Question I need a laptop that I can use for college and sometimes gaming - - - budget $2,500 USD.

[vertoxed]

I'm looking for a laptop for college that can also handle competitive games like CS2 and Tarkov, plus singleplayer games like RDR2 or Elden Ring and medium settings are fine. Also need it to run multiple programs smoothly for schoolwork (unfortunately I don't know what programs yet but I'm majoring in IT if that helps)

I've recently been looking into Framework's Laptop 16 with the configuration here. The repairability seems like it would last me through college and I know that it can do what I need it to.

I would like to know if there's another laptop that can do the same as the one listed above, but for cheaper. Preferably Windows and a minimum of 144hz. Budget is $2,500 USD.

 

[geofelt]

Check with the IT instruction people to see what requirements they might have for a laptop that will almost certainly be required for your studies.

 

[thestryker]

If you're comfortable doing DIY work on a laptop then you should buy your own memory and storage for that and save yourself a lot of money. For some perspective: you can get 64GB DDR5-5600 SODIMM kit for ~$130 right now.

While I love what Framework does the 16" with dedicated graphics is a really poor value. From the other major manufacturers you'd be looking at $2000-2300 for a laptop using a 5070 Ti (desktop 5070 GPU so probably desktop 5060 Ti performance) with a faster CPU. The only person I know with recent first hand gaming laptop experience has had an Asus and Lenovo model. They returned the Asus and have been happy with the Lenovo (one of the 16" Legion models) ever since.