LAB NOTES

JEREMY LAIRD, EDITOR

GAMING LAPTOPS have always sucked in

certain ways, such as limited upgradeability,

lower performance than a desktop, and

painful pricing. OK, a laptop is currently

one of the few ways to get hold of a half-

decent GPU at a sensible price. Forking out

for a high-end laptop rather ruins crypto

returns, so gaming laptop sales generally

go to gamers who want to play games.

But when GPU pricing and availability

eventually return to normality, gaming

laptops will again be poor value in terms of

pure performance. But it’s not really those

obvious issues that bug me. Over the years,

I’ve run something like 10 powerful gaming

laptops. It all started when I bought a Dell

Inspiron 5000 with a Radeon 7500 Mobility

chip circa 2002 or 2003. That 15-inch lump

had a 1,600 by 1,200 panel. Playing Counter-

Strike at native res was actually doable and

looked epic. At least, it did back then.

As it happens, that was probably the

high point of my laptop adventures. Since

then, I’ve bankrolled another three myself.

But one benefit of being in the tech media

is long-term loans, taking the total to about

10. Without exception, all have been borked.
    I won’t name and shame on the basis
    that every gaming laptop has disappointed.
    Many impress with their ability to squeeze
    incredible rendering power into a portable
    package. That was true back when the
    Nvidia GeForce 6800 was a thing and the
    gap between desktop and laptop graphics
    performance shrank to almost nothing.
    Granted, desktop performance tends
    to degrade a little over time. But every
    gaming laptop I’ve run long-term has felt
    seriously strained over time. Sometimes, it
    was a case of noisier fans. But often, visual
    artifacting would creep in or, worse, total
    system hangs.

I’ve taken some apart to no avail, implying

the problem wasn’t dirt but perhaps circuit

or board strain. Of course, a portable rig

takes more knocks. But my spidey sense

tells me it’s more the limitations of tight

packaging and narrow thermal margins.

It’s a recipe for flakiness in the long run.

And in the short term, too. My outgoing

portable rig with an RTX 2080 chip doesn’t

like outputting to an external display.

Change the res and the refresh turns

chunky until a full reboot. Not the end of

the world, but the kind of niggle I find all too

often in laptops. But maybe it’s just me and

you have a different take. If so, let rip and

tell me I’m wrong.

Tell me I’m wrong

Gaming

laptops suck

Will XPG’s Xenia be another disappointment?

In the last issue, I was about to

check out some new releases

from Call of Duty, Forza, Grand

Theft Auto, and Battlefield—

quite a list of triple-A titles

there. In theory, it should

have been a joyous and

exciting time, sinking hours

into playing these games,

but where to start? The Call

of Duty general multiplayer

isn’t bad, but nor am I thrilled

by it. For me, nothing will

match the nostalgic highs of

the original Modern Warfare

games, World at War, or the

first two Black Ops titles.

However, in COD, Vanguard

has butchered Zombies by

messing with the round-based

mechanics that make it so

timeless. This is coming back

in updates, but it shouldn’t

have been an issue.

Forza Horizon 5 is great

and hasn’t given me anything,

yet, to bash my brains about.

It has kept to what works and

has added a little to it. Another

big disappointment lies in the

Grand Theft Auto: The Trilogy

Definitive Edition release. Oh

boy, this is a shambles! What

should have been a positive

and exciting time for GTA fans

turned into Rockstar being a

laughing stock. An abundance

of glitches has stopped these

titles from being a great

nostalgic trip for everyone.

As for Battlefield 2042, I

haven’t invested much time

into this yet so we will have

to see. Right now though,

Forza will be the only game I

continue to play unless some

pretty big updates come our

way for the other titles.

SAM LEWIS

Staff writer

72 MAXIMU MPC FEB 2022

tested. reviewed. verdictized.
in the lab

72