Seems very hard to figure out a good budget laptop for Minecraft - some help?

[mcgeggy]

1. What is your budget?
$300-$500, but after a few days of researching I'm starting to think this is not realistic

2. What is the size of the notebook that you are considering?
11" - 15"

3. What screen resolution do you want?
Not sure

4. Do you need a portable or desktop replacement laptop?
Portable

5. How much battery life do you need?
5-10 hours ideally

6. Do you want to play games with your laptop? If so then please list the games that you want to with the settings that you want for these games. (Low,Medium or High)?
Minecraft, medium.

7. What other tasks do you want to do with your laptop? (Photo/Video editing, Etc.)
Photo and video editing, watching movies, YouTube.

8. How much storage (Hard Drive capacity) do you need?
250-500 gb

9. If you are considering specific sites to buy from, please post their links.

10. How long do you want to keep your laptop?
As long as possible, lol

11. What kind of Optical drive do you need? DVD ROM/Writer,Bluray ROM/Writer,Etc ?
DVD

12. Please tell us about the brands that you prefer to buy from them and the brands that you don't like and explain the reasons.
Any brand/model that is well rated

13. What country do you live in?
USA

14. Please tell us any additional information if needed.
I would really like to find a 2-in-1 with back-lit keyboard that flips all the way over.

Hi and thanks for reading this! I really know very little about Minecraft, but my 8year old daughter loves it and plays on her ipad mini. For her birthday next month she wants a laptop so she can play on that instead. She has seen the game on other laptops, like her cousin's Mac.

I know there are a lot of "What is the best laptop for Minecraft?" questions out there, but it seems like so many answers with links to a certain laptop result in said laptop no longer being available. So I thought I'd start fresh here.

Ideal budget is $300-$500. (Would really like to keep it under $450...) Windows 8. Screen size 11-14". What do I need to look at next? Processor speed and type? Ram gb? Dedicated video card? I would like to consider used and refurbished in order to get more bang for buck, but only from a seller that offers warranty/support.

Can anyone recommend a specific brand/model? My buddy said I should look into the Dell Inspiron 11 3000 Series 2-in-1 (new). I do like the 2-in-1 style, where the keyboard folds all the way over. I really want to avoid getting my daughter a laptop for hundreds of dollars and then seeing her disappointment or frustration because it is not powerful enough to do the things in Minecraft that she expects to be able to do. She wants to start playing on my PC, but I'm afraid my recently updated PC will offer resources/power/speed that she won't get in a laptop in our budget range, and then she won't like playing on the laptop! On the other hand, I have no idea what would be "good enough" for a 9 year old playing Minecraft...

Thanks for any assistance!

 

[jbaker22]

I would advise not to get a cheap (quality) laptop. Dell is not the best brand. For $500 you can get a laptop that will last way longer, but will not have the best battery life. That laptop is the MSI cx61. It will do minecraft easily on power savings mode. It will be able to run the most demanding modpacks even.

 

[mcgeggy]

Hmmm... That does seem like a decent one with resources for Minecraft. But no touchscreen for Windows 8. Might as well get a laptop with Win 7 then.

I think I'm going to have to let my daughter think it over and decide: Does she want a 2-in-1 that will probably not play Minecraft very well, or something missing a lot of the features she would like but will play the game decently. What a pita this is turning out to be!

 

[jbaker22]

beware of battery savings mode on any laptop. They perform worse when not plugged into the wall.

 

[velo3100]

You could get a lenovo yoga. It should be able handle minecraft and it is very robust. But unfortunetly it is not a 2 in 1 but the small form factor should make it useful enough to use it and as it has different modes, she could just put it in tablet mode when she wants to use it like a tablet.

 

[mcgeggy]

You could get a lenovo yoga. It should be able handle minecraft and it is very robust. But unfortunetly it is not a 2 in 1 but the small form factor should make it useful enough to use it and as it has different modes, she could just put it in tablet mode when she wants to use it like a tablet.

Actually, the Lenova Yoga 3 11 inch would be a 2-in-1 I thought? Since it converts from a laptop to a tablet by folding the keyboard all the way back? If it would be good enough for Minecraft with the following specs (at $699 direct from Lenova) then that is something to consider:
Intel Core M 5Y10c Processor (0.80GHz 1600MHz 4MB)
Windows 8.1 64
11.6" FHD LED AntiGlare Multitouch (1920x1080)
Intel® HD Graphics 5300
8.0GB DDR3L 1600 MHz
180GB SSD

Also was starting to consider a refurb Macbook Pro which goes for $829 (more than my budget but I was starting to think this was the range more realistic to find what she would need). Specs are:
Originally released June 2012
13.3-inch (diagonal) LED-backlit glossy widescreen display, 1280-by-800 resolution
4GB (2 x 2GB) of 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM
500GB Serial ATA @ 5400 rpm1
8x double-layer SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
Intel HD Graphics 4000

But the Lenova Yoga I mentioned above would be exactly what I was looking for, IF it is "decent enough" to use for Minecraft...

 

[velo3100]

The yoga would be able to handle minecraft at med settings. I would stay away from macs for gaming as they are not worth it.

 

[jbaker22]

Many IT people advise not to go with lenovo.

 

[mcgeggy]

This one looks powerful enough at $625:

Dell Latitude E6410

14.1 LED-backlit WXGA+ 1440x900 Display
Windows 7 Professional 64-bit
Intel Core i7 620M processor (2.66GHz, 4MB cache)
NVIDIA NVS 3100M Dedicated Graphics with 512MB VRAM
4GB DDR3 RAM
250GB 7200RPM hard drive (Western Digital Scorpio Black)
Intel Wireless Wi-Fi 6200AGN
Built-in Bluetooth v2.1+EDR
8X DVD burner
9-cell Li-ion battery (85Wh)
Weight: 4.26lbs starting (5.5lbs configured)

 

[mcgeggy]

I went with this, it had everything I wanted and appears to be decent enough for Minecraft.

HP ENVY - 15t Touch Laptop
15.6-inch diagonal Full HD WLED-backlit Display (1920x1080) Touchscreen
•5th generation Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-5500U Dual Core Processor + NVIDIA GeForce GTX 850M 4GB Discrete Graphics
•Windows 8.1 64
HP TrueVision HD Webcam with Dual Digital Microphone
•Backlit Keyboard with Fingerprint Reader
•8GB DDR3L System Memory (1 Dimm)
•1TB 5400 rpm Hard Drive
•SuperMulti DVD burner
•4-cell 48WHr Lithium-ion Battery
•802.11b/g/n WLAN and Bluetooth(R) [1x1]

 

[jaguarskx]

I went with this, it had everything I wanted and appears to be decent enough for Minecraft.

HP ENVY - 15t Touch Laptop

That is actually overkill for minecraft, but since you bought it ("went"), then there is no reason to recommend another laptop.

If your daughter ever gets the itch to play more graphically advanced games like Skyrim, Battlefield 4 and GTA V on that laptop, then she should not have any problems.

 

[Senduci]

I saw that some people did suggest you the lenovo yoga, but from my personal experience I wouldn't recommend it. Rather go with the Dell Latitude E6410

 

[mcgeggy]

I went with this, it had everything I wanted and appears to be decent enough for Minecraft.

HP ENVY - 15t Touch Laptop

That is actually overkill for minecraft, but since you bought it ("went"), then there is no reason to recommend another laptop.

If your daughter ever gets the itch to play more graphically advanced games like Skyrim, Battlefield 4 and GTA V on that laptop, then she should not have any problems.

Well, I gave it a week of research and was just updating this thread, not looking for any additional recommendations. HP was having a sale that ended yesterday ($250 off plus another $15 off coupon I found online). I'm sure my daughter will eventually find more demanding games she'd like to play, and I want this laptop to last several years, so "overkill" sorta made sense, lol.