since its mainly used to communicate on AIM and play on the internet. I occassionally use it for Word or Excel so there isn't much of a reason to have to free up that small difference in resource. The other three are using clean installs of Vista Ultimate.

Also, if you go to the systems folder in your control panel (classic view), it will give you a windows experience index number. it basically points out the measured bottleneck of your system. I think it actually runs processes to determine this so some of it might be based on running background applications and such. But either way, it might give you soem idea of if your laptop's performance might improve if you upgrade the RAM.

As for CPU performance, this index tells me my desktop is rated at 4.3. The two laptops are rated at 4.9. My work PC is 5.7. Considering my home PC is a 3.2 GHz P4 and it rates that much lower than even a 2.0 Core2Duo, I'd say you're fine as far as the CPU goes. You should be pretty close to my work PC as far as CPU power. My laptop has a 256 MB Nvidia card. I can't recall which, but it rates at 4.6. I'd expect yours is at least that. As for RAM, my laptop is scoring a 4.5 while reading 3 GB while my mom's 4GB gives a score of 4.8.

I'm not sure how a 2 GB RAM system will rate, but it would seem likely that it will have the lowest subscore on your setup. And not that I am saying to rely on thes Windows Experience index to dictate what you do, it would be likely to be the biggest impact on performance should you find that your gaming experience could use some improvement. If the WEI is somewhat calibrated to try and represent how things work together, then the RAM being the lowest subscore would likely indicate it is the bottleneck. Luckily, its usually one of the easiest and cheapest to upgrade. If you have Vista 64, you can likely go to 4GB or higher. If you are running 32 bit Vista, the highest you might be able to use is 3-3.5 GB from what I've read.

Unless you see a pressing need in running windows apps for additional RAM though, you could probably just install the game you want to try and see if RAM is causing any limitations before spending any money.

[Nali]

You might consider a RAM upgrade if your laptop supports an easy upgrade. It's pretty cheap and since your're running Vista, it might be advisable. I purchased 4GB for my HP laptop a month ago for $75 and recently, got the same RAM for my mom's new HP laptop for $50 (both at Fry's). Vista is a resource hog. I've never compared Vista to XP directly on similar systems, but looking at the resource monitor on my computers, Vista is taking a minimum of about 1 GB by itself.

32bit Vista doesnt need 4GBs or ram that is major over kill considering you will only get like 3.2 to use.Unless you are running Vista 64 you will be limited.

Many people dont know that when a game actually starts running the amount of ram being use goes up only minimally on Vista. My PC runs at 940mb idle. When running Crysis Warhead it only goes up to 1.6 - 1.8. Is that to say Crysis only uses 700mb? No, Vista drops its usage substantially.

The only bottleneck i can see with ur system is the graphics card.But since you are more into strategy games, you wont really be missing anything by setting the games to Low - medium detail.It will run anything on the market right now on Low - Medium detail.So dont worry. Just tinker with setting till you get the optimum setting you like.

[marlin29311]

I'll definatly see about the RAM upgrade in the future - I haven't really found many places that stock DDR3-8500 notebook RAM though, and I'm not a huge fan of having it shipped to me (did it once, the RAM was bad and it was a 2 month ordeal...not fun). But I'll certianly check out that vista experience index thingy. I never knew that existed....

I also had no real choice in the video card, which kinda stunk. If i wanted something better (like the FireGL or something else) I would have had to buy the W series thinkpad, which was a crapton more...

[C-Kwik]

32bit Vista doesnt need 4GBs or ram that is major over kill considering you will only get like 3.2 to use.Unless you are running Vista 64 you will be limited.

I agree. I even said so in my original post.

Many people dont know that when a game actually starts running the amount of ram being use goes up only minimally on Vista. My PC runs at 940mb idle. When running Crysis Warhead it only goes up to 1.6 - 1.8. Is that to say Crysis only uses 700mb? No, Vista drops its usage substantially.

I would hope so. Vista is supposedly better at managing memory as well. To what extent each is? I have no clue. I was merely providing some specs as own/have access to 4 Vista systems with various specs to provide something to compare to. As I had suggested in my post, if cost is an issue, then run the game and see if RAM is an issue or not. And while I would think Crysis is going to be very hardware intensive with features and settings turned on/up, not all games operate in the same manner. Some will be more memory intensive than others.

I'll definatly see about the RAM upgrade in the future - I haven't really found many places that stock DDR3-8500 notebook RAM though, and I'm not a huge fan of having it shipped to me (did it once, the RAM was bad and it was a 2 month ordeal...not fun). But I'll certianly check out that vista experience index thingy. I never knew that existed....

DOH! DDR3 notebook memory isn't quite as available or as cheap as the DDR2 I'm running. But a quick search netted this:

http://www.jr.com/crucial/pe/CRT_4GKIT25664B/

Even for that price though, I'd wait to see how a game runs before spending the dough.

BTW, are you running 32 or 64 bit Vista?

I also had no real choice in the video card, which kinda stunk. If i wanted something better (like the FireGL or something else) I would have had to buy the W series thinkpad, which was a crapton more...

Probably why most people build their gaming rigs as desktops. Espcially if cost is a concern. Most people buying laptops on a budget have to make some sacrifices.

[marlin29311]

32 bit vista - it's all that was offered at the time. I don't know if i'll have a big need for the 64 bit quite yet - but at least I have the option...i'll definatly see how stuff runs though before I go ahead and buy some more - I have 2gb now in 1 DIMM, and i still have a DIMM open.

Yea, this wasn't really built as a gaming rig, but more of something to replace my dead T42 from 5 years ago. I like the mobility of the laptop so I can take it anywhere, but I also wanted something pretty powerful as well.

[C-Kwik]

32 bit vista - it's all that was offered at the time. I don't know if i'll have a big need for the 64 bit quite yet - but at least I have the option...i'll definatly see how stuff runs though before I go ahead and buy some more - I have 2gb now in 1 DIMM, and i still have a DIMM open.

Yea, this wasn't really built as a gaming rig, but more of something to replace my dead T42 from 5 years ago. I like the mobility of the laptop so I can take it anywhere, but I also wanted something pretty powerful as well.

I wouldn't worry too much about 64 bit yet. Although I haven't run anything heavy on my systems nor do I have any real 64 bit apps, there is no discernible difference. The only reason I chose 64-bit where I could is because it cost me nothing to do so and provided me with additional access to more RAM. The plan was to upgrade all my systems to Vista at some point as I enjoy using it on my work PC. But it kinda got sped up when my laptop completely locked up and wouldn't boot. Couldn't even restore it using the OE XP partition. And while I have my own copy of XP, my friend got me a copy of Ultimate for $50. It made the decision rather easy...

Yeah, laptop mobility is nice. We paid almost $2K for our a couple of years ago. Worse still this was just before Vista became available. Sucked, but we couldn't wait for Vista to be available. We could get the same system now for a lot less, but my GF was in animation school at the time and needed something that could handle the animation software smoothly (particularly the rendering). Her desktop actually handled it fine, but she had a lot of group projects which required her to bring her computer with her. And desktops aren't exactly portable.

[Enochs]

Using your idle numbers to justify upgrading RAM is misleading.

A computer with more RAM will use more RAM. For example, a computer running 32 bit Vista that has 2GB of ram will idle around 750MB or so. If you upgrade that same computer to 3GB of RAM it will now idle between 1.2 to 1.5GB.....You see Vista will use more RAM at Idle if it sees you have plenty to spare. I can see no difference in performance when I switch between 2GB and 3GB of ram....my CPU will idle at about 40-45% of whatever I have available and if there is a difference in speed, I can't tell.

I would save the 30-40$ and just keep 2GB with 32 bit version of Vista.

[MinisterofDOOM]

$40 savings for a multi-thousand-dollar machine isn't really worth it for ANY component. Might as well get $40 more worth of RAM. Idle performance might not be any better, but if you're using the PC for gaming you WILL see an improvement when loading high-res bump-mapped textures and all the other shinies that come with games these days.

Aside from all that, who cares what the machine idles at? If it's idle it's not in use, which means it doesn't matter. What matters is RAM available when it's needed. More is better.

[marlin29311]

Also, if you go to the systems folder in your control panel (classic view), it will give you a windows experience index number. it basically points out the measured bottleneck of your system. I think it actually runs processes to determine this so some of it might be based on running background applications and such. But either way, it might give you soem idea of if your laptop's performance might improve if you upgrade the RAM.

Just thought I would update as of now...

Got the T500 on monday - I love it! I ran the Window's Experience tool, and my system got a raiting of 5.3 - 5.8 for the processor, 5.9 for the ram (i'm guessin the DDR3 drove this), 5.7 for GFX, 5.6 for the next thing ( i don't remember it) and 5.3 for the HDD (lol, who would have though it was my HDD holding me back...)

I can successfully run Crysis at a decent frame rate with settings on Medium and a 1024x768 resolution - averages about 35 or so. However, being that I have a 22" flat panel with native resolution of 1680x1050, I've been playing with my resolution up at that (i hate stretching/windowing), and with everything on low I get about 30 fps (I don't really care about the visuals, I just want to play the story).

I actually just ordered another 1GB of DDR3 from Lenovo yesterday, putting the system up to 3GB. I'll see when it comes if this will make any performance jump at all in the game - the console rates my RAM useage at anywhere from 600MB to 1000MB at any given time, so I'm hoping the 1GB increase will help to open the system up a little bit. $30 for 1GB with the employee purchase program!!!

Other than that, the computer rocks!