A New Beginning + Can My Computer Run This Game?

Hi everyone,
I started playing wow a few months before the release of TBC, and quit shortly after the release of WotLK. The game really lost its charm for me. However, just the other day I read an article about a great vanilla server called Nostalrius, and I figured I ought to check it out.
My first concern is my computer. I haven't played a video game since I quit wow. At the time I had a high end gaming laptop. That is no longer the case. I'm currently using a relatively new 13" macbook pro retina. It has a 2.8 Ghz i5 and 8gb of DDR3 @ 1600Mhz. This is a significant upgrade from the pc I began playing wow on, however, that pc did have a dedicated graphics card. This laptop has an intel iris chip which I know nothing about, and is where I'm concerned I might have problems. Below is the info my computer gives me on the chipset. Will it run Vanilla wow?
Chipset Model: Intel Iris
Type: GPU
Bus: Built-In
VRAM (Dynamic, Max): 1536 MB
Another inquiry I had was regarding PVP vs PVE. In the past I primarily played on a PVE server, although I did level one character up to around 55 on a PVP server. How hard is it to level on nostalrius PVP? Is there a lot of corpse camping and high lvl ganking, or are people generally good about that sort of thing. How are areas like STV? Is there one faction that is worse than the other? I'm under the impression that there are a lot more people on the PVP servers. are there enough people to play on the PVE? Is it hard to pick up groups while leveling? Do PVP and PVE come together in BGs? If not are the PVE BGs active? BGs were one of my favourite aspects of the game.
Is lag better in PVE due to lower population, or is it about the same? In terms of PVE vs PVP are the factions fairly balanced? I read a couple of older threads indicating that horde was dominant on the PVP server and alliance on the PVE (in terms of population). Is that still accurate? Is it really a big issue in that depending on the faction you play you can't find groups, or is it more minor?
As I mentioned, BGs were one of my favourite aspects of the game. Can you be competitive/have fun in BGs at level 60 without raiding? As much as I'd love to experience some of the end game vanilla content that I missed, I'm not willing to put more important aspects of my life on hold to make raid times every week. Can you get moderate gear doing 5 man dungeons? Might it be possible to get T.05/T1 on a casual raiding basis? Can you still get the level 60 alterac valley gear? How does it compare/how impossible is it to attain the rank required to get the gear? Would it be easier to obtain the required rank playing on a PVE server?
Lastly, I know this has been beat to death, and I've read many threads about this subject, but what are peoples thoughts on the best class to for balancing PVE content and PVP content at 60. I'd like to go back and forth between PVP and PVE content without constantly respeccing. I'm open to the majority of classes. The two things I'm sure about are I don't want to play a hunter and I don't want to tank. I love warriors, but I played one to 80, did the tanking thing, and warriors seem like they may be heavily overpopulated on Nostalrius. As tempting as it is to roll an arms or fury warrior, it sounds like spots are limited in end game content for them. Tying into that question, what do people think would be the easiest class to get a spot in a raid with on a casual basis? I'm thinking a healing priest, but I'm unsure.
That was a load of question, thanks for looking.
Tristan
I started playing wow a few months before the release of TBC, and quit shortly after the release of WotLK. The game really lost its charm for me. However, just the other day I read an article about a great vanilla server called Nostalrius, and I figured I ought to check it out.
My first concern is my computer. I haven't played a video game since I quit wow. At the time I had a high end gaming laptop. That is no longer the case. I'm currently using a relatively new 13" macbook pro retina. It has a 2.8 Ghz i5 and 8gb of DDR3 @ 1600Mhz. This is a significant upgrade from the pc I began playing wow on, however, that pc did have a dedicated graphics card. This laptop has an intel iris chip which I know nothing about, and is where I'm concerned I might have problems. Below is the info my computer gives me on the chipset. Will it run Vanilla wow?
Chipset Model: Intel Iris
Type: GPU
Bus: Built-In
VRAM (Dynamic, Max): 1536 MB
Another inquiry I had was regarding PVP vs PVE. In the past I primarily played on a PVE server, although I did level one character up to around 55 on a PVP server. How hard is it to level on nostalrius PVP? Is there a lot of corpse camping and high lvl ganking, or are people generally good about that sort of thing. How are areas like STV? Is there one faction that is worse than the other? I'm under the impression that there are a lot more people on the PVP servers. are there enough people to play on the PVE? Is it hard to pick up groups while leveling? Do PVP and PVE come together in BGs? If not are the PVE BGs active? BGs were one of my favourite aspects of the game.
Is lag better in PVE due to lower population, or is it about the same? In terms of PVE vs PVP are the factions fairly balanced? I read a couple of older threads indicating that horde was dominant on the PVP server and alliance on the PVE (in terms of population). Is that still accurate? Is it really a big issue in that depending on the faction you play you can't find groups, or is it more minor?
As I mentioned, BGs were one of my favourite aspects of the game. Can you be competitive/have fun in BGs at level 60 without raiding? As much as I'd love to experience some of the end game vanilla content that I missed, I'm not willing to put more important aspects of my life on hold to make raid times every week. Can you get moderate gear doing 5 man dungeons? Might it be possible to get T.05/T1 on a casual raiding basis? Can you still get the level 60 alterac valley gear? How does it compare/how impossible is it to attain the rank required to get the gear? Would it be easier to obtain the required rank playing on a PVE server?
Lastly, I know this has been beat to death, and I've read many threads about this subject, but what are peoples thoughts on the best class to for balancing PVE content and PVP content at 60. I'd like to go back and forth between PVP and PVE content without constantly respeccing. I'm open to the majority of classes. The two things I'm sure about are I don't want to play a hunter and I don't want to tank. I love warriors, but I played one to 80, did the tanking thing, and warriors seem like they may be heavily overpopulated on Nostalrius. As tempting as it is to roll an arms or fury warrior, it sounds like spots are limited in end game content for them. Tying into that question, what do people think would be the easiest class to get a spot in a raid with on a casual basis? I'm thinking a healing priest, but I'm unsure.
That was a load of question, thanks for looking.
Tristan