A Quick CES 2021 Gaming Machine Roundup
CES 2021 was last week and there was quite a bit of fun stuff shown off for gamers. I’ve combed through some updates that intrigued me with an emphasis on gaming computers and compiled a quick read. What was your big CES 2021 moment?
We’re going to start off with Intel and their update on the new Next Unit of Computing lineup. The NUC is going to be releasing with 11th GEN CPUs and there will eb one aimed at gamers. All of the new NUCs will ocme with Wi-Fi 6, Intel Xe graphics to models with an i5 or i7, a new NUC Pro link with power for 8K displays, and the NUC 11 compute unit for integration into future machines. If you’re a gamer though, you only care about the NUC 11 Enthusiast, aka Phantom Canyon. Inside, you’ll find a quad-core i7-1165G7 paired with an RTX 2060. For I/O, you’ll find two Thunderbolt 4 ports, one 2.5Gb Ethernet port, six USB 3.2 Type-A ports, one HDMI 2.0b port, and one Mini DisplayPort 1.4 port. If you buy the PC (not the kit) you’ll also get 16GB DDR4 RAM, Intel Optane Memory H10 with a 32GB + 512GB SSD configuration, and Windows 10 Home. There’s no announced pricing, but you can buy one from SimplyNUC.com starting at $1349.
Via: The Verge
For NVIDIA, they revealed the RTX 3060 which is set to retail for $329. Packed with 12GB of GDDR6 and with a promise of 10x more ray-tracing than the popular GTX 1060. Set to release in late February, NVIDIA also shared this nifty chart showing how the RTX 3060 stacks up to the GTX 1060 and the RTX 2060.
Via: The Verge
Let’s move on to gaming laptops now. There were a lot of new offerings shown off and we’re going to kick things off with Lenovo and their Legion series. This year, Lenovo Legions has 2 common hardware changes: AMD Ryzen 5000 CPUs and NVIDIA RTX 30-series GPUs. The Legion 7 is the flagship standing with a 16” 16:10 display that offers 2560x1600 resolution on an IPS display with a 165Hz refresh rate, and 3ms response time. That’s an impressive screen and I haven’t even mentioned how it has HDR 400 certification for Dolby Vision, NVIDIA G-Sync, and is rated at 500 nits of brightness. The insides will vary a little, but will get up to a Ryzen 9 5900H, 32GB of DDR4 RAM, and 2TB M.2 NVMe SSD. All of this with prices starting at $1669.99 and availability set for June.
Via: PCGamer
Meanwhile, the Legion Slim 7 does cut back a little with a 15.6” screen (available in UHD 4K or FHD 1080p), a GTX 1660 Ti or RTX 2060, and a Ryzen 7 4800H or Ryzen 9 4900H. It comes down to what you need from a laptop. Do you want more portability, or more power? The Legion Slim 7 is set to be available in May but no price has been revealed.
Via: Lenovo
MSI also revealed new gaming laptops that look very pretty. They’re all being beefed up with NVIDIA RTX 30-series GPUs and Wi-Fi 6e with the Steaslth 15M being the only one with an 11th-gen H35 CPU from Intel. The others are all sporting 10th-gen CPUs.
Via: XDA
Acer also dropped some new laptops. There are 15.6” and 17” models of the Nitro 5 and they will be available with your choice of Intel or AMD CPU up to the 11th-gen H-35 for Intel (required if you want Thunderbolt 4 support) or up to a Ryzen 9 5900HX. Additionally, you can take them all the way up to an RTX 3080 regardless of your CPU. You can also choose up to either a 1440p/165 Hz display or a 1080p/360Hz screen. The new Nitro 5 laptops will launch in Februayr with one model availabe in either screen size featuring a 60Hz IPS display, Ryzen 5 5600H, GTX 1650, 8GB RAM, and 256GB NVMe SSD for $749.99 if you want the 15.6” screen or $849.99 for the 17” screen. There’s no word on what pricing will be for other models in the US, but we do know that the machine does support two NVMe SSDs and a 2.5” SATA SSD along with up to 32GB RAM. Honestly, I just wish it didn’t look so big and bulky. For that, Acer showed off a new beast.
Via: The Verge
Starting at $1,399.99 in February, the Predator Triton 300 SE looks much sleeker. The all-metal gaming laptop will feature up to the i7-11375H CPU from Intel and the new RTX 3060 GPU from NVIDIA. The machine also touts a 14” FHD screen with a 144 Hz refresh rate. Users will also find Thunderbolt 4, USB 3.2 Gen 2, and HDMI ports with Intel’s Killer 6AX1650 Wi-Fi inside. There’s also a 3-zone RGB keyboard attached. The Triton 300 SE measures in at 17.9mm thin and weighs 3.75 pounds. I do want to note that we are not sure what the $1,399.99 price will have in terms of specs.
Via: The Verge