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Looking at getting this http://www.bestbuy.com/site/satellite-15-6-laptop-6gb-memory-500gb-hard-drive/1689182.p?id=1219060352357&skuId=1689182&st=categoryid$pcmcat247400050000&cp=1&lp=5#tab=specifications

Everything on it looks great except for the graphics chip, which is just an "Intel HD".

I'm not trying to play Crysis or anything, but would this be able to run older games like Left 4 Dead 2, Gary's mod, or maybe even games like Starcraft II on lower settings?

Unfortunately I can't go with a desktop. I'm going to be doing some travelling soon and a desktop would be really cumbersome.

Is there a better alternative in this price range? I know very little about computers and really just need it for general work. Gaming would just be a nice bonus to have. I know I won't be able to get something super amazing, and that if I want it to play games, it will require much better specs than a regular laptop would, but that's about it

Any help would be appreciated!

My laptop has comparable stats. I've not had any issues playing; BF3, FEAR 2,MWO, Arkham Asylum, and others.

I did have some issues with Arkham City, but that was because I had the graphics set to max.
Crysis 2 was to laggy to play on mine.

I dunno if that helps, but seems to me like that laptop should run things ok (based on my experience).

_e

This is a fairly low-end machine as far as i can tell. The fact it has a giant screen and quite high ram for the price and the fairly premium feature of HDMI actually makes me especially dubious about gaming capability. Also with that Massive screen and, as far as i can tell, not Full HD. Its all gonna look squat and stretched.

Also the processor is not dual or quad core apparently which AFAIK would mean certain games would just flat out not run. EDIT: Forget that, i think it has 4 cores.

Another fact is that although Intel HD graphics have improved ALOT over the years that is still just the base one and not HD 3000 or 4000.

My Laptop has HD 4000 and can run certain games pretty well, I get a decent frame rate out of Torchlight 2 and Path of Exile in fairly high resolution but some games really struggle. A game that Runs and Looks like utter Garbage on my machine is Dota 2 and guess what? That's a Source engine game, just like Left 4 Dead and Garry's Mod.

EDIT: IIRC Source games are just not something you can play with any fidelity on integrated graphics.

I'm afraid PC gaming at even a modest level requires a decent investment. I would do a bit more research.

This is a good little explanation of the graphics in your machine, it has a list of games at the bottom. (Alot of the page could be written in hieroglyphs but it still paints a clear picture):
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Intel-HD-Graphics-Ivy-Bridge.85998.0.html
Starcraft 2 should work.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Is there a better alternative in this price range?

Not really. It depends on what tradeoffs you want to make. The one you picked has pretty generous RAM and a decent CPU for the price; but the integrated graphics will make gaming with any modern games difficult. Garys Mod and L4D2 are probably fine, SC2 maybe. You'd really need to put down at least $450-500 to get a low end gaming laptop.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:

I know very little about computers and really just need it for general work. Gaming would just be a nice bonus to have. I know I won't be able to get something super amazing, and that if I want it to play games, it will require much better specs than a regular laptop would, but that's about it

Any help would be appreciated!

It looks like a very solid general purpose laptop, well worth $300.