New gaming desktop replacement

General Questions

1) What is your budget?
2000 - 3000 €

2) What size notebook would you prefer?
e. Desktop Replacement; 17"+ screen
17,3" screen is a must

3) Which country will you buying this notebook?
Slovenia

4) Are there any brands that you prefer or any you really don't like?
a. Like: ASUS
b. Dislike: I dont trust RAZER quality...it seems only every 2nd item from them works
But after same investigation i found out that even ASUS is not what they were....sadly

5) Would you consider laptops that are refurbished/redistributed?
Sure

6) What are the primary tasks will you be performing with this notebook?
Most demanding task will be gaming.

7) Will you be taking the notebook with you to different places, leaving it on your desk or both?
No. It will sit at dest for 99% of the time. But i want notebook. PC is not an option....

8) Will you be playing games on your notebook? (If so, please state which games or types of games?)
Sure. I own asus g750jx and it is 7 years old and just in the past year it is no longer capable to run some newer games....so i want long term solution.

9) How many hours of battery life do you need?
Zero

10) Would you prefer to see the notebooks you're considering before purchasing it or buying a notebook on-line without seeing it is OK?
No

11) What OS do you prefer? Windows, Mac OS, Linux, Chrome OS, etc.
Windows

Screen Specifics

12) What screen resolution(s) would you prefer? (See further below for explanations.)
I like performance of games more then graphics, but in that price range 1080p is a must

13) Do you want a glossy/reflective screen or a matte/non-glossy screen? (See further below for explanations.)
Dont really care

Build Quality and Design

14) Are the notebook's looks and stylishness important to you?
Nop

Notebook Components

15) How much hard drive space do you need?
With initial purchase i do not care about disk space and RAM, i will change both in following months after purchase (manufacturers seems to put cheap harddrive and RAM in notebooks).

Timing, Warranty and Longevity

16) When are you buying this laptop?
Till this summer (i hope)

17) How long do you expect to use this laptop?
As long as owned this one.... 7years, but i am afraid this is only a dream this days....

18) How long could you afford to do without your laptop if it were to fail?
N/A

19) Would you be willing to pay significantly extra for on-site warranty, or would it be acceptable to you to have to ship the laptop to the vendor for repair with perhaps a week or more outage?
N/A


My first candidate was ASUS G703gx (i9-8950HK with RTX 2080). But sadly according to threads on this forum it seems that this notebook is crap... I can not tell how dissapointed i am.

So i need some advice about other notebooks and please anwser some questions i have.

Other notbook in this price range:
MSI GE75 Raider (i7-8750H with RTX 2080)
Dell G7 (i9-9980HK with maxQ RTX 2080)
Razer blade 17 pro 2019 (i7-9750H with RTX 2060)
ASUS GX701GW (i7-8750H with RTX 2070)
ASUS GL704GW (i7-8750H with RTX 2070)
ACER predator helios 300 (i7-9750H with RTX 2060)

My main questions are temperatures (as to high temperatures are not good for components), build quality.

I am not fan of end user undervoltage, overclocking or frequency limiting. Repasting new notebook also stinks for me.

Please give me some opinions.

 

I had the ASUS laptop before. Currently I use GIGABYTE AERO 15 laptop, I really love it. They just launched their new product with a new 10th gen CPU. The AORUS series comes with a mechanical keyboard.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/4/2/2...ptop-intel-10th-gen-core-i9-i7-processor-oled

 

I can vouch for the Acer Helios 300, I have had to use it as a primary machine for a few months now as my main laptop has been in for repair multiple times. I got lucky though and picked one up for 750$ on black friday, but myn is with the 1660ti. GPU runs cool in the mid 60s, CPU in low 80s, to high 70s and never once had a crash which is one of the most important things to me.

 

I'm on the lookout for all AMD/ATI hardware gamer like the
Predator PH517...

...refreshed with Ryzen 4800/4900 CPU and newer GPU

to compete with the Bravo 17 available from MSI so far

...from other makers like Asus or Lenovo that are priced competitively​

 

If you want a true desktop replacement and don't care about weight, battery, etc. take a look at Clevo laptops. You can find crazy powerful options for your budget. I don't know many European Clevo resellers besides XMG.

XMG Ultra 17 has desktop CPU and can be configured to have as much as RTX 2080/64GB RAM/4TB SSD/UHD display/...
XMG Pro 17 is a little lighter and more affordable but can't be configured as powerful (still more powerful than your candidates)

Overall Clevo build quality seems to be good and XMG is a reputable reseller. They also apply TG Kryonaut on their laptops so you don't have to worry about re-pasting.
If I had your budget and wanted the absolute power I'd definitely consider these two over those you mentioned

 

None of the laptops you mentioned are considered desktop replacements (aside from the fact that there is no such thing as a true desktop replacement).
I would look at XMG options in Europe.

Alienware Area 51M is a DTR worth considering, however, since you don't fancy undervolting (which is a must for pretty much any Intel CPU) or repasting then probably best to stay clear of Dell laptops (not sure if XMGs are much better, pretty much all laptops benefit from tuning).

 

Wait for Ryzen 4th gen mobile to launch.

 

Guys thanks for you input. Been reading all sorts of forums and youtube reviews and i finally decided.
I orders MSI GE75 Raider with RTX 2080. I hope everything will be ok.

 

I'd suggest you avoid Asus like mad.
They have terrible cooling.

The viable option I'd recommend as a desktop replacement in your price range could be this one:
https://bestware.com/en/xmg-apex-15.html

It includes Zen 2 CPU's (desktop variants from 3600 to 3650 - all 65W) the and choice between RTX 2060 and RTX 2070.
I'd suggest getting 3900 CPU (12 cores and 24 threads) and RTX 2070 (I'd personally prefer AMD GPU like Vega 56 because it has much larger compute, but AMD gpu's aren't on offer there yet).

Since that's on a German website, and you're in Slovenia (which is part of EU), you wouldn't pay any extra fees on delivery, import, VAT, etc.

I think it's a decent option (and better one than MSI GE75 - mainly because you get a much better CPU for content creation - and you can also pick Ryzen 3950x which operates in ECO mode - but I don't think its necessarily worth it with the price increase).

Plus, Intel CPU's are fraught with security issues, so that's one reason to avoid them.

EDIT: Oh, and XMG stated that Zen 3 will be supported by the existing AM4, so they will release a BIOS update when its ready.

 

I'd LOVE to get my hands on the Acer Predator Helios PH17-61 again (had to give mine up because a bad BIOS flash essentially corrupted my mobo and they couldn't fix it... so I got a refund)... but its impossible to find one (and all the ones available outside UK [there are maybe two] are horribly expensive and would be a complete and utter rip-off with the import fees - or they don't get shipped here to UK).

As for the MSI Bravo 17... I do like Zen 2 Renoir CPU/iGP performance, but MSI messed up the cooling and they don't have anything higher than 5500M (such as 5600M or 5700M).

The CPU temps on MSI during gaming easily go to 94 degrees Celsius when fully stressed.
I need a viable laptop for content creation and occasional gaming.
A CPU which reaches near 100 degrees C while being fully stressed is not a viable solution... and it presents a potential problem relating to how long the other components would last under such duress - meaning, this thing might easily end up having a very short life-expectancy with high failure rates (repasting might help, but I'm not willing to risk it).