Selecting A Good Gaming/Office Laptop

[tssvinay]

I'm looking at laptops for gaming and office use combined. My budget is about INR 50,000 (approx $750-$850). I would like suggestions about the same.. I have found 2 laptops in HP Pavilion series as good value for money.. I play certain medium to high end games occasionally like Battlefield 2 , Prototype 2, Assassins Creed IV, Elder Scroll Skyrim, Hitman Absolution, Splinter Cell etc. I'm not a too much of a graphics freak. It ll be enough if I can run the latest games at low to high settings at the most.. More emphasis on battery life.. I travel a lot and a bit rugged one would be better.
I have done my initial market review.. Based on my review and knowledge, the final laptops in my price range and what I felt are value for money have boiled down to these two :

HP Pavilion 14-n201TX (QM87 Chipset) / HP Pavilion 15-n209TX (HM86 Chipset) :
14 Inches/15 Inches
i5 4th Gen 1.6 GHz with Turbo Boost Upto 2.6 GHz (i5-4200M)
4GB DDR3 RAM
2 GB Graphics Card - Nvidia GeForce 740M
1 TB Hard Disk
4 Cell Battery

HP Pavilion m4-103TX (HM77 Chipset)
i5 3rd Gen 2.6 GHz with Turbo Boost Upto 3.2 GHz
6 GB DDR3 RAM
2GB Graphics Card - NVidia GeForce 730M
1 TB Hard Disk
4 Cell Battery
14 Inches Screen

My questions are :

1) i5 3rd Gen and 4th Gen.. Will it make a big difference in performance and battery ?
2) What is the difference between chipsets ? (QM87, HM86, HM77)
3) Which laptop is better among the two ? Will the older i5 become outdated soon ?
4) Which graphic card is better among 730M and 740M ?
5) Are these specs decent enough to run games ? [At low to medium settings, if possible at high ]
6) What are your suggestions for other laptops ? I can stretch my budget till 900$ at the most, if any other alternative is really that good.
7) If I wait for another 1-2 months till March/April, will there be a Intel 5th Gen coming up ?

Its my first post, so I have tried to be as specific as possible, pardon me if its too big.. Waiting for all your expert opinions and suggestions !

Regards,
Vinay

 

[LummusMaximus]

NOT SPECIFIC ENOUGH!!!

Sorry, couldn't help myself. Anyway, CPU models would be much appreciated. Now, to answer your questions...

1) The difference in battery life is that 4th gen (Haswell) cores have an advantage of ~30 percent better battery life over 3rd gen (Ivy bridge) cores, which can mean one hour or more longer on battery. Haswell also has much faster integrated graphics.

2) I do not know.

3

 

[LummusMaximus]

Sorry, i hit post too soon.

3) The first is superior for performance. The older i5 won't be outdated soon for performance, but for battery life, it will be.

4) The 740m is a better card, here's a comparison resource: http/www.game-debate.com/gpu/index.php?gid=1248&gid2=1247&compare=geforce-gt-730m-vs-geforce-gt-740m So while it is better, it's not by much.

5) Depends on the game. Most games will run on medium (Semi older titles) Whereas newer ones could make low.

6) Lenovo IdeaPad Y510p is good, as for $900 you can get quad core Haswell i5 or i7, 1080p screen, 750m, 8GB RAM and 1TB HDD. However the Y510p isn't good in the realm of battery life. Another option is the Lenovo ThinkPad Edge E440, as for ~900 dollars you can get quad core Haswell i7, 740m, 8GB RAM, the works, just 1366x766 screen, with superior battery life to the Y510p.

7) I do not know much about Broadwell.