Unreal 3 on Laptop?
03-21-08, 07:48 PM
#1
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Unreal 3 on Laptop?
Hello
Wasn't sure to post this here or over at the Tech forum but here it goes. I got a Dell Vostro laptop to use mainly for my astronomy. But it doesn't have the bottom video card that's in most business laptops. Here is what I have:
Intel Duo Core T5470 1.60Ghz
1 Gig of ram
XP Home
Video Card - Nvidia GeForce 8400M GS
I use to keep up with all the cards for towers back in the days of Unreal Tournament but haven't since and know nothing about the video cards for laptops. Being a UT junkie can my laptop run UT3 even at medium to low settings? I'll still get the 360 version but the pc version has so much more.
Kenny J
Wasn't sure to post this here or over at the Tech forum but here it goes. I got a Dell Vostro laptop to use mainly for my astronomy. But it doesn't have the bottom video card that's in most business laptops. Here is what I have:
Intel Duo Core T5470 1.60Ghz
1 Gig of ram
XP Home
Video Card - Nvidia GeForce 8400M GS
I use to keep up with all the cards for towers back in the days of Unreal Tournament but haven't since and know nothing about the video cards for laptops. Being a UT junkie can my laptop run UT3 even at medium to low settings? I'll still get the 360 version but the pc version has so much more.
Kenny J
03-21-08, 08:15 PM
#2
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I'm not an expert on laptop components, but that laptop will probably play on low settings at best. Medium settings would probably cause your framerate to go too low.
The Geforce 8xxx series are the first DX10 cards. Laptop cards are generally lower end compared to desktop cards, so I am guessing that a laptop 8xxx is probably more along the lines of a desktop 7xxx card just with a few DX10 features added.
One thing that will hold your laptop back is the 1 GB RAM. This generation is requiring 2 GB minimum if you don't want eternally long load times. Every PC game I have played in the last year or so has extremely long load times on 1 GB PCs. I tried playing the Witcher on 1 GB and the load times ranged from 1 minute all the way up to almost 3 minutes.... I got fed up with it pretty quickly.
All in all I would guesstimate that laptop will probably play on low settings decently, maybe medium with some slowdown/framerate problems, but the long load times will be the major kicker.
The Geforce 8xxx series are the first DX10 cards. Laptop cards are generally lower end compared to desktop cards, so I am guessing that a laptop 8xxx is probably more along the lines of a desktop 7xxx card just with a few DX10 features added.
One thing that will hold your laptop back is the 1 GB RAM. This generation is requiring 2 GB minimum if you don't want eternally long load times. Every PC game I have played in the last year or so has extremely long load times on 1 GB PCs. I tried playing the Witcher on 1 GB and the load times ranged from 1 minute all the way up to almost 3 minutes.... I got fed up with it pretty quickly.
All in all I would guesstimate that laptop will probably play on low settings decently, maybe medium with some slowdown/framerate problems, but the long load times will be the major kicker.
Last edited by taffer; 03-21-08 at 08:17 PM.
03-21-08, 09:28 PM
#3
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Go here on your laptop http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/referrer/srtest and see what the results are for it.
It will tell you if you can run it or not and where your system is as far as the minimum requirements / recommended requirements.
It will tell you if you can run it or not and where your system is as far as the minimum requirements / recommended requirements.
03-22-08, 10:55 AM
#4
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Originally Posted by Mr. Music
Go here on your laptop http://www.systemrequirementslab.com/referrer/srtest and see what the results are for it.
It will tell you if you can run it or not and where your system is as far as the minimum requirements / recommended requirements.
It will tell you if you can run it or not and where your system is as far as the minimum requirements / recommended requirements.
Great link there Mr Music and thak you for it. I just gave it a go and it gave me a break down in CPU, CPU Speed, RAM, OS, Video Card, Direct X, Sound Card and even Disk Space. This is one cool site. As far as the breakdown of the components everything PASSED! It uses a bar graph with a Minimum Line about 1/3 the way.
The CPU was (1) bar passsed the line - Passed
System Ram was way above the minimum requirement of 512 MB - Passed
Video Card - (3) Bars above the Minimum Line - Passed
The video card was my main concerned. I know I'm not going to get super visuals and framerate versus something with a more of a gaming card and system. But at least I can DL the demo and give it a try.
Kenny J
03-22-08, 04:58 PM
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The minimum requirements really are not a good barometer to determine if you can play the game. To the developer, the game is playable and meets the minimum requirements so long as the game boots up and runs. It can run at 10 frames per second and have 5 minute load times, but so long as it actually runs, then that is the minimum requirement.
The minimum requirement for RAM is 512 MB? That is a huge joke. No "next-gen" PC game is truly playable on 512 MB. As I said in my previous post, even with 1 GB of RAM, "next-gen" PC games have extremely long load times. I wouldn't even want to imagine how unbearable it would be on 512 MB. I am sure that anyone who has played a PC game made in the last year or two will agree that 1 GB is the bare minimum with 2 GB being highly preferred.
Long story short, never bother going by the minimum requirements, because they are always misleading. The general rule of thumb is that the recommended requirements are the actual minimum requirements for playable low-to-medium settings, and for medium-to-high settings you need to greatly surpass the recommended settings. For high-to-max settings, you need a PC that won't be invented for another 2 years....
But as you said, you can always download the demo and give that a try. Maybe you have more patience for 1-2 minute long load times than I do.
The minimum requirement for RAM is 512 MB? That is a huge joke. No "next-gen" PC game is truly playable on 512 MB. As I said in my previous post, even with 1 GB of RAM, "next-gen" PC games have extremely long load times. I wouldn't even want to imagine how unbearable it would be on 512 MB. I am sure that anyone who has played a PC game made in the last year or two will agree that 1 GB is the bare minimum with 2 GB being highly preferred.
Long story short, never bother going by the minimum requirements, because they are always misleading. The general rule of thumb is that the recommended requirements are the actual minimum requirements for playable low-to-medium settings, and for medium-to-high settings you need to greatly surpass the recommended settings. For high-to-max settings, you need a PC that won't be invented for another 2 years....
But as you said, you can always download the demo and give that a try. Maybe you have more patience for 1-2 minute long load times than I do.
03-22-08, 05:03 PM
#7
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Originally Posted by taffer
The minimum requirements really are not a good barometer to determine if you can play the game. To the developer, the game is playable and meets the minimum requirements so long as the game boots up and runs. It can run at 10 frames per second and have 5 minute load times, but so long as it actually runs, then that is the minimum requirement.
Long story short, never bother going by the minimum requirements, because they are always misleading. The general rule of thumb is that the recommended requirements are the actual minimum requirements.
Long story short, never bother going by the minimum requirements, because they are always misleading. The general rule of thumb is that the recommended requirements are the actual minimum requirements.
The site is good to save you time from downloading a demo that won't run (or even worse, buying a game before even trying a demo or reading the rec. specs) or if you are having a problem getting a demo to run.
It generally will help show you where the problem is or may be.
Basically it's purpose it exactly what he was looking for.
I would have even recommended Microsoft's Game Advisor, but it doesn't list the game.
Last edited by Music; 03-22-08 at 05:09 PM.
03-23-08, 11:28 AM
#9
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That system wouldn't run UT3 at it's max but UT2K4 would look excellent on it.
03-23-08, 12:43 PM
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I guess it could be worse, like wanting to play "Crysis". My gosh, that's got to be one energy sucking game as I've ever seen.
Kenny J
Kenny J
03-24-08, 07:18 AM
#11
Well the game will run i am sure....but it will not be pretty. I installed this game recently on my shitty desktop and it ran fine, but the graphics were just horrible. After seeing it running on a half decent system and seeing how good this game can look i felt disgusted with my PC. I had already planned on building myself a kick arse gaming rig this year and this was the final nail in the coffin for my old PC.
03-24-08, 06:32 PM
#12
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I saw where the single player demo for Crysis was like ....1890mb of disk space!!
I guess times have changed allot. I still have (and play) Unreal Tournament. It along with all the mods and maps I have don't equal 1/2 of the Crysis demo. That's Unreal!
Kenny J
I guess times have changed allot. I still have (and play) Unreal Tournament. It along with all the mods and maps I have don't equal 1/2 of the Crysis demo. That's Unreal!
Kenny J
