how much will GeForce 9400M will get me?

[Zandengoff]

The 9400m was the target card for Valve for their low end Portal 2 testing. So yeah this card is still usable and relavent. I have a Macbook and a Mac mini both with this graphics chipset. I can play Prey at a decent resolution and basically anything source engine based.

[Lokkenjawnz]

I have a question, what computer are you getting that has a 9400M in it? I ask because I have an '09 Macbook Pro and it has a 9400M and a 9600M GT, and I've played a fair amount of games on this machine, and more often than not I don't even switch to the 9600. The 9600 definitely allows for better looking/responding games, but it's a pretty negligible difference as far as I can tell. The biggest difference that I've noticed is that the 9600 doesn't cause the machine to produce as much heat, which is pretty nice.

The big issue, at least currently, is the difference between the Mac and Windows side of things. A lot of games (namely StarCraft II, dammit Blizzard!) perform much better on Windows than on the Mac side. That's not to say it's unplayable, it's just not quite as good as it could be, given the hardware present. I've yet to run into a game that I really can't run, though admittedly I don't play really high powered games too often, though I'm definitely not only playing old games on it.

Point is, even though it's a mobile-specced card, specs aren't necessarily everything. Try it out first if you can, and see what works and what doesn't.

[RCBH928]

I got a late 2008 macbook
i checked out WoW it was fine

I did try Left 4 Dead , but the game did run its best at 640 resolution :S
am not sure if i was doing something wrong

all your words are encouraging and hence I will try out more mid 2000 PC games

The heat this laptop generates when running graphics intensive applications, and the fan noise scares me a lot, I think its doing more than it should be.
Fans reach something like 6000rpm and cpu at 82C

[RyaNtheSlayA]

I got a late 2008 macbook
i checked out WoW it was fine

I did try Left 4 Dead , but the game did run its best at 640 resolution :S
am not sure if i was doing something wrong

all your words are encouraging and hence I will try out more mid 2000 PC games

The heat this laptop generates when running graphics intensive applications, and the fan noise scares me a lot, I think its doing more than it should be.
Fans reach something like 6000rpm and cpu at 82C

Perfectly normal. It'll shut off if it gets too hot. The fans are just doing their job.

I'm using a 2010 13" MacBook Pro.

Anyways, as far as L4D is concerned, it sounds like you're using the Mac OS version which runs absolutely terrible. If you can, load Windows on your MacBook for games. I had a 2009 Mac Mini with the 9400m and under Windows it was nice and smooth at 1680x1050 and medium settings.

[RCBH928]

thanx
ill load up mid 2000 games as soon as I can find a reasonably priced XP copy!