Following the confusion surrounding the launch of gaming laptops with RTX-30 series graphics cards, Nvidia is now requiring manufacturers to disclose their full specifications to consumers.
Desktop vs. Laptop GPUs Explained
With the latest gaming laptops now featuring Nvidia’s RTX 30-series graphics cards, some users have reported that, depending on which card you ultimately get in your laptop, a normally less powerful card is actually capable of more than more expensive variants. Nvidia is addressing this problem by requiring gaming laptop manufacturers to fully disclose the specs of the card, which should make the process of buying a new gaming laptop a lot less confusing.
“Every mobile GPU comes in multiple variants and there have been cases where a low-powered mobile GPU was beaten by a high-powered midrange variant due to its higher total graphics power (TGP) and clock speed,” Aamir Irshad, managing editor at PC Builderz, told Lifewire via email.
Before the launch of the RTX 30-series cards in gaming laptops, many laptops came with a Max-Q or Max-P designation. The former was the lowest-powered option, typically found in thinner laptops that had to sacrifice power for better cooling.