Main Restorations Software Audio/Jukebox/MP3 Everything Else Buy/Sell/Trade
Project Announcements Monitor/Video GroovyMAME Merit/JVL Touchscreen Meet Up Retail Vendors
Driving & Racing Woodworking Software Support Forums Consoles Project Arcade Reviews
Automated Projects Artwork Frontend Support Forums Pinball Forum Discussion Old Boards
Raspberry Pi & Dev Board controls.dat Linux Miscellaneous Arcade Wiki Discussion Old Archives
Lightguns Arcade1Up Try the site in https mode Site News

Unread posts | New Replies | Recent posts | Rules | Chatroom | Wiki | File Repository | RSS | Submit news

  

Author Topic: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?  (Read 3335 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Titchgamer

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4222
  • Last login:December 17, 2023, 08:05:48 am
  • I have a gaming addiction.....
I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« on: May 31, 2019, 02:01:32 pm »
Ok guys looking to you computer guru's to give me a push in the right direction.

I am in the market for a new laptop, More specifically a gaming laptop.

Yeah I want to try and get back into PC gaming a bit but I dont have the space for a full Size gaming rig, Also I would like to get back into web and graphic design stuff but I have been away from the "scene" for a while.
My last gaming rig was a core 2 duo and that was when they were ---steaming pile of meadow muffin--- hot so yeah its been a few years....

Anyways whats a good processor to go for these days? Most I am looking at either have i5/7 or Ryzen 5's.
I know the i processors are good and have the turbo boost thing which from what I have read is a good thing.

What kind of clock speed/speeds do I need to be aiming for a "casual" pc gaming laptop?
I also plan on hooking it up to my HDTV to emulate some lightgun games once the Sindens are released and maybe some other higher end emulation of newer games that I cant or wouldnt play on my mame cab.

Money is not really a big issue as such as I will be getting it on finance (my credit card is up and I need something on finance to keep my credit rating good!) but I dont want to be spashing out crazy money as I am still wanting to come and see some of you guys next year!

I was looking at maybe something like this:
https://ao.com/product/fx505dyal007t-asus-laptop-black-63436-251.aspx

Appreciate any input or pointers :)

Vigo

  • the Scourage of Carpathia
  • Global Moderator
  • Trade Count: (+24)
  • Full Member
  • *****
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 6417
  • Last login:March 21, 2024, 08:20:28 am
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #1 on: May 31, 2019, 03:38:24 pm »
I'm not going to be a guru in this arena, so I can't throw out hard number on what CPU and GPU speeds to hit. I can through out a smattering on my thoughts from what experiance I do have.

What I do want to ask is do you plan to dock to a screen for gaming? You can probably save good money by keeping with those 15" laptops if you are only going to plug in to a monitor, but I personally would get a 17" if you are going to be gaming straight off the laptop. I saw you were thinking of doing that with light gun games, but is that going to be the normal setup?

GPU is going to be much more important than CPU, but from what I am hearing, those Ryzen processors are soon going to be replaced with a much faster CPU that won't cost any more. That might also work in your favor, as I am hearing there are some great Ryzen discounts going on to clear out inventory. You might also want to wait until the new processors come out. For reference, my CPU on my gaming tower is an AMD from 2012, but I have a newish 1080ti graphics card. There is no game I can't play at high settings, but my FPS is generally limited to 30-60 FPS depending on the game due to CPU bottlenecking. Doesn't boterh me yet, though. If you are going casual, I would focus on the GPU. As long as your CPU is decent, you should be alright. Just think about future proofing so you get a number of years from your rig.

For reference, I don't have a gaming laptop, but I do 4k video editing on my machine for work so I am sure it would be an absolute killer gaming rig. It is a Lenovo P72. https://www.cdw.com/product/lvo-p72-i7-8850h-512-16-w10p/5272472 It burns! They do cost a massive premium for their quadro GPUS, which are designed to not overheat under for long-term high graphics workloads, which is the situation of what happens when encoding video for hours on end.

I also recommend getting a primary SSD and a secondary HDD so you can benefit from quick boot speeds and still have large mass storage for games, and maybe house music and movies. Pay attention to internal drive bays as well as ram slots. I got a couple M2 slots on my and a 2.5 bay, as well as 4 ram slots, and have been slowly expanding as needed. I'd say as long as you have both an M2 and a drive bay, you should be set. Laptop manufacturers love to pre-fill all ram slots with small size sticks of ram, which forces you to remove a stick to upgrade. Stuff to pay attention to!

Good luck!

Titchgamer

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4222
  • Last login:December 17, 2023, 08:05:48 am
  • I have a gaming addiction.....
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #2 on: May 31, 2019, 04:06:54 pm »
Thanks Vigo.

Yeah I plan on running any gaming through my HDTV and the surround sound system but  have it as a laptop for basically everything else.


yotsuya

  • Trade Count: (+21)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 19955
  • Last login:Today at 01:02:22 pm
  • 2014 UCA Winner, 2014, 2015, 2016 ZapCon Winner
    • forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,137636.msg1420628.html
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #3 on: May 31, 2019, 05:56:32 pm »
I know you say you don’t have the room, but if I’m gaming, it’s a new desky over a lappy 100% of the time. You make the room.
***Build what you dig, bro. Build what you dig.***

05SRT4

  • Trade Count: (+5)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 1092
  • Last login:Yesterday at 08:04:24 pm
  • Check out my Pow Pow
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #4 on: May 31, 2019, 08:12:10 pm »
I know you say you don’t have the room, but if I’m gaming, it’s a new desky over a lappy 100% of the time. You make the room.

+1 twice the performance, half the cost.

fallacy

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 966
  • Last login:March 23, 2024, 12:27:45 am
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #5 on: May 31, 2019, 10:33:02 pm »
I don’t believe in gaming laptops, to much extra cost, fan nose and bulk. The one you linked I would hardly call a gaming laptop unless your idea of gaming is some xbox 360 power 30 FPS for most games, none VR compliant. If you want a laptop for travel I would get a thinner and lighter one with a touch screen.

Howard_Casto

  • Idiot Police
  • Trade Count: (+1)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 19399
  • Last login:March 16, 2024, 05:59:16 pm
  • Your Post's Soul is MINE!!! .......Again??
    • The Dragon King
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #6 on: June 01, 2019, 01:02:11 am »
I know you say you don’t have the room, but if I’m gaming, it’s a new desky over a lappy 100% of the time. You make the room.

+1 twice the performance, half the cost.

+2  Also when it starts getting old you can actually upgrade the video card, add ram, ect instead of buying a whole new machine.  Laptops kind of suck for gaming because once they are outdated there isn't much you can do. 

Titchgamer

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4222
  • Last login:December 17, 2023, 08:05:48 am
  • I have a gaming addiction.....
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #7 on: June 01, 2019, 02:23:54 am »
Yeah I know a PC would be better but I literally have nowhere to put a desk for a rig.

Titchgamer

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4222
  • Last login:December 17, 2023, 08:05:48 am
  • I have a gaming addiction.....
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #8 on: June 02, 2019, 04:45:56 am »
I have done a bit of reading up on the new processors and GFX chips (man shits changed allot in the last 10-15 years!)

So it seems the suggested setup is a i5/7 gen 8 H series CPU backed up by a GeForce GTX GPU and if I go for a 1060 or higher they are also VR compatible.
Though tbh I am not likely to be going down the VR route with it and probably wont need that level of power for what I plan on doing with it but its nice to have a little extra right??

So I am thinking of going for something like this which is a little more than I was looking to fork out originally but it is what it is.
https://ao.com/product/fx705gmew019t-asus-laptop-black-63447-251.aspx

The biggest dip on that seems to be the RAM but otherwise seems pretty decent price and the RAM is easy to upgrade at a later date if I really need to.

Any other thoughts or suggestions other than get a PC?
Which I probably will once I have a bigger house and some more cabinets but thats a dream away atm.....

BadMouth

  • Trade Count: (+6)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 9226
  • Last login:March 25, 2024, 08:10:48 pm
  • ...
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #9 on: June 02, 2019, 09:03:31 am »
I have an 8 year old i7 Alienware M14x (nvidia 550m). 
Mobo was bad out of the box and went back under warranty.
Entire thing needs to be disassembled to replace cmos battery.
A windows update made the graphics card fan run full blast constantly for a few years before up update finally fixed it.
(I also had an alienware alpha die twice.  Once under warranty and once after.)
The laptop is still going and still pretty snappy after an SSD upgrade and maxing out RAM, but I've had it apart 3 or 4 times to fix things or replace the cmos battery.
Circa MAME v140, it could run Ridge Racer full speed as long as only one screen was active.  (would choke if displayed on laptop display and over hdmi simultaneously)
It's been my main PC and the most powerful PC in my house until I built a new desktop last year to rip blurays.

So my advice is...don't buy an Alienware, but do buy the most kick ass processor you can afford because it will stay usable for more years into the future.
You can upgrade RAM after the sting of the original purchase wears off.  I'd probably get a Lenovo if buying today.

Wait for some kind of sale or coupon code.  The original sticker price of my Alienware was over $2,200, but I was able to get it for around $1,200 by stacking coupon codes.
It was a lot to pay, but it still performs acceptably 8 years later.


EDIT: I haven't shopped for laptops for a while and aren't a big gamer, but the Asus you linked to begin with seems pretty acceptable to me.  SSD for fast bootup, 1TB for storage, 16GB of RAM is plenty.
Not much need to upgrade any of those later.
« Last Edit: June 02, 2019, 09:14:13 am by BadMouth »

pbj

  • Trade Count: (+4)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 10871
  • Last login:Today at 09:00:13 am
  • Obey.
    • The Chris Burke Band
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #10 on: June 02, 2019, 09:29:26 am »
I have a business class Asus that retailed around $1,600 when I got it.  I googled some list of “best windows laptop” and bought the first one that didn’t have “gaming” in the description.  It runs laps around MacBooks we routinely spend $2,500 on.  Anyway, yes, it runs gauntlet legends 100%.


Titchgamer

  • Trade Count: (0)
  • Full Member
  • ***
  • Offline Offline
  • Posts: 4222
  • Last login:December 17, 2023, 08:05:48 am
  • I have a gaming addiction.....
Re: I need a new laptop - What the hell do I get?
« Reply #11 on: June 02, 2019, 11:28:24 am »
Yeah I have been searching via spec rather than “gaming” now I have a rough spec in mind.

Its much easier once you have some idea what you are looking for!!