PC gaming help

[converserock09]

Hello, I'm a Mac. But I am seriously considering migrating to Windows in the next year or two and am just gathering some intel on brands.

I'm thinking about making the switch, but absolutely love OSX in general. It's simple and easy. Windows 8 is very appealing however.

I debate the switch because I would like to play more PC games. I'm not really a hardcore gamer. I enjoy casual platformers such as Rayman Origins (on xbox), and the only highgraphics game I really play is Assassins Creed.

I want something that is reliable, this is why I got a mac in the first 5yrs ago. It's going strong, but i want to update. 2gbs ram isn't a whole lot (I have the black one from 2008 a few months before mbp went aluminium). I know that is a long time to hope something will not become obsolete and I don't expect it too, but I do need it to be in good running condition for a long time. I don't mind paying high dollar for reliability and future-proofing.

What're your suggestions?

 

[Brett928S2]

Hi

No point in advising you now as EVERYTHING will change in gaming in 2 years...

All the best Brett

 

[DelightfulDucklings]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

 

[converserock09]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

 

[DelightfulDucklings]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

By that do you mean assemble the laptop yourself or get a company to do it for you? Also I think those custom computers are reasonable heavy and large due to the nature of custom computers. Laptop brand-wise I would stay away from Dell, two of my friends have XPS's and they have hardware trouble more frequently than any others I've seen. ASUS actually seem to be pretty good at the moment also Acer I believe are reliable. However do not expect as long a lifetime out of a Windows laptop as you would have had out of your Mac, as much as I prefer Windows over OSX one thing that Apple does well is keeping the user interface smooth for a long time after the hardware is outdated. However contrary to what I have just said I have an old HP laptop that is from late 2009 and still runs smoothly (can't game obviously), although the battery lasts literally 10 minutes and the boot-time is terrible but both of those are easily fixable. A lot of people say HP is not good though so I think I may have just got lucky. Am I on the right track with the sort of info you're looking for?

 

[converserock09]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

By that do you mean assemble the laptop yourself or get a company to do it for you? Also I think those custom computers are reasonable heavy and large due to the nature of custom computers. Laptop brand-wise I would stay away from Dell, two of my friends have XPS's and they have hardware trouble more frequently than any others I've seen. ASUS actually seem to be pretty good at the moment also Acer I believe are reliable. However do not expect as long a lifetime out of a Windows laptop as you would have had out of your Mac, as much as I prefer Windows over OSX one thing that Apple does well is keeping the user interface smooth for a long time after the hardware is outdated. However contrary to what I have just said I have an old HP laptop that is from late 2009 and still runs smoothly (can't game obviously), although the battery lasts literally 10 minutes and the boot-time is terrible but both of those are easily fixable. A lot of people say HP is not good though so I think I may have just got lucky. Am I on the right track with the sort of info you're looking for?

I mean assemble it myself. That's just the suggestions I've seen people give elsewhere on the net.

That is exactly the kind of info that I am looking for. Thank you

I used to think that HP was really good also, until my girlfriends crapped out after 3 years. I ended up buying her a mbp because I didn't know what else to trust at the time and I had no issues on my macbook.

How long can I expect a windows laptop to last? I know this is an exception, but a few months after buying mine I met a 15ish year old macbook that ran just about as smoothly as mine did. Slower, yes, but quite smooth. Kid said it was his dads from when he was in college and they only replaced the battery and updated the operating system. Any ideas what Apple does differently to achieve this?

Also, I have seen a lot about Asus. The entire internet seems to agree on them at the moment as far as quality and economy. But I haven't seen much about reliability.

 

[DelightfulDucklings]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

By that do you mean assemble the laptop yourself or get a company to do it for you? Also I think those custom computers are reasonable heavy and large due to the nature of custom computers. Laptop brand-wise I would stay away from Dell, two of my friends have XPS's and they have hardware trouble more frequently than any others I've seen. ASUS actually seem to be pretty good at the moment also Acer I believe are reliable. However do not expect as long a lifetime out of a Windows laptop as you would have had out of your Mac, as much as I prefer Windows over OSX one thing that Apple does well is keeping the user interface smooth for a long time after the hardware is outdated. However contrary to what I have just said I have an old HP laptop that is from late 2009 and still runs smoothly (can't game obviously), although the battery lasts literally 10 minutes and the boot-time is terrible but both of those are easily fixable. A lot of people say HP is not good though so I think I may have just got lucky. Am I on the right track with the sort of info you're looking for?

I mean assemble it myself. That's just the suggestions I've seen people give elsewhere on the net.

That is exactly the kind of info that I am looking for. Thank you

I used to think that HP was really good also, until my girlfriends crapped out after 3 years. I ended up buying her a mbp because I didn't know what else to trust at the time and I had no issues on my macbook.

How long can I expect a windows laptop to last? I know this is an exception, but a few months after buying mine I met a 15ish year old macbook that ran just about as smoothly as mine did. Slower, yes, but quite smooth. Kid said it was his dads from when he was in college and they only replaced the battery and updated the operating system. Any ideas what Apple does differently to achieve this?

Also, I have seen a lot about Asus. The entire internet seems to agree on them at the moment as far as quality and economy. But I haven't seen much about reliability.

Apple seem to really be able to optimise their Operating Systems really well so that it appears that everything is smooth, ie on iOS devices when you open an app it plays an animation of the app enlarging from the icon on the homescreen to take up your whole screen, this is actually to disguise the fact that the device cannot open the app instantly and actually takes about half a second to open it, Google does the same for android but you can disable the animation and it just makes the whole experience seem laggy and unpleasant. Back on topic, a general life span for a Windows laptop is say 3.5 years I realise that's pretty short compared to Macbooks but that's how it is generally, if you clean the fan out and take care of the laptop like I do to mine it should last an extra year lets say (by take care I mean don't clog the fans up so it heats up, heat is a killer). Reliability on laptops generally is very dependent on how the user treats their machine, if you put it on soft material a lot, it is more likely to heat up and clog the fans with dust which will dramatically decrease the life span. Another thing is Macbooks aren't as amazingly reliable as you may think, they do break, admittedly not as much as Windows ones but I have many break within a year because of overheating (my friend has his on his bed/lap non-stop so it just overheated and died). Remember none of the reliability is actually down to Windows (the OS) but down to the hardware manufacturer, how well its put together, what parts they use, etc

 

[DelightfulDucklings]

Sorry for essays lol

 

[converserock09]

Sorry for essays lol

No problem. these essays are great. =)

 

[converserock09]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

By that do you mean assemble the laptop yourself or get a company to do it for you? Also I think those custom computers are reasonable heavy and large due to the nature of custom computers. Laptop brand-wise I would stay away from Dell, two of my friends have XPS's and they have hardware trouble more frequently than any others I've seen. ASUS actually seem to be pretty good at the moment also Acer I believe are reliable. However do not expect as long a lifetime out of a Windows laptop as you would have had out of your Mac, as much as I prefer Windows over OSX one thing that Apple does well is keeping the user interface smooth for a long time after the hardware is outdated. However contrary to what I have just said I have an old HP laptop that is from late 2009 and still runs smoothly (can't game obviously), although the battery lasts literally 10 minutes and the boot-time is terrible but both of those are easily fixable. A lot of people say HP is not good though so I think I may have just got lucky. Am I on the right track with the sort of info you're looking for?

I mean assemble it myself. That's just the suggestions I've seen people give elsewhere on the net.

That is exactly the kind of info that I am looking for. Thank you

I used to think that HP was really good also, until my girlfriends crapped out after 3 years. I ended up buying her a mbp because I didn't know what else to trust at the time and I had no issues on my macbook.

How long can I expect a windows laptop to last? I know this is an exception, but a few months after buying mine I met a 15ish year old macbook that ran just about as smoothly as mine did. Slower, yes, but quite smooth. Kid said it was his dads from when he was in college and they only replaced the battery and updated the operating system. Any ideas what Apple does differently to achieve this?

Also, I have seen a lot about Asus. The entire internet seems to agree on them at the moment as far as quality and economy. But I haven't seen much about reliability.

Apple seem to really be able to optimise their Operating Systems really well so that it appears that everything is smooth, ie on iOS devices when you open an app it plays an animation of the app enlarging from the icon on the homescreen to take up your whole screen, this is actually to disguise the fact that the device cannot open the app instantly and actually takes about half a second to open it, Google does the same for android but you can disable the animation and it just makes the whole experience seem laggy and unpleasant. Back on topic, a general life span for a Windows laptop is say 3.5 years I realise that's pretty short compared to Macbooks but that's how it is generally, if you clean the fan out and take care of the laptop like I do to mine it should last an extra year lets say (by take care I mean don't clog the fans up so it heats up, heat is a killer). Reliability on laptops generally is very dependent on how the user treats their machine, if you put it on soft material a lot, it is more likely to heat up and clog the fans with dust which will dramatically decrease the life span. Another thing is Macbooks aren't as amazingly reliable as you may think, they do break, admittedly not as much as Windows ones but I have many break within a year because of overheating (my friend has his on his bed/lap non-stop so it just overheated and died). Remember none of the reliability is actually down to Windows (the OS) but down to the hardware manufacturer, how well its put together, what parts they use, etc

I know that they break. I've known people whose hard drives crashed on mbp and there are always people at the genius bar. But they do seem to have greater longevity. The operating system bit is a great illusion. I never would have thought of that. Which is probably why I don't work for Apple.

Macs are pretty bad about heat. Especially the aluminum pros. They have almost no vent area. It gets covered by the screen when they are folded open. I love my black mac because it has better vent freedom. However, I do need to clean the vents.
How do you clean your computer vents? Is there a compound you use or is it just compressed air with the computer off and back open?
And are there hardware components I should stay away from? GPU's that are notoriously bad or anything?

 

[DelightfulDucklings]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

By that do you mean assemble the laptop yourself or get a company to do it for you? Also I think those custom computers are reasonable heavy and large due to the nature of custom computers. Laptop brand-wise I would stay away from Dell, two of my friends have XPS's and they have hardware trouble more frequently than any others I've seen. ASUS actually seem to be pretty good at the moment also Acer I believe are reliable. However do not expect as long a lifetime out of a Windows laptop as you would have had out of your Mac, as much as I prefer Windows over OSX one thing that Apple does well is keeping the user interface smooth for a long time after the hardware is outdated. However contrary to what I have just said I have an old HP laptop that is from late 2009 and still runs smoothly (can't game obviously), although the battery lasts literally 10 minutes and the boot-time is terrible but both of those are easily fixable. A lot of people say HP is not good though so I think I may have just got lucky. Am I on the right track with the sort of info you're looking for?

I mean assemble it myself. That's just the suggestions I've seen people give elsewhere on the net.

That is exactly the kind of info that I am looking for. Thank you

I used to think that HP was really good also, until my girlfriends crapped out after 3 years. I ended up buying her a mbp because I didn't know what else to trust at the time and I had no issues on my macbook.

How long can I expect a windows laptop to last? I know this is an exception, but a few months after buying mine I met a 15ish year old macbook that ran just about as smoothly as mine did. Slower, yes, but quite smooth. Kid said it was his dads from when he was in college and they only replaced the battery and updated the operating system. Any ideas what Apple does differently to achieve this?

Also, I have seen a lot about Asus. The entire internet seems to agree on them at the moment as far as quality and economy. But I haven't seen much about reliability.

Apple seem to really be able to optimise their Operating Systems really well so that it appears that everything is smooth, ie on iOS devices when you open an app it plays an animation of the app enlarging from the icon on the homescreen to take up your whole screen, this is actually to disguise the fact that the device cannot open the app instantly and actually takes about half a second to open it, Google does the same for android but you can disable the animation and it just makes the whole experience seem laggy and unpleasant. Back on topic, a general life span for a Windows laptop is say 3.5 years I realise that's pretty short compared to Macbooks but that's how it is generally, if you clean the fan out and take care of the laptop like I do to mine it should last an extra year lets say (by take care I mean don't clog the fans up so it heats up, heat is a killer). Reliability on laptops generally is very dependent on how the user treats their machine, if you put it on soft material a lot, it is more likely to heat up and clog the fans with dust which will dramatically decrease the life span. Another thing is Macbooks aren't as amazingly reliable as you may think, they do break, admittedly not as much as Windows ones but I have many break within a year because of overheating (my friend has his on his bed/lap non-stop so it just overheated and died). Remember none of the reliability is actually down to Windows (the OS) but down to the hardware manufacturer, how well its put together, what parts they use, etc

I know that they break. I've known people whose hard drives crashed on mbp and there are always people at the genius bar. But they do seem to have greater longevity. The operating system bit is a great illusion. I never would have thought of that. Which is probably why I don't work for Apple.

Macs are pretty bad about heat. Especially the aluminum pros. They have almost no vent area. It gets covered by the screen when they are folded open. I love my black mac because it has better vent freedom. However, I do need to clean the vents.
How do you clean your computer vents? Is there a compound you use or is it just compressed air with the computer off and back open?
And are there hardware components I should stay away from? GPU's that are notoriously bad or anything?

Compressed air is good for laptops because you can't actually get into the fan itself so just blowing it out every few months is good. Quality wise there aren't any components you should stay away from given you are buying a laptop because the manufacturers generally put the same sort of components in at each price point. If you're looking for battery life being good you should definitely get an nVidea gpu because they switch between the dedicated gpu and integrated gpu when the dedicated is not needed, this saves battery life a fair bit. Also wait for the next line of intel CPUs because they are going to have a MASSIVE power saving, the largest power cut from generation to generation, my guess is maybe even a 60% battery life increase but that's a complete guess.

 

[converserock09]

Well, as much as I agree with Brett that in a year or two the technology landscape will have changed a lot I will help you out a bit with your search for information. What are you actually looking at buying? Building a desktop? Buying a laptop?

I agree with Brett as well, but general build quality/reliability doesn't seem to change as quickly as the specs and Innards do. From a novices perspective at least.

I recognize the merits of building a desktop, but I really do prefer laptops and would like to stay with them. The mobility is wonderful. I have read that an option would be to buy a barebones laptop and upgrade gpu, cpu, ram and hard drive. And I am willing to do that.

By that do you mean assemble the laptop yourself or get a company to do it for you? Also I think those custom computers are reasonable heavy and large due to the nature of custom computers. Laptop brand-wise I would stay away from Dell, two of my friends have XPS's and they have hardware trouble more frequently than any others I've seen. ASUS actually seem to be pretty good at the moment also Acer I believe are reliable. However do not expect as long a lifetime out of a Windows laptop as you would have had out of your Mac, as much as I prefer Windows over OSX one thing that Apple does well is keeping the user interface smooth for a long time after the hardware is outdated. However contrary to what I have just said I have an old HP laptop that is from late 2009 and still runs smoothly (can't game obviously), although the battery lasts literally 10 minutes and the boot-time is terrible but both of those are easily fixable. A lot of people say HP is not good though so I think I may have just got lucky. Am I on the right track with the sort of info you're looking for?

I mean assemble it myself. That's just the suggestions I've seen people give elsewhere on the net.

That is exactly the kind of info that I am looking for. Thank you

I used to think that HP was really good also, until my girlfriends crapped out after 3 years. I ended up buying her a mbp because I didn't know what else to trust at the time and I had no issues on my macbook.

How long can I expect a windows laptop to last? I know this is an exception, but a few months after buying mine I met a 15ish year old macbook that ran just about as smoothly as mine did. Slower, yes, but quite smooth. Kid said it was his dads from when he was in college and they only replaced the battery and updated the operating system. Any ideas what Apple does differently to achieve this?

Also, I have seen a lot about Asus. The entire internet seems to agree on them at the moment as far as quality and economy. But I haven't seen much about reliability.

Apple seem to really be able to optimise their Operating Systems really well so that it appears that everything is smooth, ie on iOS devices when you open an app it plays an animation of the app enlarging from the icon on the homescreen to take up your whole screen, this is actually to disguise the fact that the device cannot open the app instantly and actually takes about half a second to open it, Google does the same for android but you can disable the animation and it just makes the whole experience seem laggy and unpleasant. Back on topic, a general life span for a Windows laptop is say 3.5 years I realise that's pretty short compared to Macbooks but that's how it is generally, if you clean the fan out and take care of the laptop like I do to mine it should last an extra year lets say (by take care I mean don't clog the fans up so it heats up, heat is a killer). Reliability on laptops generally is very dependent on how the user treats their machine, if you put it on soft material a lot, it is more likely to heat up and clog the fans with dust which will dramatically decrease the life span. Another thing is Macbooks aren't as amazingly reliable as you may think, they do break, admittedly not as much as Windows ones but I have many break within a year because of overheating (my friend has his on his bed/lap non-stop so it just overheated and died). Remember none of the reliability is actually down to Windows (the OS) but down to the hardware manufacturer, how well its put together, what parts they use, etc

I know that they break. I've known people whose hard drives crashed on mbp and there are always people at the genius bar. But they do seem to have greater longevity. The operating system bit is a great illusion. I never would have thought of that. Which is probably why I don't work for Apple.

Macs are pretty bad about heat. Especially the aluminum pros. They have almost no vent area. It gets covered by the screen when they are folded open. I love my black mac because it has better vent freedom. However, I do need to clean the vents.
How do you clean your computer vents? Is there a compound you use or is it just compressed air with the computer off and back open?
And are there hardware components I should stay away from? GPU's that are notoriously bad or anything?

Compressed air is good for laptops because you can't actually get into the fan itself so just blowing it out every few months is good. Quality wise there aren't any components you should stay away from given you are buying a laptop because the manufacturers generally put the same sort of components in at each price point. If you're looking for battery life being good you should definitely get an nVidea gpu because they switch between the dedicated gpu and integrated gpu when the dedicated is not needed, this saves battery life a fair bit. Also wait for the next line of intel CPUs because they are going to have a MASSIVE power saving, the largest power cut from generation to generation, my guess is maybe even a 60% battery life increase but that's a complete guess.

Spent some time today reading up on the new Intel CPU's. They sound awesome. I will definitely wait for them.

Sweet. I had assumed compressed air, but I had heard nay sayers say that you could mess up the fans by spinning them so fast.

Thanks for all the info. You've been a great help.