£500ish Gaming Laptop

[nkaushik]

Heading to Uni soon and need a laptop to do **** and play games.

$500ish budget (hopefully I can make something from that)

I have little idea how to make a decent budget laptop so this is just a guessy spec. Hoping to be able to play games like swtor and Me3 and of course be able to use it for future games.

Chassis & Display Genesis IV: 15.6" Matte HD LED 16:9 Widescreen (1366x768)
Processor (CPU) Intel® Pentium® Dual Core Processor 2030M (2.50GHz) 2MB Cache
Memory (RAM) 8GB SAMSUNG 1600MHz SODIMM DDR3 MEMORY (2 x 4GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 635M - 1GB DDR3 Video RAM - DirectX® 11
2nd Graphics Card NONE
Memory - 1st Hard Disk 250GB SERIAL ATA II 2.5" HARD DRIVE WITH 8MB CACHE (5,400rpm)
2nd Hard Disk NONE
1st DVD/BLU-RAY Drive 8x SATA DVD±R/RW/Dual Layer (+ 24x CD-RW)
Memory Card Reader Internal 9 in 1 Card Reader (MMC/RSMMC/SD: Mini, XC & HC/MS: Pro & Duo)
Sound Card Intel 2 Channel High Definition Audio + MIC/Headphone Jack
Network Facilities GIGABIT LAN & WIRELESS INTEL® N135 802.11N (150Mbps) + BLUETOOTH
USB Options 2 x USB 3.0 PORTS + 1 x USB 2.0 PORT AS STANDARD
Floppy Disk Drive NONE
Battery Genesis Series 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (48.84WH)
Power Lead & Adaptor 1 x UK Power Lead & 65W AC Adaptor
Operating System Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64 Bit w/SP1 - inc DVD & Licence (£79)
Office Software FREE 30 Day Trial of Microsoft® Office® 365
Anti-Virus BULLGUARD INTERNET SECURITY - FREE 90 DAY TRIAL
Laptop Cooling Stands NONE
Carry Case NONE
Monitor NONE
Keyboard & Mouse INTEGRATED UK KEYBOARD WITH NUMBER PAD
Mouse INTEGRATED 2 BUTTON TOUCHPAD MOUSE
Gaming Mouse Pad NONE
Speakers NONE
Webcam INTEGRATED 1.3 MEGAPIXEL WEBCAM
Headsets NONE
Surge Protection NONE
Printer NONE
External Hard Drive NONE
Warranty 3 Year Silver Warranty (1 Year Collect & Return, 1 Year Parts, 3 Year Labour) (£5)


Anything I should change to improve it while keeping around my budget?

 

[keynes]

For your budget I would suggest a desktop. Benchmark for the gt 635m:
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-635M.66964.0.html

 

[nkaushik]

I was hoping for a laptop to take to university, so that I can carry it around and take it home during the holidays. I appreciate the help, I'll have a look at that PC, but really a laptop is what I want.

 

[Yamikotai]

Any laptop for £500 is gonna be... pretty weak, as far as gaming goes. I also have the Genesis IV, back from when it had a GT630m rather than GT635m.
I have a 1080p display, and get acceptable framerates on Skyrim and Eve Online at settings I'd call just below medium, so you'd have a boost in relative framerate from not using a 1080p display.
If it's the best you can get then I thoroughly recommend it, but don't expect to play things like Mass Effect 3 at high settings (it'll still look better than the console versions though!).

If you can spring for the bottom-end i3, I suggest you do that as the performance boost from the 2030M (which is a Pentium) is worth the £30 price difference.