Slim Gaming Laptop

[Papa P]

I'm looking for a slim gaming laptop for college, it has to be able to play games and do school work. I've looked at MSI's GS series, Razer's line of laptops, and various other slim gaming laptops. My price range is less than $2000 US Dollars. What are your suggestions? 

 

Side question, are they called notebooks or laptops and what's the difference?

[MatazaNZ]

I don't really have any suggestions, I cab say that holy freaking crap the G750JZ is huge, so that won't do at all, and that is really the only gaming laptop I know. As to your second question, I think laptop is a blanket term for notebooks, ultrabooks, netbooks, etc. I usually just use notebook and laptop interchangeably

[Swndlr]

join the razer blade club

pls :c

[Sandvich]

lenovo y50?

[edwd2]

Many of my friends use an Ultrabook + Desktop combination instead, since in most cases, they won't be playing games while out.

[Guest DollarPC]

Plz tell me you didnt suggest a razer product...

[Whorax]

Plz tell me you didnt suggest a razer product...

The Razer Blade is good actually in my honest opinion. It's pricey, but you get something that looks like a more stealthy MacBook, and has pretty good power for a laptop of its size, and also a really nice display. I'd still never buy one because I don't think gaming on a laptop is comfortable, but to each their own.

 

As for the notebook or laptop thing, I believe it was called notebook instead of laptop recently because manufacturers didn't want to be held accountable for them burning people while putting them on their laps, and the name laptop suggests you can use them on your lap. Notebook less suggests this and more suggests that they're meant to me placed on a surface where it won't burn you.

[mushies1337]

I'm looking for a slim gaming laptop for college, it has to be able to play games and do school work. I've looked at MSI's GS series, Razer's line of laptops, and various other slim gaming laptops. My price range is less than $2000 US Dollars. What are your suggestions? 

 

Side question, are they called notebooks or laptops and what's the difference?

if you can afford it, Razer Blade 14" all the way

 

otherwise some of the MSI notebooks are nice

[razor767]

If you need one right now, Razer Blade 2014 is the best choice imo.

 

If you can wait, you may want to hold off and see what new offerings they'll be from other brands with the newly released Intel Broadwell CPUs. 

[Razzy_85]

Alot of good reviews of msi's gs series gs70 2qe has some fantastic reviews.

[ShadowCaptain]

gigabyte p35x?

[D2ultima]

I'm looking for a slim gaming laptop for college, it has to be able to play games and do school work. I've looked at MSI's GS series, Razer's line of laptops, and various other slim gaming laptops. My price range is less than $2000 US Dollars. What are your suggestions? 

 

Side question, are they called notebooks or laptops and what's the difference?

What kind of gaming prowess do you want? Like, what games are you planning to play? And what do you think "slim" is? Because the thinner it gets the worse it cools, usually. And are you willing to purchase a brand you've never heard of before? Also, are you willing to accept integrated CPU and GPU machines, or do you prefer socketed CPU/GPUs?

 

lenovo y50?

Screen sucks. Only 45% NTSC gamut. Also, it's known to throttle the CPU before it reaches a thermal or power limit. PLEASE don't recommend it as a good "gaming" laptop.

 

The Razer Blade is good actually in my honest opinion. It's pricey, but you get something that looks like a more stealthy MacBook, and has pretty good power for a laptop of its size, and also a really nice display. I'd still never buy one because I don't think gaming on a laptop is comfortable, but to each their own.

 

As for the notebook or laptop thing, I believe it was called notebook instead of laptop recently because manufacturers didn't want to be held accountable for them burning people while putting them on their laps, and the name laptop suggests you can use them on your lap. Notebook less suggests this and more suggests that they're meant to me placed on a surface where it won't burn you.

The razer blade is a laptop designed for someone who already has a desktop and wants a secondary machine. It only has a single mSATA slot which holds a single (at max) 512GB SSD that Razer sells, and Razer will not sell replacements to you. HDD bays and ODD bays and various things have been cut out to spread a mediocre cooling system across the laptop for it to keep its thinness. It's also VERY overpriced, considering what you actually get. You're literally paying $1000 for flashiness, in some cases, if you built a similarly spec'd machine from another manufacturer.

 

gigabyte p35x?

Has wireless problems at the moment. A lot of people have been getting them and returning them. I would avoid it for now until they iron out those issues; some people don't get the issue but I'd rather he not buy a new machine he instantly has to RMA.

[Whorax]

The razer blade is a laptop designed for someone who already has a desktop and wants a secondary machine. It only has a single mSATA slot which holds a single (at max) 512GB SSD that Razer sells, and Razer will not sell replacements to you. HDD bays and ODD bays and various things have been cut out to spread a mediocre cooling system across the laptop for it to keep its thinness. It's also VERY overpriced, considering what you actually get. You're literally paying $1000 for flashiness, in some cases, if you built a similarly spec'd machine from another manufacturer.

Like I said, I'd still never buy a gaming laptop since I do believe they're overpriced in just about every scenario.

You definitely did bring up good points about the Razer Blade and how it's kind of bad. I forgot about the extremely lacking storage options when talking about it. That alone would be the deal breaker for me.

 

To the OP: I saw some pretty neat notebook stuff from CES. Maybe you should look more into it, it may tickle your fancy.

[D2ultima]

Like I said, I'd still never buy a gaming laptop since I do believe they're overpriced in just about every scenario.

You definitely did bring up good points about the Razer Blade and how it's kind of bad. I forgot about the extremely lacking storage options when talking about it. That alone would be the deal breaker for me.

 

To the OP: I saw some pretty neat notebook stuff from CES. Maybe you should look more into it, it may tickle your fancy.

Laptops can be pretty expensive, it's true. The problem is only partially the cost of the GPUs/CPUs, though. The machines also come with screens/monitors, keyboards, trackpads (mice), batteries, decent cooling setups (once you get gaming machines, like mine) and other stuff that a basic, "mobo + case + PSU + i5 + GPU + RAM + HDD = PC" setup will not need to include. Once you begin to include halfway decent copies of the above costs, you find that gaming laptops are only ~$200-300 more than gaming desktops, if you buy from scratch. A baseline $1000 gaming laptop isn't going to be very cost effective compared to a desktop because you end up with like $500 or so for the internals alone. A $1600 machine might come a bit closer to a $1200 desktop with all the included parts, however. You do pay for the mobility, but people don't realize how to shop for them, or what's actually good.

 

There's a huge thin + light craze going around, resulting in soldered high end CPUs for all new notebooks, in a rush to make things thinner, because adding the socket adds height and removes the ability to use lower profile heatsinks. People also look for ultrabook-like thinness, expect 2" thick cooling and 2" thick power for $1200 a lot. It's... not good. And most hardware/PC gaming websites don't do any research about it or publish articles that help educate users at all.

 

Also, when I said the Razer Blade was $1000 paying for flashiness, I meant "$1000 extra over a similarly spec'd laptop you could buy from other places". Like, "a bit thicker MSI with the same specs would retail for $1500 where the Razer Blade Pro would retail for $2600".

[Papa P]

I watched Linus's video from CES on the GS30 Shadow with dock and thought that was a good options. What do you think?

[Omon_Ra]

I watched Linus's video from CES on the GS30 Shadow with dock and thought that was a good options. What do you think?

 

For college, it seems perfect. Small, lightweight laptop for at the library/class; desktop GPU at home for gaming. I'd definitely consider that.

[D2ultima]

I watched Linus's video from CES on the GS30 Shadow with dock and thought that was a good options. What do you think?

The point of the GS30 is that it can't game on its own, so if you're fine only gaming at home, it may work. The cooling system looks okay; it might be able to power the CPU properly, if you get it with the dock for gaming later.

[Papa P]

For college, it seems perfect. Small, lightweight laptop for at the library/class; desktop GPU at home for gaming. I'd definitely consider that.

 

That's exactly what I was thinking.

 

The point of the GS30 is that it can't game on its own, so if you're fine only gaming at home, it may work. The cooling system looks okay; it might be able to power the CPU properly, if you get it with the dock for gaming later.

 

Do you think I would be able to run small scale indie games off the the laptop w/o dock?

[D2ultima]

That's exactly what I was thinking.

 

 

Do you think I would be able to run small scale indie games off the the laptop w/o dock?

Sure, it has an iris pro GPU so it's not like it's an invalid. You could probably play stuff like Terraria or minecraft or starbound, etc. (assuming they don't hate intel GPUs).

[Razzy_85]

You have a few options.

If you are considering something like the gs30 then you may aswell just build an sff to a budget that suits your needs and then buy a really cheap laptop/notebook that you can type/take notes.

Or....you can just get a higher end gaming laptop that for 2000 dollars will get you one with a gtx 980m and a higher end i7 mobile cpu that will do everything you want regardless if it's thick or thin.

no one can decide this apart from yourself no matter what we say so good luck with you decision and all the best at school.

[ShadowCaptain]

Has wireless problems at the moment. A lot of people have been getting them and returning them. I would avoid it for now until they iron out those issues; some people don't get the issue but I'd rather he not buy a new machine he instantly has to RMA.

 

can easily upgrade the wireless card, for almost no cost 

 

not heard of any problems with them though so fair enouigh

[Geekazoid]

can easily upgrade the wireless card, for almost no cost 

 

not heard of any problems with them though so fair enouigh

[D2ultima]

can easily upgrade the wireless card, for almost no cost 

 

not heard of any problems with them though so fair enouigh

I know the wifi card can be upgraded, but there are other problems too. I would at this point usually link you to notebookreview's owner's lounge for the series, however NBR is down as it's migrating to a different forum backbone, so I can't. Just know I've seen more than one person get it, use it for under a week, then return it to buy another machine due to problems the notebook has.

[ShadowCaptain]

I know the wifi card can be upgraded, but there are other problems too. I would at this point usually link you to notebookreview's owner's lounge for the series, however NBR is down as it's migrating to a different forum backbone, so I can't. Just know I've seen more than one person get it, use it for under a week, then return it to buy another machine due to problems the notebook has.

 

dissapointed, I was looking at it myself

 

want something 13-15" slim light 1080p and 980m

[D2ultima]

dissapointed, I was looking at it myself

 

want something 13-15" slim light 1080p and 980m

This might work. http://www.xoticpc.com/sager-np8652-clevo-p650sg-p-7795.html?wconfigure=yes

 

But stop looking for thin, light and powerful. It usually translates into bad cooling and/or cut-out internals. Haswell CPUs are extremely hot; hotter than Ivy Bridge and Sandy Bridge, by far. And then you're looking at integrated CPUs/GPUs to further keep the thickness down. It's steps backward in modularity that've been around for years, sadly.

 

If you want socketed, try this: http://www.xoticpc.com/sager-np9752-clevo-p750zm-eta-jan23-p-7850.html?wconfigure=yes