out with the old...in with the new??

As you all may know or may not know. i am a counterstrike-aholic (Is that even a word??).

Anyway, My current laptop (name and specs will be listed below) Isn't what you would expect a gamer to have. I personally think its a good computer except for a few things (ram size,hard drive space,videocard etc.). Im thinking about getting a new one, but I dont know what to get. If i could get more ram and a new graphics card , that would be sufficient for the time being. I just want everybody here to give me their honest opinion on it.

NOTE: I don't want a whole bunch of "one sentence wonders". I need good, well thought-out suggestions.

Anyway, here are the specs.

Brand name: Acer
Model: Travelmate 4060.
Processor: Intel Pentium M 740 / 2.00 GHz
-Chipset Type: Mobile Intel 915GM Express
****RAM:1.0 Gigabyte****
HDD:100 Gigabytes
****Graphics card: Intel GMA 900 128Megabytes****

P.S,

The two features in the list with "***" in front of them are the features i think are the most essential ones to upgrade.


Cheers, dafin0

Well you hit the nail on the head, I believe. Modern computers tend to require at least 2GB of RAM to function well, and since you're a gamer you'd benefit the most (by far in this case) from an upgraded graphics card. If you were to buy a new laptop as you are considering, the league you are looking at (for gaming) would additionally most certainly come standard with a much better processor than the one you currently have, and likely a larger hard drive.

You should fairly easily be able to upgrade your current laptop's RAM - you'd just need to find out what kind you have at the moment and then obtain more of it. To my understanding the Crucial website is the way to go to satisfy all your memory whims. Upgrading your graphics card however would, put bluntly, not be a possibility. I'm sure someone like Paul who actually uses a laptop could explain that a lot better than I could so I won't go into it right now.

Due to the importance of the graphics card particularly with gaming, and to keep up with the GPU-hungry trend in operating systems as of late, I would advise buying a new laptop. While the rest of your specs also may seem fine at the moment, once you upgrade you'll never be able to go back.
I'm not really familiar with the laptop market any more unfortunately so it would be unwise of me to offer any real suggestions in that area. However last I checked, Dell was still being promoted on the forums as reasonably cost-efficient, and I know they have some powerful laptops on offer.

CPU

Firstly, the CPU. If it's gaming you want, you're going to need an absolute minimum of 2.2GHz, but if you go that low, don't expect to be able to play the latest games. Realistically, you need at least 2.4GHz, but if you have the money, you can go right up to 3GHz- but that's just overkill.

I'm sticking with Intel here, partly because I think they're better than AMD, and also because I know the Intel chips pretty well. So, unless you have a lot of cash to spare, you not going to be getting a Core 2 Extreme- so we'll stick with Duo and Quad. The Duos run from 1.33GHz up to 3.06GHz and the Quads from 2.33GHz to 3GHz. I'd recommend a Quad fro several reasons:

*The lower end ones are cheaper than the higher end Duos
*They have higher bus speeds
*and larger caches

So from now on, I'll assume you get a Core 2 Quad. You'll want a 45nm one, as opposed to 65nm, so depending on how much money you have, you'll be looking at 2.5-3GHz for your laptop.

RAM

Simple. 2GB ABSOLUTE minimum, but you're best going for 4GB. RAM is cheap and to play the new games you'll need as much as you can get.

GPU

You need a dedicated GPU- no more integrated ones. For me, and most other people, nVidia is the best here. For a laptop, I recommend either the GeForce 8600 GT. This'll cost you about £40-50. If however you have a bit more to spend, have a look at the GTS 250, but this'll cost just over twice as much.

---

Those are the three biggies there. Obviously you'll have to sort out the screen size and other stuff for yourself- that's just personal choice.

Desktops, expecially if you plan to upgrade at a later point, are much cheaper. Not only are they easier to upgrade, they're cheaper to do as well. If you get a good motherboard, you can upgrade the processor and graphics card to your heart (and wallet's ) content. Laptops tend to be a buy it once, and maybe upgrade the RAM at some point type of computer, but they've got the portability factor.

Long story short, if you plan to game, Desktops will be your friend.