Inspiron 9400 Games??

applehunter

If the laptop has only a 128mb shared graphics card will it be able to play the latest games?

It has 1024mb RAM and Intel Centrino 1.66 duo core processor.

I would be mostly intested in Pro Evolution and maybe Call of Duty etc.

KdjaCL

What card is in it?

Intel Nvidia Ati?


kdjac

applehunter

Intel® GMA 950 shared graphics memory up to 128MB

KdjaCL

Your buggered


Pes5 will run well 800*600 low to medium, Call fo Duty 1 will run okish its fairly old game using the quake engine. So try get a driver off the intel ste with opengl.

As far as new games go you will struggle mainly due to the shader supports or lack of in your card.


kdjac

applehunter

Well I havent bought it yet so what do you recommend.

Is there any laptop of a reasonable price(c.€1,500) that will play games?

KdjaCL

Select the 9400 and remove 3 year warranty option leave it at one year takes 300 off pirce and you wont need it, add the ATI x1400 graphics card.

Worked out at €1562



That would do nicely. You be up to high on some games and medium on anything thats either not out or Oblivion.


kdjac

TempestSabre

KdjaC wrote:

Select the 9400 and remove 3 year warranty option...

Ummm I dunno about that. Fixing anything on a lappy is very expensive.

RichyX

TempestSabre wrote:

Ummm I dunno about that. Fixing anything on a lappy is very expensive.

If things are gonna go wrong they'll usually do so within the first few months. Not many people I know have bothered with the 3 year warranty, I didn't when I bought my Inspiron 6000 from Dell earlier this year.

TempestSabre

RichyX wrote:

If things are gonna go wrong they'll usually do so within the first few months. Not many people I know have bothered with the 3 year warranty, I didn't when I bought my Inspiron 6000 from Dell earlier this year.

We see a lot of broken laptops at work. Most of them are uneconomical to repair once out of warranty.

TempestSabre

applehunter wrote:

Well I havent bought it yet so what do you recommend.

Is there any laptop of a reasonable price(c.€1,500) that will play games?

If I were you consider building a cheap PC for gaming and cheap laptop for other use. It would be cheaper then a gaming laptop. However sometimes you just need it in a laptop format. Keep any eye on the Dell outlet store and make sure you get something with good gfx card. Cheapest one at the moment is a Inspiron XPS Generation 2 with a 6800 ULTRA and its EUR 1,764.00 + VAT & DEL. So not in your budget.

http://outlet.dell.com/Emea_Dfo/EuDispatcher?country=IRL&target=InventoryPage&lob_constraint=DIM

I actually think Dells have gone a pit pricey at the moment. You can buy Sonys for about the same and I think the Sony's are better. Check out Peats site. You can get a Sony with a x600 or Go6400 for around your budget. That will struggle with the newest games but you would be able to play HL2 at medium settings.

http://www.peats.com/cgi-bin/shop/db.cgi?view=1&id=433&type=5&path=14x164

Keep an eye on the forsale forum.
http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2054911483

B00MSTICK

Glynf may still have a 6800 Ultra for sale that im 99% sure will fit into a 9400. He was looking for €100 IIRC.

Irishpimpdude

B00MSTICK wrote:

Glynf may still have a 6800 Ultra for sale that im 99% sure will fit into a 9400. He was looking for €100 IIRC.

will it fit into a 1300?? is there a point in putting it into a 1300? is it a hard job? hehe i know lots a questions as this is my first laptop... i will be running 1.5ghz Celeron M and 768mb ram will i be able to play games like cod and stuff on high?

TerrorFirmer

Irishpimpdude wrote:

will it fit into a 1300?? is there a point in putting it into a 1300? is it a hard job? hehe i know lots a questions as this is my first laptop... i will be running 1.5ghz Celeron M and 768mb ram will i be able to play games like cod and stuff on high?

It won't fit and even if it did the 1.5 Celeron M will not be able to run any newer games on high. It would probably run things like CS Source okay-ish but for processor intensive games like CoD2 and Battlefield etc it'd be extremely weak, if they'd work at all...

Irishpimpdude

HavoK wrote:

It won't fit and even if it did the 1.5 Celeron M will not be able to run any newer games on high. It would probably run things like CS Source okay-ish but for processor intensive games like CoD2 and Battlefield etc it'd be extremely weak, if they'd work at all...

Ok thanks for the info,and i would only wanna play the like of Cod 1 and MOHAA and things like vice city.. just stuff to play while on the go, will i be able to play these games on the Intel GMA 900?

TerrorFirmer

Irishpimpdude wrote:

Ok thanks for the info,and i would only wanna play the like of Cod 1 and MOHAA and things like vice city.. just stuff to play while on the go, will i be able to play these games on the Intel GMA 900?

Integrated graphics are fine for old games like that and you should be able run them at high res with all options on no problems. Just make sure you have at least 512mb of memory as it'll eat into your memory to make up what it needs, although I'd imagine for CoD and MOH:AA it won't take more then 64mb. But if you have 768mb of Ram, should be perfectly fine.

Irishpimpdude

Good thanks for your help (will bf2 run on it?) haha only joking.. ah well i only wanna play old games really...

TempestSabre

HavoK wrote:

Integrated graphics are fine for old games like that and you should be able run them at high res with all options on no problems. Just make sure you have at least 512mb of memory as it'll eat into your memory to make up what it needs, although I'd imagine for CoD and MOH:AA it won't take more then 64mb. But if you have 768mb of Ram, should be perfectly fine.

I have my doubts. Those games just barely run on my fx5600 which is better than an onboard gfx. But I don't have first hand experience of the Intel GMA 900. Check out the benchmarks in 3D Mark on the web for reviews of machines with that chipset.

TerrorFirmer

TempestSabre wrote:

I have my doubts. Those games just barely run on my fx5600 which is better than an onboard gfx. But I don't have first hand experience of the Intel GMA 900. Check out the benchmarks in 3D Mark on the web for reviews of machines with that chipset.

MoH:AA and to sort of the same extent Call of Duty came out at a time when the Geforce 4, even the MX model, was top stuff. I used to run both games on full with my 64mb G4MX, let alone a 128mb fx5600!

I've also run Call of Duty on an fx5200, and it ran at high res with all options on. Maybe you're thinking of Call of Duty 2?

TempestSabre

The GF4MX was never top stuff, its little better than a GF2MX.

wingnut

I would second that its never a good idea to get a laptop without a 3 year warranty. I deal with hundreds of laptops at work (in a university laptop project) and can say from my experience the majority of problems occur in year 2 and 3, not in the first year. I would NEVER recommend buying a laptop without the 3 years unless you are ok with the possiblity of writing it off in year 2 or 3. You might get away with cliaiming on your insurance but thats iffy.

I would say keep checking the outlet store. In Feb I picked up a brand new 9400, with a 1.83 Duo, a 256MB go 7800, XPS backback, 3 year warranty, XP MCE with remote etc for €1471 inc vat.. so you just gotta keep your eyes open!!

TerrorFirmer

TempestSabre wrote:

The GF4MX was never top stuff, its little better than a GF2MX.

I meant when it was first released it could run the then current games at high res advanced with options on when I said that - not that it was literally king of the gfx world

TempestSabre

HavoK wrote:

I meant when it was first released it could run the then current games at high res advanced with options on when I said that - not that it was literally king of the gfx world

I don't remember that. I had a GF2MX and GF4MX and I thought they struggled with about everything. But maybe I'm thinking of another card. However after doing some reading its seems that the GMA900 is about on a par with a fx5200. In which you are write COD should play fine on it. But something like a X600, x700, Go6400, Go7400 would be much better if you were thinking of doing any gaming.


http://www.notebookdiscussions.com//showthread.php?t=454
http://www.notebookdiscussions.com/showthread.php?t=437

Irishpimpdude

Well i could play almost anything on my fx5200... could play bf2 fine and everthing but on low...

glynf

B00MSTICK wrote:

Glynf may still have a 6800 Ultra for sale that im 99% sure will fit into a 9400. He was looking for €100 IIRC.

'fraid not, sold long ago. To op, give it a a few weeks as the go7900/GTX is about to be released, this should drop the demand & price for cards like the 7800/GTX. One of these will future proof you games wise for a while.

TerrorFirmer

TempestSabre wrote:

I don't remember that. I had a GF2MX and GF4MX and I thought they struggled with about everything. But maybe I'm thinking of another card. However after doing some reading its seems that the GMA900 is about on a par with a fx5200. In which you are write COD should play fine on it. But something like a X600, x700, Go6400, Go7400 would be much better if you were thinking of doing any gaming.


http://www.notebookdiscussions.com//showthread.php?t=454
http://www.notebookdiscussions.com/showthread.php?t=437

I think you must be - I remember the first games I got for my new system which had the mx model G4 were Soldier of Fortune 2 and Battlefield 1942 (which were new at the time)- all three ran at high res with all options on. I think the very last game I played on it before it was sent to retirement was Call of Duty actually...and that ran also on 1024x960 with all options on.

Anyway - the real argument here was that somebody said Call of Duty and Medal of Honor barely run on an fx5600 - which I pointed out was misinformed!

TempestSabre

HavoK wrote:

...
Anyway - the real argument here was that somebody said Call of Duty and Medal of Honor barely run on an fx5600 - which I pointed out was misinformed!

That was me, but I was talking about my lappy which is 1280x1024.