Gaming I've ordered this laptop, good choice?

[DeviousTom]

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/Sea...Sku=S445-170012

So, like the topic title is asking, is this laptop a good choice? I want it for running some of the newest games (mostly Left 4Dead), and it EASSSSSSSSSSSSILY outpowers my old outdated piece of shit http://www.toshiba.ca/web/product.grp?sect...mp;product=4671

I heard a lot of reviews about this laptop, CNET said it was good for the price (and that was for the original price of like 1300 USD, this one is 1000 CAD!).

So is it good? Because its refurbished will I run into any problems? It only has 90 day warranty and to extend it, it cost like 230$ (CAD) for one extra year, was it a bad choice to not extend?

Appreciate the help and reassurance (that I made the right choice). I just posted this right before going to school so I wont be back for another 7-8 hours.

 

[Law]

More than enough for running Left4Dead.

Edit: I recall reading some bad things about Gateway computers on the forums recently though, but if you have a 90 day warrenty that at least gives you some time to see if it'll crap out or not.

 

[DeviousTom]

alright sounds good, i have also found that there are some topics here already about this laptop, but most of the comments are "get a desktop laptops suck" but i already have a good desktop and i want the laptop for portability and for playing over at friends houses and such, anyways i gotta go back to job hunting, need to make some more money.

 

[Lodis]

That laptop won't have any problems with L4D at all on high settings most likely. It will also run other recent titles such as Prototype, Sims 3, Ghost Busters etc.

It will only struggle with GTA IV but that might even run well with some tweaking. The first thing you should do, especially considering the low 90 days warranty of the laptop is to check all of the temps at idle, casual usage and at full load using HWMonitor http://www.cpuid.com/hwmonitor.php

I also recommend you run a torture stress test using Prime95 http://majorgeeks.com/Prime95_d4363.html or Orthos stress test. Also don't forget to update the GPU and Audio Drivers.

The only thing I am not liking is the resolution of that laptops screen, I prefer 1680 X 1050 but that's just my opinion.

 

[sconethief]

This should run most modern games with ease.

 

[DeviousTom]

Alright thanks for the advice, I was also wondering what kind of laptop cooler I should get for this system, since I hear that it reaches some pretty high temperatures and I really want it to last me at least 3 years. I think this laptop already has 4 fans, 1 on the side and three on the bottom, so I think I would need a cooler that would actually be efficient for my laptop.

 

[Forstride]

I'd say go for it. I have a similar Gateway laptop (M-6850FX), and it runs L4D excellently. The one you're thinking of getting is much better than mine, so I'd have nothing to worry about if I were you.

 

[Ferrariman]

Should run just about everything, only I got the feeling they will release a new model...

 

[DeviousTom]

Well i got lucky and i got the version of this laptop were the resolution is 1900x1200 instead of 1440x900, but for some reason I'm having this problem with the fan that's having the fan go on and off every second or two, kinda sounding like the revving of a car. When i run games the fan runs fine, but when im just idle it kind of gets annoying, i don't know if its normal. Also, i've been on it for about 6 hours and the temperature hasn't gone above 60 so i guess that's good, i was pretty much running left 4 dead for 3 hours, trying to mess around with the settings, but here comes the second problem and its that L4D is kind of laggy... I mean I get 100 fps when i face a wall, 40 - 60 when i'm not facing a wall, when theres a few zombies it goes 20-30, and with a horde i actually drop down to 14 fps... Which i think is crazy, and even with lowering almost all the settings to low i barely gain 5 extra frames. I cut down the cpu usage and the processes running, but still no good. Dammit.

 

[Raki]

Well i got lucky and i got the version of this laptop were the resolution is 1900x1200 instead of 1440x900, but for some reason I'm having this problem with the fan that's having the fan go on and off every second or two, kinda sounding like the revving of a car. When i run games the fan runs fine, but when im just idle it kind of gets annoying, i don't know if its normal. Also, i've been on it for about 6 hours and the temperature hasn't gone above 60 so i guess that's good, i was pretty much running left 4 dead for 3 hours, trying to mess around with the settings, but here comes the second problem and its that L4D is kind of laggy... I mean I get 100 fps when i face a wall, 40 - 60 when i'm not facing a wall, when theres a few zombies it goes 20-30, and with a horde i actually drop down to 14 fps... Which i think is crazy, and even with lowering almost all the settings to low i barely gain 5 extra frames. I cut down the cpu usage and the processes running, but still no good. Dammit.

Well you're resolution is quite high, so maybe this is too much for L4D on this GPU? Although I don't think so because the Source Engine isn't a resource hog

 

[DeviousTom]

Well there's one other thing i forgot to mention, one of the first things i did (after having updated windows which took like 30 min), i checked out the norton 360 that came with the laptop, it was a 60 day trial, or 60 days left in the subscription, and i checked the scans and norton said the last scan was run 184 days ago, and upon completing a full system scan i found a trojan and some other virus... Wtf? I thought a refurbished PC would atleast have been reformatted and its OS reinstalled. I can reformat the computer myself so this isn't much of problem but i still have the fan problem, after being on for about 30 minutes it starts to do gay reving noises, i would prefer it if the fan was on for like a minute straight instead of in short 1 second bursts. I'm starting to get the feeling this was a bad refurbish job (is it done by gateway or tigerdirect?).

 

[Lodis]

Update your GPU drivers to the latest versions and then go into Nvidia Control Panel and make sure that Powermizer is enabled, Also check your power profile settings in Windows Control Panel.

I would do a fresh install if I were you. For a good cooler, I recommend the Zalman NC2000

 

[DeviousTom]

Yea I already updated the GPU and turning the power saver to better performance really did help with the gaming performance, it never dropped below 35 even with a massive horde, and it normally ran, with no zombies, at about 80-110 fps. That's one problem down, now I just need to know how to fix the fan going on for a second, off for like 3, and repeat. It's pretty damn annoying, and it kind of scares me 'cause if it is a defect then I just hope it wont cause to much damage to the laptop.

 

[Lodis]

Yea I already updated the GPU and turning the power saver to better performance really did help with the gaming performance, it never dropped below 35 even with a massive horde, and it normally ran, with no zombies, at about 80-110 fps. That's one problem down, now I just need to know how to fix the fan going on for a second, off for like 3, and repeat. It's pretty damn annoying, and it kind of scares me 'cause if it is a defect then I just hope it wont cause to much damage to the laptop.

Post your problem here with exact details and all information about it that you have along with your specs, temperatures, you are very likely to get some good ideas if you do:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/forumdisplay.php?f=26

 

[playallday]

Whoa, that looks like a nice laptop.

How much did it cost?

 

[da_head]

ok now you're just showing off. lmao

 

[DeviousTom]

With the shipping costs and taxes, I payed $1024 CAD. I didn't pay for the extra 250$ extended 1 year warranty, and shipping was only 6$, got here in two days. Haven't fixed the fan problem (if it even is a problem) but a friend said it was fine.

 

[DSGamer64]

I think I saw it for like 700 bucks.

 

[DeviousTom]

Sorry to bump this topic back up, but it seems as though my hard drive isn't the one that i was supposed to get. For the 7805u, it comes with a Western Digital Black Scorpio 7200rpm 320gb, but I got the Hitach Travelstar 7K320, I don't think this is normal, maybe someone before the refurb switched it out or TigerDirect did, either way I still think its a bad refurb for tiger direct not noticing.

 

[playallday]

Send them a really mad email. Always works to get me something.