Help me make a decision by Monday please

[Obi Wan Asterix]

Dear friends... I dont often visit the basement as a poster because my knowledge does not match that of many

I need help:

I have a great price on two Acer Aspire computers and a comparable but more expensive Sony Vaio...

Dual Core 1.6s 2 GB if RAM etc etc.

What makes a considerable price difference is the graphics card:

I have to choose between three graphics cards which makes a huge price difference....

I want to be able to run EB and maybe MTWII on this computer...

I have to choose between the following cards and the respective price difference:

1. Intel GMA 950 integrated
2. ATI Radeon 1600
3. Nvidia GeForce Go7400 - much more expensive and battery draining (this could be the 7300 which I understand to be considerably worse

I just want to run the games not necessarily have the best graphics... will the ATI Radeon 1600 suffice?

Thanks for your help o great keepers of the basement!

[Banned]

If you are planning to buy GMA 950 and also have an urge to play MT2W,then forget about it.It's just no wise acquisition if such is the case.I think you should go for Go7400 if your pocket allows.Otherwise,if you 'just want to run' MT2W,then I suggest that you simply go for ATI Radeon 1600.If you want further support,then I am referring you to another forum...
http://forums.totalwar.org/vb/showthread.php?t=68127

[kkbob33]

go for the best man. especially if your getting a deal. how much more money is the 7400 gunna cost ya then the other? how much memory does the laptop have?

[happyho]

I just want to run the games not necessarily have the best graphics... will the ATI Radeon 1600 suffice?

I recently needed to upgrade my computer for M2 and I have a P4 @ 2.93 ghz with 1 gig of ram in two 512 mb sticks. I bought the ATI 1600 and found that when I played RTW I went from 3000 or so soldiers on the field at medium graphics to over 8000 soldiers with the graphics set on high after I installed the 1600. With M2 I was unable to play it with my old graphics card but once I had my new 1600 I was not only able to play M2 but I play with graphics set on med for the city and med for units with units set to huge with virtually no lag. But having said that I would recommend you go for a higher end card if possible.

[drak10687]

I was in the notebook hunt a while back, and I basically had a choice between an Asus with an x1600 and one with a Go7600, and all the reviews I read, the two cards were basically comparable, except the ati has 12 shader pipelines, while the go 7600 has 8, but the go 7600 will perform better on some applications like OpenlGL ones, because all Nvidia performs better with that. I went with the ati, partially because it was cheaper.

So just based on what I know about the two video cards, I would go with the x1600 for more power, but there could be other factors that affect the performance of the card, so normally you really have to read reviews of both and see some benchmarks to see how they really perform.

BTW, personally, I wouldn't go with an Acer, as I heard they had lots of overheating problems because of poor cooling, and the cards in there are actually under clocked in order to minimize this problem. But maybe that was a different model, I don't recall.

EDIT - here you can find the specs for the most common notebook cards, and the x1600 gets more than twice as high in 3dmark 06 than the go 7400:
http://www.notebookcheck.net/ATI-Mob...00.2163.0.html

[Obi Wan Asterix]

This is very hempful lads... and the org forum helps much also...

The ATI I think is a normal ATI 1600 not an X... I want minimum performance because the prices is 240 Euros cheaper and I RTW modded is the only high graphics game I play anyways... I can have 2 Gig Ram upgradable to 4.. I am thinking of only getting 1 GB in a single stick and waiting for RAM prices to drop....

But I take this as an ATI vote of confidence.... and the ACERS are great machines here with lots of other perks...

I am also choosing XP over Vista in that it has much more stability atm... XP has finally gotten good

[Doono]

an 1600 is more than sifficient if the only graphically complex game you play is RTW. I wouldn't recommnded it for much else though, an x1600 pro is about as good as a 6600GT a 7400 go would probably wipe the floor with it.

[drak10687]

well, maybe in the desktop versions, but according to everything I've read, and the link I posted in my previous post, its quite opposite, and the ati x1600 is alot better than a 7400 go, unless, like I said, we are thinking of different cards.

BTW, my laptop is
2.00ghz core duo (1)
2x 1 gig corsair @667 ram
ati x1600 128 (256 hyper memory)

and Its great for RTW, and I can play M2TW demo on med-high settings. I dont have the full M2TW though, so I cant really say how huge battles will turn out

[Obi Wan Asterix]

well, maybe in the desktop versions, but according to everything I've read, and the link I posted in my previous post, its quite opposite, and the ati x1600 is alot better than a 7400 go, unless, like I said, we are thinking of different cards.

BTW, my laptop is
2.00ghz core duo (1)
2x 1 gig corsair @667 ram
ati x1600 128 (256 hyper memory)

and Its great for RTW, and I can play M2TW demo on med-high settings. I dont have the full M2TW though, so I cant really say how huge battles will turn out

Nice... its not an X though its a 1600 plain I think

I dont play MTWII and unitl they make it modable dont recommend it....

I play EB

[Incinerate_IV]

There is no Radeon 1600, it's the X1600, trust me.

The X1600 will perform considerably better than the Geforce 7400GO. The X1600 has 12 pixel shaders and a 128bit memory interface, while the 7400GO only has 4 pixel pipelines and a 64bit memory interface.

an 1600 is more than sifficient if the only graphically complex game you play is RTW. I wouldn't recommnded it for much else though, an x1600 pro is about as good as a 6600GT a 7400 go would probably wipe the floor with it.

Higher numbers doesn't mean higher performance. The 7400 is the low end of the 7 series, while a 6600GT is the midrange of the 6 series, a 6600GT is a lot faster than a 7400.

[Hadrian]

Listen to Incinerate, he's right about the VC's....

[Doono]

Im making a comparison to the x1600 pro since ive never heard of a plain x1600 if it's better then fine but the x1600 pro is not as good as any in the 7000 series
My friend bought one and it was worse than my old 6600GT.

[Obi Wan Asterix]

hmmm I am listening to Incinerate..... it is about 300 Euros cheaper with the Radeon and I ran Rome on an ATI for most of my time playing it... even won a screenie contest ones