Surface Book 3 Gaming Capabilities?

[adeogaygay]

I recently bought the i5 8GB RAM base model Surface Book 3 and was having problems with gaming from the start. When I first start playing Tomb Raider (2013), it runs between 30 to 40 fps. After half an hour it overheats and slows down to an unplayable 10 to 20 fps. Tried everything to reduce core temperatures from limiting background CPU usage to using a USB fan to turning off wifi and playing offline to no avail. It struggles even at minimum settings. I understand I don't have a gaming laptop with a dedicated graphics card but surely it should run a game from 2013 at minimum settings fro the $1600 price tag. If it is not a manufacturer's defect, this is truly pathetic.

I'm thinking about retruning it and upgrading it to the i7 model with NVIDIA GEFORCE graphics card which goes for $1799.00 after discount at the Microsoft Store. The Surfacebook 2 with similar specs is $1395.00 on Amazon. Is it worth the $400 price difference?

 

[HeyCori]

So you got the base model with the Iris Plus graphics and you expected more out of it? Nothing pathetic about it. You got exactly what you paid; a Surface Book 3 with above average GPU power. The Iris chips didn't do a very good job running modern games when they were released and they've advanced for little since. Ultimately, you'll want to upgrade to the Geforce 1650 if gaming is something you plan on doing. Even if you went with the Surface Book 2 with a GTX 1050, it would be better than integrated graphics. That said, I know little about thermal performance on the Book 3, so even if you do upgrade, overheating might still be an issue.

 

[Ryujingt3]

I recently bought the i5 8GB RAM base model Surface Book 3 and was having problems with gaming from the start. When I first start playing Tomb Raider (2013), it runs between 30 to 40 fps. After half an hour it overheats and slows down to an unplayable 10 to 20 fps. Tried everything to reduce core temperatures from limiting background CPU usage to using a USB fan to turning off wifi and playing offline to no avail. It struggles even at minimum settings. I understand I don't have a gaming laptop with a dedicated graphics card but surely it should run a game from 2013 at minimum settings fro the $1600 price tag. If it is not a manufacturer's defect, this is truly pathetic.

I'm thinking about retruning it and upgrading it to the i7 model with NVIDIA GEFORCE graphics card which goes for $1799.00 after discount at the Microsoft Store. The Surfacebook 2 with similar specs is $1395.00 on Amazon. Is it worth the $400 price difference?

The SB with the GeForce card will undoubtedly provide better gaming performance, because of the card. But it still won't be close to a proper gaming laptop.

 

[HelloNNNewman]

[merged multiple threads] OP - please create only 1 thread (not 4 in different forums) as your question will get answered in any proper forum. Thank you

 

[anon(5327127)]

The Surface Book 3, with the 1660 would be considerably better for gaming, since the i7 gpu is basically not that great unless you reduce the resolution a LOT. Are you playing at the default screen res? heck, that would cripple most AAA games. Reduce the res to 1280x720 (or something near there).

After that, return for the SB3 i7.

Other than that, there's always a dedicated gaming laptop.