The gaming industry is definitely huge, with gamers in the US who spent over $60 billion on games in 2021 alone. However, it is important to consider what the gamers actually prefer to play on. It turns out that PC remains the most popular platform, with console gaming coming in second. So, what makes PCs so important to gamers. Everyone can agree that gamers simply have more freedom with a computer. Especially when you take into consideration some of the latest gaming laptops that are up to par with gaming consoles in terms of portability. Laptops are some of the fastest growing platforms because new dedicated chips are becoming smaller, allowing these devices to become much more powerful compared to before. Laptops are no longer simply another office tool, but they actually deliver extraordinary gaming performance too. When it comes to laptops there are so many choices to make. Here is everything you need to know before buying a gaming laptop.
Look at the GPU
Most serious gamers understand that if they want a stable and optimal gaming performance, they have to prioritize the graphical processing unit (GPU) component. Most modern games include extremely detailed high-resolution textures that can be quite taxing on your GPUs video memory (VRAM) with the standard being 6-8GB for most modern titles. However, next to how much VRAM a graphics card has, you should also consider the features that it has to offer. There are two most popular brands to choose from Nvidia and AMD. With the former being the most prevalent choice in gaming laptops. Nvidia features different series of cards which are all built on separate architectures. This means that some of the latest features such as ray tracing and DLSS only come with the newer series cards. The current premium models are 30 RTX series with some of the cards capable of gaming in 4K at 60fps. Some of the best deals on Nvidia configurations come from digiDirect – Gaming Laptops. You will be game-ready in no time, with a powerful system that can enable smooth gaming in over 100fps.
The type of display
When people usually think of a laptop, they tend to overlook the display. This is because for years, business laptops have not made any revolutionary changes to displays. However, things have drastically changed with the advancements in laptop gaming. New powerful GPUs allow gamers to push well over the standard 60Hz refresh rate that most business laptops have. This means that the animations on the screen look far more realistic and smoother thanks to the increased number of frames per second. Here are some of the key features of modern gaming displays. Most gaming laptops will feature a 15 or a 17-inch panel. This is completely up to personal preference as it doesn’t offer you any performance increase. Just make sure that it is portable enough for you. When it comes to resolution, there are three main categories. FullHD 1080p displays can be easily powered by most GPUs and represent the standard. However, for those with more powerful cards there are configurations with 1440p and even 4K displays, just make sure that you have at least a 30 series card if you want to game in 4K. Lastly, consider the refresh rate as well since most gaming laptops will have 144Hz displays with some pro-gaming options going up to 240Hz or 360Hz.
Keyboard type
Gaming laptops are usually recognizable for their fully backlit RGB keyboards that display a wide array of colors. Some gaming laptops will feature mechanical keyboards that offer really good actuation control and optimal response times.
Processor
When you have a dedicated GPU, you don’t want to bottleneck its performance by a suboptimal processor (CPU). There are two different brands to choose from Intel and AMD Ryzen. However, there is a caveat with CPUs. Since they are not the primary driver of gaming performance, you won’t actually benefit from getting the top-level models, because they are used for editing and rendering resource intensive data only.
How much RAM?
Everybody always worries about RAM. This is especially the case in gaming, and that’s for a good reason. Insufficient RAM will result in micro stutters and sudden FPS drops which means that your RAM is undermining your entire system. For optimal results get two sticks of 8GB of RAM that have a matching frequency. This will enable you to run 16GB in dual channel mode.
The world of laptop gaming certainly comes with many new features. If you want to buy an ideal laptop for your needs make sure to: find an appropriate GPU, choose at least a fullHD screen, check out the type of keyboard, and see that your RAM and CPU aren’t the limiting factors.
