eGPU Or Replace Laptop?

[giblet]

Bought a XPS13 9370 in November, mainly for work use. Perfect for that given the spec (i7 8550U, 16GB ram, 512GB SSD etc.

However I recently visited a games arcade that has opened up near me and found myself playing CS GO with some mates. I installed it on my laptop but the frame rate isn’t great 28-32 with everything on medium.

Should I buy a eGPU for my existing laptop or am I better switching to something like the XPS15 9570 which has a GTX1050Ti built in plus a beefier processor (8750H).

[parabolica]

Cost vs reward I guess; if nothing else is wrong with your current XPS (and it's a nice spec) I would look at getting an external GPU. Not sure on their current costs though; I can't imagine a decent spec one would be more than a new XPS however!

[giblet]

A quick search shows an enclosure is around £250 and then I’ll need to add the cost of the card.

The XPS15 option would require me to sell my laptop and then spend around £400 on top to buy one. Roughly the same either way!

[bloomen]

A egpu could go with you from machine to machine and be upgraded if necessary. A 1050ti laptop would do a fine job for your purposes but it's not cutting edge if you wanted to delve deeper.

All the same I wonder whether egpus are in their final form. There's talk of needing something better than thunderbolt 3 to sort latency.