Hi, want to buy some used hardware to run with Linux (Gnome DE ON Mint, Debian OR ElementaryOS). Mainly Office use, transcoding, but also for casual gaming Half-life 2 and maybe some more modern games.
Are Thinkpads with integrated GPUs sufficient for that? Any nice alternatives which are sturdy and can be upgraded?
TIA!
EDIT: thank you for all the helpful input. Will check AMD options!
- Björn Tantau ( @bjoern_tantau@swg-empire.de ) 10•3 months ago
Stay away from the Thinkpad T580 with the Geforce MX150. It’s horribly throttled and can’t even run Quake 3 properly although it should actually be capable of running Doom 2016.
Might be the same with the T480.
- finley ( @finley@lemm.ee ) English5•3 months ago
Depends on the specs and the games. Possibly/probably.
- data1701d (He/Him) ( @data1701d@startrek.website ) English5•3 months ago
I’ve been enjoying my Thinkpad E16 that I got brand new from Best Buy. https://startrek.website/post/13283869
- data1701d (He/Him) ( @data1701d@startrek.website ) English4•3 months ago
I don’t know about other games, but it wasn’t too terrible playing Civ 6.
- bloodfart ( @bloodfart@lemmy.ml ) 3•3 months ago
Yes it’s fine stay away from the discrete gpus there’s not adequate cooling for their extended use.
- cmnybo ( @cmnybo@discuss.tchncs.de ) English3•3 months ago
Modern games are not going to run well. Look for a Thinkpad with a Thunderbolt 3 port (make sure it actually has 4 PCIe lanes, some only have 2) and use an eGPU. Retro games will run fine on integrated graphics though.
Will do, thanks!
- wallmenis ( @wallmenis@lemmy.one ) English3•3 months ago
I can reliably play wii on an x230. I am pretty sure you can go ahead and play unless it is ps2 or xbox og or anything newer (wii/gamecube excluded)
- jcarax ( @jcarax@beehaw.org ) 3•3 months ago
I’d say if you get a Ryzen, yeah. I have a P14s gen4 AMD that I use for my primary machine, and game on successfully. But I also have an old T14s gen1 AMD that work let me keep when I got refreshed. Right now I have Windows on it, to play some games that don’t work well in Proton, but it works fine in Linux as well.
If you can swing it, the T14s gen3 with a Ryzen 7 6850u was a truly excellent machine, it’s what I have for work right now. But we won’t see it coming off lease for another couple years, so it’s a bit early for good prices on the used market.
- nerdovic ( @nerdovic@discuss.tchncs.de ) Deutsch3•3 months ago
How’s battery life on your T14s G1? Currently looking into getting one myself, and hope for at least 8 hours on battery on Linux (no gaming, just light dev stuff with web browsing)
- jcarax ( @jcarax@beehaw.org ) 1•3 months ago
Honestly, I never really use it untethered enough to give you a good answer. But I can say that notebookcheck’s battery tests are pretty good, and they test enough laptops to compare well across a large number of models and generations.
- noddy ( @noddy@beehaw.org ) 2•3 months ago
For old not very demanding games by todays standard, yes. As long as you get something new enough to have proper support for Vulkan API (such that DXVK would work). As others have mentioned, AMD have better iGPUs than intel, so definitely look out for that.
- kittenzrulz123 ( @kittenzrulz123@lemmy.blahaj.zone ) 2•3 months ago
I use a T440p and it works amazing for lightweight gaming (tested so far: Fallout NV, BTD6, Minecraft, and Enter the Gungeon)
- potentiallynotfelix ( @potentiallynotfelix@lemdro.id ) English2•3 months ago
generally a thinkpad should be fine, but you’ll want a 1.7ghz+ cpu, aswell as a dx8.1 video card for half life 2