new laptop?
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$2000USD is pretty much the bare minimum. You can likely shave off a few hundred bucks around the holidays due to the inevitable sales.
Try checking out Sager's website to get a good feel for what a good performance laptop will cost.
custom gaming laptops - Welcome to Sager Notebooks
Try checking out Sager's website to get a good feel for what a good performance laptop will cost.
custom gaming laptops - Welcome to Sager Notebooks
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8,674 Posts
Well you can spend $1200-$1400 on the high-end ASUS and HP Pavilion notebooks with ~2.6-2.8GHz dual-cores, that would definitely run many games on PCSX2 decently. Plus they come with GTX260Ms so can easily handle most new PC titles as well.
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Except for GTAIV. 
Well, anyway, a laptop that can handle PS2 emulation is really... asking a lot. You won't just be spending a fortune on that, you're literally asking for the absolute strongest laptop on the market. Battery life would be more than horrid, too, of course.
A laptop that can play most newer PC games wouldn't be asking a lot, though.
In fact, I'd suggest getting a compact LCD and building an HTPC with a decent Core 2 Duo clocked to over 3GHz. Should set you back around $900 for all of the components (assuming they're the very good ones), and would do about the same thing as the laptop you're asking for. Plus you can put them both into your backpack and haul them around all over the place.
If anything, they both have to be plugged in when you are doing PS2 emulation or playing PC games... so... might as well get an HTPC, which will obviously be able to do almost full-speed PS2 emulation in most titles.
And no, Phil, that's totally legit. You should have a hint of what my desktop looks like now... as well as the specs.
Well, anyway, a laptop that can handle PS2 emulation is really... asking a lot. You won't just be spending a fortune on that, you're literally asking for the absolute strongest laptop on the market. Battery life would be more than horrid, too, of course.
A laptop that can play most newer PC games wouldn't be asking a lot, though.
In fact, I'd suggest getting a compact LCD and building an HTPC with a decent Core 2 Duo clocked to over 3GHz. Should set you back around $900 for all of the components (assuming they're the very good ones), and would do about the same thing as the laptop you're asking for. Plus you can put them both into your backpack and haul them around all over the place.
If anything, they both have to be plugged in when you are doing PS2 emulation or playing PC games... so... might as well get an HTPC, which will obviously be able to do almost full-speed PS2 emulation in most titles.
And no, Phil, that's totally legit.
You should have a hint of what my desktop looks like now... as well as the specs.
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lol my current desktop is old and im starting to get grphic errors in games like dragon age. sometimes the walls dont wanna load correctly so ill be missing part of it. ive posted my specs in several threads and ive even got one on here for a new desktop somewhere. but right now im flat broke and i dont know when ill have around $1k-$1.2k to spend. now if i could get both a new desktop and a decent laptop. i want the desktop to do the ps2 emulation sence my dang brother takes the ps2 a lot. and have the laptop for me on the go gaming with lesser emulated sytems and just pc games. to be honest i wouldnt want to play gtaiv anyways not into those types of games. i like older rpgs better and mabe a few of the newer ones like dragon age and torchlight which dont need that good of a pc anyways. ill also be doing movies on the go along with working in openoffice sence i dont have the money to spend on microsoft office and i perfer openoffice to it anyways.
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Problem is GTA IV. The game requires you to have either a PS3 or 360, or a ridiculously powerful PC.
The way I see it, a laptop won't cut it either for what you want to do. Might well buy a laptop and a new PS2 so your brother will leave you alone and you don't have to deal with bugs and hardware requirements of PCSX2.
So my suggestion would be to get a decent laptop and a new PS2. This should settle down at $500 nicely if you know where to buy stuffs. A laptop and a desktop altogether, and especially a desktop that can do PCSX2 or GTA IV, will settle at over $1000 no matter how you cut it. And it will probably go over $1500 if you want the desktop to play PCSX2 AND GTA IV. That's just... a gross picture.
The way I see it, a laptop won't cut it either for what you want to do. Might well buy a laptop and a new PS2 so your brother will leave you alone and you don't have to deal with bugs and hardware requirements of PCSX2.
So my suggestion would be to get a decent laptop and a new PS2. This should settle down at $500 nicely if you know where to buy stuffs. A laptop and a desktop altogether, and especially a desktop that can do PCSX2 or GTA IV, will settle at over $1000 no matter how you cut it. And it will probably go over $1500 if you want the desktop to play PCSX2 AND GTA IV. That's just... a gross picture.
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gtaiv is NOT on my list of games to play rap so i wont need one powerful enough for that. as i said i would want the desktop to be powerful enough for pcsx2 and the laptop for just the rest of the things so i dont need that powerful of a laptop.
An E8500-based desktop with a 9800GT/GTS 250 would be fine for PCSX2 gaming.
For a laptop, if you're not doing 3D gaming, any netbook will do OpenOffice. I don't know what "doing movies" needs for processing power, but if you want a Core 2 Duo type of thing there's plenty of cheap low-end C2D-based laptops.
For a laptop, if you're not doing 3D gaming, any netbook will do OpenOffice. I don't know what "doing movies" needs for processing power, but if you want a Core 2 Duo type of thing there's plenty of cheap low-end C2D-based laptops.
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Again, a PS2 and a laptop would cost much less than that.
Unless you opt for the absolute cheapest netbook then perhaps a good desktop to compensate would be appropriate, but that's actually a step backwards, and again, PCSX2 doesn't play everything. If it's just FFX then it won't be a problem, but FFXII... is just too much trouble.
What's preventing you from getting a new PS2? You need a new TV as well perhaps...? Because that's the only thing I can think of...
Better yet, what kind of budget are we looking at? Obviously it ain't $1000 so I know for sure you have a lot of limitations to work with here.
Unless you opt for the absolute cheapest netbook then perhaps a good desktop to compensate would be appropriate, but that's actually a step backwards, and again, PCSX2 doesn't play everything. If it's just FFX then it won't be a problem, but FFXII... is just too much trouble.
What's preventing you from getting a new PS2? You need a new TV as well perhaps...? Because that's the only thing I can think of...
Better yet, what kind of budget are we looking at? Obviously it ain't $1000 so I know for sure you have a lot of limitations to work with here.
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i will be running some older games like diablo2 and neverwinternights 1 and mabe 2 on the laptop on the go sence i can end those games quickly when need be. but i will run a few emus like playstation 1 and snes and nes on the laptop show i can show some people the good games from those eras. but ill do most of my game playing on the desktop. so a nettop might not be the best bet for me. and some of them struggle with hd content.
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Just got off my lazy arse and dumped my PS2 BIOS again just to try a few games out on... you-know-what.
Whaddayano... it actually does play alright. Yeah, I guess we've come a long way with PS2 emulation already. So... apologies for the misleading info.
In that case, I'd say...
Newegg.com - HP G61-320US NoteBook AMD Athlon II M300(2.0GHz) 15.6" 3GB Memory 250GB HDD 5400rpm DVD Super Multi ATI Radeon HD 4200 - Laptops / Notebooks
At least that should be able to handle FFX to some extend. Then with a machine like that, you may not need a desktop after all...
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I'm not recommending a friggin' Intel Atom for PCSX2.I thought for a second that you had recommended him an EEE Pc. Whew, you actually showed some balls there for a second rap
AND has been making some pretty good mobile CPUs lately. Since the Core i7 mobile series are too ****ing overpriced, and the Core 2 mobile line hasn't gotten down in price at all, I suspect AMD has caught up to Intel in the mobile market.
Plus the HD4200 in there should be able to hang on to a few titles and the laptop itself will do Crysis at Medium settings just fine. I have tested it myself... well, not with PCSX2 but you know... the usual suspects.
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That's not really saying much if you consider how overly hyped the entire "ZOMG!! Crysis needs a $2000 PC to run decently" banter was. In fact, I'd say that on low-medium settings, it's one of the better optimized games out therePlus the HD4200 in there should be able to hang on to a few titles and the laptop itself will do Crysis at Medium settings just fine. I have tested it myself... well, not with PCSX2 but you know... the usual suspects.
My old HD2400 Pro ran Crysis much better then FC2, TCRSV2, GTA4 and many other games!
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Simply cuz Crysis doesn't do very advanced physics or crazy draw distances at those settings. :innocent: Crysis is plagued by two things:
- It tries to do physics for everything on the screen with just the CPU (urg...)
- It tries to draw objects even when you are not seeing them.
Then again, the draw distance thing also applies to other games using other open-ended engines. It just depends on how the engine is used. At least in Crysis you can tone it down. There's not a lot of options for other games.
Also the AI in Far Cry 2 and other games might be the culprit of slow framerate. If you run the Far Cry 2 benchmark and turn off the AI, and you get more than 100% performance boost then likely you're CPU-limited.
- It tries to do physics for everything on the screen with just the CPU (urg...)
- It tries to draw objects even when you are not seeing them.
Then again, the draw distance thing also applies to other games using other open-ended engines. It just depends on how the engine is used.
At least in Crysis you can tone it down. There's not a lot of options for other games.Also the AI in Far Cry 2 and other games might be the culprit of slow framerate. If you run the Far Cry 2 benchmark and turn off the AI, and you get more than 100% performance boost then likely you're CPU-limited.
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