Expert: Bobbert - 12/9/2006

Question
Hi. My daughter wants a laptop for Christmas and Ive been looking at one which has a 128mb NVIDIA GeForce Go 6150 graphics card. Would this card be sufficient to run her Sims 2 PC game which states requirements of a min of 32mb T & L graphics card? Thanks

Answer
Of course, I don't mean this to placate you, instead I mean to say that T&L (Transform & Lighting) has existed in consumer graphics processors since around 2001, so anything you buy will support T&L. I would also like to elaborate a little more on The Sims 2, which is a rather demanding game.

The game wants DirectX 9.0 support, as it runs in DirectX 9.0 natively, the 6150 should provide that, however it probably won't provide a large amount of processing power, which results in choppy game play. I would suggest a laptop equipped with something a bit faster, you could look at the GeForce Go 6600, GeForce Go 7600, Mobility Radeon X700, Mobility Radeon X1400 and Mobility Radeon X1600 series to provide more power along those lines, as well as full DirectX 9.0 support.

I'd also suggest getting a system with at least 1GB of system RAM, and a decent processor, Intel Pentium M, Intel Core Duo, or better.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834101012
That one looks good, the RAM is a bit lower than I'd suggest, but you can upgrade that after purchasing the notebook if you should decide to. (Core 2 Duo is just a newer version of Core Duo, faster and more thermally efficient)

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834117287
This one should maintain admirable battery life, as it switches off the more power hungry 3D processor (the GeForce 7400) in favor of an integrated GMA 950 chip during non-3D applications.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834117362
This provides a very capable processor/graphics pairing, and should be capable of doing most anything you can throw at it.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16834220075
This notebook will probably be the slowest of the bunch, it doesn't have a dual core processor, and it only has the X600 (which wasn't very impressive at its peak).

-bob