Advice on new laptop

cbarchuk

I'm wanting to upgrade my aging laptop. The only PC games I play are older titles such as Baldur's Gate here. So I'm just trying to find out what would be a cost efficient laptop that would run BG, IWD, etc...I know some of the cheaper laptops mainly use integrated graphics as opposed to a graphics card. Not sure if this a big deal or not. I'm not the most computer savvy person there is. So any direction would be great. Don't want to break my wallet. Thanks.

TJ_Hooker

Some more information would probably be good. For starters, a rough estimate of your budget. Other things you want/need to use the laptop for other than gaming. How important portability is to you, i.e. what kind of size/weight would be appropriate.

cbarchuk

I would say maybe $600 or so. I know that's not a lot. I would only be using the laptop for general web use and gaming. Portability is not a necessity at all. I just like the smaller size of the laptop over a desktop. My current laptop has 14 inch screen which I do like.

sarevok57

I used to use a 550 dollars laptop that I bought 4 or so years ago to play bgee and bg2ee and it ran pretty decent, as cbarchuk says, virtually any 600 dollar laptop now adays should be able to run any of that stuff, if you can get an i5 for 600 bucks than that should be more than enough, even an i3 should be good

CaloNord

I got mine for 800 in Aus, it's got an i7 and a 720m as well as a 3 year warranty which was where half the money went. Runs everything pretty well, even though the 720 is hardly beastly. It plays Flight Sim X and BG's really well, which is all I needed. I wanted something a lot more powerful but if you want high end stuff you pretty much have to have it made for you. Which costs through the nose, the rig I wanted was around 6000. Which I can't afford right now.

TJ_Hooker

i7s are nice (have one myself), but for most people they aren't necessary. See, programs only take advantage of additional threads if they have been developed to do so. Games (particularly older ones) tend to only take advantage of 1-4 threads (most i7s have 8 threads). There are certain activities that tend to benefit from high thread count (e.g. video editing), so if you do that it might be worth it. For the kind of uses the OP described, I think almost any Core i5 or i3 would suffice, although I wouldn't personally go with a low-power CPU (designated by a U or Y suffix, like i5-4300Y).

Lastly, something to keep an eye on are Intel CPUs that have Iris Graphics (only a few models have this). It's supposed to be a meaningful step up from the regular Intel HD integrated graphics. Although if Infinity Engine games are what you'll typically what you're playing, I'm pretty sure the standard Intel HD should be plenty.

Here's a website that I've found useful in the past http://www.notebookcheck.net/

cbarchuk

Thanks for the feedback guys. What about brands? Dell, Asus, Lenovo, etc...I really don't want to go over $700. 6 would be better. My current laptop is a Dell btw. 14 or 15 inch screen and windows 7 preferred. Thanks again.