So my boss told me today that I will probably be getting a new laptop as we will need the Mac I have now for another project. So I wanted to get something that is going to be as good, but hopefully better and will be able to play some games when I am out of town or need a 2nd PC. I have the 15 inch Macbook Pro 2011 with the Core i7, ATI 6770M and 16GB of RAM. Right now I am looking pretty close at the Lenovo Y50 as it basically matches what I have, but the latest version of everything... plus it is a PC instead of a god damned Mac. A couple things I have to have. It must be a PC, it must have a TPM chip, and it must have a Core i7 processor. I would also like 12-16GB of RAM and I REALLY do not want intel HD graphics, so a separate GPU is also important. Any suggestions outside of the Y50, or any good or bad info on the Y50?
I did that laptop 'for work and a bit of games' thing for 4+ years. I discovered that for work you're always having too few monitors and pixels. For games you are always having insufficient heating and substandard GPU. And the performance/price ratio is dreadful. But I also recognize that sometimes the only other option is simply not being able to play and work with a computer. Whatever you end up with, buy a 'cooling platform' for your laptop. Then, replace the standard fans with more powerful ones and also you could consider buying a relatively large fan and building your own air-pipe that you can use to blow additional cool air into the air intake. I actually managed to play MWO with the laptop staying cool because I used a 50cm fan from an air filtration unit on full power to blow air through a series of cardboard tubes into the laptop. You can easily get cardboard tubes from toilet paper rolls and hand towel rolls. The issue with many laptops is that the heat will damage the components. Also, many laptops have 'throttle' setting based on heat, they reduce performance and workload to reduce the amount of heat generated - this sucks. If you can find any way of keeping it cooled, go for it. One of the benefits of having your own custom coolant pipe is that you can sometimes hook the intake to an open window if outside air is cooler than the air inside the room. Works like a charm during winter! Couple of plastic bags and a little bit of tape can go a long way - you can even make it so that all of the air from open window goes to your air pipe instead of cooling the whole room. Ever since being able to use home office I've grown to dislike laptops as gaming platforms.
I do not expect it to be a machine I use primarily for gaming. But when my son and I want to play a game or I am out of town and want to play something light... I would like it to be able to run it. Unfortunately the Y50 is out because it does not have a TPM chip in it. So I am still trying to find something.
