System Requirement Questions

[Stonewarrior]

Hi all, I have been playing the Baldur's Gate series for over a year now and am thinking of trying a new game. Wasn't very much into Icewind Dale and have thought of trying Neverwinter Nights. I typically play on my laptop and wondered if some of you might help me out with some system requirement questions. My laptop has a 1.3 processor with 256 RAM and a 40 gig HD. To my knowledge I do not have a 3D graphics card (wasn't thinking gaming when I bought it). My desktop has the same specs but does have a 3D accelerator card in it. I have looked at the reqirements on the platinum box and I appear to be a bit short. That said, do any of you think I would have to much difficulty playing? Thanks in advance!

Peace, John.

[Zink Whistlefly]

Hi Stonewarrior,

Unfortunately the Aurora Engine requires hardware 3D acceleration.

What graphics chipset does your laptop have?

[banzai]

But NWN is very frugal when it comes to graphics. If you have *any* 3D hardware acceleration it should suffice.
In my old desktop I had 256 MB RAM, a 1 Gig processor and a GForce 2 card - it ran NWN without problems.

[Stonewarrior]

Zink - I have no clue whatsoever. LOL Add to that, I am not even sure where to look to find out. I might just have to stick to the desktop.

[banzai]

Open Control Panel -> System -> Hardware -> Device Manager -> Display Adapters. There you find your graphic adapter (card).

Another way is to open Start -> Run. Then type in dxdiag and press enter. After program start open the Display tab. There´s your card is listed under device.

Hope that helps ...

[Variol (Farseer) Elmwood]

There are a lot of of options in the game which relate to graphics. You may be able to run them at a lower lvl and be fine.

[Stonewarrior]

Banzai - When I look at my Display Adapters I have two entries...

Intel(R) 830 Graphics Controller-0
Inter(R) 830 Graphics Controller-1

I am not sure what this means, but it does not appear to be a 3D type card. I googled the above ad found only one very odd entry. LOL

However, when I tried the second option you suggested under DirectX features it idicates Direct3D Accerleration is enabled. I tried googling this as well and got a bunch of very indecipherable results. Lots of ???????'s. Odd.

[banzai]

This does mean you have an onboard graphic chip in your system - no *graphic card* but merged with your mainboard.

According to Intel (http://www.intel.com/support/graphics/sb/cs-010473.htm) your system should be DirectX 9 compatible and so should run NWN - but if I were you I would give it a try before buying (if possible).
Your other specs are ok I thing - but don´t abide too much. It´s not just proc, RAM and graphic, e.g. almost all laptop HDs are much slower (data transfer rate) than their desktop counterparts.

Good luck !!!

[ 01-27-2006, 05:18 AM: Message edited by: banzai ]

[Stonewarrior]

Thanks a lot banzai! One other question if you don't mind. I have been looking on E-Bay for a copy to get and there a bunch to choose from. I had thought of getting the Gold edition. Seems I can get a copy for about $10 to $12 with shipping which is a LOT cheaper than in a store. The Platinum version is also available, but I am not sure which to get. There are also other versions but they seem to be individual modules. Thanks in advance!

[robertthebard]

I'd go ahead and get the platinum edition. It has all three of the official campaigns, and will be easier to work with, especially if you plan to go online to play.