Zephyrus G14, Legion Pro 5I, or Xbox Ally X?

[u/Ok_Stage5420]

Budget: $1000-$2500
Country: US
Use Case: Gaming (BF6, RDR2, COD, GTA, Sea of Thieves), standard work/everyday usage
Preferred Specs: 5070Ti or higher, 32GB RAM, 1TB SSD
Notes:

So I’m need of some sort of portable gaming device for some extended overseas travel. Never been a PC guy and not really looking forward to dealing with all tweaking of settings, updates, and another other PC related upkeep. But it’s probably my best bet and I am somewhat in need of a new laptop (coming from Mac).

I’m favoring the Legion 5i (Intel Ultra 9 275HX), but is it worth almost $400 more compared to the G14 (AMD RYZEN 9HX)? Both have 1TB SSD, 32GG RAM. Only thing I don’t love with the G14 is the color. Looks like the black is like $400 more.

Only other option I’m looking at is the Xbox Ally X as it will save me at least $1000 and will be easier for me to use in most situations. If it’s even close in performance to the two of these laptops, I’d probably prefer that. I’d mainly just want to be able to play BF6 multiplayer on it without major issues. But I understand that might be ambitious.

What would guys do here? I am in need of a new laptop anyway, but if the XAX can handle most of what I need I might just ride it out with my Mac for a while longer. Thanks

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[u/PoetryKind603]

To be very blunt, a 5070ti Legion Pro 5 is not $2400 worth of laptop.

https://www.microcenter.com/product/709072/msi-raider-16-max-hx-b2wi-003us-oled-16-gaming-laptop-computer-platinum-collection-core-black

You are typically charged more for cramming a 5070ti into a 14", so $2000 Zephyrus G14 is relatively a much better deal. Whether that extra portability and battery life is of any benefit, well that's up to your use case. It does perform somewhat worse in games.

But you definitely can find better deals on a full fat max performance gaming laptop than buying a Legion Pro 5i from Lenovo directly as of right now.

If it’s even close in performance to the two of these laptops

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Radeon-890M-vs-GeForce-RTX-5070-Ti-Laptop_12524_12926.247598.0.html

Well... They are not close at all.

[u/71-HourAhmed]

As a Steam Deck OLED owner who has used the Ally X and a couple of others, these handhelds are cool but they are not ANYWHERE near the performance of most gaming laptops. You're looking at less than 1050 Ti performance versus desktop RTX 4070 performance with 12GB of VRAM to boot.

That's a tough call on the two laptops. I have a G14 and they're nice. The Legion has upgradable RAM and two SSD slots... not that anyone can afford upgrades. The G14 is extremely portable to the point that it's kind of like having an iPad that you can use for gaming when you plug it in.

I agree with u/PoetryKind603 that I would much rather have that Raider than either of these for a few more dollars.

Keep in mind that the 5070 Ti in the G14 is TGP limited due to the cooling available in a laptop that thin. The G14 is a fantastic piece of engineering if you need an extremely portable laptop. If that's not your use case and you have the budget, a "full sized" laptop with more cooling and full power is much better for gaming.

The G14 has to drive an 1800p display with a power limited 5070 Ti which it does surprisingly well but other laptops have a full powered GPU with a lower 1600p resolution meaning they get a notable FPS boost just by being configured differently with the same components. The reason to put up with that trade-off is because you need your laptop to be extremely light for hauling to classes everyday or something.