Gaming laptop & 3D

[Darkbluesky]

Hi

I have recently built a new 3D Nvidia desktop PC, but some changes in my life ask me to travel between two cities for weeks or months. I was moving my desktop with me but it is too heavy, and if I keep doing that I'll finish to break my back. So, I was looking to buy a gaming laptop (which I would use of course for other uses too, like photo editing, internet, mail, CAD design, watch movies, etc).

I have 3D Vision Ready screens in both sites (one is 1920x1080, the other is 2560x1440), and I plan to use them normally with the laptop, so I do not need a laptop whose screen is 3D Vision Ready (although it would be a good positive point). I doubt there is any laptop out there with 3D Vision Ready/working screen, though. I want to understand that the USB-C with DP1.4 as they describe the connections in some laptops are ok to connect a DP 3D Ready Screen. Are they? Have you tested it?

I have seen laptops with RTX2070, RTX2070 Super and RTX2080/Super. My budget is around 2000-2500€. The ones with RTX2080 are well above 3000€, so too much for me. I guess I'll have to stick to a laptop with RTX2070/RTX2070Super.

I am not a competitive gamer, I play for the pleasure of gaming in 3D (as always for the last 20 years), so I play old and recent games, but I am not expecting super high fps (but not too low neither. I can accept some lag or some isolated low fps at some moment, I mean if it is not too frequent).

I am in Spain, and I was looking to the Asus Zephyrus GX701 or ROG Strix SCAR 17 G732 (G732LWS-HG033T). I like Asus brand, in general, although I am open to others. I am somewhat lost in other laptop specifications, I have not look for a laptop in years...

Not sure, though, about potential problems to activate 3D with a notebook RTX card and an external G-Sync/3D Ready screen. BTW, I normally use 3DFix Manager to install drivers, fix them, and activate 3D. Is it already as straight forward as this, for the "Super" versions? Or do they need some additional manual tweaking ? If so, it is safe/quick/easy ? Experience on laptops ?

Well, summarizing are you aware/have experience in this situation ? Do you have some recommendations ?

I need to buy it this week or the next one at latest.

Thanks a lot for any help!

[RAGEdemon]

Outside the box alternative suggestion: Change your existing PC case into a Small Form Factor PC - you already have 3DV monitor.

https://www.reddit.com/r/sffpc/

I have a 3D Vision laptop and have never been able to game on it. It seems always to be such a waste of a great game to play it on such limiting hardware.

You could spend your money on upgrades: Zen3 about to be launched soon; RTX 30XX series look great for the price and only need to be confirmed to be hacked into 3DV.

Evolving this solution: Get a portable VR headset (i.e. inside out tracking) instead of a monitor and then use HelixVision / VorpX which would prevent the need of a monitor altogether even for work. The Reverb G2 looks very promising, especially as a high resolution multi-application screen.

Most trains in the UK have power sockets; unsure about spain - you could game or watch movies on an IMAX screen while travelling.

To me personally, the only time a laptop would make sense is when you would regularly need to use the battery as no power sockets were available. Even on battery, your gaming sessions would be significantly gimped as your CPU and GPU would be working in lower power states. For these seldom encountered scenarios, maybe look into a N3DS XL for excellent 3D gaming on the move.

[john105]

I've never used a laptop for 3D Vision myself, but I saw that Helifax uses it and gets good performance in this thread viewtopic.php?f=105&t=25068&start=520

I mostly tested on my Alienware Area 51m laptop with a full (desktop) RTX 2080 GPU and on ULTRA preset in Detroit: Become Human, I can get around 30-45FPS when running the SteamVR environment with HelixVision on a Vive PRO (same as a Valve Index) with SSR of 150%. In normal 3D Vision I get around 45-60FPS.

So I guess the Alienware Area 51m would be a good choice, but it's not cheap.

[bo3bber]

Modern gaming laptop designs are not much different than regular desktops. Some even use straight up desktop parts, which are the ones I'd recommend.

I've got a Sager (in Europe it's Clevo), and it's a desktop in laptop chassis. This is a no compromise laptop in terms of performance, the CPU and GPU can be overclocked, although you need to keep track of the thermals. Clocked at regular speed it has enough cooling to run both GPU and CPU at full throttle without being a jet turbine. These have one drawback- they are heavy at 6 kilograms. The power adapter is 330W. But it's a fully portable machine and fits in a (big) laptop bag. I use it for VR demos.

A current example: https://xoticpc.com/collections/ultimat ... o-x170sm-g

Now is a good time to look at these- they'll be putting them on sale to clear inventory before the next gen 3080 variants come out. These machines are in your price range with a 2080, and the only thing I would consider for a laptop use.

I would not recommend any of the mainstream manufacturers of gaming laptops, they tend to make poor decisions like sacrificing cooling for thinness. I'm not a fan of the ASUS/MSI or even Alienware gaming laptops. When reviewing all these a couple of years ago, there were a lot of complaints about thermal throttling. Also when I looked at them, the build quality was on the feeble side for a $2800 machine. I'd avoid any of that MaxQ nonsense, as being crippled machines like the NVidia Optimus trash. But to be clear- I have not studied MaxQ and it might be OK, I just don't trust NVidia anymore after that Optimus debacle.

BTW, you cannot use the internal monitor for 3DVision, not even if using VR via HelixVision. NVidia locks out internal screens on laptops, so you cannot even do Discover mode there. Yeah- NVidia, land of a million incomprehensible decisions. I use an external 3D Vision Ready screen of PG278QR with a mini-DP to DP cable and it runs 3D Vision perfectly.


Another possible path to take- If you can leave a monitor at each spot, consider building another desktop instead. You can retire your last gen machine to whichever location matters least, and have a good machine at each spot, with no lugging.

If you build a desktop this way, you can save money, or get higher end parts than you could through a Clevo approach.