Dell Inspirion 9300 Video Card

[tnt118]

I know this subject comes up every once in a while, but most of the posts are several months old, and the one current thread doesn't really answer my question.

I'm buying a laptop, primarily to run FFXI, but I also don't want to shoot myself in the foot by getting something that barely runs it and can't run any other games that are out there. I'm leaning towards Dell (the Inspirion 9300) but I've had some people give me cautionary tales about their video cards that make me wonder if that is indeed a good choice.

All configured, the Dell would run about $1700 .. which was a little more than I origonally had budgeted, but I can make it work. *IF* I'm comfortable that the the system isn't gimped.

The crux of my dilemia comes down to the video card. The only real two options in the Inspirion is the ATI Mobility Radeon X300 (128MB) or an "upgrade" to the GeForce Go 6800.

From what I understand, the ATI X300 should run the game rather well, however from what I've seen elsewhere this is considered a "low end" card and will likely not run any newer games (Doom, F.E.A.R, ect).

The "upgrade", the GeForceGo 6800 -- well I've been warned that this card doesn't work well at all with FFXI. (I've bought GeForce cards for the past 10 years on my desktop PC, and am also for the first time disappointed in how it handles the game).

Unless I change brands (any suggestions?) I'm looking at one of the two options above ... and I'm hoping that someone with personal experience w/ dell laptops can help me make a decision.

Thanks in advance!!

[Rikaku]

Re: Dell Inspirion 9300 Video Card

i have a dell inspiron 9300
what i have on it

Pentium M 1.7GHz
512MB Ram
ATI x300 128MB vRam
60GB HD

i been playing FFXI when i got it last week XD, it run very good, i have it play in widescreen.

there is some slow down when i am in jeuno and out side in a zone were there is a earth storm going on.

it runs so good i stop playing FFXI on my pc and play it on my laptop now lol i like the screen size, i play in 1440 by 900(no edit reg) useing 16:9

i downloaded the Bench mark 3 prog from playonline.com

testing in highres mode i got a VT PC about 3500+
and the test on lowres i got a IT 5000+

i like it very much and cost my $1,402.23(tax and Shiping with the total)

but if you do get the laptop from dell,start uninstalling a lot of dell crap that starts takeing up the system. when i frist got it last week there was over 50+ things runing got it down to 30 +/-4, and the sad thing is i play on my wireless card and still runs good no lag and i am useing a linksys router(wap)

i can't forget the sound on it
sounds good to me, sounds like if i had my headphones on from my PC

one downsite to the laptop is the keyboard is small with all the room on the laptop

i haven't tryed to play Doom on it yet been on FFXI XD so i don't know how well it will play

i hope that will help you out

[elfie]

Re: Dell Inspirion 9300 Video Card

I was looking at the same laptop too and had the same question.

I saw somewhere else that people say NVidia doesn't run well for FFXI. What are the specific issues?

I'd like my computer to be able to play not only FFXI, but also other latest games too. Can someone tell me if I should go with NVidia or ATI?

Below are the specs of the computer I was thinking about?

Inspiron 9300Intel® Pentium® M Processor 760 (2GHz/2MB Cache/533MHz FSB)Operating System (Office software not included)Genuine Windows® XP Media Center Edition 2005Display17 inch UltraSharp™ Wide Screen UXGA Display with TrueLife™Memory1GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 533MHz 2 DimmVideo Card256MB NVIDA® GeForce™ Go 6800Hard Drive60GB 7200rpm Hard Drive

The other option for the video card on this computer is 128MB ATIsâ„¢ Mobility Radeonâ„¢ X300.

Thanks for your advice.

[Rikaku]

Re: Dell Inspirion 9300 Video Card

Elfie drop the Genuine Windows® XP Media Center, get home or pro will be better

as for the Nvida cards i don't know how good it is, i never used i been useing ATI cards all the time