Hi! I got an Alienware 14. Before you all start flaming me, IT WAS FREE! And a gift. I would never buy this over priced piece of junk. That being said, I can't wait for it to get here so I can play Planetside 2 again. I am also interested to see how it actually stands up to all the flak I have heard about them. Specs: (take into mind I DIDN'T CHOOSE IT) i7-4700MQ processor (6MB Cache, up to 3.4GHz) 8GB Dual Channel DDR3L at 1600MHz 750GB SATA 3Gb/s (7,200 RPM) NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 750M with 1GB GDDR5 14" WLED HD (1366 x 768) Anti-Glare Display What do you guys think? Can it run Planetside 2 on ultra? I know it can run it, because the ****** G70 laptop I have right now can miraculously run it on lowest settings possible at around 2 FPS LMAO! But will it be playable? Am I better off selling it brand new and buying something better? Any input is appreciated, thanks!
I don't think so. I've yet to hear of ANY laptop running PS2 on Ultra and maintaining decent FPS, that seems to be a desktop only thing. If you've set your personal benchmark as "Ultra or bust" then you need a Desktop.
You're not going to do all that much better for a laptop (spec-wise. I'll rage at the price in a moment) to play PS2. A 750M is fine, 8GB RAM is sufficient. The kicker is as always the processor. It's not a bad processor, it's just that almost all mobile chips can't handle PS2 in enormous fights without falling extremely close to choppy-framerate territory. I have a Lenovo Y400 which is basically the same system aside from the processor being the equivalent model from the previous generation. The difference is of course that mine cost $820 and a new Alienware 14 in that configuration costs about $1300 before tax and shipping. It runs alright on mostly high settings with shadows low, render distance at 800m, voice channels limited to about a dozen, and particles low. ~29-34fps in very large fights, 60fps everywhere else. I honestly don't know if ultra would work at stable fps because I didn't bother to try. High looks good enough for me at 720p. I chose not to disable automatic thermal throttling, so the clock speed tends to hang around 2.4-2.6GHz. If I were to disable throttling and force it to stay at 3.4GHz it would of course perform better in large fights in addition to getting very hot. If you could get retail price back for it, do that and buy either a cheaper system with similar specs or a better one for the same price.
plenty can. Im running ultra. In big fights it will drop regardless though. Thats unavoidable, even on desktops. yes laptop performance will be worse in most cases though. I still liked a few months ago when I could say that my dual core laptop had better fps then 8 core amd processors. Anyways, I need to draw peoples attention to a single very important detail, the resolution of 1366x768. My card is a 7690m XT which normally would be alittle slower then a 640m. I overclocked it though, so now I would expect performance between a 640m and 650m in planetside 2 on similar settings. I never drop below 30 fps with all settings maxed unless its a CPU bottleneck. a 750m is one generation newer, and its still at this lower res. its going to destroy this game. Its the processor thats gonna kill him though. If he got it for free, I see no reason to go out of his way to try and get his money back. If he would prefer more power and better all round performance, and is able to get the full value of that PC back, then he could get himself a very nice laptop with something like a 770m or 8970m, or even a 780m along with a better processor like a i7-4800QM.
Thank you guys for the replies. I mean, I had a desktop once that could run PS2 on ultra at 70FPS, but due to a loss of a job I had to sell it. What can I reasonably expect to run PS2 at? Medium\Low? (native resolution) As long as it is playable, I don't really care about ultra etc, would be nice eye candy but I just don't want the about 300 dollars I spent on station cash over the lifetime of me playing go to waste. This game is really good, and it looks like they added a lot of things (BUGGIES ) I can sell it brand new and get 1100 for it, MAYBE, on ebay. Unused, 100 dollars less than retail. Maybe. Can I buy something better performance for 1100? Still don't have a job btw (college for the ******* win) Sorry, I know hardly anything about laptop\mobile gaming. I don't want to get another desktop.
On newegg you can easily get a laptop with a gtx 770m and an i7 4700 for about $1200, you should sell that laptop and invest in one of those.
High for sure, perhaps ultra. The 750M is pretty capable. It's the mobile processor that will hold you down a bit. Shadows, particles, render distance all at low values will help with that. I don't use mine for PS2 much, but I get around ~35fps in moderate to large fights with shadows/particles low and render distance 800m. You would likely do a little better as the Haswells are generally faster at the same clock speeds. I'll say the usual: "get a desktop unless you ABSOLUTELY need the mobility." You said you don't want to, so I'll leave it at that. Again, my very similar Lenovo was $830 instead of $1200-1300. So you can definitely get more for the price. Whether it's worth the hassle of selling what you have, I don't know. As an example of what's out there, I see the Y410p (current model of mine) on their site with the same specs as yours for $770 before tax/shipping. I'm sure Alienscam's build quality on the other hand is better than the lower-priced Lenovo consumer models. The Y400s aren't on the same level as the Thinkpads. You could probably step up a processor model and more than one GPU model level for around $1100 buying a new laptop off of Newegg as suggested above.
My alienware m18x r2 can play at ultra with 40-60 fps in battle. It is actually a little smoother then my desktop.
Second recommendation here for one of the new Lenovo gaming laptops. Sell the AW 14 for $1200 and get one of these: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ATCH&Description=Lenovo Y510p&N=-1&isNodeId=1 It has better components all-around and twice the GPU power. GT 750M SLI is comparable to GTX 770M, which you won't find at this price level. Very nice 1080p screen, loud speakers, and famous Lenovo quality keyboard. The build quality probably isn't as good as the Alienware but it's not bad either. Touchpad is below-average but you'll be gaming with a mouse anyway. The GPU and CPU can be overclocked with MSI Afterburner and Intel XTU respectively. You can bump the i7-4700MQ up by 200 MHz in XTU so it runs at 3.4 GHz on all cores, which puts it on-par with the stock desktop 3770K. I've got the previous iteration of this machine, the Y500 650M SLI, and this things plays PlanetSide 2 beautifully at 1080p Medium settings with Ultra textures and highest render distance. I get 50-60 FPS for the most part except in massive Zergs where it will drop down to 30-40 FPS. My GPU is running a massive overclock of 1120/2250 (stock is 790/2000) on stock volts and it never exceeds 80C.
I would just keep it. You should be very playable at mostly Ultra settings. You are not going to do much better for the price. A side from being over priced (not nearly as bad as some trolls will tell you but still over priced yes) i've never had any problems with Alienware and have always been pleased with their products.
PS2 will not be playable on "mostly Ultra settings" on his rig. It's a competitive FPS, so anything significantly lower than 60 FPS won't cut it. I can't even play on Ultra with a good frame rate on my laptop, and it's much faster in the GPU department. Also "you are not going to do much better for the price" is not true either because it's not difficult to find a something with a GTX 765M, or even GTX 770M-level performance in the case of the Y510p, at the same price of his AW 14 (~$1200).
My experience (friends, these forums and from myself) you just are not holding a good 60 fps in large battles. As far as GPU goes doesn't matter his is good enough for high and most likely Ultra settings, what tends to bog people down in PS2 is CPU usage and his i7 has that covered. Is it good enough to get a steady 60 fps in all encounters, no but 30-40 will definitely cut it.
I have an i7 too, the 3630QM to be exact, which is the exact same clock speed as the 4700MQ and should only be 5-10% slower due to Haswell's IPC improvements. I have twice the GPU power as my 650M's are overclocked to 1120/2250 compared to a single 750M at 1058/2500. I'm not getting the kind of performance you're describing even with my configuration, which is superior on paper. Also, I think one needs at least 45 FPS on average to be competitive in an online FPS, because there is just a massive difference in input lag between 30 and 45 FPS, much more so than between 45 and 60 FPS. 30 FPS is only tolerable in massive Zergs because it's inevitable and not even high-end desktops can do better, but outside of that more FPS is definitely desirable.
Jolly good, you're in a pretty fortunate and rare position. At a starting price £1,500 and with a top spec model costing £3,250, I guess that's not a practical suggestion for most though, especially when you consider I could build my Rig from scratch for around two thirds of the cost of the "basic" laptop. I'll be interested to see how the OP gets on though, as I suppose that's why we're all here.
I will be sure to post the performance I get out of it when I do get it (Arrives the 16th) Thank you all for the help, I think I will just stick to this computer. As long as it can play the game on native resolution, even at low quality, I am happy. I am going to be playing minecraft mostly anyway, haha. I haven't seen one single review of the cheapest alienware 14 right now anywhere, everybody has only reviewed the upgraded versions of the 14 which makes me curious, is it that bad? I will find out
Well the GTX 765M has twice the number of CUDA cores as the GT 750M, so it is a lot faster when it is not limited by the 128-bit memory bus (high resolution, antialiasing, etc.). Since most people are going for the 1080p display option, which I heard is IPS and very nice, they are getting the faster 765M to supplement that.
They are pricey, and I was a little worried about the purchase. Once I received it all of the doubt went away. It is by far the best laptop I have bought. The build is solid, the software loaded on it actually works properly out of the box, and the fact i can upgrade components without voiding the warranty, just the parts added are not covered by the laptop warranty. So if the OP wants he can upgraded it. Since if was free for him he doesnt have to worry about the purchase price. Alienware actually gives out teardown instructions.
The GPU in the AW 14 cannot be upgraded, only the CPU. Unlike the 17 and 18, which use MXM, the GPU is built into the motherboard on the 14. He can still swap in a faster Haswell i7, although I have to question whether the one-fan cooling design can handle anything significantly hotter and more powerful. The previous M14x had well-known heat issues.
Ah I see. I thought they were all built the same. It is a shame they are not. When I bought mine I chose it for the upgradablity, I didn't spend half the amount of money on a laptop I could not upgrade again. I have the m18x r2
