Laptop Recommendations for XIV

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10-26-2018, 11:54 PM
Vespar

Laptop Recommendations for XIV

My laptop finally died and I'm in the market for a new one. I'm a newbie lately when it comes to laptops as my old one was bought 3 years ago (and not originally for XIV) so I don't really know what to look for anymore as far as specs go. My old one could manage FFXIV on high laptop settings before it died, but I'd really love to use maximum settings if at all possible. FFXIV is the only game I really play so it doesn't need to be more capable than that. It'll only be used for XIV, youtube and general web browsing when Im travelling.

If you know of some good laptops that you could recommend I'd love to hear it. I do however have to limit myself budget wise as Xmas is soon therefore I can reasonably afford to go as high at $1700.
Appreciate any input you can give.
10-27-2018, 12:18 AM
Paladinleeds

If you can go up to $1700, you might be able to get the cheaper Razer Blade, but let's run through what you'll mainly be after in a laptop
CPU: i5 or AMD equivalent, which is I believe Ryzen 5 (can go up to the i7/R7 if you want, but the 5s are cheaper)
GPU: Aim for an NVIDIA 1050Ti or higher (or AMD equivalent, which I don't know what it is)
RAM: Go for 8GB or more, for multitasking purposes.

Everything else is kinda up to your choice, such as do you want a touch screen or not? Alienware may also be a good option. There's also the possibility of custom built laptops, such as PCSpecialist in the UK (don't know any NA equivalents, sorry!)
10-27-2018, 01:05 AM
Fhaerron

I'd advise against Razer and Alienware because they are overpriced so much. All laptop brand are overpriced but these 2 higher.

MSI and Asus have a lot of configs and you may also go look for an Acer, the Acer is 'most of the times' cheaper.

There aren't many gaming laptops with I5, most are I7 but this is not something you should watch for when you specifically search for gaming laptops as the CPU's in those are good enough.
If you want to play XIV on maximum settings and with 1080P/60 I'd advice to get a 1070, if you can't find any within your budget go for the 1060 but make sure you get the 6Gb vram one.
As for ram 8Gb is enough for this game and the stuff you've summed up but 16Gb will be more future proof, in most laptops though you can always upgrade the ram later so look in the specs/info pages to how much ram that is supported.

There's AMD variants which are 'sometimes' cheaper but there aren't that many AMD gaming laptops.

Anything lower won't run the game on maximum settings with 1080P/60.

I don't know where you're from but maybe there might be some Black Friday deals or x-mass deals. The 20xx GPU series laptops will also be releasing sometime although many are speculating Nvidia is still artificially limiting those to try and sell more of the already existing 10xx series for higher price.
Anyway, when those 20xx laptops do release there 'might' be a drop in price of the 10xx laptops although it might still take a while.

Hopefully you find some nice deal somewhere.
10-27-2018, 01:13 AM
Paladinleeds

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fhaerron

I'd advise against Razer and Alienware because they are overpriced so much. All laptop brand are overpriced but these 2 higher.

Aye, I do agree about them being pricey, but when you think gaming laptops, those are the 2 brands people tend to lean towards. And like I said, there's things like PCSpecialist in the UK, whom allow you to configure their laptops and use Clevo branded parts (basically an OEM that's used in non-big-brand computers), which helps makes them a bit cheaper. I'm a fan of Razer products myself mind you, pricey but they work well for me. So I'm ok with the premium price of entry, that being said I know that's down to each individual, so I won't make them the only recommendation.
10-27-2018, 01:24 AM
ElazulHP

Acer Predator Helios 300 fits well within the budget you have given. Should run the game fine and has a SSD too. Use the extra cash to buy accessories if you need.
10-27-2018, 02:06 AM
Vespar

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fhaerron

I'd advise against Razer and Alienware because they are overpriced so much. All laptop brand are overpriced but these 2 higher.

MSI and Asus have a lot of configs and you may also go look for an Acer, the Acer is 'most of the times' cheaper.

There aren't many gaming laptops with I5, most are I7 but this is not something you should watch for when you specifically search for gaming laptops as the CPU's in those are good enough.
If you want to play XIV on maximum settings and with 1080P/60 I'd advice to get a 1070, if you can't find any within your budget go for the 1060 but make sure you get the 6Gb vram one.
As for ram 8Gb is enough for this game and the stuff you've summed up but 16Gb will be more future proof, in most laptops though you can always upgrade the ram later so look in the specs/info pages to how much ram that is supported.

There's AMD variants which are 'sometimes' cheaper but there aren't that many AMD gaming laptops.

Anything lower won't run the game on maximum settings with 1080P/60.

I don't know where you're from but maybe there might be some Black Friday deals or x-mass deals. The 20xx GPU series laptops will also be releasing sometime although many are speculating Nvidia is still artificially limiting those to try and sell more of the already existing 10xx series for higher price.
Anyway, when those 20xx laptops do release there 'might' be a drop in price of the 10xx laptops although it might still take a while.

Hopefully you find some nice deal somewhere.

Thanks for the heads up. I'm gathering info on what to look for right now and will likely wait until Black Friday/Cyber Monday :)
I do still have my desktop I can use, but its getting dated also, and for travel purposes a laptop would be more convenient.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ElazulHP

Acer Predator Helios 300 fits well within the budget you have given. Should run the game fine and has a SSD too. Use the extra cash to buy accessories if you need.

After I saw this post, I came across a video on youtube of someone doing the Stormblood benchmark with this. It just might be the ticket and at $1100 its well within budget! Thanks for recommending it.
10-27-2018, 01:26 PM
KisaiTenshi

Quote:

Originally Posted by Vespar

My laptop finally died and I'm in the market for a new one. I'm a newbie lately when it comes to laptops as my old one was bought 3 years ago (and not originally for XIV) so I don't really know what to look for anymore as far as specs go. My old one could manage FFXIV on high laptop settings before it died, but I'd really love to use maximum settings if at all possible. FFXIV is the only game I really play so it doesn't need to be more capable than that. It'll only be used for XIV, youtube and general web browsing when Im travelling.

If you know of some good laptops that you could recommend I'd love to hear it. I do however have to limit myself budget wise as Xmas is soon therefore I can reasonably afford to go as high at $1700.
Appreciate any input you can give.

If you want the best parts, The Clevo/Sager types (they're basically the equivalent of a BYO OEM), if you want better support... uh Dell. Build quality tends to follow along the lines of the capabilities. Gaming Laptops are basically just a desktop in a laptop case. If you are going to play games for extensive amount of time, get a 17" laptop. Anything smaller will be loud, and don't even look at the 13" models.

If you want to something usable, 1700$ will probably get you something mid/upper-range. If you want to Dell, go to their page, ignore everything on it and go straight to the GPU selection and pick NVIDIA® GeForce® GTX 1060. I'd suggest not selecting Alienware (Geforce 1070/1080 only), but otherwise yes, that's probably closer to your price range. If you want to price compare, do the same with other manufacturer's sites.

But I will mention again, like the last time someone asked. Get a NVMe SSD, it will make gaming on a laptop equal to gaming on a desktop with a SSD when it comes to load times.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fhaerron

There's AMD variants which are 'sometimes' cheaper but there aren't that many AMD gaming laptops.
...
Anything lower won't run the game on maximum settings with 1080P/60.

A 1050 Ti can run the game on maximum settings at 1080p, the catch is that it will be loud. Hence go up at least to the 1060.

AMD in laptops is... just kinda sad. The current Ryzen CPU's might not be so bad as they perform cooler than Intel's current chips, but manufacturers that pick AMD CPU and GPU's tend to put them in such poorly built laptop cases that were designed for the cooler Intel CPU's of the same TDP that they overheat even when there is plenty of air.

For reference, where I do some work right now uses workstation laptops, and the most common thing that requires calling an on-site tech from the OEM is cooling fan issues. The smaller the laptop, the worse the cooling is. So you sacrifice performance for cooling.