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There’s been a development the final two or three years in gaming laptops (and elsewhere) that nobody likes: Prices are going up. It hasn’t been shocking to see methods with probably the most highly effective graphics, together with high-refresh shows, mechanical keyboards, or tons of RAM, to value wherever between $3,000 and $5,000, and extra. See a few of our strongest picks just like the MSI Titan 18 HX AI and the Razer Blade 18.
But that very same factor has been taking place on the low finish. Systems that was once $999 or much less at the moment are usually at the least $1,100. Those laptops usually use older processors and the lowest-end present GPUs.
It’s a nice idea, but the more I thought it through with my colleagues, the more quickly my dreams were dashed.
There’s precedent, but it makes more sense now
I scoffed at the idea. My colleague at the time, Michelle Ehrhardt, titled her review of the system “expensive and unbalanced.” It was $1,600. She was right.
But what if the Xenia Xe hadn’t been designed to be premium? I could see a version of that, using today’s chips, making a new kind of low-end gaming laptop.
Imagine an ultraportable-sized system, perhaps with a 14-inch, 1080p display up to 120 Hz, using something like the AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme (or its most equivalent laptop part that exists). Other than some beefed up cooling, designs using largely plastic chassis that could work are probably already sitting on shelves.
What would make that gaming?
On the other hand, there are laptops out there now with chips using AMD’s Radeon 890M, though they’re generally in premium ultrabooks. People do play games on those, the same way Apple’s entire product line doesn’t include a dedicated “gaming” laptop. There’s no reason you couldn’t use one of them, but they’re probably priced higher than I’m thinking.
So, now we have a theoretical plastic laptop with an otherwise strong chip that could, generously, play games at 1080p on medium settings. Hopefully, that could make for something affordable, even if it’s not powerful.
With handhelds, gamers accept that lack of power because they get portability. Gamers expect portability from laptops already. So what would make something like this a gaming laptop? What could give that value?
For starters, I would want to see an OS focused on gaming. What if it was officially licensed to run SteamOS, and you could use Arch Linux for productivity? Or perhaps it could run Windows 11’s upcoming handheld gaming mode that will debut on the Asus ROG Xbox Ally. In exchange for power, get rid of bloatware and give people a gaming-focused experience. Using one of these would also allow for game validation, like what the Steam Deck and upcoming Xbox Ally will offer, so you can get an idea if games will run. But honestly, these should be options on high-end machines, too.
The laptop companies could also team up with Nvidia or Microsoft to get lengthy trial subscriptions to streaming services for games that may have trouble running well on integrated graphics.
Lastly, if you’re not paying for a discrete GPU, maybe toss a mechanical keyboard in there. It’s not unprecedented. The Dell G16 previously had cheap configurations with a Cherry keyboard, and that was a great value-add (the Dell Gaming lineup has since been discontinued).
There’s also the question of which companies might be bold enough to put their gaming brand on a laptop without a discrete GPU.
Counterpoint: The market is complex
But enough brainstorming. When you start to think about how things really work, this idea is harder than it seems.
Take my thought that companies could stick a chip with strong integrated graphics in some existing system’s chassis. They probably could, to some degree, but more cooling would still be helpful. And existing gaming laptop designs are built around the idea that a dedicated GPU is there, so tweaking that would require more tooling. Additionally, using an existing gaming chassis defeats the idea that you could get a slimmer laptop if you don’t have a GPU to cool.
Next up is that in most systems, the companies that make gaming laptops can pair the CPU and GPU they want together. That’s why we’re seeing so many RTX 50-series laptops with 13th Gen Intel Core CPUs — those CPUs are fast enough, and they’re likely cheaper. Companies can mix and match to hit whatever price point they want. But APUs using graphics like Radeon 890M are the highest-end parts, paired with high-end CPU cores, and they’re sold at a premium.
If a laptop company wanted to make something like what I described, they might have to go to Intel or AMD and ask for something custom, and that would require a big order. (This is also what happened with the Steam Deck. Valve got a custom chip.)
Otherwise, we’re hoping Intel or AMD come around and make an SoC with a “good enough” CPU but the best GPU cores on the market. That doesn’t seem likely, especially with limited fab capacity and a demand for higher-margin parts.
In an ideal world, maybe one day, the companies that make these systems could bring costs back down. But realistically, I don’t see that happening. That makes each gaming laptop below $1,000 a rare bird these days. And while an RTX xx50-class mobile GPU might not excite you, it’s all some people can afford, especially as prices creep up.
Despite the hardships of doing it cheaply, we are already seeing some steps down this road; they’re just not cheap. After all, we saw AMD’s Radeon 8060S with the Ryzen AI Max+ 395 in the Framework Desktop, as well as in the Asus ROG Flow Z13. The latter is technically a laptop (well, tablet) and is selling for $2,400 on Best Buy. Admittedly, it will be straightforward to drop the worth by utilizing one thing with out Strix Halo and 64GB of RAM. But even then, it’s in all probability not getting near the sub $1,000 mark, at the least till it goes on clearance.
And firms that make gaming handhelds have been elevating costs. If these units promote, no firm goes to have a lot incentive to place these in laptops at a cheaper price.
Almost, but not quite, there
I think we’re a lot closer to the idea of laptop gaming on integrated graphics than we’ve ever been. (You can argue it’s been happening for a long time! People who want to game will find the means to play on any system they have.)
On the other hand, people buy gaming laptops because they want to play games – usually modern AAA titles. Some of the initial handheld chips, like the Steam Deck’s Aerith, are showing their age. This happens to all systems, eventually.
That might just be the way games are now, with less optimization and more graphical capabilities (Nvidia and AMD are trying to sell their high-end GPUs, after all). But to call a laptop a gaming laptop, it really needs to play all of the games, at least for a while after launch. So maybe a few more iterations will be required before this idea is ready for prime time.
But it also means we need to wait for great integrated graphics to get even cheaper for market forces to get in line. I think it would be great to see a true “gaming lifestyle notebook” that’s slim, powerful enough for most games, and ready with plenty of gaming features at the OS level. But with all of the factors making it tough on the low end, we’ll have to settle for pricier Strix Halo experiments, at least for now.
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