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Good Gaming Laptop with Linux support
Joeg1484 Oct 31, 2022
Can anyone recommend a good gaming laptop with all AMD w/ at least a Radeon 6700 or better? Would prefer DDR5, but if DD4 at least a good GPU?

I have a list here that I have been looking at, so feel free to comment or add>

1. Lenovo Legion
2. ASUS Strix,Zephyrus, etc...
3. HP Omen

So far, I really like the Lenovo and Asus offerings, although not opposed to HP - although I have heard that the BIOS config is super limited on the HP.

Have also looked at the MSI, like the Delta 15, but I hear their QC on hinges is horrible.

I have some Best Buy gift cards to spend, so if you find something there, that would be preferable, however, I can also go to Amazon.

Thanks!
Joe
Trias Nov 10, 2022
Quoting: Joeg1484Can anyone recommend a good gaming laptop with all AMD w/ at least a Radeon 6700 or better? Would prefer DDR5, but if DD4 at least a good GPU?

I've been using ASUS ROG Strix G15 G513QY-HF001 since last December. AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX 3.3GHz 8 core CPU, AMD Radeon RX 6800M 12Gb GPU, 15.6" 1920 x 1080 300Hz IPS monitor. DDR4 RAM (I think originally there was 16Gb), M.2 NVMe PCIe 3.0 512Gb SSD and second free M.2 slot.

Notebook has microphone, but no camera and no optical disk drive. Also, design is quite good. :).

I changed RAM to 32Gb, installed 2TB SSD and bought an external ODD. After using it for almost a year I'm quite satisfied. My recommendations.

About negatives: it can be notably noisy under pressure, but it's understandable with that setup in a small frame. And while notable, it's still far from being the noisiest note I ever had...
Joeg1484 Nov 10, 2022
Quoting: Trias
Quoting: Joeg1484Can anyone recommend a good gaming laptop with all AMD w/ at least a Radeon 6700 or better? Would prefer DDR5, but if DD4 at least a good GPU?

I've been using ASUS ROG Strix G15 G513QY-HF001 since last December. AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX 3.3GHz 8 core CPU, AMD Radeon RX 6800M 12Gb GPU, 15.6" 1920 x 1080 300Hz IPS monitor. DDR4 RAM (I think originally there was 16Gb), M.2 NVMe PCIe 3.0 512Gb SSD and second free M.2 slot.

Notebook has microphone, but no camera and no optical disk drive. Also, design is quite good. :).

I changed RAM to 32Gb, installed 2TB SSD and bought an external ODD. After using it for almost a year I'm quite satisfied. My recommendations.

About negatives: it can be notably noisy under pressure, but it's understandable with that setup in a small frame. And while notable, it's still far from being the noisiest note I ever had...

Thanks for the reply! I bought it and got it yesterday and put in my Linux USB and everything just worked :) . Im going to wipe Windows off it today and see how it works. Im not a fan of Windows 11 anyway.

It has the 316 BIOS on it and was thinking about upgrading to the 320 but have see others have various issues with it - mainly with the Nvidia card - which I dont have ;) .

The SN version I got starts with N1 so it seems pretty new - Some articles I read where the SN started with M1-M6 noted issues with heating, so hopefully I wont run into any issues there... I did run the Linux stress on it for about an hour and nothing bad happened LOL. It did get up to about 93c on the temps for the CPU, but never went higher than that and I didnt notice any CPU throttling, so thats good.

So, when I install games, will the games just "Know" to use the 6800m or do I have to install something like prime or some other software on it like I did with my Nvidia laptop before it?

Looking forward to hearing back.
Thanks!
Joe
Trias Nov 10, 2022
Quoting: Joeg1484So, when I install games, will the games just "Know" to use the 6800m or do I have to install something like prime or some other software on it like I did with my Nvidia laptop before it?

It's usually pretty decent in picking right gpu automatically, no additional software is required. And you usually can get what was picked by the noise. :).

If you want to be sure then, at least for windows games in proton, you can simply launch the game with DXVK_HUD=1 %command%. That will show the gpu in use.

Edit: typos.

Last edited by Trias on 10 November 2022 at 3:25 pm UTC
Joeg1484 Nov 10, 2022
Quoting: Trias
Quoting: Joeg1484So, when I install games, will the games just "Know" to use the 6800m or do I have to install something like prime or some other software on it like I did with my Nvidia laptop before it?

It's usually pretty decent in picking right gpu automatically, no additional software is required. And you usually can get what was picked by the noise. :).

If you want to be sure then, at least for windows games in proton, you can simply launch the game with DXVK_HUD=1 %command%. That will show the gpu in use.

Edit: typos.

Ok cool, thanks!

What are you using to control the RGB lights? I installed OpenRGB but it doesnt see any devices to control?

Thanks again for the info!
Joe
Trias Nov 10, 2022
Quoting: Joeg1484What are you using to control the RGB lights? I installed OpenRGB but it doesnt see any devices to control?

Erm... I'm probably not using anything, to be honest. When lights turn on (I think they needed updated kernel a year ago) I think I was just fine with default regime. Will re-check it on Monday, but I don't think I installed any additional software for this.
Joeg1484 Nov 10, 2022
Quoting: Trias
Quoting: Joeg1484What are you using to control the RGB lights? I installed OpenRGB but it doesnt see any devices to control?

Erm... I'm probably not using anything, to be honest. When lights turn on (I think they needed updated kernel a year ago) I think I was just fine with default regime. Will re-check it on Monday, but I don't think I installed any additional software for this.

Oh, I found asusctl works and there is a rog-control-center application where you can control your lights from a GUI... Fancy!

Joe
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