Hello
I’m abut to start Zwifting and would like to try my old alptop wich has a GTX 460M. Surfing zwiftalizer found two users with this card and this results
1080 MEDIUM 1/3337 <1%
PC / Intel Core i7-2630QM @ 2.00GHz / Nvidia GeForce GTX 460M/PCIe/SSE2
FPS _MAX 34.1
FPS _MED 24.6
720 MEDIUM 1/3337 <1%
PC / Intel Core i7-2630QM @ 2.00GHz / Nvidia GeForce GTX 460M/PCIe/SSE2
FPS _MAX 43
FPS _MED 31.29
My other option would be just using the phone, with a Qualcomm Snapdragon 845 (more than two years old).
Obviously my best course of action would be to dump the damn thing and buy a new desktop, but I already spent >1000€ on the direct trainer and my wife would kill me.
Any thoughts?
The rest of the components I think not help either: i7 840QM, a basic Samsung SSD and 4GB RAM (adding 4GB more would make a difference?
Thanks
Have you tried installing the app and running it? if you select the just watch option you’ll see if it cam handle the graphics and stuff
Yes that laptop is a bit underpowered. It depends on what sort of settings and frame rate you want to Zwift on. You definitely don’t need to spend a lot to build up on an old office PC to Zwift on Ultra settings @Dave_ZPCMR should be able to help!
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Initially I ran Zwift on my 2013 laptop. I got about 12fps in 1080 mode.
I used the guidance provided by: https://zwiftalizer.com
to get a tower gaming computer, and to also help me configure a gaming laptop for my wife, who Zwifts now as well.
I have run Zwift fine at 1080p on an i5-4300 laptop and on a Ryzen 5-2500 laptop. I do not think either has an extra GPU card. That said, on my new i7-10750H with NVidia 1660Ti Zwift looks spectacular…noticeable difference for the better (Lenovo Legion 5).
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The 1660Ti is great!
Also, on M’s G7-15 laptop: i5-9300H + NVidea RTX 2060: 1080@60fps (but can do UHD with external TV)
You can run any setting in game, you should just put it on 4K all the time. 
That said, a gaming laptop is just about the worst value for running Zwift. You pay an astronomical premium for portability and can’t upgrade it in any meaningful way - extra RAM if you’re lucky and Zwift doesn’t need more than 8GB anyway. It only actually needs about 2GB but you get crappy textures with less than 8GB.
Nobody should buy a gaming laptop for Zwift IMO. For the price of a decent one they could knock up a dedicated Zwift PC with TV, buy a nice Chromebook or decent Windows laptop and still have spent much less. And get better results at both ends.
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Well sure…but that is assuming all I do is Zwift. The i5 and Ryzen were work laptops…my personal laptop was a Dell i7 mobile workstation from 2012 and it was working fine until my wife spilled a quart of water on it. The Lenovo Legion was the best deal going on Costco for power, graphics, WiFi6 and storage. Plus if you use a Costco cc…double the warranty. I buy as much power as I can afford and use it until it fails via water or whatever. No workstations on Costco so I went gaming. Zwift is about the only game I play.
I still have a Dell Latitude from 2005 that works (PATA SSD and all) but have not tried Zwift on it. Probably would not do well. I have been contemplating learning Linux on it but I need an end use and have come up with one yet…maybe for monitoring my well and such…
All I’m saying is that any other decent modern laptop should walk normal workstation applications (perhaps excluding AutoCAD and video editing), so getting one with the GPU grunt to run Zwift well is an extraordinarily large jump up in cost. To each their own though. 