using a laptop for PJ64

[Psythik]

I've actually found another laptop that fits my budget it's a COMPAQ:

Intel(R) Pentium(R) M Processor 760 (2.0 GHz)
FREE Upgrade to 15.4" WXGA BrightView Widescreen!
128MB ATI MOBILITY(TM) RADEON(R) X700
512MB DDR2 SDRAM (1x512MB)
80 GB 5400 RPM Hard Drive
DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive

My budget is $1350 area, this laptop is perfect, but I've never used a COMPAQ before.

That's actually a pretty good deal there. The video card is nice too. Now might I ask you what the model number of that laptop is; I can't seem to find one with those specs on the Compaq website...?


/edit

I think I found the laptop you're talking about; it's the V4000T, right? After playing around with configurations, I came up with this:

Intel(R) Pentium(R) M Processor 760 (2.0 GHz)
FREE Upgrade to 15.4" WXGA BrightView Widescreen
128MB ATI MOBILITY(TM) RADEON(R) X700
1.0GB DDR2 SDRAM (2x512MB)
80 GB 5400 RPM Hard Drive
DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive
12 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

Price: $1,398

Now if you didn't mind sacrficing battery power and go with the 6 cell instead, you could have a laptop with a gig of RAM and still stay within your budget.

 

[rmarier83]

That's right, I was looking at the V4000T model.
For me getting a laptop is all about portability, so I am staying with the 12 cell battery, I can always upgrade memory later.
I actually have only 512 MB on my desktop computer and I can run PJ64 w/ the most resource hogging games with no problems.

 

[Doomulation]

Laptops don't have battery power anyway...
It usually runs 1 - 6 hours, depending on use. The battery power listed, to my experience, is the MAXIMUM battery life you can get out of your laptop--and that's when it's idle.

 

[Psythik]

Very true. On my laptop I can only get about 45 minutes of playtime with a game or DVD; but then again my lappy has a clunky old 3.4GHz P4.

 

[rmarier83]

I have now got that laptop I was talking about

I purchased the compaq laptop two weeks ago and have been using it for a while. Here's my specs a long with a review.

:matrix: Compaq Presario V4000T CTO
- Microsoft(R) Windows(R) XP Home Edition with SP2
- Intel(R) Pentium(R) M Processor 760 (2.0 GHz)
- 15.4" WXGA BrightView Widescreen (1280x800)
- 128MB ATI MOBILITY(TM) RADEON(R) X700
- 512MB DDR2 SDRAM (1x512MB)
- 40 GB 4200 RPM Hard Drive
- DVD/CD-RW Combo Drive
- FREE Upgrade to Intel(R) PRO/Wireless 2200BG WLAN!
- 12 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

I played games on my laptop from a full charge down to nothing and got almost 4 hours of battery life.

I actually have a few questions:
1. How do you underclock the CPU and can you do the same for the GPU?
-a link to a guide of sorts would be helpful.
2. I'm curious, if upgrading my hard drive to a faster spinning RPM, would seriously impact my battery life, or is that only when I'm constantly accessing the hard drive; like when burning a CD.

 

[Dj Noop]

i'd avoid compaq, i've just always had bad experiences with it and the harddrives for them are usually noisy. hps are great, dell i believe is best if you have the money for a good one from them, and toshiba's aren't quite as customizable. some laptops and computers can't be under/overclocked because the company locks that stuff out, some can be, do research on your computer. faster harddrives take more power, but i'd suggest getting them, they do a world of good.

 

[revl8er]

You could have got a custom laptop from a ibuypower for around that price with a athlon 3000, 1gig of ram, 80gig hd, 128mb ati radeon 9700, windows xp home sp2, and wireless card.

 

[Blacklord]

About the intel PRO wireless, i suggest u wactch out becouse if u run too many servers or draw too much bandwith your computer will show the BSD(blue screen of death) and automatically restart. I sugest u change it if u can to anything just not that card! Trust me i have one too.

 

[Clements]

I actually have a few questions:
1. How do you underclock the CPU and can you do the same for the GPU?
-a link to a guide of sorts would be helpful.

This should happen automatically when you unplug the laptop from the mains. To check, use CPU-Z and you'll see that the multiplier has lowered. As you are using ATi like me, open the Catalyst options and check the PowerPlay option to save some battery life here.

If you don't know already, you do not have to install graphics drivers from Compaq, you can install the latest drivers direct from ATi - which is what I am doing to maximise my performance and compatibility with games and graphics plugins. Uninstall the old drivers completely, and install the latest mobility drivers. The latest CCC version (requires .Net Framework) is available below:

http://www.ati.com/online/mobilecatalyst/

2. I'm curious, if upgrading my hard drive to a faster spinning RPM, would seriously impact my battery life, or is that only when I'm constantly accessing the hard drive; like when burning a CD.

Burning a CD would be a consuming action, as you are accessing the HD and DVD/CD drive. I would conduct such opperations with the laptop plugged in. The faster spinning hard drive would probably have an impact on battery life, but I shouldn't think much of an impact.

You could have got a custom laptop from a ibuypower for around that price with a athlon 3000, 1gig of ram, 80gig hd, 128mb ati radeon 9700, windows xp home sp2, and wireless card.

Would have been a little slower too, and less battery life.

 

[Doomulation]

Would have been a little slower too, and less battery life.

Now THAT I very much doubt. Not only is the processor faster, but it has more ram as well. Lower battery life, probably yes... but certainly not slower. What makes you think that?

 

[Clements]

Now THAT I very much doubt. Not only is the processor faster...

Prove it then. A P-M @2.0GHz like rmarier83's would easily outperform it. The RAM will not affect benchmarks very much, 512MB is sufficient for most things.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2382

Athlon64 3000+ wins: 12
P-M 2.0GHz wins: 20
(the overclocking tests are repeats of previous tests so are not included in the no. above)

The fact is, the P-M overall is faster, I suggest you read a review to enlighten yourself. The P-M 2.0Ghz even defeats a 4000+ in some tests, and when the 3000+ wins, its usually by a small amount and is one above the P-M, and when the P-M wins, it's normally above the 3200+ or 3400+. That's why Intel's new CPUs for desktop are all P-M derivatives.

Of course, if that was an AthlonXP-M 3000+, then the P-M @ about 1.6GHz would be enough to outperform it in every test.

The battery life of a P-M based system would also be about double the 3000+, so 4 hours instead of 2. A X700 is faster than a 9700 and uses less power and has a better feature set.

So, that other laptop (desktop replacement I should say) is not even worth considering at the same price. Could not reccommend a desktop processor in a laptop.

 

[thepreserver]

I have been curious with this statement. How long does the average laptop screen last before it gives out? Someone told me that flat screens only last about 2 years compared to the tube ones, which last longer than 5 years (meaning the desktop counterpart), and I wanted to know if it was true about lasting 2 years.

 

[Clements]

LCD monitors last longer than CRT monitors. I've seen 50% longer with some sources (Link)

You could say though that LCD technology is constantly improving, so LCD screens will become dated very quickly and so may need replacing. The two-year thing sounds false, no evidence I've seen backs that up.

 

[thepreserver]

Ok, thanks for the reply. That seems convincing and I might look into getting the laptop. Ive had my computer since 1999 and am looking foward to a laptop that will bring me an experience of mobility and duration.

 

[Azumah]

One thing you might want to check on is the LCD response time. My friend bought a $1200 Toshiba a few months back and its LCD lags just as much as the one on my 5-year-old laptop!

It's not a total deal-breaker, but it's nowhere near a CRT.

 

[Doomulation]

Prove it then. A P-M @2.0GHz like rmarier83's would easily outperform it.

I shrug at the topic of P-M vs Athlon. I don't know much about it...

512MB is sufficient for most things.

It is not. 1024 mb minimum - otherwise it will hog the computer down.

A X700 is faster than a 9700 and uses less power and has a better feature set.

Let's not speak of the video card... it is apparent that mobile processors and cards are better than their desktop counterparts...

So, that other laptop (desktop replacement I should say) is not even worth considering at the same price. Could not reccommend a desktop processor in a laptop.

Ah, but you can customize other parts in the laptop at that site. I found a very pleasing laptop put together. 7200 rpm drive and 1024 mb ram MINIMUM for ANY laptop AND desktop - that is a statement I know. This stupid laptop
I'm writing this message from boggles down and becomes crippingly slow if you just burn a cd or dvd with nero.
And guess what - it has 512 mb memory and a slow HD.

 

[Clements]

It is not. 1024 mb minimum - otherwise it will hog the computer down.

I have been on sites where they state 2GB minimum based on the fact the BF2 game needs it. In actual fact, 512MB would be more than enough for a smooth operation most of the time. 1GB just typically gives you 700MB to play with instead of 300MB or so if you take away OS overhead.

It's HARDLY a requirement to have 1GB, just turn off the XP visual styles and adjust the performance options in the System Control Panel to save yourself a lot memory. Anyway, the guy said he was going to update the RAM anyway and save some money. In my experience, I ran XP well on 256MB of RAM. Nowadays both my rigs have 1GB because it's cheap.

Let's not speak of the video card... it is apparent that mobile processors and cards are better than their desktop counterparts...

If you are implying that the R9700 is a desktop chip, both are mobility chips. The Futuremark ORB shows the X700 is faster. Might I add it's also highly overclockable. I got over 400MHz on the core on these things, and over 800MHz on the memory.

Desktop chips are faster than their mobile counterparts by about 10%.

 

[Agozer]

I agree, having 1GB is hardly minimum. Sure, it won't be too long when it is, but not yet.

 

[Doomulation]

I have been on sites where they state 2GB minimum based on the fact the BF2 game needs it. In actual fact, 512MB would be more than enough for a smooth operation most of the time. 1GB just typically gives you 700MB to play with instead of 300MB or so if you take away OS overhead.

It's HARDLY a requirement to have 1GB, just turn off the XP visual styles and adjust the performance options in the System Control Panel to save yourself a lot memory. Anyway, the guy said he was going to update the RAM anyway and save some money. In my experience, I ran XP well on 256MB of RAM. Nowadays both my rigs have 1GB because it's cheap.

I insist it is necessary. When you run memory hungry applications such as the bittorrent client bitcomet, you'll appreciate that extra memory.

If you are implying that the R9700 is a desktop chip, both are mobility chips. The Futuremark ORB shows the X700 is faster. Might I add it's also highly overclockable. I got over 400MHz on the core on these things, and over 800MHz on the memory.

Desktop chips are faster than their mobile counterparts by about 10%.

Well, whatever you say, really... I don't know much about that area and I stand corrected.

 

[Clements]

I insist it is necessary. When you run memory hungry applications such as the bittorrent client bitcomet, you'll appreciate that extra memory.

1GB is certainly a benefit over 512MB when using certain memory hugging programs, but is not a requirement to run the OS. There are almost always less memory hungry alternatives. You can use utorrent which has a tiny memory footprint. 1GB is your reccommendation, but is in no way necessary. Many people on this forum can attest to that, very few people I know say 1GB is neccessary.