My asus laptop wont let me download mods

Ok let me take a guess. You haven’t played Minecraft in about a year and would love to get back into the game or maybe your daugther’s birthday is coming up and she’s requested a PC that can run Minecraft because she’s tired of playing it on the 360 or your iPad Mini. 

So the first thing you did is asking what’s the best laptop for MineCraft on the web..

And you got comments like:

“Minecraft can run on a toaster and if you get optifine it can run on a potato. Get a cheap +100$ laptop”

“Minecraft will run on an integrated graphics card and a pentium CPU”

“My pre built 10-11 year old machine eats MineCraft for breakfast”

“I have a 400$ laptop from 2 years ago with the screen falling off and MC still runs good”

You get the point….

Those comments do hold some truth to it. 

It is true that  MineCraft isn’t too hardware demanding but it requires more than people give it credit for. (I would love the people throwing those comments to jump on to the servers I play on and see if they still feel the same way though…)

So what If I listen to those guys and get 200$ second hand old laptop?

If you play it on an old atom 450 ( a dinosaur CPU) with 2GB RAM and Windows 7 on it you will get around 20 fps with minimum chunks loaded…

On the other hand…

If you get a modern decent laptop for about 400-500$,  you can run the game at max settings or at least at medium settings with some shaders/mods and still pull off a lagless +60fps.

The problem is…

Of course that most of you have no idea what they’re doing when it comes to computers.

Sit bax and relax…

In this post we are not only going to list the current 6 best laptops for MineCraft in 2020, we’ll also take an in depth look at Minecraft graphical settings, their impact on the game, the hardware specs every setting needs and your pocket.

Unfortunately that analysis can be awfully long and boring for many of you.

So we’ll try to summarize* it before we go over our 6 best laptops for Minecraft. 

*If you really want the full guide which you can use to find a laptop for your own or just to research more about MineCraft perhaps to squeeze out every bit of FPS of any machine, check out the last section “Buying a Computer for MineCraft”. That last section also includes a lot of information if you are on a tight budget and want to get the best bang for your buck by venturing into other options than just modern and new laptops.

Recommended Specs for MineCraft

The minimum official requirements listed on the official site basically translates to a low-end OLD laptop that will only run a bare-bones version of Minecraft with a screen resolution of 854 x 480 pixels at 10 frames per second, or less.

It definitely doesn’t include the ability to run all thousands of mods people have released.

So we are not going to re-list those “official” requirements.

Our requirements are going to be categorized in two types:recommended and best.

1. The “recommended” specs should let you run most mods and a few shaders without too much drama.

2. The “best” specs will let you run a fancy version of MC at FHD resolution with +120fps and the most hardware demanding shaders. 

    Mid-Range: NVIDIA 1050Ti,1060, 1650, 1660Ti. (Thelast one is the highest you should go for).

    High-End: 2060RTX, 2070RTX. Only useful for “RTX Minecraft”. Still in beta.

RAM

If you don’t plan going crazy with shaders, RAM will play a bigger role in eliminating lag when playing MC.
Aim for at least 4GB. Recommended 8GB.

Best: No point in assigning anything more than 12GB. You can’t find 12GB on laptops so 16GB if you really want to max it out.

Storage

Could be any type of hard drive honestly. MC doesn’t take a lot of space even with hundreds of mods and shaders.

Solid State Drives are standard these days and if you’re looking for an old refurbished computer make sure you get a SSD too.

It won’t get your FPS to higher numbers and won’t run MC any faster but it’ll help launch other games and your OS in literally split seconds.

While most devices can run Minecraft, it’s not easy to run Minecraft well. Java is slow so Minecraft needs a decent processor and plenty of memory. 

Getting a good processor and enough RAM  isn’t expensive so don’t be alarmed, we’ll list budget laptops too. 

Laptops with plenty of CPU power and 8GB of RAM will only cost you ~ 450$ and even 350$ (if you got a copy of Windows 10). 

Note that I’m going to include only laptops that have an acceptable frame rate with MC, not just “playable”. All of them can run several mods but the prize will increase depending on the resolution and graphical effects you want to play with. 

1. HP 14 TouchScreen
Best Laptop For Minecraft Under 500

  AMD Ryzen 3 3200U

  8GB RAM DDR4

  AMD Radeon Vega 

  256GB PCIe NVMe SSD

  14” IPS full HD 1080p

  3.24lb

  8 hours

This is not the best best laptop for Minecraft but it is the most budget friendly laptop for MC with windows 10 on it which you need to play the full version of MC.

You can find several laptops with the same specs and cheaper but careful some of them won’t have Windows 10 on it and will only come with 4GB of RAM. If you get ones for 400$ or less, you’ll just have to play the “App” version of MineCraft available from the Windows Store. If you got a copy of Windows 10 though, you can save yourself 100 bucks!

Now let’s get to the hardware, the AMD Ryzen 3 3200U is not a weak processor at all. It’s even faster than the 10th generation Core i3 processor and it’s actually much cheaper which has brought down the price of this laptop significantly.

The cool thing about this laptop is that it’s got the RAM already upgraded to 8GB and you even get a nice SSD in it.

The GPU however is integrated and you won’t find dedicated GPUs under 600 bucks. Although, it is an integrated AMD GPU, it’s almost as powerful as any recently released mobile Integrated GPUs from Intel.

You can expect an average of 100FPS with medium settings in building worlds. However, if you start adding shaders then FPS might go as low as 20,  not too bad.

As for Mods, if you’re planning on adding tons of Mods, you’ll be fine with nearly all of them  as long as you have 8GBs of RAM and +3GHz and a recent graphics card even if it’s integrated like this one.

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2. Lenovo IdeaPad 3
Best Laptop for Minecraft under 400

  Intel Core i3-1005G1 Up to 3.4GHz

  4GB RAM

   Intel UHD

  256GB SSD NVMe PCIe

  15” HD 

  4.07 lbs

  8 hours

If you actually looked at the table I posted above carefully and you know a thing or two about computers, you’d quickly realize that this is the best deal in it.

As for speed and performance, it’s pretty much the same as the HP 14, though it’s 100 bucks cheaper for the simple reason that it doesn’t have 8GB of RAM, just 4GB RAM.

Now 4GB might be okay for most mods and a few shaders and might also be okay if your son or you just want to run MC without any fancy graphics. If not, you can do either of these two things:

1. You can upgrade it to 8GB RAM, yourself by buying a stick from this link. They both have to be of the same brand/size so you get a boost in speed(this is detailed at the end of this post). Saving yourself 150$
2. You can buy the 499 version, which not only comes with 8GB RAM but a Core i3 10th gen processor and UHD graphics, which are both relatively faster than the AMD Ryzen 3 3200U/Vega 3 GPU.

Another cool thing about the 499, besides being faster than the HP 14/Ryzen 3 Lenovo models, is the fact that it has 256GB of storage and 32GB of USB storage, so if your son is going to use this for schoolwork or you’re going to edit some videos/photos for work it may come in handy.

But let’s not be kidding ourselves you’re going to use a laptop just for MineCraft or Minecraft youtube videos and if you’re going to do some work it’ll probably be some interior design with the Mr Crayfish Furniture mods

The only real downside about this laptop and the HP 14 is that they only got HD resolution.

Unfortunately, there aren’t many laptops under 600 with an IPS full HD display and Windows 10. 

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3. Acer Nitro 5
Best Cheap Gaming Laptop For Minecraft

  Intel Core i5 9300H

  8GB RAM

   GeForce GTX 1650 

  256 PCIe SSD

  15” FHD 1080p IPS

  5.07lb

  5 hours

THis laptop is totally different from the other two, it’s not just the Core i5 processors, it’s the GPU that will have the biggest on impact on running heavy shaders smoothly and the game itself at high settings with +100fps.

Now to be more precise, this laptop will give you an average of 300 fps with low settings with mods like the MindCrack Pack however High settings using the same mods will make it go down to 150 or so.

Vanilla MC with shaders,at high settings will decrease it further to 70-80FPS. Still good considering that most laptop’s only have 60 hz refresh rates on their screens. Indeed it’s not just one of the best laptops for Minecraft but also the best deal for a gaming laptop!

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4. ASUS TUF FX505DT 
Best Laptop For Minecraft Mods & Shaders

  AMD Ryzen 5 R5-3550H

  8GB DDR4

   GeForce GTX 1650

  256GB PCIe SSD

  15.6” 120Hz Full HD

  4.85lb

  5 hours

I think this laptop right here might be the best laptop for minecraft you could get to play the game at high settings with high framerates and actually get a smoother gaming experience.

It’s not very different from the Acer Nitro, the Ryzen 5 CPU is just as powerful as the Core i5 9300H, it also has the same GPU and RAM size….

But…it does have a 120Hz display…which is nuts considering it’s only around 700$ about 100$ cheaper than the Acer Nitro. 

A 120Hz will allow your eyes to witness those 120FPS your GPU/CPU can output as opposed to the Acer Nitro’s 60Hz which will only limit it to 60FPS (although the game will actually run at +100fps).

Anyways because MC isn’t a very hardware demanding game you’ll still be hitting similar FPS numbers as the Acer Nitro:

+200-300 FPS with low settings.
+100-120 with high settings
+50-60 FPS with shaders at high settings.

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5. XPC MSI GF65
Best Laptop For RTX Minecraft

  Core i5-9300H

  16GB DDR4

   GTX 2060RTX

  256GB SSD

  15” full HD 120Hz IPS

  4.10lb

  4 hours

This is the highest configuration you should go just for MineCraft.

The reason is simple. Higher processors and GPUs will start giving you diminishing returns, you’ll get +250-500FPS with Vanilla MC on all of them .

Lag spikes will no longer be caused by insufficient hardware and will only be caused by the lack of internet speed that we still face around the world because the number of players and everything has to render takes way too much data

The 2060RTX GPU here was released last year but it’s still quite popular and known as the most budget friendly “high end” GPU (along with the AMD equivalent which is only available on desktops).

How should we evaluate performance now with high end CPU/GPU laptops that  can all output far more FPS than our display can handle? By looking at how much FPS you can get with the most hardcore shaders.

The 2060RTX with a shader like ChocaPic will give you around 70FPS on average, which isn’t too bad for running one of the most hardware demanding shaders out there! 

6. Acer Predator Helios 300
The Best Laptop For Minecraft RTX

  Core i7-10750H

  16GB DDR4

   NVIDIA RTX 2060 

  512GB PCIe NVMe SSD

  15” full HD 144Hz IPS

  5.07

  4 hours

Indeed this is The “The” Best Laptop For MineCraft and pretty much any game out there and more than likely any upcoming expansion of MC itself.

It’s more appeaing for those that are really into shaders and plan on using the most hardware demanding ones to get higher framerates than just 50-60.

For that you just need a laptop with an “2060 RTX”  GPU and a big bad ass CPU like this one.  The increase in framerates with the most hardware demanding shaders won’t be significant though, only 20-30FPS but during all other instances of the game, the framerates should go up by 50 if not 100 .

Let me talk a bit more about the RTX GPUs…

There’s another good reason to opt for a laptop with an RTX GPU, RTX MineCraft.

Still in Beta but should come out this year and obviously RTX GPUs are the ones to go after and out of the three RTX GPUs ( RTX 2060, 2070 and 2080) , the RTX 2060 has the best performance/money ratio.

Another cool thing cool thing about getting this laptop or the MSI above is that you will never have to fight with your kids over your desktop because either of those laptops can run pretty much  any game out there at high at ultra settings just like a powerful desktop.

One of the downsides of the Acer Predator, maybe not a downside because it would make it much more expensive, is the lack of the 240Hz panel. The acer Predator here only has a 144Hz panel. If you really care about high refresh rates, there’s an EULEK laptop that’s only 150$ dollar more expensive with pretty much the same specs and a 240Hz display.

The 240Hz display will give you a better gaming experience if you play Vanilla MC at high settings because your eyes will actually be able to see every framerate output by your GPU/CPU (Up to 240Hz of course).

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What’s in this section?

While minecraft will run best with any gaming laptop with a dedicated GPU those start from 750$ or 650$ if you are lucky to find them. However, most people reading this post probably can’t afford even that.

This section will not only be devoted to those who have the cash to play MineCraft with settings up the Wazoo with the most hardware demanding shaders or the latest RTX features but also for people who are willing to venture into refurbished, old and much cheaper laptops.

It’s a guide written for all gamers around. It’s quite long but well worth it for those who want to get the best bang of their bucks.

Just make sure to read it carefully and if there’s anything you don’t understand check our posts on the sidebars which explain basic computer terminology.

You can also use this section to help you build your own PC/desktop for minecraft. 

MineCraft can run on a Potato but…

A potato won’t let you unlock a tons of features or join the coolest servers out there. With a potato you’ll just be playing against….well other potatoes.

There’s also the issue of the rendering engine likely to be updated during future updates which will also raise the hardware requirements.

Keep in mind that if you decide to run Mods/shaders, the system requirements will go even higher dnd well…. if you don’t even know what mods you or your son is going to venture on you might as well overcompensate over the recommended/minimum requirements

Official Requirements

Before we get into the CPU, GPU, RAM and go over every single spec,  what role they play into running MC smoothly and what parts you should aim with the settings you have in mind, let’s dsicuss the Official Requirements.

Minimum

My cousin actually plays minecraft with the bare minimum requirements as you can see by this screenshot. It’s 2020 and his laptop is almost 6 years old. But he’s quite limited in a lot of ways with the game althoug he does still have fun with it.

I’ll post a video of his game play soon (it can’t even tolerate recording screen software).

Recommended

On the other hand, is far more powerful than the recommended requirements and this is the kind of stuff I can do on it:

Moral of the story is this. Like every game…you can run it on a potato but with potato graphics, potato settings and potatoe gameplay.

Extra power will always give you better frame rates, longer rendering distances, more textures etc and the ability to run more mods. There’s still a limit though and that depends on how bad ass you want the graphics to be or what exactly you want to do with MC…

Heck possibilities are endless with this game, gamers have even created a 1:1 scale representation of the entire country of Denmark, a recreation of King’s Landing from the Game of Thrones television show, and even a mini-game version of Minecraft within the game itself. 

Would you do all of that with a potato laptop? 

Anyways enough with intros let’s talk about CPU, GPU, RAM and Storage and what role they play to get the FPS/Settings you want and which ones you should get to get the graphics/gameplay you want.

CPU (Processor)

The CPU speed determines how fast the computer can process the game, and how well it can handle doing multiple operations like running Skype or a browser while you’re playing. Dual or quad core will make this much easier, and you want to look for a speed of at least 2.6 GHz. 

And as you probably noticed , MC is not really a “graphics game” as much as it is a “CPU game”. That’s why it can be played on almost all systems these days because most of the graphics are actually processed by the CPU and the GPU only renders what the CPU tells it to.

You can launch MC and notice that it’s consistently somewhat high on the CPU consumption scale.

In fact, both in RAM and CPU usage, Minecraft is higher than any other game with the same graphics I play or have played with.

Core vs Clock Frequency

Minecraft is generally pretty CPU-bound and doesn’t really multi-thread well.  This means that it can’t use a whole bunch of cores so don’t sweat it if you can’t get the latest 10 core processor  because MC won’t be able to take advantage of all cores.

Although the later versions of MC actually use more than one thread ( this started with 1.7.10 and offloading even more to other threads in higher versions, up to four cores), single threaded performance is still the biggest factor on performance.

So if you come across any of these CPUs when shopping for laptops or desktops, you should prioritize “clock frequency” over number of cores or other features.

What’s the highest I should aim for?

When it comes to minecraft there is no such thing as overkill on the cpu front. Better CPU will always translate to better graphics and more features. Check our full post on AMD/Intel CPUs if you want a much better comparison table of what they currently got to offer.

But generally the CPU should be at least in the mid to high 2GHz range, +3GHz is ideal.

QuadCore vs Dual Core

Today, dual cores are found mostly Intel Core i3 or Ryzen 3 processors. They’ll run MC with no problems and even let you play with mods but you should opt for quad cores CPUS anyways. Although they will not increase performance with MC significantly they’re all round better at multitasking.

Six Core and Eight Cores

These are not really needed unless they got more clock frequency. They’ll only be more useful for  tougher jobs, such as video editing .

Modded MC

Preferably gen 7/8/9. (Look for processors with names that have “Core i7-7XXX” for 7th gen and “Core i7-8XXX” for 8th gen etc.)

AMD vs Intel

Laptops

Generally AMD processors will give you the best bang for your buck even on laptops. You can check out how several laptops with AMD processors and a dedicated GPU are a lot cheaper than their Intel Counterparts. So if you’re looking to get the best bang for your buck in terms of CPU performance + GPU, you should definitely include a couple of AMD laptops on your list.

If you have the budget to afford the most powerful CPU out there, you’re going to do a lot better with Intel CPUs as you can easily see on the table above. Note that the AMD Ryzen 9 HS 4800 CPU might actually be more powerful than many of the Intel Processors with “higher clock speeds”. This is due to design and cooling factors. Unfortunately AMD Ryzen 9 CPU laptops are like a unicorn today and you won’t find them that easily.

Desktops

For years i’d have said intel on desktops too, now AMD is strong on single clock frequency too. In fact, I would go for AMD myself now. I bought my Intel processor way before the new Ryzen Series was out. 

At nearly every price range AMD will give you better performance, better “price” , better connectivity and better overclockability(is that a word?).

I suggest you pick an AMD Ryzen processor in almost every instance unless you have unlimited budget and want the best performance for gaming by opting for one of the most insanely powerful Intel CPUs.

CPUs like the AMD Ryzen 5 3600 or 3600x are a great budget choices. Intel doesn’t really compete for budget CPUs right now.

OLD CPUS

AMD and Intel are always releasing new generations of processors and they come out with a new generation at least once a year. So previous generations aren’t that bad and may still be worth buying if you are not looking to run MC on turbo mode.

But just because you heard that MC can run on a toaster and you only have enough money to buy the oldest one doesn’t mean you should. If you plan on buying an OLC CPU due to budget issues, follow these simple rules and you won’t be wasting all that hard earned cash:

• Avoid any of the low voltage versions, AMDs E1, E2 or Micro processers, and Intel Celeron, Atom, M or Y processors(Ex: m5-6Y54 , m5-6Y57).
• Look instead for  AMD processors with a 7xxxP or 8xxxP part number, or Intel processers with 4xxx, 5xxx, or 6xxx part numbers.