Dota 2

so i may be late to this party but i just got an invite to the dota 2 beta

has anyone else played it yet? does it play nicely with optimus?

 

The DOTA 2 tournament was more than 6 months ago, where they gave away almost $2 million in prize money... It's an absolute joke that it's still in the "beta" stage.

But i digress.

I play it fine on my M11x R3, so i don't see why it wouldn't run fine on yours.

 

well what about the game itself, any good?

 

I dont see any reason why it wouldnt run fine on the M14x consider it run well on my friend's HP whose GPU is a GT540M, unless the game for whatever reason to run on the iGPU. Plus Dota 2 will be running on the Source engine, and again source engine is not really a graphic intensive engine though.

 

The game's amazing, the original was amazing this is even 100x better with the graphics and animations. As well as all the other benefits of having hosted on Steam.

Although I'm not sure this is the proper section to talk about the game itself.

 

Takes a deep breath..

Well I just hooked up the m11x R3 to a 50' plasma tv via hdmi out with the laptop lid closed on a flat desk. Just did a fresh install of Windows 7 pro (everything up to date) and the laptops been upgraded with an ssd. Steam (dota 2) runs on an external WD passport drive. Using external kb/m. The m11x is sort of attempting to replace a desktop which has been assigned a different task. Performance is decent and the game is playable without everything graphics wise maxed out. Albeit once the cpu reaches 80c the framerates drop to about 10-15 fps. This took about 4 minutes into the game, or 8-10 minutes if you count from when the game opened. It's pretty seemless, the game just starts lagging like crazy. My theory is that the cpu is reducing clock speeds to an unplayable state until the temps cool down. A few more minutes after the initial lags I turned down all settings except left texture quality on high. I also minimized the game for a minute to look at the temps allowing it to cool long enough get decent and now seemingly sustained fps. After a game of DotA 2, CPUID Hardware Monitor reports 90c and 87c max on the cores and 95c on the gpu. Specs of the laptop are i5, 8 gig ram, gt 540m driver 295.73. The Game and Windows resolution is set at 1366x768 b/c it seems that since that is the native resolution of the laptop, when the pictures goes to a 1080p tv, the tv just doesn't appear clear unless it's also at laptop's native resolution. It's noticable when trying to read text as some letters are darker than others making uneven chararacters. (Maybe I need to use the vga pc input on the tv? No vga on laptop.) The fan starts up almost immediately upon opening the game but is drowned over the audio from the tv speakers (audio over hdmi works). Overall dissapointed in the this piece of machine. I can either call them and complain, re-paste and maybe modify the interiors with my fingers crossed hoping it will do something, or build a personal cooling paradise around it. Either way these temps are way too for a couple of DotA games. Room temp is around 25c. Idle temps of the laptop at this time are 60c and 56c for the cpu and 50c for the gpu which is being used by the hdmi and apparently firefox. Go DotA 2!

On a plus note, for all of those that were skeptical, Nvidia 3d vision does work on this laptop with all of the right ingredients. Nvidia control panel also says the display and graphics are HDCP capable. External blu ray 3d movies anywhere anyone? I don't have blu ray.

hey m14x'ers. I'm 11x