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Long story short, it's a time for a new laptop for me. The choice has been mostly narrowed, it will have:

- 17.3 inch display,
- 1 TB hard drive,
- 8 GB RAM.

What I can't decide on, is the processor & GPU configuration. The possibilities are:

- i5-6300HQ and GeForce GTX 1060,
- i7-6700HQ and GeForce GTX 1060,
- i5-7300HQ and GeForce GTX 1050,
- i7-7700HQ and GeForce GTX 1050 Ti.

The price is very similiar, only the 1050 version is much cheaper. I'm not an expert when it comes to GPUs and processors, please give me some advice:

- is the new generation of processors (7xxx series) visibly more efficient than the previous one?
- is the i5 enough for 1060?
- or is it 1050 enough for casual gaming (I don't have to play on ultra in brand new AAA game)?

I'd be very grateful for your help :-)
A few questions:

Budget?

How long do you plan to use it before replacing?

Besides gaming, what else do you use it for - among those things that might require some beefy hardware?
I always used Game Debate to see how well my laptop stacks against the latest games.

Take a brand new game like [url=http://www.game-debate.com/games/index.php?g_id=1712&game=Prey%2520(2017)]Prey[/url] for example. Put your stuff there and it spits out a general idea of how above or below each of your components are to the minimum or recommended settings. It will also tell you what your bottleneck is.

For me it was always CPU, but I'm an insane man with an laptop running SLI.
I would buy the one with Gtx 1060
Or if money is an issue, the one with Gtx 1050 TI

The reason is simple. I choose most powerful GPU as every processor listed there are good enough for anything
If it's for running the latest games get one with the 1060 - either the i5 or i7 is fine (I'd get the i7)

Though if it includes a gtx 10 series it's surprising that kaby lake (7x00) isn't being used...

in any case for gaming GPU is more important than CPU and in this respect 1060 > 1050 TI > 1050
Do you use other stuff on the laptop besides gaming?

does this laptop can be upgarade it to 16 GB Ram ? can't have enough ram nowadays.

i would go with the best processors & Nvidia GTX if money is no object to you.
well you can always pay on 12 months installment everywhere so...

make sure to get & install windows 7 instead of windows 10 ;)
If price is very similar stick with i7-6700HQ and GeForce GTX 1060. The 6000 and 7000 CPU series arent so much different, but the i7 is quite a bit more powerful than the i5. And then 1060 beats the 1050TI by far, too. Only make sure the 1060 has 6GB of ram.
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zeffyr: - i5-7300HQ and GeForce GTX 1050,
I just recently got a laptop with this combo, and MSI GL62M, and it's been working for me so far, though I haven't really tried pushing it. I played Arkham Knight and it was pretty smooth, though the VRAM meant that I couldn't turn everything on. If you don't really worry about maxing everything out, this should work just fine. If you have the money, go ahead and bump up to one of the better ones.
Post edited May 09, 2017 by doccarnby
If at all relevant:
get the 6xxx CPUs if you plan to use win 7.
get the 7xxx CPUs if you plan to use win 10.
Post edited May 09, 2017 by MadalinStroe
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zeffyr: - is the new generation of processors (7xxx series) visibly more efficient than the previous one?
- is the i5 enough for 1060?
- or is it 1050 enough for casual gaming (I don't have to play on ultra in brand new AAA game)?
No.
Yes.
Depends on what games you plan on playing. The 1050 ti is the general middle ground for "it can run new AAA games on low/medium". 1050 non-ti is perfect if you play games like Overwatch, DOTA, ARK, etc.

Also it was recently trending that people reported kaby lake overheating randomly. Not too sure what that means but an i7 6700 + 1060 is an all around good bet.
I'm looking for a new laptop and have done quite some research so this is for start. The 1050ti is a considerable improvement from the 1050 and the 1060 6GB is a considerable improvement from 1050ti. Right now the 1060 6GB at 1080p ultra settings can play almost everything at 60fps but in Witcher 3 for example you may want to lower a few settings. So if you want the most futureproof gpu out of these go with the 1060 6GB and you will be comfortable with most AAA games for the next few years. With the 1050ti you can play AAA games now at about low-medium settings so you might have problems in the near future. The 1050 is out of the question in my opinion. And the 1060 3GB doesn't look like a good deal to me.

About the CPU, Skylake or Kabylake doesn't matter much. A 6700HQ with a 1060 is a clearly better choice than a 7700HQ with a 1050ti. I wouldn't get the i5s because more and more games use more than 4 threads and the i7s will be more useful and futureproof.

I would also tell you to go to the notebookreview forum and ask for advice. And have a look at Clevo laptops, you are in Poland so you probably have access to resellers and you can configure one wth the characteristics you want.
Post edited May 09, 2017 by greeklover
buying a new laptop with 8 GB only of ram is nonsense imo, except if you alreay planned to buy a 8 GB stick to add as soon as it arrives!
Laptop i5 are weak compared to their desktop counterpart. So I would go with an i7 (which is actually similar to desktop i5). Also I would actually go overboard to an 1070 which at least would support VR if in the future I'd decide to try it out. However if your budget is limited go with the 1060.
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brainvision: buying a new laptop with 8 GB only of ram is nonsense imo, except if you alreay planned to buy a 8 GB stick to add as soon as it arrives!
Probably it's prebuilt like that. But yeah a good point.
Also I would get an SSD to put next to the hard drive.
Post edited May 09, 2017 by blotunga
Go with i7-6700HQ and GeForce GTX 1060, it is the best option from those 4, the difference from cpu gen 7 and gen 6th(on same cpu) it is too low, but at gpu it is a bigger difference between 1060 and 1050...on laptop allways go with best cpu+gpu your money can buy, because those 2 are not easy(if not at all) to be changed....
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blotunga: Laptop i5 are weak compared to their desktop counterpart. So I would go with an i7 (which is actually similar to desktop i5). Also I would actually go overboard to an 1070 which at least would support VR if in the future I'd decide to try it out. However if your budget is limited go with the 1060.
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brainvision: buying a new laptop with 8 GB only of ram is nonsense imo, except if you alreay planned to buy a 8 GB stick to add as soon as it arrives!
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blotunga: Probably it's prebuilt like that. But yeah a good point.
Also I would get an SSD to put next to the hard drive.
sure it's a prebuilt laptop the one he's picking up among, but still mounted RAM does not mean max ram specs, so at least the laptop should have room for additional stick(or double the mounted one)..