Gaming laptops - Which of the 2 would be better?

[FerrariVie]

Hi! I'm new to the forum and just recently came to find PCSpecialist while looking for Clevo chassis that would be shipped to Ireland. Just for your information, I currently have a Dell Gaming 7559 which is 5 years old now and having issues with the hinge (almost breaking).

I came across the below 2 builds that are matching the budget and specs that I'm looking for, but I can't seem to decide which of the 2 would better suit me. I'm going to post below the specs of both laptops (they're similar in many ways) and then explain a bit about my doubts, that would also give you an idea of how my usual laptop usage would look like.

OPTION 1 - Nova Series

Chassis & Display 15.6" Matte Full HD 144Hz 72% NTSC LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU) AMD Ryzen 5 3600 Six Core CPU (3.6GHz-4.2GHz/36MB CACHE/AM4)
Memory (RAM) 16GB Corsair 2666MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX 2060 - 6.0GB GDDR6 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1
1st M.2 SSD Drive 512GB INTEL® 660p M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 1500MB/sR | 1000MB/sW)
AC Adaptor 1 x 230W AC Adaptor
Battery Nova Series Detachable 4 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
Thermal Paste STANDARD THERMAL PASTE FOR SUFFICIENT COOLING


OPTION 2 - Optimus Series

Chassis & Display 15.6" Matte Full HD 144Hz 45% NTSC LED Widescreen (1920x1080)
Processor (CPU) Intel® Core™ i7 Six Core Processor 10750H (2.6GHz, 5GHz Turbo)
Memory (RAM) 16GB Corsair 2666MHz SODIMM DDR4 (2 x 8GB)
Graphics Card NVIDIA® GeForce® RTX 2060 - 6.0GB GDDR6 Video RAM - DirectX® 12.1
1st M.2 SSD Drive 512GB INTEL® 660p M.2 NVMe PCIe SSD (up to 1500MB/sR | 1000MB/sW)
AC Adaptor 1 x 180W AC Adaptor
Battery Optimus Series Detachable 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
Thermal Paste ARCTIC MX-4 EXTREME THERMAL CONDUCTIVITY COMPOUND

Both are similarly priced (around €50 more for the Optimus) and are quite thick and heavy, which are not issues for me. My doubts and concerns about those 2 builds are:

- Battery Life on the Nova Series - Since it does not have integrated graphics, would the battery be enough to watch a 2 hour Netflix movie? Not even talking about gaming here, as I know both should last for less than an hour;
- Gaming performance - How different those 2 builds are going to be for gaming? Their main differences are the chassis thickness and cooling, Desktop x Laptop grade CPUs and the lack of Nvidia Optimus on the Nova (which supposedly would bring some performance improvement). But overall, how much of an advantage would the Nova have over the Optimus?
- Noise - I've found reviews of the Optimus Series on the internet and they're saying that it is very quiet, even under heavy load. However, I don't have any information on the Nova Series. Do both of them have fan software controls that you could tweak to your liking? Anyone that has a Nova (or has used it for gaming) knows how loud the fans are? Capping the FPS to 90 would make any improvements here?
- Screen - I've seen that the colour accuracy of the Nova series is better, so it would mean that this screen has the best quality overall (brightness, contrast, refresh rate)? I've also seen that the screens are classified as LED, but are they really LEDs? I assumed that those laptops would have an LCD IPS screen instead;
- Durability - I know both of them are all-plastic chassis, but which of the 2 would probably have better durability? Mainly talking about the hinge here, since it is a problem that I had with my current Dell laptop.

Sorry for the big post and lots of questions, but it is really hard to decide without having physical access to those machines and not knowing anyone that currently has one of those.

 

[SpyderTracks]

The Nova isn’t a laptop, it’s a desktop replacement (DTR) and uses desktop cpu’s. It’s not designed to be portable so is very heavy and has poor battery life.

 

[FerrariVie]

The Nova isn’t a laptop, it’s a desktop replacement (DTR) and uses desktop cpu’s. It’s not designed to be portable so is very heavy and has poor battery life.

Yeah, I do understand that.

Being heavy is not a problem for me as it would be on my desk for most of the time, but I'm interested to know if it would last for at least 2 hours under low/medium load, like browsing and watching stream movies. That would be sufficient for those times where I do need to unplug it.

 

[SpyderTracks]

Yeah, I do understand that.

Being heavy is not a problem for me as it would be on my desk for most of the time, but I'm interested to know if it would last for at least 2 hours under low/medium load, like browsing and watching stream movies. That would be sufficient for those times where I do need to unplug it.

It's probably only going to get about 1hr battery life tbh.

 

[FerrariVie]

It's probably only going to get about 1hr battery life tbh.

Thanks for that, it makes sense. And regarding the gaming performance, any guess since both have the same GPU? One has a Desktop AMD CPU with no iGPU, while the other a Laptop new-gen Intel CPU using Nvidia Optimus.

 

[SpyderTracks]

Thanks for that, it makes sense. And regarding the gaming performance, any guess since both have the same GPU? One has a Desktop AMD CPU with no iGPU, while the other a Laptop new-gen Intel CPU using Nvidia Optimus.

The Nova is significantly more powerful if you accept the shortcomings of DTR over laptop. It's also much better thermally. Just generally anything AMD is going to smash Intel.

 

[maha]

Remove the battery and always keep it on charger as it would be on your desk for most of the time.
Why don't you change the Ryzen 5 to a Ryzen 7?
The graphic card is always used with the Ryzen while with i7 10750h, you can configure to only use the Nvidia card for games.

 

[FerrariVie]

Remove the battery and always keep it on charger as it would be on your desk for most of the time.
Why don't you change the Ryzen 5 to a Ryzen 7?
The graphic card is always used with the Ryzen while with i7 10750h, you can configure to only use the Nvidia card for games.

Thanks maha, maybe the heat will indeed be detrimental for the battery longevity. Regarding the upgrade to Ryzen 7, I can't do it for budgeting purposes, as it represents €150 difference. I can always do it myself after a few years (maybe even to a Ryzen 9), when prices go down.

 

[FerrariVie]

Games at the moment (and for the foreseeable future as I understand it) don't utilise more than one CPU core so the jump to the 7 wouldn't be worth it as there wouldn't be enough performance to warrant the cost (not to mention the increased power usage of a higher chip)....if CPU intensive uses like editing or streaming for example were being used then it would be a good idea.

So, in your opinion, the 10750H would make more sense for gaming than the Ryzen 5 3600? Going by the same principle: less power usage and (based on benchmarks) better single core performance, even though the 3600 has a lot better multi core performance.

 

[SpyderTracks]

So, in your opinion, the 10750H would make more sense for gaming than the Ryzen 5 3600? Going by the same principle: less power usage and (based on benchmarks) better single core performance, even though the 3600 has a lot better multi core performance.

What benchmarks are you referring to, because I'm not sure they're accurate.

 

[FerrariVie]

What benchmarks are you referring to, because I'm not sure they're accurate.

I looked at this one:

AMD Ryzen 5 3600 vs Intel Core i7-10750H - Benchmark, comparison and differences

Benchmark, test, review, comparison and differences between these CPUs in Cinebench 23 and Geekbench 5

www.cpu-monkey.com

Cinebench R20 (Single-Core) CPU benchmark list

Cinebench R20 (Single-Core) CPU benchmark list

www.cpu-monkey.com

Maybe it is due to the fact that the 10750H can reach 5Ghz with turbo boost when using 1 core?

 

[SpyderTracks]

Games at the moment (and for the foreseeable future as I understand it) don't utilise more than one CPU core so the jump to the 7 wouldn't be worth it as there wouldn't be enough performance to warrant the cost (not to mention the increased power usage of a higher chip)....if CPU intensive uses like editing or streaming for example were being used then it would be a good idea.

This isn't quite accurate, games tend to favour single core speeds, but that doesn't mean they only use one core, they'll use up to 6 quite happily and some like BF and others will use more than that. It just means it favours frequency over multicore performance.

For gaming, the 3600 is the go to for price vs performance, it will easily keep up with the i7 and in multithreaded will absolutely destroy it.

 

[SpyderTracks]

@SpyderTracks Thank you for the correction Apologies for posting wrong information

That’s ok, no problem, just good to point out so we can all learn. That’s the wonderful thing about forums.

 

[FerrariVie]

And what about the fan noise on the Nova Series, there is anything that can be done about it? Like if sometimes I want to do light gaming without being too noisy, is it possible to tweak the fan? Capping FPS to 60 or 90 could also help reduce the thermals and consequently fan noise?