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Laptop GPU for WOW

kmufc77

kmufc77

kmufc77

Soldato
Joined
15 Jul 2007
Posts
4,953
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South West
Hi im looking at getting a laptop to play WOW on.
my current laptop only gets 11fps,the laptop im looking at has a 512MB DDR3 ATi RADEON HD 4650,screen res of 1366 X 768 will this be ok?.
Do i want a higher model gpu?,rest of the specs are fine processor ,ram etc.
 
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Arterion said:
Should be fine, don't expect to be able to play it maxxed out comfortably though.
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so in other words will i have to have settings on low to get a half decent frame rate,if so i wont bother ordering.
Are the Alienware laptops really the only machines that can max out wow?
Laptop i have chosen is cutomized and not some crappy machine from the purple shop ppl so i was expecting a half decent machine for nearly £700 to play wow comfortably

Would this be any better 1GB Nvidia® GeForce® GT 230M Graphic but the screen res will be 1680 x 945??
 
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That's not even remotely what I said, I'm not saying you'll have to cripple it, I'm just saying highest shadow, ground clutter and draw distance settings will make it faulter a bit. Not so much that I'd rule out getting it. Find a review with some benches.
 
Ideally you should make sure you get a fast CPU as well. I recall people said that WOW is CPU dependant as much as GPU dependant (or may be even more so). Someone said that at a big group raid, dropping the quality of the graphic and resolution down to 1024x768 barely increase the frame rate at all and the guy got a GTX260 I think.
 
Marine-RX179 said:
Ideally you should make sure you get a fast CPU as well. I recall people said that WOW is CPU dependant as much as GPU dependant (or may be even more so). Someone said that at a big group raid, dropping the quality of the graphic and resolution down to 1024x768 barely increase the frame rate at all and the guy got a GTX260 I think.
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yeah the cpu would be a intel® Core™2 Duo Mobile T6600 (2.20GHz) with 4gb ram
 
That definitely was the case, less so these days since the graphical upgrades which came wtih WotLK (I think) but it's still a big factor, so if youre running a T6600 with 4 gig of ram you're off to a good start...
 
This place is good fora rough guide on how well mobile gpu's compare.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-ATI-Mobility-Radeon-HD-4650.13883.0.html

The 4650 I'd suggest is slightly faster than the 230m, especially given the higher res.
That said - neither of them are that great, look for a 280m for the best notebook performance.

Be wary of the model numbers and names - not really the place for discussing this, however both manufacturers have re-branded old tech with new series model numbers.

The list on the right on the link given, is a pretty good guide - best at the top.. poorest performing at the bottom.
 
In this case 4650 = 4650.

I run games like Left 4 dead 2 just fine at 1366x768 on my 4650.

There are 3 versions:

Worst
DDR2
DDR3
GDDR3
Best

I have the DDR2 version that comes in at 550/500. I have it running at 760/625 and I am very happy with it.

There are a few machines coming out with the 5650 which would be a better choice however.
 
Meaker said:
In this case 4650 = 4650.

I run games like Left 4 dead 2 just fine at 1366x768 on my 4650.

There are 3 versions:

Worst
DDR2
DDR3
GDDR3
Best

I have the DDR2 version that comes in at 550/500. I have it running at 760/625 and I am very happy with it.

There are a few machines coming out with the 5650 which would be a better choice however.
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The 4650 spec im looking at is GDDR3
 
Blackbadger said:
This place is good fora rough guide on how well mobile gpu's compare.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-ATI-Mobility-Radeon-HD-4650.13883.0.html

The 4650 I'd suggest is slightly faster than the 230m, especially given the higher res.
That said - neither of them are that great, look for a 280m for the best notebook performance.

Be wary of the model numbers and names - not really the place for discussing this, however both manufacturers have re-branded old tech with new series model numbers.

The list on the right on the link given, is a pretty good guide - best at the top.. poorest performing at the bottom.
Click to expand...
Hi thanks for the link very helpful,the 280m i would be lucky to find in a laptop that isnt £1500+,which is beyond my budget.
 
I would've thought a GDDR3 4650 mobility would be okay for WoW, but then it's hard to tell since WoW is an MMO and thus has a few complexities in terms of its system requirements.

I think it'd help to tell us what your current laptop is, i.e. what specs it has so that a comparison can be made.
 
i would say dish the hard disk drive and buy a low gb ssd if its only for gaming a 60 gb ssd should be ok for you and they are cheap, much better for laptops take less power and preform much better.
 
Lightnix said:
I would've thought a GDDR3 4650 mobility would be okay for WoW, but then it's hard to tell since WoW is an MMO and thus has a few complexities in terms of its system requirements.

I think it'd help to tell us what your current laptop is, i.e. what specs it has so that a comparison can be made.
Click to expand...
WIN 7 32 Bit
Intel Pentium Dual CPU T2310 1.46MHZ
2.00 GB Ram
1280 X 800/Mobile Intel (R) 965 Express Chipset Family

Wow Is unplayable,9-11 fps with all settings on complete minimum settings
 
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chaosquall said:
i would say dish the hard disk drive and buy a low gb ssd if its only for gaming a 60 gb ssd should be ok for you and they are cheap, much better for laptops take less power and preform much better.
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i dont think a SSD will make any difference if the gpu isnt up to scratch, and the cpu isnt a core 2 duo
These are massive reasons why my current laptop wont play wow half decent i believe,correct me if im wrong someone.
 
Anything like a 4650 or more will be absolutely fine for WoW. My mate's gf runs it with medium settings on a 16 shader 9300m.
 
I think you have the right idea.

Your current cpu and gfx are just not suitable for what you want to use the laptop for.

As others have mentioned a fast core2/i3/i5 cpu coupled with a half decent gfx accelerator and you'll be fine.

SSD's are great, and will make loading times / zoning faster, but at the moment I bet that's the least of your worry's.
 
I think it's pretty much entirely down to the intel 965 chip, it's a piece of poo. The pentium dual core CPU isn't that bad, it's basically a Core 2 (specifically, the T2310 is, I checked, it's capable of 64 bit operation according to Intel.com indicating it's not based on the Core Duo parts) with less cache, although the clock speed is likely a limiting factor.
 
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