Looking for a new gaming laptop

[Nihility]

my gf uses an acer predator, i believe it's a series so you can sliding scale to your price range within, and it has been incredibly stable for her.
It does blow pure fire out the back when she's heavy gaming but internally it maintains a good temperature

[KisaiTenshi]

Whilst there's some good nuggets in there and I agree that Clevo rebrands are always a great budget option to look out for, there's a few things I feel the need to correct...

You do not need to "correct" anything, you are looking to start a fight. The OP asked for recommendations, said thank you, and you STILL decided to troll the thread.

If someone buys a Dell/Alienware, they are in for a world of hurt should they break anything on it. Dell is special kind of hell which I won't go into here. It is worth warning people away from Alienware unless they want to spend the extra money for the style of it. That is it. Dell ruined that brand, and customer service is BAD.

Lenovo produces some gaming laptops that look like business laptops. That's the point. Apple's laptops are a joke and are not gaming capable, not by a long shot. That leaves the Taiwan-based laptops (Acer, Asus, MSI, Gigabyte, etc), and Microsoft somewhere in the middle.


Source: https://www.laptopmag.com/articles/laptop-brand-ratings

Someone who is after a gaming laptop, and is willing to spend more than a desktop on one, would be better off just buying a Clevo machine and ignoring everything else. Clevo is an OEM, which means that other companies buy their machines and stick their own brand on them. But they also sell bare systems that can be customized (eg different CPU, GPU, etc) where you can't do that on anything else presently short of a few older Dell models that had the upgradable GPU boards. This is why you don't see Clevo on "lists".

MSI has a fairly long list of reasons why they should be avoided, but the latest is claiming coil whine is normal.

The average laptop dies because people don't allow it to be cooled properly. Laptops have fans, they need to be cleaned. "Thin and light" laptops are not gaming laptops, they throttle down when they get hot. They are not appropriate for playing a MMORPG on, as they will slow down when you don't want it to.

Businesses make their purchasing decisions based on what their employees are supposed to be doing with it. Those that need to use their laptops on the road can not have a "gaming" laptop because a non-EV car can't put out more than 75 watts. Those that have a laptop as a way to economize on office space and send people home to work, can get whatever machine the business wants. Business machines are generally built better as long as the person who uses it doesn't use it in a dusty environment or let their pets sleep in their workplaces.

[Sebazy]

Nah, I just don't like people who preach blatant misinformation as if it was gospel. Hi.

If someone buys a Dell/Alienware, they are in for a world of hurt should they break anything on it. Dell is special kind of hell which I won't go into here.

Again you state this as gospel and fact, yet Dell are sat there third in your list. Care to back this up? I'll admit that I'm coming from the angle that I'll likely just repair it myself. The only Dell thing I've ever RMA'd was a high end monitor and they had a new one on my desk before the week was out. I've overhauled and refreshed pretty much every other Alienware from the likes of the M9700 through to M17X R1-3s (and actually have an older M17 going through a burn in as we speak). If you need to replace the motherboard on any high end laptop, it's going to be painful, pretty much all the other moderate risk components are either standard and easily replaced parts, or hard soldered. Other typical subjects like hinges and keyboards are no different to any other comparable laptop. Again, this is not a Dell/Alienware specific issue. You're just as likely to get burned with this with any other machine as well. Hating on one brand for it is stupid. Doing your homework before a purchase is smart.

where you can't do that on anything else presently short of a few older Dell models that had the upgradable GPU boards.

Absolutely false.

Whilst MXM3 is indeed dieing out, Clevo most certainly aren't the only people that still use it. However it's worth noting that relying on buying an older machine to put a new MXM3 GPU isn't particularly great idea, LVDS vs eDP isn't something you want to find out about after you've thrown a ton of money around. Not to mention the eye watering cost and limited availability of new cards with any real warranty.

Don't get me wrong. I agree with you on the Clevo praise, and we are both preaching the same thing when it comes to the importance of good cooling. But calling Alienware junk and Apple a joke frankly marks you as a mindless sheep in my eyes. Alienware's current line up is pretty solid and respectably priced in the UK at least. Apple have absolutely no place being even mentioned in this thread frankly (And I don't mean that as a slight, you just don't buy a MacBook to play games irrespective of your budget).

[KisaiTenshi]

Nah, I just don't like people who preach blatant misinformation as if it was gospel. Hi.

So you just admitted you came to a "recommend me a laptop" thread that someone else started to be a troll to ME.

Dell has been nothing but a rubbish to deal with. I do not recommend them. What is wrong with you?

[Sebazy]

So you just admitted you came to a "recommend me a laptop" thread that someone else started to be a troll to ME.

Dell has been nothing but a rubbish to deal with. I do not recommend them. What is wrong with you?

No, I came here to correct the nonsense you are spouting. Calling me a troll then coming out with 'what is wrong with you?' isn't a good look either tbh.

And on the flipside, my experience with Dell has been absolutely fine. You can find similar stories with pretty much any brand you could name. Even Apple have plenty of horror stories abound despite their heavy focus on accessible and friendly support.

Again, I ask you to cite your examples.

[XenoCranel]

not sure about laptops, but I like evga products. This one's for 1k https://www.evga.com/products/produc...516-34-1833-T1

Here's a review:

https://www.notebookcheck.net/EVGA-S....230932.0.html

There are probably more reviews besides the link mentioned above. Getting a computer is an investment so I recommend researching before you impulse buy or anything. If it's just to play ff14, you shouldn't have any issues with the laptop from EVGA.

Another alternative is to try and put parts together at https://pcpartpicker.com/ to build your own tower.

It's a very useful site that gives you trends on pricing and updates on prices dropping.

However, tbh prices on RAM and Video cards are high right now and it may go over your budget. It may be more ideal to buy a pre-built tower if that's the case.

[Paladinleeds]

Consider going to places like PCSpecialist. As previously mentioned, these sorts of companies tend to use Clevo parts, and are cheaper than equivalent big brand laptops (your Dell's, Razer's, etc). I have one of theirs myself. Really good. Has a 960m (this was pre-10 series.). Brick sized, but it's got good cooling. PCSpecialist even offer some laptops with mechanical keyboards.

I don't know if you have the room for it, but a laptop with the correct port (I think it's Thunderbolt 3), and something like the Razer Core V2 could potentially allow you to get stronger graphics. Could potentially help with the heat too. Reason being is the heat produced from the graphics card has its own separate cooling (be forewarned you will need to supply your own GPU though, but since GPU seems to be the main part to upgrade in a CPU as games get better, this would mean not having to replace the laptop each time you want a graphics upgrade).

[Rinuko]

Always a laugh reading KisaiTenshi comments on anything

Anyhow, to OP. I can from personal experience that picking a MSI or Asus gaming laptop and you'll be perfectly fine.
I've had less good experiences with HP in the past (8-10 years ago now) with overheating. This may have changed over the generations.

[Caitlinzulu]

Hiya, whilst the 980M is still a capable card, the reason why people put so much stock in the 10 series line is because it was such a substantial step forward in performance per watt as well as being a bigger leap in raw performance than you would normally expect. A very significant detail in a laptop where both heat and power are big concerns.

To put it into perspective. The 980M has a 120w TDP whereas a 1060M is a little bit quicker across the board yet has a TDP of 80w.

This is a big deal both in terms of portability and long term reliability.

Ok I agree, my laptop can be used as a platewarmer when you put them just behind it and it doesnt really work well on battery when gaming either