Gaming on Lenovo T500

Hi Guys,

I'm very interested in buying a T500 and i'm fairly convinced that it is the machine for me. I do a lot of programming so having a high resolution and reliability is definitely a requirement in my search for a new laptop.

I know that the T500 is a very reliable and capable machine. However, this laptop will also act as my primary rig and I want to know how well it works when gaming. I do not currently have a desktop so I need a laptop that is powerful for gaming and reliable for working.

Basically, how well do games run on the T500 with the HD3650? Will it run games like WoW, L4D, TF2 on High Settings? How about more demanding games like Crysis?

If the T500 can't handle this very well, what do you suggest for a laptop that is around the same price ($1000) that is business like but can also handle gaming?

Thanks guys, appreciate it.

 

I think the Radeon 3650 is similar to the Geforce 8600M GT. The Ideapad Y550 comes with the Geforce GT240M which is significantly better than the Radeon 3650.

 

Yea, i've also been looking into the Y550 but I'm not sure if it's as well built as the thinkpad line.

 

The source games should not be a problem at all. They run maxed out at 1920 x 1200 on a 7900gs and according to 3dmark06, the 3650 should be even a bit better.

I don't know about crysis. A random guess is medium at 1280 x 768.

 

Well I feel the Y550 is a great steal now for the features it carry. Going by the online reviews, the build quality is pretty decent. The notebook doesn't suffer from any overheating issue as the GT240M is built on the 40nm technology. I myself am interested in that model.

 

I had no problem gaming with the T500. Ok, it is not a gaming machine, but runs games ok. What I tried is WoW (and although this may not look good, it can tax the hardware with the expansions in maximum settings), Left 4 Dead, GTA IV.

If it is not a problem for you to tune the settiings down a little (but not necesarily to the minimum), you could choose the T500.

 

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "tax the hardware" ... do you mean that it runs well on high settings? or bad on high settings? I am glad to hear that it runs L4D well though.

 

I've seen SLI and Crossfire systems struggle with Crysis. Something tells me a T500 won't cut it.

 

Crysis on the most minimal minimal graphics may just be playable, but without eyecandies there is no real point of playing crysis............

 

I was able to play Crysis on all medium and shadows at low at 1024x768 with the ancient Go 7600 at fps of 20-25. I don't know what you mean by minimal of minimal. A Radeon 3650 or a GT240M are significantly much more powerful cards.

 

Was just a joke. Regarding Crysis runability i am not too sure, don't play games that much.... the most advanced game that i have played is C&C3, WoW and Ages of Empire 3... and these games i have not played since the last christmas.

 

Yeah I thought you were serious. I feel the 3650 will be able to handle 1280x800 all medium quite comfortably even in the later ice stages which are so demanding on the hardware.

However I still stand by my point that the GT240M is quite a bit powerful than the Radeon 3650.

 

What I meant was that if you put WoW into max details and max distance (== high settings) it will make the FPS drop to below 5. But it shouldn't be measured against a single game.

And yes, L4D runs really nice

 

I've played Mass Effect and Bioshock on my T500, both maxed out at 1440x900. They looked great, and were completely playable.

 

Gaming on a business notebook. Tut tut...

 

Gaming doesn't always mean playing the latest and the greatest.

 

The most advanced game I've played so far on my T500 is Call of Duty 2. I ran it with the highest settings at 1360x768 (outputting to my HDTV) with no slowdown.

 

yes i can attest that i play 3 years old game and feeling like it is a new game.

 

I find nothing wrong with that

 

Hmm i woulda thought that the T500 with the hd3650 would play WoW on almost highest settings pretty well considering that my SO's 13" macbook pro plays wow on medium-high settings pretty well.

I want a business laptop but since i also don't have a Decked out Desktop, i would want the business laptop to be able to handle games like L4D, TF2, WoW, Aion and some other MMO's. I might just purchase the T500 and give it a try, worst comes to worst i'll return it and pay the restocking fee.

 

My W500 (same card) runs wow maxed at 60fps

 

Really now? Doesn't the W500 use a ATI Mobility FireGL V5700? Hmm maybe i should just settle and get the T500 as it seems to fit both my casual gaming needs and business needs.

 

That's the workstation version of the ATI Radeon 3650M - basically same card, different drivers.

I'm pretty sure the T500 can max out WoW... I don't have WoW so I can't test, but that's what I've been hearing.

 

Well it looks like i've pretty much decided on the T500.

How much battery life difference is there between the 6 cell battery and the 9 cell battery on the t500? Anyone have an idea?

 

9 cell provides 33% more charge than a 6 cells, since they use the same battery size.

 

I'm sure the original starcraft would work.

 

Doesn't the 9 cell stick out of the laptop while the 6 cell doesnt?

 

That is correct.

 

Shouldn't it be 50% more (9/6 = 150%)? Yes I realize the corollary is that the 6 cell provides 33% less than the 9 cell (6/9 ≈ 67%).

 

Yes. I think lead_org meant that both the batteries use the same internal cells, just the 9-cell battery has 3 more of those cells.

Here's a link for more information on the exact differences between the 6 and 9 cell on the T500: http://forum.lenovo.com/t5/T400-T50...e-what-sticks-out-and-what-doesn-t/td-p/40462

I was about to comment on that too

 

It seems like T500 with the ATI 3650 is a bit of a dated graphics card option and should be due for an upgrade...but then again Thinkpads have always been a bit behind in that regard.....If you are familiar and accustomed to Thinkpad quality you might be in for a surprise if you go to something like the Y Series.....I have one and have owned many Thinkpads and I know it's a different product line marketed to a different client but I still expect a bit better than what the competition offers in the same price/spec range. Don't get me wrong I'm satisfied with Y550 but my requirements weren't probably as stringent as most notebook users...(basically it just sits on my desk a lot, I'm not moving it a lot like most notebook users do).

 

I just put in my order for the T500 and with the employee discounts, current sale, and 10% coupon, i got my T500 2.53 ghz, 4 gb ram, 320 gb 7200 rpm hd, for $1001 after tax. Free shipping as well...

Seems to be a pretty good deal to me. I'll update when i get the laptop with how i feel about the laptop.

I dont plan on playing very hardcare games like crysis on it that much so the ATI 3650 should be able to fit my Orange Box and WoW needs.

 

If those are your gaming needs, the Mobility Radeon HD 3650 will be more than enough. It handles games from that generation with ease. Seems like you got a pretty good deal too.

 

why not W500? or something..

 

I was under the impression that the W500 GPU was not as good as the T500.

Correct me if i'm wrong.

 

Depends on the purpose in mind. Since the OP is looking to use the T500 for potential gaming, the T500's Radeon gaming-optimized GPU will likely get slightly higher framerates than the W500's workstation-optimized GPU in gaming.

If the purpose in mind is CAD rendering etc, then the W500 will be much better than the T500's, as many CAD apps only support GPUs with workstation drivers, and therefore will not let you use some advanced features of those apps with a Radeon card.

The extra 256MB of memory in the W500's card is a moot point, since the bus of both the Radeon 3650 and the FireGL 5700 is 128-bit. Therefore, its maximum useful RAM is about 256MB.

 

hey guys, for you t500 gamers who play WoW, can you tell me the settings you use? I'm trying to optimize the settings for the best performance while having decent quality.

Thanks.

 

Do you have all the expansions? Because the original game I can play almost on max settings, but for the expansions some settings need to be reduced.

The setting that affects FPS the most (in my experience) is the distance at which objects get invisible ( Terrain distance). I even adjust this sometimes during the game for the particular area I am in to get optimal frame rates.

Ground Clutter Radius I try to keep at about 1/3 of the maximum setting.

Other than these you can turn up the settings because they did not improve or worsen the frame rates drastically (as far as I remember - I am taking a break from WoW, so I can't check my settings ATM ).

 

Yea i'm running all the expansions.

At the moment, the switchable graphics doesn't work very well on the windows 7 for me so things seem buggy. That might be lowering my fps at the moment.

 

There are many settings on the T500 that can cause performance degredation in a game.

Things I always seem to forget are:

• Activate High Performance (Dedicated) graphics. Yes, sometimes I just forget this and start a game with the integrated card
• Switch to Power Source Optimized or Maximum Performance mode in Power Manager. Another thing I tend to forget. I run on profiles that use slower CPU / GPU settings, part because of battery life and part because I like to keep things cool and quiet. And I forget to switch to profiles that let the games use the hardware at its maximum. If you use Power Manager in Basic mode, make sure you drag the slider to maximum performance before starting to game. If you use Windows Vista/7 built in profiles and not Power Manager, make sure you are not in battery saving mode.

 

It would be useful for the equivalent of CUDA on ATI.

 

May not help but I max TF2 and play medium settings and 1440x900 for WoW. The post 3.0 graphics engine for wow is ALOT more demanding then before, so a t500 should be able to max pretty much everything (minus shadows) for wow and easily max source games.

 

Thanks guys, after disabling switchable graphics and switching it to the discrete cards in bios, the Framerates in WoW are MUCHHH better.

When i had switchable graphics on and it both video cards were active, things werent working the way it should.