Let’s be honest, gaming laptops have always been a balancing act, often forcing us to choose between portability, raw power, and decent battery life. While recent models have made strides, the arrival of powerful gaming handhelds like the Xbox Ally X has truly thrown their compromises into sharp relief.
Certainly, the Asus Xbox Ally X isn’t the pioneer in portable gaming, and many still consider the Steam Deck OLED superior. However, my recent experience reviewing the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X concurrently with the Razer Blade 14 gaming laptop vividly demonstrated both the persistent shortcomings of gaming laptops and the areas where they continue to excel compared to handhelds.
The most glaring lesson laptops can take from handhelds is in battery longevity. During my PCMark 10 gaming tests, the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X managed just under three hours of playtime. While that might not sound stellar on its own, it significantly outpaces every gaming laptop we’ve evaluated under identical conditions – by over an hour, in fact, and almost triple what most laptops achieve. (Of course, adjusting settings can extend battery life for both, but these are standardized comparison results).
Of course, there’s a significant trade-off: the Razer Blade 14, like most gaming laptops, boasts a much more powerful GPU than even the top-tier handhelds. Its RTX 5070 GPU can consume over 100W, pushing out an average of 97 frames per second in Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p with Ultra settings. In contrast, the Xbox Ally X’s Radeon 890M GPU is limited to 35W, achieving only 49 frames per second at 1080p with medium settings, and it heavily depends on FSR upscaling (on balanced mode), which notably lowers the internal rendering resolution.
You might assume that a gaming laptop equipped with comparable GPU power would offer much better battery life. However, the issue extends beyond just gaming; general productivity and desktop use also see significant battery drain on laptops.
For everyday desktop tasks, the Asus ROG Xbox Ally X truly shines, lasting an incredible 17 hours and nine minutes in PCMark 10’s Office battery test. This dwarfs the best gaming laptop result we’ve seen in the same test – eight hours and 28 minutes from the impressive Razer Blade 16. The more compact Razer Blade 14, for instance, only managed four hours and 24 minutes.
Part of this battery challenge stems from the design philosophy of these laptops. The Razer Blade 14, for example, is astonishingly thin and light, especially considering it houses a formidable, dedicated GPU alongside its 10-core CPU. This compact design necessitates a smaller battery – 61.6Wh compared to the Xbox Ally X’s 80Wh – which naturally impacts its endurance. Yet, this isn’t solely a problem for ultra-portable models; many larger, bulkier gaming laptops (even with more potent GPUs) still feature only modestly sized batteries. While airline restrictions on large batteries might play a role, many manufacturers don’t even utilize the full 160Wh capacity limit.
For the Blade 14, a simple solution to greatly enhance its overall usability would be for Razer to slightly increase its thickness and add 100-200g of weight to accommodate an 80-100Wh battery, effectively doubling its battery life. Gaming handhelds have already proven that users are willing to carry a slightly bulkier device if it delivers excellent performance. A more substantial, ‘chonkier’ Blade 14, in my opinion, would be a massive success. This isn’t just a Razer issue either; similar laptops, like the Asus ROG Zephyrus G14 (2025), have also suffered from poor battery performance.
Another key advantage handhelds currently hold over most gaming laptops is their reliance on integrated graphics, contrasted with laptops’ use of separate GPUs. The Xbox Ally X, for instance, features the AMD Ryzen Z2 Extreme CPU with an integrated Radeon 890M GPU. The Razer Blade 14, however, combines an AMD Ryzen AI 9 365 CPU, an integrated Radeon 880M GPU, and a discrete Nvidia GeForce RTX 5070 laptop GPU. This hybrid setup allows the Blade 14 and similar laptops to achieve significantly greater gaming performance, as our benchmarks clearly show.
Yet, to balance the power of a dedicated GPU with the need for better battery life, these gaming laptops are designed to switch between their discrete GPU and the integrated one. This automatic switching process is where the user experience often falls short.
While Windows manages this switching automatically – activating the appropriate GPU when you launch a game – the transition frequently leads to frustrating delays, with the screen often blacking out. This can also trigger compatibility issues with certain applications, cause windows to inexplicably resize, and generally disrupt your workflow.
Furthermore, for applications like Photoshop that leverage GPU acceleration, or for less demanding games that run perfectly well on integrated graphics, users must manually configure which GPU to utilize for each individual program. In stark contrast, a system with a single integrated GPU simply handles everything seamlessly without fuss.
It’s important to acknowledge that gaming laptops certainly retain their value due to larger displays, exceptional performance, and the inherent utility of a built-in keyboard and trackpad. Some of their drawbacks are even rooted in software – the Xbox Ally X, for example, benefits from a Windows version optimized for better battery life. However, when viewed purely as dedicated portable gaming devices, they often feel like they’re missing that ‘special something’.
This context makes the upcoming collaboration between Intel and Nvidia incredibly significant, as it promises Intel CPUs equipped with integrated Nvidia graphics. This partnership isn’t just about Intel finally having integrated GPUs that can genuinely rival AMD’s in performance – a key factor in why AMD chips power the latest Xbox, PlayStation, and many gaming handhelds – but it also offers the exciting prospect of gaming laptops finally ditching that clunky GPU switching technology.
Developing such potent integrated chips is no simple feat, though. AMD already offers its own incredibly powerful integrated GPU, the Ryzen AI 9 390 Max (codenamed Strix Halo), which drives the Asus ROG Flow Z13 (2025). This chip can achieve over 50 frames per second in Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p with high settings. Despite its capabilities, very few devices currently incorporate this chip, underscoring the complexities and high costs associated with its production.
Nevertheless, with AMD and the Intel/Nvidia collaboration seemingly gearing up for an intense competition to develop increasingly powerful integrated GPUs for the next wave of gaming laptops and handhelds, the future for both platforms appears exceptionally promising. Now, if only we could get those laptops equipped with some significantly larger batteries next time around, that would be truly ideal!
For recommendations on top-tier gaming handhelds and laptops, covering everything from budget-friendly options to high-end powerhouses, look no further.