Need a new laptop for COH

[PeregrineFalcon]

On 10/17/2022 at 9:21 PM, Hyperstrike said:

Most important.

WHAT SORT OF BUDGET ARE YOU LOOKING AT.

Can you beat this price?

 

https://www.amazon.com/Asus-TUF-i5-11260H-Threads-Keyboard/dp/B09JFHQT8V/

 

I ask because I'm thinking about buying this for one of my sons.

[Hyperstrike]

9 hours ago, Digirium said:

Duh! Take apart your existing laptop and clean the dust and crap inside out of it... no more high temps.

Yeah...You've never seen some of the "cooling" "solutions" used on some craptops...

[MistressOhm]

9 hours ago, Digirium said:

Duh! Take apart your existing laptop and clean the dust and crap inside out of it... no more high temps.

 

As an A+ certified tech... unless you're familiar with the brand/model and the layout, this can brick a laptop.  There's a process, which includes removing the battery before doing any other work ... just as you'd not mess around with a desktop's connections while the power is still connected.  With liquid metal cooling now a thing, jostling the wrong part could result in an internal 'bleed' that fries your components once power is turned on.

 

That said, if you can get to the fans and vents with a small vacuum/brush tool, this is a good way to get the obvious dust and fuzz that can accumulate. 

 

[Hyperstrike]

40 minutes ago, PeregrineFalcon said:

Can you beat this price?

 

https://www.amazon.com/Asus-TUF-i5-11260H-Threads-Keyboard/dp/B09JFHQT8V/

 

I ask because I'm thinking about buying this for one of my sons.

Please read to the end before responding.  Just pointing out parts and problems.  Not suggesting it isn't an acceptable machine.

Just going to let you know that the monitor, while versatile, is actually kinda dim.  200 nits peak brightness.
It's okay for most movies.
But it's going to come out dark and under-saturated.

If you're using it for photo-editing or anything like that, this is NOT the machine you want.

If, you're just using it for long-session gaming or don't give a damn about accurate colore reproduction, it's probably fine though.

And if you need a better presentation to do work or want a brighter, more color-saturated gaming, you can hook up external monitors.
However, if you intend to use it as a multi-monitor work screen, you're better off economizing on a 15" unit and spending the difference on better externals.

Speakers are front-mounted down-fire crap.  Use a headset.

On the plus side, so long as you're a righty, mousing should be comfortable.  With no vent ports on the right hand side and only the USB port you'll likely use for the mouse.

 

You've got a second M.2 slot and a SATA slot.  So you have lots of expandability on storage.

Check the device when you get it to make sure both SO-DIMM ranks are filled so you're getting maximum memory performance.
And memory's expandable to 64GB.  Though there's no realistic need for more than the base 32GB (again, provided dual ranks) right now.

Honestly, looking at other options, this is probably the best bang-for-buck unit I can currently find if you're looking in the 17" space.

[Hyperstrike]

7 minutes ago, MistressOhm said:

 

As an A+ certified tech... unless you're familiar with the brand/model and the layout, this can brick a laptop.  There's a process, which includes removing the battery before doing any other work ... just as you'd not mess around with a desktop's connections while the power is still connected.  With liquid metal cooling now a thing, jostling the wrong part could result in an internal 'bleed' that fries your components once power is turned on.

 

That said, if you can get to the fans and vents with a small vacuum/brush tool, this is a good way to get the obvious dust and fuzz that can accumulate. 

 

Sorry, I've USED liquid metal for cooling.

While it works, using it in a laptop is a fargin gimmick.

And there should be no need to pull apart a laptop to clean out dust when 90% of that can be achieved with a can of compressed air.

[lemming]

42 minutes ago, Hyperstrike said:

And there should be no need to pull apart a laptop to clean out dust when 90% of that can be achieved with a can of compressed air.

Unless you have cats. 😛

[Hyperstrike]

16 minutes ago, lemming said:

Unless you have cats. 😛

And I repeat, COMPRESSED AIR.

If you have anything stuffed in there that cannot be blown out that way, you have a cooling solution that was designed by an inbred moron.

PERIOD.

[agentx5]

3 hours ago, MistressOhm said:

 

As an A+ certified tech... unless you're familiar with the brand/model and the layout, this can brick a laptop.  There's a process, which includes removing the battery before doing any other work ... just as you'd not mess around with a desktop's connections while the power is still connected.  With liquid metal cooling now a thing, jostling the wrong part could result in an internal 'bleed' that fries your components once power is turned on.

 

That said, if you can get to the fans and vents with a small vacuum/brush tool, this is a good way to get the obvious dust and fuzz that can accumulate. 

 

 

Also unplug the fans before airblasting or vacuuming.

 

I would've thought unplugging the battery was common sense...  But thanks for making a point about that

 

Also know that many laptop Li-Ion battery packs include a CMOS battery as part of the pack, and so when you unplug the battery pack you're also unplugging the CMOS.  Not an issue, but just be aware you may have to update the BIOS as soon as you boot it up or it'll BEEP at you.  Lenovo Thinkpad's are an example, they love to scream beep codes at you.

 

Also while we're on the subject, ChromeOS is either easy or really hard, depending on whether or not your manufacturer used indexed MAC addresses for core components.  If you replace a motherboard on a Chromebook, expect to run some low-level Linux sudo command lines, or get stuck forever in a loop waiting for an FTP connection to the China factory local intranet.  It won't let you proceed until the UUID is associated with the various MACs, and while the ChromeOS Factory interface is cool for functionality validation, getting stuck because it can't connect to a particular server is aweful.  In short, there is such a thing as over-engineering something, and that's what ChromeOS can be. Just FYI since tablet gaming and TikTok are hot things these days...

 

3 hours ago, Hyperstrike said:

Sorry, I've USED liquid metal for cooling.

While it works, using it in a laptop is a fargin gimmick.

And there should be no need to pull apart a laptop to clean out dust when 90% of that can be achieved with a can of compressed air.

 

Thank you, 100% agree. Yes, it's definitely gimmicky "sexy tech" to use liquid metal on any mobile device.  It just makes for marketing hype to corporate executives, but in reality it doesn't do much to help cool, for the heat exchanger reasons I said above in more detail (basically limited surface area and limited mass flow rate on a laptop heatsink).

 

Also I will add this advice of yours that when you go to airblast a fan, please make sure to unplug it first -- otherwise it may have potentially damaging backfeed voltage (because unless it has a diode to ground protection, it will act like a tiny wind-power generator when you spin the motor from the air flow)

[lemming]

3 hours ago, Hyperstrike said:

And I repeat, COMPRESSED AIR.

If you have anything stuffed in there that cannot be blown out that way, you have a cooling solution that was designed by an inbred moron.

PERIOD.

Let's just say, I've pulled enough out of various fans that compressed air just doesn't do the job.   I do a lot with animal rescue, but with my heavy IT background, I fixed a lot of systems for coworkers, etc...

 

There's a reason I'm having my new system have a couple steps of filtered air for it.

[Techwright]

8 hours ago, MistressOhm said:

 

As an A+ certified tech... unless you're familiar with the brand/model and the layout, this can brick a laptop.

 

 

8 hours ago, Hyperstrike said:

And there should be no need to pull apart a laptop to clean out dust when 90% of that can be achieved with a can of compressed air.

 

Not to mention that opening a computer/pulling apart a laptop without an A+ certification can void any remaining warranty on some computers.

 

On 10/18/2022 at 3:06 PM, Oubliette_Red said:

 

I will never buy another HP due to poor design. Blew up 2 laptops playing Legacy CoH, not because of the game but because HP rolling 🎲🎲🎲🎲 on their Wisdom roll used a single fan and air-flow channel over the CPU and GPU with zero additional heat sink or thermal paste.

 

I've seen several HPs in the workplace that were lacking in thermal paste.  Not sure why that is.  You'd think the initial application would be measured and delivered by machine.  Not a fan, personally of HPs nor of Dells.  I've met too many of them.

[lemming]

34 minutes ago, Techwright said:

I've seen several HPs in the workplace that were lacking in thermal paste.  Not sure why that is.  You'd think the initial application would be measured and delivered by machine.  Not a fan, personally of HPs nor of Dells.  I've met too many of them.

HP Systems took a huge dip in quality about when they bought Compaq.  I used to like the HP offerings, but there was a noticeable change then.  (Probably due to management decisions than anything else)

[Hyperstrike]

2 hours ago, lemming said:

HP Systems took a huge dip in quality about when they bought Compaq.  I used to like the HP offerings, but there was a noticeable change then.  (Probably due to management decisions than anything else)

And, server side, Compaq took a massive dip in quality when they were acquired by HP.

[MistressOhm]

Going from laptop repairs on Thinkpads and Toshiba Tecras (HAAAATE Tecras!) to working on rack servers was night and day.  Of course, there were still design flaws here and there... but rack systems are set up so that a tech can remove and replace pretty much any part without having to disassemble the thing completely.  

 

That, and Out-of-Band system monitoring and management.  Even if the OS is dead in the water, you can still grab logs, figure out what's broken, and re-image the system remotely once any hardware issues have been corrected.   

[lemming]

I've been building machines since the 80s.  I'm not sure if I have found a laptop that I didn't curse at some design decisions.   Though I'm glad I don't have to play with jumpers anymore.  (Or solder in my own stuff, but that was some early gen AIX boxes...)

 

On the other hand, I haven't built a system for years (huh, think my system from 2016 was originally done in 2006, but upgraded a lot)

Going to be ordering bits next week, though I should get another laptop for supplemental purposed.  (And everything gets Linux anyway)

[Hyperstrike]

43 minutes ago, lemming said:

I've been building machines since the 80s.  I'm not sure if I have found a laptop that I didn't curse at some design decisions.   Though I'm glad I don't have to play with jumpers anymore.  (Or solder in my own stuff, but that was some early gen AIX boxes...)

 

On the other hand, I haven't built a system for years (huh, think my system from 2016 was originally done in 2006, but upgraded a lot)

Going to be ordering bits next week, though I should get another laptop for supplemental purposed.  (And everything gets Linux anyway)

Yep.  It's nearly plug and play these days.
The 7000-series AMD are pinless, meaning you can put a system together without any real possibility of damage.

[Harl]

COH does make pc/laptops generate a lot of heat.  I can run a lot of modern games with getting the same temp from COH.  On the bright side, energy prices are high but i can comfortably heat my house just by playing COH.  Win/win scenario.  Also, quick thanks to the dev's, i appreciate the work you people put in.

Edited October 22, 2022 by Harl

[MistressOhm]

4 hours ago, Harl said:

COH does make pc/laptops generate a lot of heat.

 

Truth.  I killed an AMD system back in the day because CoH pushed it into the red too much (and back then, AMD's tended to run hot anyway.)   That's when I switched to Intel-based mobos with overengineered cooling systems!

[Hyperstrike]

2 hours ago, MistressOhm said:

 

Truth.  I killed an AMD system back in the day because CoH pushed it into the red too much (and back then, AMD's tended to run hot anyway.)   That's when I switched to Intel-based mobos with overengineered cooling systems!

Yeah.  COMPLETELY different animals nowadays.

The i9 13900K is a 300W hotplate.  Between that and a 4090, you're looking at 800W JUST for the GPU AND CPU.

Honestly, if I'm looking top-end performance, it's going to be a LARGE liquid cooler (my 5950 is running a 420mm rad).

[MistressOhm]

Wait... how the hell did you get your grubby paws on a 4090?  Are you a cryptofarmer??? 😛 

 

My desktop dates back to 2016, it's i5 based, with an ROG GFX1080 in it.  But the P/s is 1300w, not cos I need the juice, but because the Antec HCP Platinum 1300 was the only one I could find that had multiple 12v rails instead of just one rail with multiple taps.  That and the Antec Kuehler 120mm cooling AIO pretty much have kept this system nicely humming along for the past 6 years.  I'd LOVE to upgrade it, even have a build specced on Newegg.  Problem is... the RTX 3090 I wanted to build into it is 3/4 the cost of the whole rig... IF it's not sold out cos of cryptominers and scalpers!

[Hyperstrike]

54 minutes ago, MistressOhm said:

Wait... how the hell did you get your grubby paws on a 4090?  Are you a cryptofarmer??? 😛 

 

My desktop dates back to 2016, it's i5 based, with an ROG GFX1080 in it.  But the P/s is 1300w, not cos I need the juice, but because the Antec HCP Platinum 1300 was the only one I could find that had multiple 12v rails instead of just one rail with multiple taps.  That and the Antec Kuehler 120mm cooling AIO pretty much have kept this system nicely humming along for the past 6 years.  I'd LOVE to upgrade it, even have a build specced on Newegg.  Problem is... the RTX 3090 I wanted to build into it is 3/4 the cost of the whole rig... IF it's not sold out cos of cryptominers and scalpers!

I don't have one.  I'm just a hardware geek.

My current rig is a Ryzen 9 5950x and an RTX 3070 Ti.

The problem of miners and scalpers is greatly reduced.

There's a few places that have them readily in stock for about $1000.  Mostly Zotac models.  Unfortunately, Zotac fiddles their board layouts so much, that if you ever want to water cool, you're screwed.

[Wageslave94]

On 10/16/2022 at 4:08 PM, Hyperstrike said:

https://archive.paragonwiki.com/wiki/The_Players'_Guide_to_the_Cities/System_Requirements
 

The minimums pretty much aren't much higher than this.

And, due to the way the game is built, simply throwing God-level hardware at a 17 year old game doesn't really make a HUGE difference.
The only recommendation I would give is "use a solid state drive".  It makes client-end loads MUCH faster.

Also, Here's an update of my sub-$700 desktop screamer.
https://newegg.io/ed09777

Basically the only major difference is a larger SSD from its previous iteration.

You don't need some hugely expensive 3rd party graphics.

I actually had one of my clients use this as the basis for a new small business server.
The thing's got MASSIVE grunt.

 

That appears to be a desktop, I'm trying to parse a laptop, Hyper.    Apologies if that was unclear -- things have been a little bit hectic here lately.

[Hyperstrike]

2 hours ago, Wageslave94 said:

 

That appears to be a desktop, I'm trying to parse a laptop, Hyper.    Apologies if that was unclear -- things have been a little bit hectic here lately.

Again, this is a desktop circa MAYBE 2012.

If you're buying more or less NEW equipment, you're already WELL beyond even "recommended" requirements.

The only thing I would recommend is avoiding Intel integrated video (Intel UHD, Iris should be fine)
Or dedicated GPU.

Beyond that, SSD, quad-core or better  CPU, 8GB of RAM.

That's it.

You can pick up a brand new system under $600 that'll blow the doors off the game.  It'll run the game at higher settings than you have any right running on a laptop.
1920x1080 MAX!

Don't waste money on 4K gaming.