How is this spec? (work & gaming)

fat_wife

fat_wife

fat_wife

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21 Oct 2006
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I am a Photographer and I am new to the world of windows laptops. Programs I will mainly be using will be Photoshop CS3, Adobe Lightroom, Noise Ninja and Photomatix.

Baring this in mind, I am also into gaming. Whilst I am looking for a workhorse for my photography, I am also into the option of being able to play games on the laptop too (CSS/TF2 mainly).

Here is the spec:

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor T5470 (1.60 GHz, 800 MHz FSB, 2 MB L2-cache)
Windows Vista® Home Basic - English
15.4" Wide Screen WXGA (1280 x 800) Display
2048MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2x1024)
120GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive
256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT
Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive

Firstly - how would this perform as far as photo processing goes?
Secondly - how would it perform as far as CS:Source/TF2 goes?

Any other recomendations? I'm looking to keep it under £500 :)

Thanks
 
You may want to consider a faster CPU if you're using those sorts of apps. Not to say the 1.6GHz will be slow, but if you're going to be using those a lot, a faster CPU might feel snappier to you.

Only other recommendation would be to increase the display resolution if you can - assuming that's a Dell, you can usually upgrade the resolution to at least 1440x900, which will give you much more room on screen (equivalent to a 17" widescreen display for a desktop PC). 1280x800 might feel quite limited for your usage.
 
Yeah, I thought about this too (there seems to be issues with bleeding on the 1440x900 displays though?). How do you think it will cope with gaming? :)
 
For the titles you've mentioned, quite well I should think. The 8600M GT is a pretty decent notebook graphics chipset, so you should be able to run those games quite well. Might not be so capable for something like Crysis, but anything less demanding should be OK.
 
please can you let me know what laptop you are looking at, I'm trying to find a laptop with an Nvidia 8600 GT for as cheap as possible. If that's under £500 then I'd love to know which one it is :D

I had an amd64 turion 1.9ghz x2 lappy with an 8400GS and the performance in TF2 was not good enough for me. 15fps in places. So I took it back and am looking for a better gpu.

If you clould let me know the make and model of this laptop it would be great :)

Email is in trust :)

Cheers,

G
 
i would also think larger screen 1400x1050 or a 17" display would be suited to photos more than a 1280x800 i find them very small for display editing at events for on site photo printing hence i use a dell 17" for such or take a external monitor.

just another point to think on i guess
 
Id get a better cpu for playing source, the game is cpu dependent and if you want over a 100fps constant that 1.6ghz wont cut it, also css losses some fps running under vista, maybe worth going with xp?
 
would an 8600 give a constant 100fps on source then?

I know my 8400 on a 1.9ghz lappy was no where near :(

One of the reasons I returned it.
 
Just ordered:

Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor T7250 (2.00 GHz, 800 MHz FSB, 2 MB L2-cache)
2048MB 667MHz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM (2x1024)
256MB nVidia® GeForce® 8600M GT
120GB (5400rpm) SATA Hard Drive
Genuine Windows® XP Home Edition - English
Fixed Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Drive
Intel® Pro Wireless 3945 802.11a/b/g Mini-Card

:)
 
£603 delivered - expected delivery date on or before Jan 22nd.

I also went for the 1440x900 w/ True life. Not quite sure how much of a con truelife is, guess I will soon see.
 
Guru said:
would an 8600 give a constant 100fps on source then?

I know my 8400 on a 1.9ghz lappy was no where near :(

One of the reasons I returned it.
Click to expand...

not even the fastest desktop card can keep above 100.

it still dips to 30-40 or so FPS on the best of cards, if your talking worst case scenario.
 
Out of interest, if ordering via the dell website and your order goes into Phase 3: In Production, how long does it usually take from this point till it arrives ?

EDIT: I refreshed the page about 15 minutes later and now it's in Delivery Prep! ;D
 
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