If you have had your gaming laptop for a while but feel it needs to be up to date with the current gaming standards in most laptops, an upgrade would do wonders for your gaming needs.
Making a laptop upgrade might sound more like buying a new laptop, but this is not always the case. If you do not have a budget to a high-end gaming laptop, it is possible to upgrade the features of your current laptop to fit the current gaming standards.
In this article, you will learn what you need to upgrade for a gaming laptop, and whether the upgrade is worth it.
Can You Upgrade a Laptop For Gaming?
You can upgrade a laptop for gaming either by buying a new laptop with the current specs for gaming or by upgrading the features of your current laptop.
The gaming features that need an upgrade include the laptop RAM, SSD/HDD, graphics card, CPU, keyboard, and external laptop hardware such as the mouse.
How To Upgrade a Laptop For Gaming
If you decide to upgrade your laptop specs for gaming instead of buying a whole new laptop, these are the parts to upgrade:
RAM
If your laptop has less than 16GB RAM, you should make an upgrade. You need at least 16 GB RAM for a seamless gaming experience. If you have a 16GB RAM but it is underperforming, you can upgrade to 32GB, which is ideal for the most intense laptop programs.
To upgrade the laptop RAM, follow this procedure:
- Remove the laptop battery
- Use a screw to access the bottom of the laptop
- Check whether there is an extra slot to insert the new RAM
- If your laptop does not have an extra slot, remove the current RAM and replace it with the new RAM.
- Close up your laptop after making the RAM upgrade.
What does a RAM Upgrade Do For Gaming Speeds?
Making a RAM upgrade can boost your laptop performance. If your laptop has 4GB RAM and you upgrade to 16GB, you should notice significant improvements in the gaming speeds of the laptop.
However, if you have 32 GB RAM, an upgrade may not be necessary since the RAM is already sufficient for gaming.
Keyboard Upgrade
A standard keyboard does a good job in gaming. However, it cannot beat the luxury of having a mechanical RGB keyboard. First, check whether your laptop is compatible with a gaming keyboard. If it is, purchase a gaming RGB keyboard and install it to enjoy all the buzz that comes with having a light-emitting gaming keyboard.
Hard Disk Upgrade
Whether your laptop has an SSD or HDD, making an upgrade helps with speeds during gaming. The preferred storage capacity for gaming is at least 500GB HDD or 256GB SSD.
Recent gaming laptops feature SSD storage as it has some advantages over HDD. SSD laptops are slimmer and lighter, they have faster speeds and consume less power.
There are laptops with slots for SSD and HDD. If yours has both, make an upgrade on both storages.
CPU Upgrade
The laptop CPU is the most crucial laptop component. It is the showrunner, and it determines how well and fast a laptop performs. Most laptops have either Intel or AMD CPUs, except Apple which uses an M1 chip processor.
It is possible to make a laptop CPU upgrade to improve gaming, but this depends on the laptop’s make. Laptops that have the CPU attached to the motherboard are difficult to upgrade. If the CPU is independent, you can make an upgrade, as long as the new CPU is compatible with the laptop.
For instance, if you were to upgrade from an Intel core i5 to i7, you are most likely to get better clock speed for your games, faster speeds even for other laptop tasks, and general laptop performance improvements. A bigger CPU means better clock speed, more cores, and even higher capacity for games.
Conclusion
If you upgrade your laptop for gaming, you will find gaming more thrilling, and your laptop will stop heating. Your laptop becomes better equipped to handle gaming demands. Some of the components you can upgrade include RAM, hard disk, keyboard, and CPU.
All these upgrades must be professionally done and must be compatible with the current laptop parts. Gaming laptop upgrades are not only beneficial for gaming but also general laptop performance.