How We Assign Laptop Performance And Value Scores
2/14/2021
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- coming from the laptops page, or
- you've seen our laptops page before
If not, check out the laptops page first! If you have, then great, read along!
Prelude
Each component of the laptop, except storage, is assigned a score. Display has two scores assigned to it, one for refresh rate, and one for color accuracy. The scores we assign to these components is neither a relative score nor an absolute score.
For example: A and B are two CPUs. A is given a score of 4, whereas B is given a score of 2. Having a score of 4 as compared to 2 does not mean that A is twice as better / faster as B. Instead, it just means that, in most cases, A is likely to perform better than B.
The score given to a component is based on a combination of synthetic benchmark results, real world usage, etc.
Performance Score
We calculate performance and value scores differently depending on the type of the laptop. Mainly we divide laptops into 2 categories, gaming laptops and non-gaming laptops.
Any laptop without a dedicated Graphics Processing Unit (GPU), plus a few more laptops which do have a dedicated GPU but are not really meant for gaming come under non-gaming laptops.
RAM and Color Gamut are weighed equally among gaming laptops and non-gaming laptops.
Gaming Laptops
Since the GPU is the most important part of a gaming laptop, we give weightage to the GPU more than any other component. The GPU score is the single largest contributor to a gaming laptop's overall score. After that comes the CPU. As refresh rate is also an important criterion for gamers (not generalizing), we give a gaming laptop's refresh rate more weightage than a non-gaming laptop's refresh rate.
Roughly, this is the order of importance given to components in a gaming laptop:
GPU > CPU > RAM ~ Refresh Rate > Color Gamut
Non-Gaming Laptops
When it comes to non-gaming laptops, the CPU is given more weightage than the other components. GPU and refresh rate are given less weightage as compared to gaming laptops.
Roughly, this is the order of importance given to components in a non-gaming laptop:
CPU > RAM > Color Gamut > GPU > Refresh Rate
Value Score
Value score is derived from the performance score, latest price, and storage. Since prices change quite frequently, the value score of a laptop will keep changing as well. More storage for the same price is rarely a bad thing, and this reflects in the value score as well. Obviously, SSDs are considered more "valuable" than HDDs.
What Should You Do With These Scores?
There are a lot of subjective parameters involved in these scoring procedures. At the end of the day each person will have their own choices and preferences. Some may not care about the GPU, some may want more RAM over anything else, and so on. Therefore, these scores are meant to be used as a rough guide only. You must choose your laptop considering your own use cases, preferences, etc.
In many cases, you should not be using these scores to compare 2 laptops head-to-head. Having a lower performance score does not necessarily mean lower performance (for you). Same case for the value score. But if one laptop has a performance score of 80 compared to another laptop having a score of 50, you can rest assured that we're talking about an entire different performance segment (and probably price segment too).
Anyways, performance and value (in this context) are not the only things you should be worried about. Good design, thermals, and after sales service are some of the metrics which just cannot be reflected via a performance or value score, but are quite important and should be considered by everyone.
Happy laptop shopping! Back to the laptops page.