The first examples of laptops powered by Nvidia’s upcoming RTX 4060 mobile GPU are now appearing on Newegg with prices starting at $1,100. Currently, the laptops are only available for pre-order instead of being available immediately.
Likewise, we’ve yet to directly test the new RTX 4060 mobile GPU. So the jury remains out on exactly how it will compare to previous-generation notebook graphics from Nvidia.
That said, Nvidia has released some pretty detailed specs for the new chip. It will run 3,072 CUDA cores at 2,370 MHz along with 8 GB of GDDR6 memory over a 128-bit bus.
For comparison, the old RTX 3060 actually had more CUDA cores at 3,840, but a maximum boost clock of just 1,425 MHz. In raw computational terms, this translates to about a 35% increase for the new mobile GPU.
But then CUDA cores are not completely comparable between generations. Additionally, the RTX 4060 will come with niceties like DLSS 3 and Frame Generation, which will almost certainly not will be retroactively released for the old RTX 3060. This could tip the balance quite a bit in favor of the newer GPU.
It’s also worth noting that the mobile RTX 4060 may actually turn out to be more powerful than the desktop variant, if the latest rumors are to be believed.
For the record, among the RTX 4060 laptops listed for that $1,100 is the MSI GF63 series (opens in new tab). In fact, it uses a latest generation Intel Core i5 12500H processor, plus 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. The display is a 15.6-inch 1080p 144Hz unit with alleged “IPS-level” panel technology.
The other $1,100 option is the Gigabyte G5 (opens in new tab). It also runs the latest generation CPU technology with the slightly superior Intel Core i5 12500H CPU, plus a 512GB SSD. It also has essentially the same 15.6-inch 1080p 144Hz display technology. The interesting thing about the Gigabyte option is that it comes with just 8GB of RAM. Blah.
All of which means you’ll soon be able to stick RTX 40-series tech into a laptop for vaguely reasonable money. Just don’t expect the new GPUs to completely take out the old RTX 30 series.
With the possible exception of DLSS 3 and the Frame Generation driver, all indications are that the RTX 4060 will be more of an iterative upgrade than a performance revolution. So $1,100 for an RTX 4060 laptop probably isn’t a great deal, but it’s a lot more reasonable than most things related to next-gen graphics.
Indeed, as we noted the other day, RTX 40-series laptops generally seem to be relatively decent value next to their megabuck desktop counterparts, with RTX 4070 laptops available for just over $1,500 and RTX 4080s from $1,699 (opens in new tab). Well, despite the $4,000 price tag of the first edition RTX 4090 gaming laptops (opens in new tab) we have tried anyway.