Zero1 Awards Special: Best gaming laptops of the past decade

Power. Performance. Perfection. These are the hallmarks of the gaming laptops that have graced the Digit Zero1 Awards over the past decade. As we rev up for the 2023 awards, we’re taking a moment to honour past gaming laptops that have delivered beyond expectations, setting the bar for what it means to be the best in the gaming world.

Also read: Zero1 Awards Special: Best smartphones of the past decade

From cutting-edge graphics to blistering processors, these are the laptops that have allowed gamers to immerse themselves in worlds beyond imagination and experience nothing but the best of virtual gaming experiences. Check out the winners of Digit Zero1 Awards of the recent past for best gaming laptops…

Zero1 Winner 2013: ASUS ROG G750JX

In 2013, the ASUS Republic of Gamers G750JX came out ahead of the Alienware 17 by a very close margin. This 17-inch gaming behemoth wasn’t quite as spectacular as the Alienware in terms of looks and glam factor, but it was built very well and had the most impressive hardware: a quad-core Intel Core i7-4700MQ chip, 16GB RAM, 1.5 TB HDD, and NVIDIA GTX 770M (3GB GDDR5 VRAM), that conquered any latest game with ease. 

Despite sporting identical battery capacity, the ASUS gaming laptop lasted about 23 mins more than the Alienware 17 in our synthetic benchmark carried out at identical settings. And the slightly superior GPU that ASUS G750JX sported definitely helped it gain an edge over the Alienware 17.

Zero1 Winner 2014: ASUS G551JKDM053H

This was an interesting laptop released in 2014 for a number of reasons. First, its hardware was unquestionably impressive, sporting an Intel i7 4710 CPU, 8GB RAM and an Nvidia 850M GPU. What was interesting was that this laptop outperformed the likes of the MSI GE60 and GS60, both of which sported 860M GPUs. The laptop was also cheaper than the aforementioned competition and thus, it offered a combination of price and performance that was hard to match. Not by a huge margin, but still our Zero1 Award Winner!

Zero1 Winner 2015: MSI GT72 6QD

This machine was the undisputed king among all gaming laptops we tested in 2015. Weighing in at 3.8 kg, it was no ultrabook, and for good reason. Just take a look at its specs – 17.3-inch Full HD display with NVIDIA GSync, powerful quad-core Intel Core i7-6700HQ processor clocked at 2.6 GHz (it can reach up to 3.5 GHz), 16GB DDR4 RAM clocked at 2133 MHz, 1TB 7200RPM hard drive and discrete NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M graphics with 3GB GDDR5 memory. With a PC Mark score of 5465, 3D Mark (Fire Strike Ultra) score of 1673, it offered unmatched CPU-GPU performance that simply blew away its nearest competition. 

What was even great about the GT72 6QD was the fact that it stayed relatively cool at 42-degree-Celsius even at full load and offered a respectable battery life of 147 minutes in our tests. We had absolutely no trouble playing the latest and greatest games on this laptop as it accommodated all of them fairly well with no lag or stutter. What’s more, the laptop’s onboard Dynaudio speakers were probably the best we’ve heard on a laptop, providing very good audio performance as far as laptops went at the time.

Zero1 Winner 2016: MSI GT72VR 6RE Dominator Pro Tobii

MSI continued to be at the top in this best performing gaming laptop list with its GT72VR 6RE Dominator Pro. The laptop packed an Intel Core i7-6700 HQ processor along with 32GB RAM, 256GB SSD storage + 1TB HDD, a 17.3-inch Full HD IPS anti-glare display with 120Hz refresh rate along with an option to upgrade to 4K resolution. But what truly made this laptop the Zero1 winner was its desktop level performance, owing to the 8GB GDDR5 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 GPU. Raw CPU performance was at its best with the i7-6700 HQ that could be cranked up to 3.4 GHz with turbo-boost. 

Also read: 5 retro-tech gadgets that won Digit Zero1 Award over 20 years ago

Starting at 3.85 kg, the big form factor ensured you missed out on absolutely nothing when it came to connectivity. Tobii, MSI’s addition of an innovative eye-tracking technology let you game with your eyes and it worked pretty well too. The GT72 delivered serious performance with uncompromised desktop-class gaming experience, thus making it a worthy winner.

Zero1 Winner 2017: ASUS ROG-GX800VH (7th Gen)

With two GTX 1080 GPUs in SLI, there was absolutely no doubt in our minds that the ASUS GX800VH was going to be 2017’s Zero1 Award winner the moment it arrived. But we kept our minds open, we waited for the Predator 21 X and we waited for the MSI GT83VR Titan SLI but neither of them turned up. Both were equally expensive but we had to give it to ASUS for bringing such a beast to the Indian market. Powered by a Core i7-7820HK and two GTX 1080 GPUs, we saw a Fire Strike 1.1 score of 24,468. And that was the highest we had seen that entire year. When you compare that against a single GTX 1080, then we were looking at nearly a 40 per cent gain in gaming performance. 

The unit came with a liquid cooling attachment and two power adapters, so for all intents and purposes, you could throw portability out of the window but that was a minor trade-off for the performance gain that you could get at the end of the day. You didn’t get the full potential of the laptop without connecting the cooling unit. So you had portability whenever you needed it, and could go all guns blazing and conquer all the best games at the highest of settings!

Zero1 Winner 2018: Alienware 17 R5

Zero1 Winner 2019: MSI GT76 TITAN DT 9SG

Zero1 Winner 2020: Alienware Area51m R2

Zero1 Winner 2021: MSI GE 76 Raider

Zero1 Winner 2022: MSI Raider GE67 HX (12UHS)

Who will win the Zero1 Award 2023 for best gaming smartphone of the year? Stay tuned and keep checking www.digit.in/zero1-awards for all the updates regarding Digit’s annual best products of the year awards.