Going to buy a laptop for KSP. My price limit is about $500. Help please?

[sokid2k]

Title pretty much says it all. Im willing to go over like $20-30 if its really worth it.

[Whackjob]

You'll want more processor than graphics card powah. Lemmie do some diggin' for ya.

#EDIT:

Sighted at tigerdirect.com - HP ProBook 4540s Notebook PC - 3rd generation Intel Core i5-3320M 2.6GHz, 8GB DDR3, 500GB HDD, DVDRW, 1GB AMD Radeon HD 7650M, 15.6" Display, Windows 7 Pro 64-bit / Windows 8 Pro 64-bit (C9K41UT) - $499

Sighted at newegg.com - Lenovo G500 (59373039) Notebook Intel Core i5 3230M(2.60GHz) 15.6" 4GB Memory DDR3 1600 500GB HDD 5400rpm DVD±R/RW Intel HD Graphics 4000 - $479

#EDIT2: Tigerdirect one looks better to me.

Edited July 14, 2013 by Whackjob

[sokid2k]

You'll want more processor than graphics card powah. Lemmie do some diggin' for ya.

Thank you

[trippytripp]

Are you going to play other games aswell? I have a list of parts somewhere, and it's a budget gaming desktop for about $500.

[JakeGrey]

Unless you've got your heart set on playing KSP on the crapper or something, buy a desktop instead. You'll get way more bang for your buck and it won't take three hours of your life to pop the case open and blow the dust bunnies out.

[sokid2k]

Are you going to play other games aswell? I have a list of parts somewhere, and it's a budget gaming desktop for about $500.

No, only KSP

[sokid2k]

You'll want more processor than graphics card powah. Lemmie do some diggin' for ya.

#EDIT:

Sighted at tigerdirect.com - HP ProBook 4540s Notebook PC - 3rd generation Intel Core i5-3320M 2.6GHz, 8GB DDR3, 500GB HDD, DVDRW, 1GB AMD Radeon HD 7650M, 15.6" Display, Windows 7 Pro 64-bit / Windows 8 Pro 64-bit (C9K41UT) - $499

Sighted at newegg.com - Lenovo G500 (59373039) Notebook Intel Core i5 3230M(2.60GHz) 15.6" 4GB Memory DDR3 1600 500GB HDD 5400rpm DVD±R/RW Intel HD Graphics 4000 - $479

#EDIT2: Tigerdirect one looks better to me.

Any desktops you could recommend?

[ouion]

its from walmart and its cheap

a quad core with DDR3 ram

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Refurbished-HP-Midnight-Black-17.3-Envy-dv7-7223cl-Laptop-PC-with-AMD-Quad-Core-A8-4500M-Accelerated-Processor-and-Windows-8-Operating-System/23993762

[Whackjob]

Suddenly busy at office... will research desktop when time avail

[ThePsuedoMonkey]

Here's a desktop which PassMark puts its CPU at about 3x better than my laptop (and comparable to that ProBook) for $400: 3.2GHz A8-5500, 4GB DDR3, 1TB HDD, Radeon HD7560D, USB keyboard/mouse, Win8 - $370 after rebate

...and the most reasonable HDMI monitor I found 22", 1080p, 5ms - $138, which seems like a ripoff considering I paid less than that for my old 22" monitor five years ago.

I tried building one from components, but it came up to $370 before I picked a mainboard/CPU/GPU combo and I'm not sure that leaves enough wiggle room . Honestly, I'd recommend that HP ProBook from TigerDirect if you can get it for $500.

[Eleven]

I have an even cheaper version of that Lenovo, i3 processor, virtually everything else is the same though. I upgraded to 8gigs of ram, installed Linux and I run the 64bit client. KSP is just fine on it.

[Whackjob]

Desktop: Lenovo H520s Desktop PC - 3rd generation Intel Core i5-3330 3.0GHz, 4GB DDR3, 1TB HDD, DVDRW, Windows 8 64-bit (57311365) $499.97, or 50 bucks less if you take a refurbished system.

[Landge]

Personally I'd stay away from any desktop or laptop with integrated graphics. They pretty much suck at gaming. Save your $500 and get a decent DIY desktop instead with dedicated graphics.

If your dead set on getting a gaming laptop get one with at least a 17" screen and dedicated graphics.

Edited July 15, 2013 by Landge

[Brabbit1987]

Personally I'd stay away from any desktop or laptop with integrated graphics. They pretty much suck at gaming. Save your $500 and get a decent DIY desktop instead with dedicated graphics.

If your dead set on getting a gaming laptop get one with at least a 17" screen and dedicated graphics.

You would be entirely wrong if you are talking about AMDs line of APUs. They work perfectly fine for gaming, as long as what your looking for isn't to play all games at maxed out settings.

[Panichio]

Got one for you for $1 dollar less than your budget! It's the one I'm getting.

http://www.costco.com/Acer-Aspire-V3-Laptop%2c-AMD-Quad-Core-A10-4600M-2.3Ghz.product.100056398.html

I don't know if Costco ships to Duna, though.

[lammatt]

you want a higher clock freq CPU and an nVIDIA GPU.

you know why?

cos the PhyX engines sucks.

it supports nVIDIA GPU only and DOESNT support CPU multi-threading

(just to QQ a bit... unity should really dump PhyX and get Hovak instead)

[FishCraftLabs]

If you just want something to play games on, don't get a laptop. You spend more and get less. Unless you really want or need the mobility a laptop offers, there's no reason to impose those limitations on yourself.

Instead, get a desktop. KSP needs a fast CPU, and seems to scale best with single threaded performance. That means you want an Intel processor. Since you don't seem to care about other games, you could probably get away with the integrated GPU on Haswell. This means you can get the top of the line CPU, even on your restricted budget.

Spend $200 on the CPU, $80 on the motherboard, $40 on the memory, $100 on a HDD, $40 on a PSU and $25 on a case will get you a pretty nice computer, starring the Intel Core i5-4570, and fit within your budget. Of course, you have to build it yourself, and Windows is going to cost you another $60-$80 unless you can get a copy cheaper (students can often get it cheap or free through their university).

[Leonov]

Maybe come join us on the KSP computer Building Megathread? We can help you.

Here is a rig for the gamer who wants bang for buck, $21 out of your budget but if you can save a little more up for a rig you will not be dissapointed.

[KasperVld]

I don't see a graphics cards in that rig, Leonov