Will the Intel 4000 intergrated GPU work or not work with the pc version of TPA

rehtroboi40 said:

I'll probably need to do some upgrades on my desktop to get this game. Just found out that my laptop exceeds every requirement except that darned Intel mobile family chip set series 4 GPU (wish I knew then what I know now when buying the laptop). Anyway, if all works out, Rehtroboi37 will be all in.

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Just think how I feel because I purchased a brand new laptop for playing TPA and the person who sold me the laptop said that the darn Intel 4000 chipset would "Run my little pinball game just fine". He was a gamer himself, I thought he knew what he was talking about. I am not a gamer so I had no idea what kind of computer to get.

I trusted this man to sell me a computer to run TPA on. I did tell him that it was going to be a fairly sophisticated program and he told me the Intel 4000 GPU set would be fine. I had already given this person $1100 to order a refurbished Quad Core Toshiba Satellite, but he said save the money and buy this Acer 471-p and all would be fine.

Is there any definitive answer that the Intel 4000 GPU integrated with an Intel i3 Core is a no go? I would really like to know before the game comes out so I can either relax or remedy this situation.

The person who sold me the 'puter lives in the small town my mom and I grew up in, so there are things I can do to try to make him make things right. I want a laptop so I can take TPA with me everywhere I go. Right now I have my eye on an Asus N456VJ model. I am sure this is great for TPA, but can someone confirm that this will be an okay laptop for TPA and maybe other pinball simulations?

Any help would certainly be appreciated. Thanks for taking the time to read this.....Frank

Really wish I could help but PC specs are out of my league. I can use one but have no clue on the rest of that stuff.
Has it been released on Steam yet? Wondering how close it is to being able to demo tables. I would really like to see if I could run it too.
Hope it works out for you man. The only help I can give is nudging the thread back up in hopes someone that knows what they are taking about will see it.

Would be good if FARSIGHT pre released just the trial/demo version to check if our PC's are up to it. I'm sure a lot of us are using computers with "basic" on board graphics.

grashopper said:

Really wish I could help but PC specs are out of my league. I can use one but have no clue on the rest of that stuff.
Has it been released on Steam yet? Wondering how close it is to being able to demo tables. I would really like to see if I could run it too.
Hope it works out for you man. The only help I can give is nudging the thread back up in hopes someone that knows what they are taking about will see it.

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Thanks for your reply grasshopper. You've helped validate my honestly when I was in a tournament and I accidentally cross posted a score to another table.

TPA has not been released on Steam yet. Like you, I am anxious to see if my computer will work on the Steam release. I have no idea when the demo will come out; however, Mike and the beta testers are doing a bang-up job getting the pc version up-to-par.

My original post was a harsh and I asked all of you to state your opinion in writing, that was wrong. You were smart enough to know I could use any of your replies to complain to the person who sold me this computer. Thanks to all of you who read this post, did not reply and put a governor on my crankiness. I know all will work out as it should.

Frank I have an acer aspire 5742z. it's got a ****ty integrated graphics card as well.

I am finally getting around to installing the TPA Steam Beta this weekend, i'll let you know how it runs.

Thanks, I look forward to your thoughts on how TPA runs on your acer.

MontanaFrank said:

Thanks, I look forward to your thoughts on how TPA runs on your acer.

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Frank,

Your GPU, like mine, is ultimately powered by the CPU power. While TPA looks good on my laptop it's pretty sluggish. Most tables run around 15-30 FPS, with a few exceptions. I tried everything I could think of to improve performance right up to, and including, setting windowed mode at 640 x 480.

Your CPU is a little more powerful, and your GPU has a bit more juice so you may get bare minimum play, but I think that the minimum you've going to want to look for would be an i5 CPU with the same integrated GPU; that set up has been reported as working. Your i3 might be just a little under powered, imo. The only way to know 100% for sure though is to run TPA unfortunately.

Frostyglitch says he picked up this laptop at Frys for $300 and it runs TPA acceptable.

netizen said:

Frank,

Your GPU, like mine, is ultimately powered by the CPU power. While TPA looks good on my laptop it's pretty sluggish. Most tables run around 15-30 FPS, with a few exceptions. I tried everything I could think of to improve performance right up to, and including, setting windowed mode at 640 x 480.

Your CPU is a little more powerful, and your GPU has a bit more juice so you may get bare minimum play, but I think that the minimum you've going to want to look for would be an i5 CPU with the same integrated GPU; that set up has been reported as working. Your i3 might be just a little under powered, imo. The only way to know 100% for sure though is to run TPA unfortunately.

Frostyglitch says he picked up this laptop at Frys for $300 and it runs TPA acceptable.

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Thanks Netizen for your help and opinion. I am not sure what I am going to do. I wanted a computer that played TPA pretty good and what you are describing is maybe okay. I guess that maybe my sister will get this new acer-471-p. It will be a great machine for her.

I have my eye on an Asus N456VJ model. It has the following specs:


Intel Core i7-3630QM 2.4 GHz Processor
8 GB DDR3 SDRAM Expandable to 16 GB
1TB 5400 rpm Hard Drive
15.6-Inch 1080P Full-HD LED Screen, Nvidia GeForce GT 635M 2GB DDR3 VRAM Graphics
Windows 8 / Backlit keyboard

I think that this will work with the PC version of TPA - Can someone tell me if this is a pretty good laptop to play TPA on. I also wonder if any of the other pc pinball sims would work with this configuration. After being sold an underpowered computer for TPA, I don't want to choose one myself that is just as bad.

Thanks again, Netizen. You truly are a commendable citizen of the internet. You chose a great name that fits you well. Are you going to be doing anything to improve your TPA experience on the computer?

Frank,
If this is the laptop you were looking at it should totally play TPA
http://www.asus.com/Notebooks_Ultrabooks/N46VJ/#specifications

Depending on which pinball sims you wanted to play some of them will work, and some of them may not. Things changed with Vista and again with Win8. I think most of Littlewing's newer ones are win8 compatible, but if you're talking stuff like Micrsoft Pinball Arcade or Full Tilt Pinball then maybe you'll have to extract the individual table exe's.
I am not 100% on what will run on Win8 or not.

I have a desktop that I should install an OS on, and see how TPA plays on it. I can always put a better GPU in it if necessary.

Frank - I don't know much about PC / Laptop gaming hardware, but here is my take on it.

Laptop gaming rigs will cost you more than a desktop. Appreciate your need for portable gaming, but remember if your running on battery then you will get short run times and likely a degree of throttling.

That GT 635M is certainly better than the HD4000 but not exactly top end. http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+GT+635M.

coupled with that processor I would expect that Asus to run TPA OK. If your buying a dedicated laptop, I'd try and get something a little better though.


My laptop is a Dell Precision M4700, 16GB, i7 3740QM. It has 2 GPX cards. Onboard HD4000 and Nvidia Quadro K1000M. I appreciate this is a business laptop, but I'm hoping/expecting TPA to run OK.

xAzatothx said:

Frank - I don't know much about PC / Laptop gaming hardware, but here is my take on it.

Laptop gaming rigs will cost you more than a desktop. Appreciate your need for portable gaming, but remember if your running on battery then you will get short run times and likely a degree of throttling.

That GT 635M is certainly better than the HD4000 but not exactly top end. http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/gpu.php?gpu=GeForce+GT+635M.

coupled with that processor I would expect that Asus to run TPA OK. If your buying a dedicated laptop, I'd try and get something a little better though.


My laptop is a Dell Precision M4700, 16GB, i7 3740QM. It has 2 GPX cards. Onboard HD4000 and Nvidia Quadro K1000M. I appreciate this is a business laptop, but I'm hoping/expecting TPA to run OK.

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I really appreciate you insight on the laptop xAzatothx. I think the best thing to do is just to be patient and see what transpires after the release on Steam. It would be nice when the demo game and TPA hits the Steam store, that someone would do a thread template like Gord did for PC Beta testers but add the make and model of the computer also. Then we all could see what PC's run TPA in an excellent - pretty good - good - all right -and (SOL)..unplayable.

Santa in on his way and so it would be nice to know what to ask for.

We tested the beta on my friends MacPro (running win7 bootcamp), it has a HD4000 gpu (i7 processor) and it worked without Post Processing enabled.

Also tested on my secondary computer with a i5-750 (2,6ghz quad core) and a Geforce G210 (25 dollar card) and it could not handle Post Processing.

You can add my name to the camp which would tell you that you would definitely get much more bang for your buck with a desktop computer compared to a laptop. I don't know what your other computing needs are, and don't know if it's more than TPA that you'd be buying for, but you would definitely get a lot more gaming power out of a desktop, particularly if you build it yourself. Anytime you buy a laptop with the term "gaming" attached to it, your expense just went up by a lot, but the available gaming power didn't go up in lockstep with the price.

Again, I don't know what all of your needs are with a computer, or budget or anything like that, and only offer my opinion on particular topic: bang for buck as it pertains to PC gaming. The nice thing is that it's not like you have to run out this morning and get one immediately, and you have a chance to see where things end up as far as TPA's system requirements go.

I'll also add this: IMO, you don't want to have a computer which only plays the game on its lowest settings from the outset. Farsight will be adding the directx 11 features, which will require more computing horsepower, and I can only imagine that members of the modding community will also produce features which will be more demanding of our computers. I would imagine you'd like some wiggle room in this area, and not be hamstrung right off the bat.

Good luck, and I'll definitely be keeping an eye on this thread to see how it goes for you.

Any kind of integrated graphics on a pc or laptop are not ideal for running games.
They will run to an extent yes, but will be limited in how graphics and speed are handled.

Thanks everyone for your help and suggestions. Except for TPA or other pinball sims I may want to try, my computer needs were well taken care of with my old Dell Vostro 1000 with Vista basic. The only thing I really need a powerful gaming PC for is TPA, other pinball sims I may like to try and an HDMI output.

Well MontanaFrank, when it's installed, let us know how TPA looks on your machine. I know from this and other threads you have been worried how your laptop, with its integrated graphics, is going to work for you with TPA.

MontanaFrank said:

Just think how I feel because I purchased a brand new laptop for playing TPA and the person who sold me the laptop said that the darn Intel 4000 chipset would "Run my little pinball game just fine". He was a gamer himself, I thought he knew what he was talking about. I am not a gamer so I had no idea what kind of computer to get.

I trusted this man to sell me a computer to run TPA on. I did tell him that it was going to be a fairly sophisticated program and he told me the Intel 4000 GPU set would be fine. I had already given this person $1100 to order a refurbished Quad Core Toshiba Satellite, but he said save the money and buy this Acer 471-p and all would be fine.

Is there any definitive answer that the Intel 4000 GPU integrated with an Intel i3 Core is a no go? I would really like to know before the game comes out so I can either relax or remedy this situation.

The person who sold me the 'puter lives in the small town my mom and I grew up in, so there are things I can do to try to make him make things right. I want a laptop so I can take TPA with me everywhere I go. Right now I have my eye on an Asus N456VJ model. I am sure this is great for TPA, but can someone confirm that this will be an okay laptop for TPA and maybe other pinball simulations?

Any help would certainly be appreciated. Thanks for taking the time to read this.....Frank

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Frank,

My work computer is an i7 with an Intel HD 2000 series chip.

As long as I keep the ball reflections low (still looks pretty good) and the AA down to none it plays wonderfully on all the tables I've tried at 1920x1080.

I'm going to assume the "bigger numbers are better" and hope that your 4000 is a superior line (I know it's not always the case).
I'm actually happy we can get some basic 3d performance out of these on-board cards now-a-days.

My 5 year old Gateway Laptop (gaming laptop when i bought it) plays pretty nicely, but I still keep ball reflections to low and AA off.