by With so many Black Friday gaming PC deals, some of them aren’t all that great. For example, this Gamer Xtreme from CyberPowerPC looks good at first glance, but for a bit more you can get a laptop with a better GPU. You’ll save some space and won’t have to sift through multiple gaming monitor deals, although it might be worth it if you plan to use your laptop as a desktop replacement.
Why you shouldn’t buy the CyberPowerPC Gamer Xtreme – $850 was $1,100
The RTX 3050 is a great entry-level card, although it was originally designed for laptops, so incorporating it into desktops is interesting. Unfortunately, while this usually means we’d see the price drop, the Gamer Xtreme is still relatively expensive for an entry-level laptop GPU. The other specs are good though, with a 12th Gen Intel Core 5-12600KF, a mid-range CPU that’s great for gaming and productivity work, so a versatile gaming PC. You also get 16GB of DDR4 RAM and 500GB of SSD storage space, which is on the low end for storage on a gaming rig but endemic for pre-built PCs.
Why you should buy the Dell G15 Gaming Laptop – $899 was $1,100
On the other hand, while this G15 is $50 more expensive, it comes with an RTX 3050Ti, which makes sense for its chassis. Even better, the 120Hz FHD screen doesn’t tax the RTX 3050 Ti very much, so you can crank up the graphics settings even with more modern games. Also, you don’t need to look for a standalone monitor for your gaming PC as it is already included. As for the CPU, you’re getting a 12th Gen Intel i5-12500H, similar to the Gamer Xtreme’s CPU, meaning you’re getting the same CPU performance. The only difference is that you get 8GB of RAM with the G15, although it’s DDR5 vs DDR4 RAM, which is faster and won’t affect you much in day-to-day use. Storage is also slightly larger on the G15 with a 512GB SSD, although you can snag an external hard drive to supplement.
Alternatively, if you want a more powerful G15, you can get a version with an RTX 3060, which even upgrades the screen to a 2k resolution, which is the sweet spot for a gaming laptop without any pixel wastage. You get an upgrade to a 12th Gen Intel i7-12700H, a high-tier CPU that lets you do things like stream to Twitch and Youtube if you want to. Memory is boosted to 16GB DDR5, so it’s lightning fast, and you get 1TB of storage instead of 512GB, which should last you a couple of years at least. All of this costs $1,400, of course, but it’s $330 less than Dell’s usual $1,730 retail price.
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