Custom built computers...

[Karen St John]

I've built windows boxes before, both for work and for myself...and I am probably going to do so very soon again. This one will get tricked out...

But I am also thinking about getting another laptop, and I was wondering if a discrete graphics card would be useful or even necessary for running GRLevel3/2, or should I save the money for the CPU and let shared VRAM do the trick....

Any thoughts?

 

[Rob Wadsworth]

Nah, they run fine on shared RAM on my laptop.
It isn't that graphic hungry, like a game or video is.
Just so long as the laptop has enough RAM, so that it can be shared, it should be fine.

 

[Matt Tottle]

GR2AE is a power hog because of the 3D rendering, but from what I've read it'll still run acceptably on a middle of the road laptop.

 

[Mark Blue]

Karen,

With the new Sandy Bridge core CPUs you can get a lot more bang for your buck and at much less $$ than the previous generation just a handful of months ago. I'm of the opinion that if you are meticulous enough to build your own rig that you *must* install some sort of dedicated GPU. I'd shoot for something mid-range so you don't break the bank and check the reviews on these websites for the latest and greatest hardware:

MaximumPC

HardOCP

Anandtech

There is so much useful information you could literally spend weeks on any of these sites, but if you have a pretty good idea of what you want I think they could help you narrow down the choices relatively quickly.

Mark

 

[Karen St John]

Oh, yes, any home rig I build will have a GPU card. I was wondering if it was worth the expense for a laptop. The thought has occurred to me to build a small form factor box (kind of like a LAN box), and just mount it in the car?

I have a MacBook 13" aluminum unibody from 2.5 years ago. That is probably going to get a SSD upgrade soon. But I was thinking about a dedicated box for meteorology use.

 

[Mark Blue]

Sorry Karen, I must have been half asleep when I read your post last night after chasing. I guess it all depends on what direction you are leaning towards (SFF or laptop) for the new build. If budget is a concern you can definitely get away with not having a dedicated graphics card, however if you've built your own in the past, just knowing you have the dedicated horsepower in the GPU gives you that extra level of good feeling all over. Building our own laptop is a good way to go, although I've never tackled it myself yet. You'll really like the SSD upgrade as I did one of my own a month or so ago and I couldn't be happier.

 

[Skip Talbot]

I've had so many headaches dealing with integrated graphics. Its usually something with video playback, some glitches in OpenGL rendering in various applications, or secondary display support. I would definitely spring for dedicated graphics. Grlevel2 can get pretty heavy with a lot of placefiles, and you'll get much better performance out of your other apps and HD video playback.