how much better is nvidia's desktop rtx
3070 graphics card compared to the
laptop 3070. i've compared both in 17
different games at 1080p and 1440p to
find out here are the differences in
specs between the 3070 mobile and
desktop gpus both the ga104 dies but the
desktop 3070 has 15 more cuda cores
compared to the laptop version they both
have 8 gigs of gddr6 memory at the same
speed but the desktop card is of course
able to hit higher clock speeds as it's
got a higher 220 watt power limit the
laptop 3070 has to have lower power
limits because more power generally
equals more heat and i don't know if you
can see the size difference here but
it's pretty big basically the laptop
just has less space for cooling to do
this testing i'm using the xmg nero 15
for the laptop it's got an 8 core ryzen
7 5800 h processor and 16 gigs of ddr4
3200 memory in dual channel i've chosen
this model because it both runs the rtx
3070 mobile at its full power limit and
it has a mock switch allowing us to
disable optimus and bypass the
integrated graphics something that our
desktop system here isn't subject to now
technically the nvidia spec sheet does
allow the rtx 3070 mobile to run all the
way down to 80 watts so expect an even
bigger difference compared to what i'll
be showing with these two here this is
basically a best case 3070 laptop the
desktop pc also has an 8 core zen 3
processor but it's the ryzen 7 5800 x
and like the gpu that does run at a
higher power limit compared to the
laptop i've also used 16 gigs of ddr4
3200 dual channel memory here granted
the timings are lower alright let's get
straight into comparing the laptop 37e
against desktop 3070 in 17 different
games at two different resolutions then
after that we'll compare pricing and
availability power draw and content
creator workloads let's start out with
red dead redemption 2 which was tested
with the game's benchmark i've got the
1080p results below and the 1440p
results above with the laptop results
underneath the desktop results at 1080p
the desktop 3070 was reaching 18 higher
average fps compared to the laptop 3070
a below average result out of the 17
tested with a similar 19 lead at 1440p
this game recently added dlss support
and with this enabled both were able to
get a further performance boost 85 fps
on a laptop at high settings 1440p is by
no means unplayable so although the
desktop is still around 19 higher the
laptop still offers a good result
cyberpunk 2077 also had a below average
difference out of all the games tested
high settings at 1440p was just above
60fps on the desktop putting it 24 ahead
of the laptop even the 1 low from the
desktop was ahead of the average fps
from the laptop the difference was
similar at the lower 1080p resolution
with the desktop system almost 26 faster
than the laptop now this is another game
with dlss support and both machines are
able to get a decent performance boost
by enabling this simple setting though
the desktop was still 26 ahead of the
laptop at 1080p so no change there but
the laptop was now capable of averaging
above 100 fps at high settings call of
duty warzone was tested with all
settings maxed out the one percent lows
from the desktop 3070 were close to the
average frame rates that the laptop was
able to offer though with the laptop
being capable of about 100 fps at the
higher 1440p resolution at max settings
it's not exactly terrible despite the
desktop reaching 30 higher average fps
at the risk of sounding like an nvidia
shield this game has dlss support too
and both machines can get an fps boost
by enabling this setting the desktop
3070 was now about 28 ahead of the
laptop so a similar margin and both were
running the game without issue control
is a fairly gpu heavy game though the
differences between the two machines
were close to the 17 game average the
desktop had one percent lows higher than
even the average fps from the laptop a
common trend in this testing again i'd
argue 60 fps at max settings 1440p on a
laptop is quite decent but the desktop
370 was reaching a 32 percent higher
average frame rate compared to the
laptop here and a similar 31 percent
lead to 1080p this game also has dlss
support so yeah now that we're above 100
fps at 1440p on the laptop there's
really no concern about playability or
anything but the fact is the desktop was
now 34 ahead of the laptop so it's
receiving a larger gain i've also tested
both with ray tracing enabled sure dlss
could have been used here to boost
performance which would be recommended
given the frame rates at 1440p but i
wanted to see the rt difference between
laptop and desktop both resolutions were
around 27 faster on the desktop a lower
difference f1 2021 was also tested with
some ray tracing because the maximum
ultra high setting preset enables some
of these settings by default again one
percent lows from the desktop were
beating the average fps from the laptop
the desktop was reaching 33 percent
higher average fps at 1080p and 32
percent higher at 1440p microsoft flight
simulator was right in line with the 17
game average at 1080p with the desktop
3070 reaching 30 higher average frame
rate though in this game i wouldn't be
surprised if the processor difference
was playing a part but that's just the
way it is when comparing laptop and
desktop at 1440p the desktop was
reaching 33 higher average fps compared
to the laptop the fourth best result at
this resolution watchdog's legion on the
other hand had one of the smaller
differences out of all games tested at
least in terms of average fps the one
percent low gap seems to be larger at
1440p the desktop was reaching 24
percent higher average fps but the one
percent low is almost 49 higher so a
much more stable experience on the
desktop but again it's hard to say how
much of this is due to other components
such as the processor it's not just the
gpu that has a higher power limit in the
desktop the cpu does too this game also
has dlss support which can be enabled to
further boost performance on both gpus
shadow of the tomb raider had the
largest difference out of all 17 games
tested in favor of the desktop 3070 at
1080p the desktop had a massive 47 lead
over the laptop and then it was 36
percent ahead at 1440p assassin's creed
valhalla on the other hand had the
smallest difference between the laptop
and desktop out of the 17 games tested
the desktop was reaching 11 percent
higher average fps at 1080p and 15
percent higher at 1440p given the laptop
is still above 60fps here though like
most of the other games covered it's not
like it's going to be unplayable and
that's coming from someone who has
played this game for more than 100 hours
now fortnite was tested with the exact
same replay file on both machines like
many other games the 1 lows from the
desktop were ahead of even the average
fps from the laptop but 100 fps at max
settings 1440p on the laptop is of
course still playable the desktop is
just reaching 33 higher average fbs
instead of talking through the rest of
the seven games in detail i'll just
quickly skip through them so we can get
onto looking at the average differences
of all games tested as that's more
interesting just pause the video if you
want a detailed look at any of these
results differences can vary a fair bit
between games which is why it's
important to test a large sample so that
we can get a better average on average
over all 17 games tested at 1080p the
desktop rtx 3070 was 28 faster than the
laptop much more of a difference
compared to my recent comparison between
the laptop and desktop 3060 which only
saw the desktop eight percent faster
than the laptop in these same games i
suppose the 3060 laptop and desktop have
a lower 55 watt power difference while
the 3070 laptop and desktops gap is
larger at 95 watts and i believe this is
why the difference is larger here
stepping up to the higher 1440p
resolution the performance difference is
slightly smaller on average but still
quite similar and close to the 29 point
most of the games covered seem to be
around 30 faster on the desktop but yeah
as you can see it depends on the game
worst case valhalla down the bottom was
less than 15 percent faster on the
desktop the desktop system is definitely
using more power when compared to the
laptop both were measured at the wall so
this is the total power that the entire
machine is using and not just the gpu in
control at 4k a gpu heavy game at a high
resolution the desktop system was
drawing around 65 percent more power
from the wall and granted i didn't test
fps at 4k 1080p and 1440p resolutions
were about 30 percent higher average fps
on the 3070 desktop compared to the
laptop so there's definitely an argument
to be had for the laptop being more
power efficient just before we get into
the price differences i've also compared
both in some content creator workloads
it's not all just about gaming blender
was tested with cuda and the results
were quite close together the longer
classroom test was nearly 12 percent
faster on the desktop 3070 which i
suppose makes sense when you consider
that the desktop 3070 has 15 percent
more cuda cores and this is a cuda test
it seems that the power limit difference
means less here compared to the games
previously likewise v-ray was tested
with cuda and the desktop card was
scoring 18 higher than the laptop
graphics here i've also run its ray
tracing test and the desktop was scoring
about nine percent higher than the
laptop there spec view perf tests out
various professional 3d workloads the
desktop 3070 shown by the red bars was
always ahead of the laptop in the purple
bars but the margins could vary
significantly depending on the specific
task so the desktop 3070 was generally
better surprising absolutely no one the
next question is what's the price
difference prices will of course change
over time so refer to those links in the
description below for updates right now
the price of a 3070 laptop can vary
significantly based on the specific
model on newegg we're generally looking
at 1800 to 2200 us dollars the xmg near
15 i've tested is currently 2200 euro
but i've seen other full powered 3070
laptops like the legion 7 on sale for
about 1600 us dollars for a desktop pc
well we all know that graphics card
prices have been all over the place for
months now the rtx 3070 was meant to
have a 500 us dollar msrp but we can see
on newegg that the cheapest one
currently in stock is 1050 usd with most
being more than this even the lowest out
of stock ones are mid 700s the rest will
greatly depend on the other parts that
you select the 5800x i've used for
example is another 400 alone but
honestly something like a 5600x for less
money will probably still do well of
course if you already have a pc just
upgrading the gpu is also an option
that's not available with a laptop i'm
not going to go ahead and do a complete
pc build because as mentioned prices are
just all over the place and it's going
to heavily depend on what components you
pick anyway but once you factor in
everything like motherboard case power
supply ram storage screen keyboard
you're probably going to end up paying a
similar amount to a laptop anyway but as
mentioned it really will depend on the
hardware selection again i've got
absolutely no doubt that you can find
cheaper desktop components and even a
cheaper 3070 laptop i'm just speaking
generally at the end of the day to me
personally cost isn't even the major
factor it comes down to whether or not
you actually need portability do you
actually need to take your machine with
you if you do good luck taking something
like this to school or the office for
people that do need portability a laptop
is clearly the superior option or it
might even be another reason like just
not having enough dust space to keep
something like this set up or maybe as
this shirt foretold you're having a hard
time getting your hands on these parts
for some people it might be easier just
to find a laptop in stock it depends the
point is obviously there are scenarios
where a laptop has its benefits
generally though if you do have the
space for a desktop pc and you don't
need portability i would suggest a
desktop pc mostly because it's way
easier to upgrade compared to a laptop
with a laptop the cpu and gpu were
soldered to the motherboard and you
can't upgrade them unless you replace
the entire machine kind of inefficient
whereas on the laptop i can just pull
out this 37e and put the next gen
graphics card straight in of course
assuming they're in stock anyway i guess
the point i'm trying to make is
different things for different people
and while the desktop 3070 was a fair
bit better compared to the laptop 37e
the fact is the laptop 3070 was still
offering a pretty great gaming
experience even at the higher 1440p
resolution personally what i was most
interested in was to see the performance
gap between the laptop 3070 and desktop
3070 being larger compared to the laptop
and desktop 3060 and that's because the
power limit difference between these two
is higher compared to the 3060 versions
now the power limit difference between
the 3080 laptop and 3080 desktop is even
bigger than this so let me know if i
should revisit this video but using the
rtx 3080 instead you can check out my
comparison between the laptop and
desktop 3060 over here and i've also
done the same type of comparison with
previous gen graphics over here which
might be easier to get your hands on
than this new stuff make sure you're
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