laptop suggestions?

[mollytheMaid15]

I already know that this has been ask a million times but since i’m getting a new laptop in the upcoming weeks for school I wanted to ask which ones would be best for sims 4. I have a majority of the dlc and i also play with a lot of cc/mods. I’m trying to stay under $500 max and i would like to be able to at least play on high/very high  graphics if possible.

These are a few i’m looking at:

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/lenovo-flex-5i-15-6-fhd-touch-screen-laptop-core-i5-1135g7-8gb-memory-2... (it’s a bit over what i’d  like to spend but if it’s better i’ll consider)

https://www.walmart.com/ip/Lenovo-Ideapad-3-15-6-FHD-PC-Laptop-Intel-Core-i3-1115G4-4GB-RAM-128GB-SS...

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/945394621

https://www.hp.com/us-en/shop/ConfigureView?langId=-1&storeId=10151&catEntryId=3074457345619903818&c... (i could upgrade if it’ll make a difference)

[puzzlezaddict]

@mollytheMaid15  I would cross off the second one on the list because it's a tier below the others in terms of performance.  And while the first one is perfectly fine, and very good for a laptop within your price range, you don't need to go over budget for it—this model isn't any better than the third laptop.

As for the fourth, its performance should be equivalent to the first and third, but I would absolutely upgrade the screen—the $10 option; you don't need a touchscreen and it doesn't work well with Sims 4 anyway—and the storage—128 GB is really not enough if you're going to install anything aside from Sims 4 and a very small amount of custom content.  256 GB is fine, but 512 GB would be nice to have if you're upgrading anyway.

Alternately, this laptop looks to be the same model as the fourth one above, except with a better screen than that base model and 256 GB storage:

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/345858801

While 256 GB is more than enough storage for Sims 4, you may want more if you're planning to install other games or store more than a trivial amount of other data.  (I don't mean browsers and the like but rather something on the scale of a collection of photos.)  Since the fourth one would take a while to ship, you may want to consider other options.  All of these have the same processor and graphics chip as the first and third models you linked, so their performance in running Sims 4 should be at least roughly equivalent too:

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/746901299

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/934195040

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/497014617

If you have more questions, please feel free to ask.

[mollytheMaid15]

Thank you so much! The shipping date doesn’t really matter since it’ll be here before school starts! And I think I may go with the fourth one. Will I be able to play at the graphics I want? And would upgrading the graphics help improve the graphics and speed or will it not make a difference?

[puzzlezaddict]

@mollytheMaid15  You should definitely be able to play on at least medium-high graphics settings, and perhaps high settings, but that depends on your playstyle and also your preferences.  (Some people with this hardware play on ultra settings, but I don't want to tell you it's absolutely doable because I don't know what your expectations are for smoothness and framerates.)  There's no harm in experimenting with different settings either, for example putting sim detail on very high and turning something else down to medium.

Upgrading the graphics would in this case just mean going from a 5500U to a 5700U processor, and that would only make a small difference.  For ultra settings, you'd need a dedicated graphics card, which would mean buying a gaming laptop and spending more like $650 at the very least.

[mollytheMaid15]

I’ve also done a bit of research and I’ve heard that I would need a nividia gtx 1650 chip to run the game with good settings ? So  do you have any recommendations with a more lightweight laptop with that chip?. If not do you also think that this laptop would work :

https://www.bestbuy.com/site/hp-15-6-laptop-amd-ryzen-5-12gb-memory-256gb-ssd/6502177.p?skuId=650217...

[puzzlezaddict]

@mollytheMaid15  The laptop you've linked is exactly as good as the other laptops we talked about.  The limiting factor in any case will be the graphics card or chip.  When a computer doesn't have a dedicated graphics card (like an Nvidia 1650, for example), it uses the graphics chip built into the processor.  Thus, the processor model is what matters because a given model of processor will always have the same chip.  So any computer with a 5500U will have the same graphics chip and be expected to perform about the same in graphics-heavy tasks, plus a few percentage points for variation in internal settings.

You only need a dedicated card like a GTX 1650 if you absolutely need to play on ultra settings.  And like I said before, that would push the price into at least the $650 range.  Lightweight laptops with that card (it's not a chip, it's a dedicated card) cost even more; I think I've seen them drop below $900 here and there, but that's unusual.  There is one exception—the MSI GF-something thin models—but then you'd be looking at a gaming laptop weighing around 4.1 lbs that ran hot and loud.  For example:

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/172321853

I'm also seeing this one (4.0 lbs, $600) on the Walmart site:

https://www.walmart.com/ip/seort/466827503

But I can't tell you anything about its actual quality.  Gateway hasn't traditionally been in the gaming laptop business, at least not recently, so I have no idea about build quality.