Not sure if these laptops are good for gaming

[Louis Brown]

I've been looking around for decent laptops around £500 to £600 and I've found a few but I'm unsure if they'll be ok for playing games like Battlefield 3 on medium to high settings, I'd really appreciate some advice so I don't buy the wrong thing

1. Lenovo Ideapad Z580 (£579.99)
>Intel Core i5 3230M
>8GB RAM
>1TB HDD
>Nvidia GeForce GT 635M (2 GB
>2.5 GHz (not sure if figure quoted is turbo boosted or not)

2. Exactly same as above except has i7 3520 and only has integrated graphics (Intel HD 4000 I presume) (£499.99)

3. Samsung 350V5C (£499.99)
>Intel Core i7 3630QM
>8GB RAM
>1TB HDD
>Integrated graphics
>2.4GHz (again possibly not turbo boosted)

I am considering all of these to buy but I would like some further advice, also I am slightly concerned that in 2 years time all these machines will be outdated so I want to make sure I get something relatively powerful.

Many thanks for all contributions

 

[aatje92]

For that budget you're better off building a budget gaming pc because those two laptops have very weak GPU's

 

[cozmium]

For a laptop with gaming in mind, gpu is the main issue; an i5 would be plenty, but integrated graphics is out of the question. a 635M would be 'ok' but nothing at all impressive; it certainly wouldn't get near high detail in something like BF3 at a decent frame rate I don't think. A 640M would fit more in the the med-high range give or take, so I'd try to find something with at least one of those.

 

[Louis Brown]

For a laptop with gaming in mind, gpu is the main issue; an i5 would be plenty, but integrated graphics is out of the question. a 635M would be 'ok' but nothing at all impressive; it certainly wouldn't get near high detail in something like BF3 at a decent frame rate I don't think. A 640M would fit more in the the med-high range give or take, so I'd try to find something with at least one of those.

Ok, so would it be possible to get a 640M or better and then add it on to one of those laptops, bearing in mind if I got the £499 one I would still have £100 to spend on a GPU, how much is 640M and can I add it on to an existing laptop?

EDIT: Actually how does this look, I'm not really familiar with the brand but the specs look good

MEDION® AKOYA® P7815 (MD98303)
Intel® Core™ i5-3230M processor, Windows 8, NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 640M graphics, 500 GB hard drive, 8 GB memory, 39.6 cm/17.3" matt HD display

 

[Louis Brown]

For that budget you're better off building a budget gaming pc because those two laptops have very weak GPU's

Its really annoying as I know I can get a lot more for my money if I buy/build a PC, however I'm going to college next year and I've got to bear in mind portability as well as power. And I'd rather have a decent laptop than a poor PC and an even worse laptop

 

[aatje92]

You can't add / upgrade a laptop's GPU by the way. That medion looks good, but still it wouldn't be that good at gaming.
Can't you take a look at AMD laptops? Those are more budget friendly most of the time.

 

[Louis Brown]

You can't add / upgrade a laptop's GPU by the way. That medion looks good, but still it wouldn't be that good at gaming.
Can't you take a look at AMD laptops? Those are more budget friendly most of the time.

All the laptops I've been looking at only seem to have Nvidea graphics, GeForce GT 635M at best for my budget. Secondly, I'm not really that familiar with AMD CPUs so I don't really know what to look for, but I have heard they are better value.

 

[aatje92]

What store / site do you use for searching?

 

[Louis Brown]

What store / site do you use for searching?

Anything UK based, but I have found a really decent Lenovo on their US site which I'm thinking of getting, its $819 or about £550

Processor
4th Generation Intel Core i7-4700MQ Processor (2.40GHz 1600MHz 6MB)
-
Operating System
Windows 8 64
-
Display
15.6" HD LED Glossy Wedge 1366x768
-
Graphics
NVIDIA GeForce GT750M GDDR5 2GB
-
Memory
8.0GB PC3-12800 DDR3L SDRAM 1600 MHz
-
Hard Drive
1TB 5400 RPM