Hi,

Looking to gift a notebook to my nephew who loves playing Minecraft, GMOD and on occasion COH/COV. Surprisingly I found this:

Samsung A6

Does anyone else know of anything better or any advice you could lend toward a cheap semi-gaming laptop?

Thanks, Happy Holidays!

Theres alot of choices in that category of laptop, but you look like you hit the nail on the head with the samsung there.   You could also take a look at slickdeals as they got alot of laptops sub 500$ at http://slickdeals.net/deals/computers/.

Although it will play the games you listed it wouldnt play them very well, looking at that graphics card its only an integrated card which means the memory on it, well the graphics chip itself doesnt have any memory like a dedicated card would be, so even for garys mod or especially City of Heroes/Villians its not going to play them very well at all.

When your looking for a gaming laptop you need to find something with a dedicated graphics card, its that simple, anything intergrated is by no means a gaming laptop, heh its really the truth, its kinda odd that you would post a laptop with a integrated graphics card in the first place for gaming, not sure where you get these ideas but it seems as though it happens alot so your not the only one. 

That's about as good as you're going to get on a sub-$400 semi-gaming laptop.  The one thing I'd worry about is the memory configuration.  They say it's 4 GB, but nothing more than that.  If it's two 2 GB modules, it will be fine.  If it's one 4 GB module, then you'll have to add a second 4 GB module of your own in order to avoid crippling the system for lack of memory bandwidth.  That only costs about $20, though.

Now, don't kid yourself into thinking that's a serious gaming laptop.  It's very much a severe budget model, but that's what you get on a $400 laptop.  And that seems to be about what you're expecting.  Most games will run decently at moderate settings, which is a lot better than you could have gotten on a $400 budget a year ago.

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Originally posted by eycel
Theres alot of choices in that category of laptop, but you look like you hit the nail on the head with the samsung there.   You could also take a look at slickdeals as they got alot of laptops sub 500$ at http://slickdeals.net/deals/computers/.
Although it will play the games you listed it wouldnt play them very well, looking at that graphics card its only an integrated card which means the memory on it, well the graphics chip itself doesnt have any memory like a dedicated card would be, so even for garys mod or especially City of Heroes/Villians its not going to play them very well at all.
When your looking for a gaming laptop you need to find something with a dedicated graphics card, its that simple, anything intergrated is by no means a gaming laptop, heh its really the truth, its kinda odd that you would post a laptop with a integrated graphics card in the first place for gaming, not sure where you get these ideas but it seems as though it happens alot so your not the only one. 
 

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LOL, he is playing COH/COV on a 10 year old Dell laptop, of course with graphics cranked down but it does play and he can play on teams.

Thanks for the help guys. I am not expecting it to be a true gaming laptop by any means and I would love to go down the discrete graphic card road but I am already breaking the bank on this gift.

After reading some reviews up on Best Buy, it does sound like this is 4 GB's on a single stick, so I will kick in the other 4 GB stick.

Thanks again for the advice.

Originally posted by Kravis

 

After reading some reviews up on Best Buy, it does sound like this is 4 GB's on a single stick, so I will kick in the other 4 GB stick.

Thanks again for the advice.

One memory stick will cut memory bandwidth in half, and performance by nearly that.  It probably saves Samsung a dollar or two.  Which shows you about how bright they expect their customers to be.  That sort of goofy configurations is hardly unique to Samsung, though.

Ideally, it would be 1333 MHz memory, but if they're willing to go only one module, then they might also stick you with 1066 MHz.  Regardless, picking up 1333 MHz just in case Samsung did give you that isn't expensive:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231266

Well, I guess it could be expensive if you buy it from Best Buy, as you never know when they'll decide to charge you $100 for a part that you can get for $20 elsewhere.

Originally posted by Kravis

 

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Originally posted by eycel
Theres alot of choices in that category of laptop, but you look like you hit the nail on the head with the samsung there.   You could also take a look at slickdeals as they got alot of laptops sub 500$ at http://slickdeals.net/deals/computers/.
Although it will play the games you listed it wouldnt play them very well, looking at that graphics card its only an integrated card which means the memory on it, well the graphics chip itself doesnt have any memory like a dedicated card would be, so even for garys mod or especially City of Heroes/Villians its not going to play them very well at all.
When your looking for a gaming laptop you need to find something with a dedicated graphics card, its that simple, anything intergrated is by no means a gaming laptop, heh its really the truth, its kinda odd that you would post a laptop with a integrated graphics card in the first place for gaming, not sure where you get these ideas but it seems as though it happens alot so your not the only one. 
 

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LOL, he is playing COH/COV on a 10 year old Dell laptop, of course with graphics cranked down but it does play and he can play on teams.

Thanks for the help guys. I am not expecting it to be a true gaming laptop by any means and I would love to go down the discrete graphic card road but I am already breaking the bank on this gift.

After reading some reviews up on Best Buy, it does sound like this is 4 GB's on a single stick, so I will kick in the other 4 GB stick.

Thanks again for the advice.

Thats pretty amazing, on 10 year old dell laptop. 

10 years ago there wernt even any dedicated cards in laptops yet, well not ones that could play any games very well.  I got an alienware laptop in 2004, it was one of the first with 128 megabyte of video memory which could play games resonably well, but even then it was a 4 thousands dollar laptop and barely ran City of Heroes.

Actually eycel, I did not see that link to the HP laptop you put up. They seem to have some in stock close to me. So instead of that Samsung the HP would be a better choice?

http://www.staples.com/HP-Pavilion-dv6-6110us-156-Laptop/product_332942

No I was thinking it had dedicated graphics in it but it doesnt so really its the same thing as you got posted with the samsung. There is one with a dedicated card but its 500$.   If I find something around 400$ ill post it here ASAP, most of the time you can find a dedicated gaming laptop around 400$ if you look hard enough.

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Originally posted by eycel
No I was thinking it had dedicated graphics in it but it doesnt so really its the same thing as you got posted with the samsung. There is one with a dedicated card but its 500$.   If I find something around 400$ ill post it here ASAP, mot of the time you can find a dedicated gaming laptop around 400$ if you look hard enough.

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Thanks eycel!

Heres a few you can skim over, i thought they were better then what I had seen at first. http://slickdeals.net/forums/showpost.php?p=45764986&postcount=347.  

If you look at #2 in the list, thats the kinda deal you would want to get if your going to go the laptop route for best price.

This might be something to look at although its refurbished, 399.00$, its got a crossfire setup dedicated graphics solution http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1554189&CatId=4936&SRCCODE=LINKSHARE&cm_mmc_o=-ddCjC1bELltzywCjC-d2CjCdwwp&AffiliateID=lw9MynSeamY-4KOSBKvt7Gqc9ImKiL4.tw/ 

You might want to call them on the return period and warranty as Im not seeing anything on it.  Heres a little synopsis of the Asus I posted, http://www.gadgets-freak.biz/asus-k53ta-bbr6-review-with-amd-6650m-graphics/.  You can find out more if you look on the search engines about it.

Originally posted by Kravis

Actually eycel, I did not see that link to the HP laptop you put up. They seem to have some in stock close to me. So instead of that Samsung the HP would be a better choice?

http://www.staples.com/HP-Pavilion-dv6-6110us-156-Laptop/product_332942

 

That's probably about the same thing as the Samsung, except more expensive.  In particular, it uses exactly the same APU (processor and graphics) as the Samsung.

You should also be aware that there are a lot of discrete cards that are actually slower than Llano integrated graphics.  Having a discrete video card isn't automatically a good thing.

Excellent find OP.  I think I just found my new bathorom pc.  Thanks.