Affordable laptop for 3D work (Blender, Substance, Unity) and gaming

[urbanhusky]

My partner's laptop broke and we are in a hurry to find a replacement with equivalent or better performance.
Previous laptop was a Lenovo Legion 5 15imh05, probably with a quad core i5, GTX 1650 (Ti?), upgraded to 32GB RAM and 1TB + 512GB storage.

 

Usage profile:

• 3D modelling work using Blender, Substance Painter and Unity
• Gaming - if it ran on the old one, it should run (better) on the new one

Requirements:

• Nvidia GPU this is not negotiable because Bakery and other things require Nvidia
• 32GB RAM, preferably user-upgradeable to 64GB later on
• At least 1TB + 512MB SSD storage, non-soldered. Probably doesn't matter if single 2TB module or 1TB + user expandable but empty.
• Minimum 15.6" IPS FHD 120Hz display
• 3+ USB A 3.x
• Some level of repairability. It's a laptop, it's going to break eventually. Handing it over to a repair shop and having them be able to even take it apart would be good. So non-soldered RAM etc. might perhaps be beneficial
• US keyboard layout

Budget:

• We'd prefer if we could stay around 1500€, lower is better - but I'm open to hearing about options beyond that if it would give us significant benefits. I'll have to check where we could buy one from without having to import one to Austria or Hungary.

(If Nvidia wouldn't be a requirement I might have had a good hard look at Framework because the old laptop has been in repairs way too often)

[OddOod]

Love the profile pic

For that performance portfolio at that price you're likely looking at a used machine. You're gonna have to go fishing in the depths of ebay and hope you strike lucky. 

[Somerandomtechyboi]

8 minutes ago, OddOod said:

Love the profile pic

For that performance portfolio at that price you're likely looking at a used machine. You're gonna have to go fishing in the depths of ebay and hope you strike lucky. 

1500€ im pretty sure is enough for a new 4060 based laptop

 

idk about used but if a 3070 laptop is cheaper then sure why not, itll probably be better considering its basically a desktop 3060ti and the desktop 4060 has trouble even keeping up with the thing let alone a mobile version

[urbanhusky]

I'm just mostly looking for something of equal or better performance, that should hopefully fit within that budget

[FlyingPotato_is_taken]

13 hours ago, urbanhusky said:

1TB + 512MB SSD storage

O.o  

 

With access to the educational discount a ThinkPad P16 G2 would barley fit within the 1.5k€ budget (i7 and A500).

 

For the it needs to be Nvidia there is Zluda: https://github.com/vosen/ZLUDA

In a hopefully not far future this eliminates the Nvidia lock in.

[Likwid]

You could get lenovo legion 5 pro with i7 13700hx and rtx 4060 for 1400 eur, but you would need to upgrade ram 50 eur and storage 100 eur.

Upgrading it on your own looks cheaper than buying laptop with 32gb ram and 2tb of storage

[urbanhusky]

We got a good offer on a new Lenovo LOQ 15IRX9 (13450hx, rtx 4060, no OS) with an upgrade to 3TB and 32GB. Kept us way below 1500€
Only trouble we had was that we had to go with Windows 11 because half the drivers wouldn't work under Win 10.

P.S.: Bakery needs Nvidia (OptiX) so ZLUDA wouldn't help.

Thanks for all your suggestions