As newer generations of gaming laptops are released to the market, gaming laptops with older GPUs and hardware naturally become a lot more pocket friendly. This time around, we’re going to be taking a look at three budget gaming laptop options from HP, MSI and Lenovo. All of these laptops come with NVIDIA GTX 1650 GPUs, and are priced between the Rs 60,000 – Rs 80,000 range. With that being said, let’s take a quick look at the HP Omen 16, MSI GF63 Thin 11SC, and the Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming 81Y4.
HP Omen 16
Quick specs comparison
Like we mentioned above, most of these laptops come with older specs. All three of these laptops come with NVIDIA GTX 1650 GPUs, which is decent for low-end gaming setups. All three of them also come with 8 GB of RAM, and 512 GB of SSD storage.
MSI GF63 Thin 11SC
The HP Omen 16 comes with a Ryzen 5 5600H, while the MSI GF63 Thin 11SC comes with a 11th Gen Intel Core i7 11800H, and finally, the Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming 81Y4 comes with a 10th Gen Intel Core i7 10750H.
Display
MSI GF63 Thin 11SC
Coming to the displays, both the Omen 16 and the GF63 come with 144 Hz displays, while the Ideapad 3 comes with a 120 Hz display. The overall display quality on all three laptops isn’t all that great with poor sRGB coverage across the three displays. Of the lot, the HP Omen 16 has the best display, while the Lenovo was the weakest. However, when it comes to brightness, it’s the other way around, with the Ideapad 3 Gaming having the brightest display, and the HP coming up third. We should point out that when it comes to just gaming, the sRGB coverage really doesn’t make all that much of a difference, however the brightness might, depending on the kind of lighting you use the laptop in.
Performance breakdown
In terms of just processor performance, the MSI GF63 Thin has a slight edge over the HP Omen 16, scoring slightly better in most processor benchmarks. The Lenovo Ideapad 3, understandably with the oldest hardware, was the weakest of the three.
Processor Benchmarks
Next we come to the gaming performance. Despite all three having the same GPU, we noticed that the HP Omen 16 consistently gave us better frames and benchmarks than the other two laptops in this comparison. Next up, it was actually the Lenovo Ideapad 3 that got us better frames, leaving the MSI GF63 in last place when it comes to purely gaming benchmarks. None of the laptops are capable of ray tracing.
In-game benchmarks
However, the difference between the Lenovo Ideapad 3 and the MSI GF63 was almost negligible, with a difference of 1-2 FPS in most gaming benchmarks. The Lenovo scored consistently better than the MSI in all 3DMark benchmarks as well. Considering the price difference and the difference in hardware, that’s troubling for the MSI GF63 Thin.
3DMark Benchmarks
Overall, the HP Omen 16 has the best performance of the lot. The MSI wins out on processor benchmarks, but if you’re looking for purely gaming performance, then the HP Omen 16 is your best bet. It’s also the most expensive of the lot, at nearly Rs 80K. In which case you should probably consider the Lenovo over the MSI, which while being cheaper offers better gaming performance.
Build and Design: A brief review
While the Omen and the Ideapad 3 Gaming feature fairly subtle looks, the MSI features a very gaming laptop aesthetic. Ultimately this is subjective, but if you’re someone who uses your laptop in a professional setting this might matter.
Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming
Coming to the keyboard, the HP Omen 16 doesn’t have a numpad, additionally, there’s no backlighting either. The MSI GF63 Thin doesn’t have a numpad either, but you’ve got MSI red backlighting which is in line with the overall aesthetic MSI is going for. The Lenovo Ideapad 3 features both a numpad and blue backlighting. While the trackpad on the Omen 16 is large and can get in the way of typing, both the MSI GF63 and Lenovo Ideapad 3 feature small, off-center trackpads that don’t interfere with typing too much. Of course, if you’re someone who uses the trackpad over a mouse (why?) then maybe the HP Omen 16 is preferable.
HP Omen 16
The Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming also comes with a webcam cover which can slide off or on. Nice touch for those who value their privacy.
Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming
Finally we come to heat and loudness. The MSI GF63 Thin runs the loudest of the three, followed by the Lenovo Ideapad 3 Gaming and finally the HP Omen 16, which runs the quietest of the lot. In terms of heat though, the Lenovo got the hottest, too hot to keep on your lap that’s for sure. This was followed by the MSI which you also probably want to keep on a table while gaming. Again, the HP Omen 16 comes out on top here. So if volume and heat are something you want to keep in mind, once more the HP Omen 16 is your best bet of these three budget gaming laptops.
Verdict
While you should easily be able to play most modern games at low to medium settings on FHD on these three laptops, we should point out that if you’re looking for purely gaming performance, there are cheaper options in the market, with RTX GPUs. Still, these gaming laptops are budget offerings, ranging from Rs 60K to under Rs 80K and should more than suffice as entry level gaming laptops.
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