Pick Up Acer's Nitro V for only $869 — great laptop for the new school year

So, a relatively slow i7 (already an oxymoron, LOL), but it needs a GPU or the kids will be laughed at?
Even today Intel integrated graphics won't cut it and win on performance, efficiency, price, something?
Shrug.
I stopped following this stuff in any detail some time ago, but was just fascinated trying to make sense of this configuration.
It may be time for me to give up on workstations and get a modest laptop instead - just so it comes with a good docking station, or are docking stations kind of old school now too?