Which would be the best for D3??

[jamesL]

yeah, I came back to vote against the 550ti also
I believe a read on the official forums about bugs with that card
I think here is also a problem with the 560, but if you go to nvidia and update the driver then it works

[Cappy]

So what would you guys suggest for a laptop?
I need to upgrade for the game, as this one is closing in on 6 years old. Problem is I'm a teacher and there's no money in it!!! I'm not as big a game junkie as I used to be, so uber graphic quality isn't an issue. I do need it to be a laptop, but as cheap as can possible and still be able to play the game.

Thanks in advance!

[Tilitoon]

Anything with a dedicated video card like a ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650. Post the links here and we'll tell you if it'll work. I wouldn't be comfortable recommending something with Intel HD 3000, even if the game starts, I'm not sure It'll be playable.

[Cappy]

So it is going to take a dedicated video card to run at all? That's lame!
Edit:

Would something like this work?
"11.6" HD CineCrystal LED-backlit display - Intel HD Graphics with up to 128MB of dedicated graphics memory and Microsoft DirectX 10 support"
I'm guessing integrated graphics with dedicated memory? I'm not near as techie as I used to be...

Did some more looking. I found this computer on amazon. It has an ATI Radeon HD 6250. I checked the thread that has the list of supported/unsupported video cards and this video card isn't listed anywhere...
Thanks again for your help!!

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0051OLA3G

[Tilitoon]

So it is going to take a dedicated video card to run at all? That's lame!
Did some more looking. I found this computer on amazon. It has an ATI Radeon HD 6250. I checked the thread that has the list of supported/unsupported video cards and this video card isn't listed anywhere...
Thanks again for your help!!

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0051OLA3G

The ATI Radeon HD 6250 is still not powerful enough, you might be able to play The Sims at the minimum settings...

Something like the AMD Radeon HD 6620G or the AMD Radeon HD 6520G should be "good" enough to play DIII on min.

Edit: Or on the green side : GeForce GT 540M (Something like this : http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834215256)

[Cappy]

Thanks for the link- something like that was what I was looking for!
Should I be concerned that this "NVIDIA GeForce GT 540M" isn't on the list posted on the list that's stickied in this forum??

[Tilitoon]

Should I be concerned that this "NVIDIA GeForce GT 540M" isn't on the list posted on the list that's stickied in this forum??

Yes and no. I'm not sure how well this list represents the supported video cards for the release version. There are so many kinds of mobile GPUs that it would be impossible to list them all. The GeForce GT 540M is kind of "Standard" and from the comments I've seen from people who have tried to run the beta on it, it works really well. I'm not sure if Blizzard will ever officially support laptop configurations, but I can tell you that the chances you can run the game on Low / Medium without any problems are about 99.5%. The link I posted is something I found real quick, it might not be the best laptop out there but it's a good example of something that would work and is not too expensive (i5, GeForce GT 540M, 4GB of memory is a good config). If you find another interesting laptop that you would want to buy, link it here and we'll tell you if it's a good deal.

[Cappy]

Excellent input- it's very appreciated!! Hopefully I'll have some free time this evening (parent/teacher conferences) and I'll see what types of builds I can find.

Update:
I'm beginning to remember why I got away from computers! Here's what I've found so far...

I like this one. At least I think I do, seems to have everything.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834215245


What I'm not sure of is exactly how much of a video card I need (and how to tell good from crap). Also how important is dedicated video memory, and if I need it, how much is enough?? Aside from the price, would I be able to tell the difference from the above computer and this one??
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16834200411

[Tilitoon]

Yes, there is a huge difference between the 2 laptops you linked. You probably overlooked the configurations, or maybe you only wanted to know if the video cards would make a difference ?

The first one has a 17.3" screen while the second has a 14". So obviously they aren't the same size / weight either.
The first one has a resolution of 1600 x 900, second one 1366 x 768.
The first one has a 640GB Hard drive, the second a 500GB.
The first one has an i5 instead of i3. The i5 is quad core while the i3 is dual core. 2 cores VS 4 cores won't make a big difference for D3.
Both have VGA + HDMI outputs (on the second one it's not in the list but it's on the pictures, so I would need to double check to make sure)
The first one has the AMD Radeon HD 6650M (2GB Memory), the second one has the AMD Radeon HD 6470M (1GB Memory).

So, the main thing you need to check is the video card. Usually the higher the number, the better it is. You can google search with the video card model and you should find some websites with benchmarks. I usually look for Starcraft II benchmarks and just pretend that DIII will run at least as good as SC2. You can ignore the amount of memory, usually it scales well with the average performance of the card. A high amount of memory is useful when you use high resolution textures. But in the case of DIII the textures aren't that big anyway, so at medium and even high, 1GB should be enough.

For the CPU, the i3 is good enough, so ideally, if you could find a laptop with a good video card but with a i3, it would be the best combination for the price. The i5 is an excellent CPU but it'll be a bit pricey and won't give you any advantages for D3, unless you are doing a Virus Scan or Unzipping files or encoding a video while playing D3... so...

[Cappy]

Great, great info man!! And yes, my main concern was how the different cards would effect the playability.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the moral of the story is:
Mediocre (i3) processor with a good card and some dedicated memory is better than none, but it doesn't take a lot.

What would you suggest being the minimum CPU speed? Not less than...



Thanks again!