Poor Graphics Card with HDMI

[soxfan93]

Hey guys, quick question about how PC games would look with my setup.

 

I have a pretty good Dell laptop (6.0 GB RAM, etc.) but it came with the standard "Intel HD Graphics Family" video card. This means that, according to Can You Run It?, I can't run any games, failing only the video card test.

 

If I use my HDMI cable and plug it into my TV, will the games run the way they are supposed to? I know that the video card is an important part of the computer, but if the computer is outputting to the TV, does that make it rely less on the video card, therefore allowing me to run the games correctly?

 

I doubt it, but I'd like to get some verification here.

 

Thanks.

 

Edit: Another thing that, again, I just want some clarification on:

 

http://i53.tinypic.com/xghdep.jpg

 

So... Why did that fail?

[D-Lyrium]

Running it on a monitor or a TV via HDMI will make zero difference; it's still the graphics card doing all the work. The card does all the calculations, the cable just transmits the results to something capable of displaying them.

 

In this case, what it's displaying as "Intel HD Graphics Family" is a built-in graphics processor that uses far less power than a traditional graphics card, but for gaming is... not so good. I don't think the Intel chips actually support many games.

 

Lots of people who use laptops for gaming also have a more traditional graphics card installed, and the laptop will switch between them if you try to run graphically intense programs (like games) and then switch back afterwards to save power. Automatic detection programs generally don't pick graphics cards up when there's an Intel chip installed but it's usually pretty costly, so I figure you'd know if you had one...

 

I don't know a huge amount about laptops, so I can't be a lot more help than that. :/

[soxfan93]

Thanks man, much appreciated.

 

After I posted this, I remembered that my older brother builds computers for a living so I gave him a call, so we can probably let this die. Just wanted to say thanks.

[bigtplaystew]

If your TV has a pc connection OR if your laptop has the HDMI port so you can just go HDMI to HDMI... you should have zero problems.

 

If you play on going VGA-to-HDMI or VGA-to-composite you might run into some problems. Just google your graphics card and see if others have had problems. Almost always, you'll find a post somewhere with someone talking about whether they needed specific drivers or whatever.

 

Sometimes it's hassle free. But i've had headaches with that in the past.