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my dad's graduation gift to me is a $1500 laptop that I get to trick out as much as possible. I want it for a gaming laptop. the problem is, I no nothing about computer hardware. any suggestions? (oh, and it has to be a Dell) !techponies
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 19:56:10 UTC from web-
@nightwillow I managed to get a nice 2.5 gigahertz laptop for $600, you just have to look around for a little while and you'll find one/
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 19:57:44 UTC from web-
@nvrrmbr well we're doing the first run-through of the tricking-out tonight, and I need some advice. I don't know squat about processors, RAM, etc, so I don't know what's good and what's bad
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 19:58:54 UTC from web
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@nightwillow Why does it have to be a Dell? Not much else to decide then.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 19:58:20 UTC from web-
@starshine my dad is a very loyal Dell customer. he has never had a problem with their customer service, and their replacement policy is top-notch.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:00:07 UTC from web-
@nightwillow Fair enough. I've heard the Alienware laptops are good. Other than that, I don't know much about laptop buying. @scribus is right, avoid integrated graphics like the plague, max out the RAM and get as fast a HDD as you can find. You can always buy a spare drive later on if you start running low on space.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:03:46 UTC from web-
@starshine and can you please explain to me why i don't want an integrated graphics drive?
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:04:34 UTC from web-
@nightwillow They're really slow, and leech off your system RAM instead of having their own.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:06:27 UTC from web-
@starshine and what is the alternative to having an integrated graphics card?
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:07:42 UTC from web-
@nightwillow The opposite of integrated would be dedicated.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:09:40 UTC from web-
@starshine and explain to me what that is
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:10:12 UTC from web-
@nightwillow Integrated = soldered onto the motherboard. Dedicated = the video card is a separate entity. Downside is they cost more, and use a bit more power, but it's worth it because it runs a lot faster.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:15:26 UTC from web-
@starshine i'll ask my dad about it. he knows my needs and wants better. I
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:16:35 UTC from web-
@nightwillow 'm off for that first pass at tricking out the lappy!
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:16:53 UTC from web-
@nightwillow first pass, specs are pretty badass. nothing final yet, but what we have now is actually better than my dad's, which can run Starcraft 2 with all the sliders cranked up at ~70 fps!
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 21:26:00 UTC from web-
@nightwillow Aww yeah - feel the raw power XD
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 21:27:52 UTC from web
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@nightwillow If at all possible, avoid an integrated graphics card, go for more than default RAM, and a higher RPM hard drive as opposed to more GB. That's my off-the-cuff $0.02, anyway.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 19:59:04 UTC from web-
@scribus duly noted.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:00:21 UTC from web
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@nightwillow oh, and keep in mind, I'm not going to be trying to run freaking Crysis 2 on this. though that would be nice.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:08:28 UTC from web-
@nightwillow I don't think that there's a computer that exists that can actually fully run Crysis 2.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:09:24 UTC from web
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@nightwillow oh, and did I mention that he presented the gift to me in the form of C++ code that I had to manually step through (I don't know C++, just Java. however, that is soon going to change.)
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:55:41 UTC from web-
@nightwillow *shudder* I had a bad time with Java years ago... Anyway, that's irrelevant. Your dad has an amazingly geeky sense of humor.
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@scribus trust me, you have no idea.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:58:01 UTC from web
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@nightwillow C++ is like Java without the annoying verbosity and pedantic exception-handling, but with really annoying memory management to make up for it.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:58:17 UTC from web-
@starshine so i've heard. Automatic Garbage Collection ftw! and a fun fact: Java was written in C++
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 20:59:49 UTC from web-
@nightwillow What I like: C (and not C++!), linked with Boehm's garbage collector, and do-it-yourself objects. I also like void *.
Thursday, 02-Jun-11 21:01:43 UTC from web
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