Which of these computers under $700 dollars could run World of Warcraft?

Hey all, thanks in advance for any responses.

First and foremost, I don't know much about computer hardware. I don't know how to build my own computer. I just bought a desktop gaming PC in 2008, but it recently died from what I believe was a motherboard and/or video card failure.

Here is the desktop I was using:

http://cgi.ebay.com/HP-GQ500AA-Pavilion-Elite-m9080n-PC-2-4-GHz-Intel-/390291743782?pt=Desktop_PCs&hash=item5adf336426

It's gone now, I salvaged some parts and sold them.

I know desktops are the most powerful for your money, but I am definitely going to get a laptop this time around. So I am for sure getting a laptop, and I am for sure buying it from Costco, and I won't consider buying one from anywhere else.

I was wondering if any of these computers from this list in the link below that are under $700 dollars would be able to run World of Warcraft, and if so, which one would run it the best? I was also wondering, based on the responses and choices, how would it run compared to the desktop I was using before? Thanks for any responses.

http://www.costco.com/Common/Category.aspx?ec=BC-EC10590-Cat56670&pos=0&whse=BC&topnav=&cat=78129&eCat=BC|84|56670|78129⟨=en-US

Do the Goof Refurbished laptops come from Costco? Also, what kind of warranty does Costco offer? Do you think I would be good if I decided to get one of the $699 dollar laptops? Do I need to get one with a video card or will integrated graphics work?

Do the Goof Refurbished laptops come from Costco? Also, what kind of warranty does Costco offer? Do you think I would be good if I decided to get one of the $699 dollar laptops? Do I need to get one with a video card or will integrated graphics work?

arkephonic

Most of those sub $700 laptops won't run WoW very well at all... They all have integrated or very low end GPUs and thus will run the game horribly... I have a little 11" laptop with i5 @ 2.3GHz, 4GB of DDR3, and an integrated 4500MHD and I can barely run WoW at all at the lowest settings on my native res (1366x768)... Most sub $900 laptops aren't made for playing games... At all... Most GPUs in those laptops are as low as they can be to 1) Easily run windows at the laptops native res and 2) decode + display HD video... That is about it... They weren't designed to run games and thus don't do it very well...

...but this is due to the low 1366x768 resolution...dabigsiebowski

As far as being capable of running WoW, it is a highly optimized program that will run on most any machine. If you want to run at similar performance to your prior rig, though, you need a dedicated graphics card in your laptop. While WoW is processor-intensive relative to other games, integrated graphics will really hamper your WoW experience.

Integrated (bad) = "Integrated Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500MHD"
Dedicated (good) = NVIDIA GTX 460M 1.5GB DDR5 VRAM

Try this out, it's under your budget, has a great monitor, a dedicated graphics card, and should yield similar and possibly superior performance to your existing desktop. You'll need to decrapify it, though.

Good luck!

Boz

Weird, I was expecting them to run it a bit better than that.

Since my latest gaming desktop PC broke, I pulled out my desktop from 2003 to play WoW for the time being.

It has:

AMD Athlon 64 processor 3500+ 2.21 Ghz single core

1 gig of PC2100 RAM

Windows XP Home

Radeon X1300/X1500 series (which I believe is a 256mb graphics card or lower)

40 gig slow harddrive

That desktop right there that I'm using runs WoW fine. I get like 30 frames per second in Org, and I get 60+ frames per second in battlegrounds. Do the new laptops in that link under $700 dollars seriously not outperform my dinosaur desktop that I bought in 2002 and gave minor upgrades to in 2003?

I appreciate the links, but I can only buy this laptop from Costco. I linked a website to the laptops they have available. Would any of those under 700 bucks outperform the AMD Athlon I'm using?

I could only find one for under 700 without an Intel GPU. Since GS is stupid with linking, just search SAMSUNG CORE i5 in the costco search box. Being CostCo only really limits the choices. If you could buy from somewhere else theres are much better laptops for the same price.

I really doubt you were getting that kind of performance with WoW unless you're running at the absolute minimum settings. Even then that doesn't sound right.

I appreciate the links, but I can only buy this laptop from Costco. I linked a website to the laptops they have available. Would any of those under 700 bucks outperform the AMD Athlon I'm using?

arkephonic

Thanks Chubbie, that laptop I will keep my eye on. Dabig, no, I'm not using American Express, I'm using cash. I am a little confused about the warranty. What is AM? And what exactly is the difference between the 2 and 3 year warranty? I get the 2 year one if I use cash and 3 year if I use a credit card? Does the warranty go through Costco or through the laptop manufacturer? Warranty is very important to me because my last computer died that I got from Fry's and they don't have warrantys.

Thanks Chubbie, that laptop I will keep my eye on. Dabig, no, I'm not using American Express, I'm using cash. I am a little confused about the warranty. What is AM? And what exactly is the difference between the 2 and 3 year warranty? I get the 2 year one if I use cash and 3 year if I use a credit card? Does the warranty go through Costco or through the laptop manufacturer? Warranty is very important to me because my last computer died that I got from Fry's and they don't have warrantys.

arkephonic

Thanks Chubbie, that laptop I will keep my eye on. Dabig, no, I'm not using American Express, I'm using cash. I am a little confused about the warranty. What is AM? And what exactly is the difference between the 2 and 3 year warranty? I get the 2 year one if I use cash and 3 year if I use a credit card? Does the warranty go through Costco or through the laptop manufacturer? Warranty is very important to me because my last computer died that I got from Fry's and they don't have warrantys.

arkephonic

Contrary to popular believe, WoW is not a demanding game, it is however network demanding and the so called "lag" and stuttering is generally down to the game demanding data from servers and as we all know this means lots and lots of small downloads and if a CPU can't cope with the network traffic required then it freezes and causes problems on laptops but as desktops are more suited to this by not having the graphics card share main memory and having better CPUS then people just blame the graphics card but when you look at wow you can clearly see it's not demanding it's just that people blame the graphics card for the lag when it's not.

Of course a graphics card can have some effect by these textures and armours, weapons, spells, buff animations and so on being multiplied by 25 when raiding then sure it will cause FPS to drop quite a lot on even the best PC but again this is mostly because all that data having to come from across the world from 25 other people before it can load on your computer, so i'm not saying it's absolutely nothing to do with graphics cards what-so-ever i'm just saying it's nowhere near what people make it out to be.

Dabig,

Sorry, 1 last question about the 2 warranty. Does it come with every laptop you guys sell or is it an add on service that you have to pay for in addition to the laptop? Also, I'm not getting the computer online, I'm going to get it inside the store. I can see that the Costco website offers a bunch of $100 off and $150 off on a lot of their laptops. Does that apply to online purchases only or can you still get those savings buying it from inside the store?

Example:

http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11619567&search=samsung%20core%20i5&topnav=&Mo=0&cm_re=1_en-_-Top_Left_Nav-_-Top_search&lang=en-US&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&N=5000043&whse=BC&Dx=mode%20matchallpartial&Ntk=Text_Search&Dr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ne=4000000&D=samsung%20core%20i5&Ntt=samsung%20core%20i5&No=0&Nty=1&Ntx=mode%20matchallpartial

It says the computer is $599 "after $100 off". Does that only apply to online transactions or inside the store as well? Also, do you know if the product selection available online is the same as the products available inside the warehouse?

Contrary to popular believe, WoW is not a demanding game, it is however network demanding and the so called "lag" and stuttering is generally down to the game demanding data from servers and as we all know this means lots and lots of small downloads and if a CPU can't cope with the network traffic required then it freezes and causes problems on laptops but as desktops are more suited to this by not having the graphics card share main memory and having better CPUS then people just blame the graphics card but when you look at wow you can clearly see it's not demanding it's just that people blame the graphics card for the lag when it's not.

Of course a graphics card can have some effect by these textures and armours, weapons, spells, buff animations and so on being multiplied by 25 when raiding then sure it will cause FPS to drop quite a lot on even the best PC but again this is mostly because all that data having to come from across the world from 25 other people before it can load on your computer, so i'm not saying it's absolutely nothing to do with graphics cards what-so-ever i'm just saying it's nowhere near what people make it out to be.

JohnF111

Well I am rocking a 16mbit connection on my schools network and wow can bring my q9550, GTX470, and 8GB of RAM to its knees walking around Stormwind on a busy night, all while having ~30ms ping world and local... And wow doesn't use a lot of bandwidth... Run a bandwidth meter while playing lol, even during a 10m raid you are pulling like 60kb up/down lol... That's not a lot, not by far... And when in 40v40 BGs it doesn't get much higher than that...

In 2004 it wasn't a demanding game, but it has grown up and although still having some pretty eye raping textures, it has some pretty up to snuff effects (DX11 deferred lighting, 1:1 water reflection/refraction, simulated water instead of just a water texture like it was before, HDR/light beams, etc...)... It may have bad textures and models, but the effects have been updated fluidly...

you should buy my friends computer its WAAYYY better than that HP and it's cheaper! He plays Wow totally maxed no lag.

Link

Looks like a nice computer, but I'm decided on a laptop from Costco.

So I am for sure getting a laptop, and I am for sure buying it from Costco, and I won't consider buying one from anywhere else.

arkephonic

Mainly because I've shopped at Costco my whole life, and if I have ever had a problem with something from there, they've always been by far, hands down the best about helping me out and getting my problem solved with no questions asked. Everytime I buy electronics from anywhere other than Costco, I end up regretting it and wish I had bought it from Costco. I'm also friends with the vice-president of the meat department, and live right near the headquarters / corporate. It just comes down to the service that Costco has which is why I want to buy it there. I'll even sacrifice some PC power to get it at Costco, the service is that important to me.

In that case your options are, in my mind:

ASUS K52JT (Unable to link, $800)
Samsung Q430 (Unable to link, $600)

Both have strong reviews and are the best available options given your constraints. Both will be notable upgrades over your current hardware. Do yourself a favor, though, and increase the longevity of your laptop by buying a cooler (Examples, fits the recommendations, above). It would've saved my wife's laptop had we had one.

Enjoy your new laptop!

Boz

Thanks, I might take the plunge and get the Asus laptop even though it is 100 dollars more. It looks like it is more future proof. I saw those laptop coolers at Target yesterday and was wondering if I should buy one. Do you think that they are only needed for gaming laptops or for all laptops? I will definitely follow your advice and get one for my new laptop, but should every laptop use one? Right now I'm using a non-gaming laptop, Lenovo Thinkpad Z61t with 2 gigs of RAM, Intel Core 2 CPU T7200 @ 2.00 Ghz and 2.00 Ghz each. It uses integrated graphics and I never use it for games, just web browsing, e-mail, HD videos and other media. Do you think I need to get a laptop cooling base for that or just for the gaming laptop I'm getting?

I always thought laptop coolers were a scam, but after going through the issues with my wife's laptop that I linked, I'm sold. Passive air coolers, which are basically a stand for your laptop that allows the laptop's built-in fans (which are on the bottom of the laptop) to do their job, will also work great. Not sure what idiot decided to put cooling vents on the bottom of something called a laptop.

Anyway, it doesn't matter if it's a "gaming" laptop so much as how much you tax the hardware. If you're running 3D applications - even older ones - it's going to cause your electronics to work harder than they will with spreadsheets and Word. In fact, low-cost laptops designed for basic desktop apps are at greater risk of overheating than powerful gaming laptops which have additional cooling devices built-in, such as heat pipes and added fans.

Boz

Thanks for the heads up. At under $20 bucks, I think that would be a smart investment to get 2 of them to help ensure a lengthy lifespan of my laptops. I'm all about doing whatever I can to treat electronics the best way possible to extend their lifetime. My last gaming PC that broke, along with the 22 inch samsung monitor I got with it, both from Fry's Electronics, are the only 2 pieces of electronic hardware that I have ever owned that have failed. I take great care of my stuff. I will never shop at Fry's electronics again. I wasn't going to even go there in the first place, but my friend INSISTED that I go there because they were the best he claimed. The box my computer was in was all beat up, Windows wouldn't even load when I brought the computer home, their customer service (Fry's) is an absolute joke, I had to restore the entire computer on day 1. Lesson learned, I should have returned it the day I got it.

Dabig,

Sorry, 1 last question about the 2 warranty. Does it come with every laptop you guys sell or is it an add on service that you have to pay for in addition to the laptop? Also, I'm not getting the computer online, I'm going to get it inside the store. I can see that the Costco website offers a bunch of $100 off and $150 off on a lot of their laptops. Does that apply to online purchases only or can you still get those savings buying it from inside the store?

Example:

http://www.costco.com/Browse/Product.aspx?Prodid=11619567&search=samsung%20core%20i5&topnav=&Mo=0&cm_re=1_en-_-Top_Left_Nav-_-Top_search〈=en-US&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&N=5000043&whse=BC&Dx=mode%20matchallpartial&Ntk=Text_Search&Dr=P_CatalogName:BC&Ne=4000000&D=samsung%20core%20i5&Ntt=samsung%20core%20i5&No=0&Nty=1&Ntx=mode%20matchallpartial

It says the computer is $599 "after $100 off". Does that only apply to online transactions or inside the store as well? Also, do you know if the product selection available online is the same as the products available inside the warehouse?

arkephonic

Cool, thanks for the help Dabig.