Warning: A laptop with 128GB of RAM won’t please everyone for two reasons. They cost a lot, and you won’t find them in thin and light laptops; none of them have screens smaller than 15.6 inches.
Instead, they exist almost exclusively in so-called mobile workstations (although there is a gaming laptop on this list) and are usually paired with the most powerful processors on the market (surprisingly, both are based on Intel Core rather than AMD Ryzen). ).
We typically arrange all currently selling laptops in 2023 with 128GB of RAM into four 32GB DDR4 or DDR5 SODIMMs. The list only includes Windows laptops; at the time of writing, Apple’s top laptop, the MacBook Pro 16-inch 2023, maxes out at 96GB. They are all 11th, 12th or 13th generation laptops.
1. Lenovo ThinkPad P16
At just under $2,770, the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 is the cheapest way you can get a laptop with 128GB of RAM, and even its base configuration should be more than enough for most resource-intensive applications.
You still get a 12th Gen Core i5 CPU (12600HX with four performance cores and eight efficiency cores), a 256GB PCI-E NVMe SSD with OPAL/SED capability and TLC technology (instead of QLC).
That’s a reasonable 43% increase in price from the standard 8GB of RAM (DDR5) to 128GB (ignoring the inflated price tag advertised by Lenovo). That’s $7 per gigabyte, or $113 per 16GB module, roughly double the market price. You’re paying a huge premium for four 32GB modules. Note that the P16, which doesn’t support the Xeon CPU, supports ECC memory, adding another $500 to the price of the laptop. In general, BTO (build-to-order) upgrades cost more and there is no option to remove Windows as the system OS.
2. HP ZBook Fury 17 G8
The ZBook Fury 17 G8 is the only one on this list to feature a Xeon processor from Intel’s server/workstation CPU family.
The first thing that blew our minds was the lead time; custom laptops in the series will ship in May 2023 (at the time of writing), which is a three-month lead time, which is great if you’re looking to get your hands on a laptop sooner rather than later. Not a good thing. Since it still uses Intel’s 11th generation processors, there’s no DDR5, only DDR4. Again, only Wi-Fi 6 instead of Wi-Fi 6e, and the fastest GPU available is the Nvidia Quadro RTX A5000 instead of the A5500.
The ZBook Fury 17 G8 supports four SSDs (up to 8TB total capacity), and the base unit comes with a free 2TB secondary hard drive. We like the fact that you can swap out Windows 11 Pro for Ubuntu and save around $200, and users can even ask HP to configure their rig for data science or virtual reality – though sadly you’ll have to pay extra for the fingerprint reader .
3. Dell Precision 7770
Dell has been making workstations for over a quarter of a century, so they know a thing or two about what makes a good machine.
The 7670 sits at the top of Dell’s lineup, competing directly with Lenovo and HP in the new 16-inch non-Xeon mobile workstation industry. It is more expensive than its competitors, partly due to the introduction of a new technology called CAMM, which stands for Compressed Attached Memory Module. This is essentially a new proprietary memory technology that reduces the size of memory modules and can make future upgrades expensive.
Also, the 128GB modules run at a lower memory clock speed (3.6GHz) compared to 5.6GHz on the Titan GT77HX. Compared to the competition, it can handle four SSDs and can run multiple RAID versions (as low as RAID 10), but those upgrades don’t come cheap; expect to pay over $8,000 for 16TB.
4. Getac X600
If you want to run memory-intensive applications on the go in harsh environments, the Getac X600 might be for you – and while it’s over $11,400, not many of us would line up to buy it: it’s clearly a specific target market, namely Professionals who work in demanding industries such as defense, manufacturing, and oil and gas.
Weighing only 4.41kg, this rugged mobile workstation is MIL-STD-810H and IP66 certified, shock resistant and 120cm drop resistant. However, it’s based on 11th Gen Intel Core as those platforms need more time to be certified and tested; so no DDR5 here; only 128GB DDR4. It comes with a dizzying array of ports (including VGA and two 2.5Gb Ethernet ports) and two hot-swappable 74.5Wh batteries.
5. MSI Titanium GT77HX
If only the best is enough, there’s nothing like the MSI Titan GT77HX right now. This has got to be the fastest laptop out there, and yes, it’s the current performance champ despite the premium price you pay for it (over $5,100 at the time of writing).
What do you get for your money? The fastest commercial mobile Intel CPU and fastest laptop GPU on the market: the combination of the Core i9-13980HX and Nvidia Geforce RTX 4090 can only produce many high-resolution FPS. It’s not just gaming, as content creators who need a lot of RAM will also be pleased with this gaming laptop/mobile workstation.
The CPU has 24 cores, which can be accelerated up to 5.6GHz; the GPU has 16 GB GDDR6, and the memory module is a DDR5 module with a main frequency of 5.6 GHz. It has three SSD slots for up to 24TB of storage, but you can’t enable RAID (0, 1, or 5), which is a shame. For the screen, MSI opted for a 17.4-inch 4K model with a 144Hz refresh rate; that’s fine, but keep in mind it adds weight. Note that you can only book by reservation (ETA late February 2023).
