Home Technology Laptops are now as powerful as desktops, thanks to Nvidia’s GTX 980

Laptops are now as powerful as desktops, thanks to Nvidia’s GTX 980

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NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-980_Laptop

Gaming laptops have always been a mysterious idea to me. They’re never quite up there with desktop performance, they cost nearly twice as much and often can’t actually function as a laptop if you want to play proper games. They’re bulky, battery chomping, monstrous pieces of over-priced tech, but they have a niche market for those looking for mobile gaming stations for travel, expos and few other situations. If you’re in that market, well then today is your day.

Nvidia has revealed a brand new mobile chip that really shouldn’t be possibly mobile at all. Forgetting all naming conventions, the new GTX 980 chip for beefy laptops is exactly what it suggests – it’s the exact same flagship card that you can buy for your desktop, complete with all the performance you expect from it. That means you’re getting 2048 CUDA cores, 128 texture mapping units and 64 raster operation units, all inside a mobile device.

Couple that with the standard clock speed of 1126 MHz base and 1218 MHz boost clock, unlocked Skylake processors and a staggering 8GB of GDDR5 memory over a 356-bit wide bus, and you’ve got a mobile laptop that delivers near identical performance to some of the strongest desktops out there – if not more.

NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-980_Laptop_VR-Gaming

Eurogamer has already had the chance to mess around with a 980 equipped laptop, and it manages to stick right on par with a desktop version. Testing Metro: Last Light, Tomb Raider and Shadow of Mordor, the two were always within a frame or two of each other – with the laptop sometimes coming out on top. Futuremark’s FireStrike tests showed similar results, with the unlocked Skylake processors in supported laptops driving the physics calculation way, way up.

But that’s also the thing – these aren’t your normal type of laptops. Hell, they’re not even regular gaming laptops. Just look at the ASUS GX700, one of many supported devices alongsidemodels from MSI, AORUS and more. The GX700 has an optional water-cooler that you can attach to the laptop on a desk, which will be a requirement if you hope to suck out more juice from the card while overclocking. Desktop cards are big for a reason, and these supporting laptops will have to compensate to deal with the ridiculous amount of heat they will generate.

And that’s where you’re going to have to ask yourself – how much do I really need mobile gaming? For those on a plane every other day or the few of your not wanting  a massive tower at your desk, sure. These fully powered laptops are a suitable, albeit expensive solution, even allowing upgradable configurations that include SLI setups (no jokes). It’s great to see Nvidia finally not force people to compromise on desktop performance, but you should think long and hard about why you want one before taking the plunge.

Last Updated: September 23, 2015

14 Comments

  1. What about the motherboard, the RAM and all that other jazz? Putting in a fast graphics card is great, but is there not something more to the actual benchmark speed than that?

    ” these aren’t your normal type of laptops”

    Reply

    • Alessandro Barbosa

      September 23, 2015 at 12:47

      Yes and no. Most modern games are heavily GPU dependent, which is why Intel is struggling to convince gamers in particular to adopt their new CPU architectures. Hell the in-game different between a Sandy Bridge Processor from 2011 and a brand new Skylake one is down to 2 FPS in a lot of cases.

      That said, all of the laptops that support this card at the moment are all running brand new Skylake chips, so they’re the best of the best at the moment with regards to hardware. The benchmarks it seems were tested with desktop equivalents – and even if faster it jist shows how well these laptops do in comparison.

      Reply

      • Brady miaau

        September 23, 2015 at 13:14

        And this is why, when one of the interns asked for help with his A+ course, I was confused. A lot.

        My hardware knowledge effectively froze in about 2002 / 3

        Reply

  2. HairyEwok

    September 23, 2015 at 12:42

    I’ve watched Linus Tech Tips talking about this and I must say holy shit!

    Reply

  3. Ottokie "Yahtzee"

    September 23, 2015 at 12:42

    I wonder how long the lifespan will be, I don’t really see this Laptop running under 80 degrees.

    Reply

    • HairyEwok

      September 23, 2015 at 12:43

      Check the vid I pasted here.

      Reply

      • Ottokie "Yahtzee"

        September 23, 2015 at 12:43

        your last vid almost killed SOA…

        Reply

        • HairyEwok

          September 23, 2015 at 12:44

          Don’t worry, I wont kill Nvidia…. yet.

          Reply

          • Ottokie "Yahtzee"

            September 23, 2015 at 12:48

            Mmmm they did not really talk about heat, but it did get me all hyped up again for using VR with Elite Dangerous.

          • HairyEwok

            September 23, 2015 at 12:51

            Considering it’s a 9 series and this is purposefully built for laptops I would say the full load heat will be between 55-85 C (That’s with the SA summer climate)

  4. Raptor Rants

    September 23, 2015 at 12:59

    1) This laptop will burn your pants off if you try game at max settings while putting it in your lap. If you’re even wearing pants that is.

    2) The 30 seconds of full power on battery will be great I guess

    Reply

    • Brady miaau

      September 23, 2015 at 13:16

      So….. the old story of laptops causing or helping to cause male infertility, then?

      Reply

      • Raptor Rants

        September 23, 2015 at 13:38

        hahahaha that one 🙂 It’ll set fire to your crotch

        Reply

        • Brady miaau

          September 23, 2015 at 14:17

          I do remember the old 486sx laptop from Intel. White case, went brown near the CPU within a month. Ouch.

          Reply

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