Hi I’ve been trying to find a gaming laptop that would play sims 3 with mods and expansion packs smoothly and realised that I have no idea what it is I’m looking for and was hoping I could get some help and ideas on what to look for.
My money limit is no more then $2000au
thanks for reading
@FaoPerriwolf For $2,000 Australian, you can get more power than Sims 3 would ever use. So the question is whether you want a somewhat cheaper good option, one that would run the game on ultra settings without any trouble; or whether you'd like something overpowered, perhaps for other games either now or in the future. Within each category, the are other details that may matter to you, for example whether the laptop runs faster/louder/hotter or slower/quieter/cooler, although those aren't always mutually exclusive.
As examples, these laptops should all run Sims 3 quite well on ultra settings, minus the two settings (water an high-detail lots) that need to be turned down to lower the demands on the game engine. The Lenovo has 16 GB memory, but you could upgrade either of the others easily enough; the graphics card in the Acer is a bit slower than the others but still more than fine.
https://www.harveynorman.com.au/acer-nitro-5-15-6-inch-i5-10300h-8gb-512gb-ssd-laptop.html
https://www.jw.com.au/lenovo-ip-gaming-3-r5-4600h-16gb-gtx1650-ti-w10-430472
https://www.centrecom.com.au/msi-alpha-15-a3ddk-156-fhd-144hz-ryzen-7-3750h-laptop
On the higher end, the graphics cards in these laptops are significantly faster, which won't help with Sims 3 but might with other games. In order of slowest to fastest GPU (the gap is small):
https://www.harveynorman.com.au/acer-nitro-5-15-6-inch-i5-10300h-8gb-512gb-ssd-gaming-laptop.html
If you'd like to look yourself, the relative speed of the graphics cards in your price range is this:
Nvidia 1650 < 1650 ti < AMD 5500M << 5600M < 1660 ti < 2060
There's no reason to get a high-end card just for Sims 3 unless you want to play with high framerates, e.g. 144 fps rather than 60. But you may have other plans for this laptop in the future, in which case it might be worth the extra money to futureproof. On the other hand, if playing those games is several years down the line, you might be ready for a new laptop anyway by that time.
If you have more questions, please feel free to ask.
