Gaming Laptop Analysis

Is the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 good as a gaming laptop? Good

Processor - The processor we find in this laptop can meet modern AAA game requirements with ease, making it an excellent 2021 laptop gaming choice for CPU. This laptop CPU has 6 cores. This is excellent for modern AAA gaming as the games start to require more cores for simultaneous activities.

Graphics Card - This graphics card, GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB Mobile, is good at running 2021 AAA titles and a good choice for a gamer on the move. The GPU in this laptop comes with 6GB of VRAM. This is a good amount for today’s AAA games.

System Memory - This laptop’s 16GB RAM can deal with everything modern games can throw at it and is a good step towards this being an excellent gaming laptop choice.

Screen Size - A laptop with a 17.3" screen size, like we find on this laptop, puts it into the excellent category for mobile laptops and top end 2021 gaming. Of course it always needs the hardware to backup this up.

Refresh Rate - Refresh rates can be hard to see, when the laptop reseller doesn't make it clear. Assume 60Hz if this is the case. Ideally for a gaming laptop you want 120Hz. This means the games you run can get up to 120 frames per second, assuming the hardware inside them is powerful enough to deliver that FPS. The refresh rate caps a games deliverable FPS even if the hardware can deliver more FPS than the Hz. And so considering that, this laptop is available with up to 144Hz as its refresh rate. This high refresh rate would be an excellent choice in a gamers laptop, but anything over 60Hz would be suitable.

GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB Mobile graphics card gaming performance in the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 laptop

One of the most important components to a gamer for this laptop is getting it’s graphics card right. We will be taking a look at the sort of price to performance ratio the laptop hardware has and in particular help us know if how well the graphics card can run Far Cry 6 at 1080p ultra settings. Coming loaded with the GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB Mobile, this laptop is capable of beating 489 games at their minimum system specs and 280 games at their recommended system specs. This is when looking at today’s top 500 most demanding games.

Comparing Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 to today’s best price to performance laptop ranges

We really want to see how the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 will compare across all permutations of the Alienware M17 R3 model range. This will give us a good sense of how well it sits in terms of cost to performance within its own lineup, and will better help us decide if this laptop represents good value to us today.

With a P2P rating currently of 8.2 out of 10 for the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2. This relative value will change as hardware costs and their performance change over time for laptops. There look to be a number of Alienware M17 R3 versions of this laptop and currently this hardware configuration sits at 3rd in the Price to Performance order. Obviously scoring towards the 1st position represents the better value laptop from a purely gaming performance and price tag perspective.

Looking outside of the Alienware M17 R3 laptop range we can compare our review laptop to today’s leading Price to Performance laptop, the ASUS TUF A15 R7 4800H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 512GB M.2, which has a recorded price of $999. Our laptop has 99% worse rating when comparing on just price to performance against that best bang-for-your-buck laptop. Lets move down the P2P ranking list to position 2. Here we find the MSI Bravo 15 R7 4800H RX 5500M 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop, which has a price at $1049. The Alienware M17 R3 laptop in this review is 74% worse when compared solely on price to performance against that 2nd best model.

How does the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 laptop compare to the best CPU performance focused laptops and today’s most popular games?

CPU performance is always going to be something we are interested in, when looking to buy a new laptop. So if we compare this Alienware M17 R3 laptop to a CPU focused laptop, we will pick today’s top CPU performing laptop at the cheapest price point, then we can use this as a good measuring point for our laptop in question. We will choose the ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 R9 4900HS RTX 2060 Mobile 16GB RAM 1.0TB M.2 laptop for our CPU comparison tests as that laptop currently has the best CPU in it at the cheapest laptop price. Its CPU is the Ryzen 9 4900HS 8-Core 3.0GHz which we will compare to our review laptop’s Core i7-10750H 6-Core 2.60GHz processor. Our performance comparison shows the top end laptop CPU to be 35% better in performance compared to our laptop’s processor.

Currently 451 games recommended system requirements of the top 500 most demanding games today are worse in performance than our laptop’s Core i7-10750H 6-Core 2.60GHz. Or it is 499 games of the top 500 most demanding for minimum cpu specs.

Today’s games are getting more demanding so let's see how our gaming laptop performs against their recommended cpu system requirements. First off we have the New World which currently our Core i7-10750H 6-Core 2.60GHz is 41% better next let's see how well it runs against Battlefield 2042. We can see it is 28% better. Ok finally lets see it against Far Cry 6. Here our laptop is 9% better.

How does the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 laptop compare to the best graphics card performance focused laptops and today’s most popular games?

Shall we see if our review laptop holds out favourably against a top GPU performance focused laptop PC that is currently available. A top tier graphics focused laptop is the MSI GT76 Titan i9-10900K RTX 2080 Super 64GB RAM 2.0TB M.2 4K. Housing a GeForce RTX 2080 Super 8GB GPU that performs 67% better when compared to our review laptop’s GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB Mobile.

Interestingly we can see 280 games recommended system requirements are lower in performance than our laptop’s GPU performance capability. This is when we look at the top 500 most demanding games around today. For minimum system requirements in this same area the number is 489 games are worse than our GPU performance, again looking at the top 500 most demanding minimum system requirements.

But the real test is seeing how well the laptop GPU performs against today's popular games. Our GeForce GTX 1660 Ti 6GB Mobile compared against recommended graphics requirements for Far Cry 6 delivers 23% worse performance while against New World it’s 25% better and finally compared to Battlefield 2042 it has a performance difference : 33% worse.

The Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 has a 1080p screen resolution, should I get a 4K resolution gaming laptop instead?

With a 1080p native screen panel our Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 has a 17.3" physical screen size. This inch panel size is measured starting in one corner, say the top corner and then across the middle of the screen down to the bottom corner on the other side. And in our case it has a fixed number of pixels in that screen that are 1920 pixels wide by 1080 pixels tall, or 1080p resolution. Today’s 4K laptops normally have a 60Hz screen refresh rate which would mean that should the laptop’s hardware be capable of running a 4K game, it would be restricted to a cap of 60 frames per second. As game system requirements continue to push for more powerful hardware, the components in a laptop, and many desktops as well, are simply not capable of delivering playable frame rates at Ultra graphics settings and a 4K resolution. This particular laptop refresh rate options are 144Hz.

Dropping a game’s resolution down from the laptop’s native 4K resolution to a more sustainable 1080p or maybe 1440p, would certainly deliver extra frames and improve stability. So there is always that option if the experience is unplayable due to low frame rates. But know that this action comes at a price. Dropping from a monitor or laptop panel’s native resolution immediately reduces in-game visual definition across all the game’s graphics. It basically makes the game look blurry. Not an ideal situation if you just bought your new 4K gaming laptop. If your 1080p laptop has the hardware to run today’s AAA games comfortably at 4K, then plug your laptop into your desktop 4K monitor, when you are at home for some serious gaming sessions. As that desktop monitor probably isn't 60Hz restricted and is physically larger than the relatively small 17inch laptop screen size. We do just that here, with a 27inch 144Hz Nvidia GSync 1440p desktop monitor and an Alienware 51M laptop sporting a desktop RTX 2080.

4K streaming could be a viable reason to consider 4K over 1080p laptop panels.

As you can probably gather from the information above, its probably not worth the extra cash for a 4K laptop if gaming is your Laptop purpose. 1080p is likely plenty and has enough alternative gaming options for when you want better resolution. It feels like you might not get what you were after if you picked up a shiny new 4K laptop, then was needing to lower game resolution, while getting blurry in-game experience and achieving a max 60FPS when you could push the hardware into better frame rates.

Today’s best 1440p desktop monitor for a laptop is - ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV 27 inch 1440p 75Hz 5ms IPS

Today’s well priced 1440p desktop monitor we have found is a ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV 27 inch 1440p 75Hz 5ms IPS that has a 75Hz refresh rate and priced at $311.99. We have seen this desktop 1440p monitor recorded at a low price on 9th Mar 2021, where we saw it was costing $229.99.

Today’s best 4K desktop monitor for a laptop is - Asus Predator XB273K 27 inch 4K GSYNC IPS 1ms 144Hz

Here is a 4K monitor to compliment any laptop - Asus Predator XB273K 27 inch 4K GSYNC IPS 1ms 144Hz. We watch a handful and it is currently the best priced at $618. It has a 144Hz refresh rate as well. During these past 2 weeks, this 4K monitor’s price has gone up by $618. To give a bit more info about this monitor we saw it cost its lowest of $549.99, which we recorded on 13th Nov 2020.

[Note - check that monitor display connectors are compatible between a monitor and a laptop before purchase]

Possibly a suitable purpose for a 4K laptop would be if you were keen to watch 4K streaming services like Netflix. At which point perhaps it's enough of a selling point for you to consider a 4K laptop?

We still feel it's not the time to spend extra cash for the 4K gaming laptop due to the limitations laid out above. It would surely feel somewhat disappointing to boot up your new 4K laptop, only to then realise you have to drop down the resolution on modern titles to get them to run smoothly. And then see that anything you play is somewhat less sharp than you have seen on your older PC and capped at a maximum of 60FPS due to the usual 60Hz 4K screen tech.

Today's Best Priced Mouse and Headset for Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 laptop

If you are looking for a good value mouse to go with your Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 laptop, then the Kayinuo M738 Gaming Mouse 3200DPI wired 6 Buttons is our favourite today, of those we are price tracking. Currently it’s priced at $12.99. Our suggested mouse has actually lowered its price during these past two weeks, dropping by $32.26. This was part of the reason we selected it as a good mouse for the price and a great accompanying peripheral for this laptop. Another point of reference for this mouse, is that our lowest recorded price for this mouse was on 15th Aug 2020 where it was costing $11.99.

A headset that is well priced at the moment and could accompany the Dell Alienware M17 R3 i7-10750H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 256GB M.2 laptop is the Corsair HS45-7.1 Surround. Of the headsets we price track, it is one of the best valued headsets today and currently priced at $36.99. Out of interest our lowest price tracked on this headset was on 28th Nov 2019 where we saw it for $34.99.