You only have to take a look at some of the biggest streamers out there to see why so many people turn their hands to streaming platforms like Twitch or YouTube Gaming at some point in their lives. While only a handful tend to make a successful career out of it, streaming is a hobby many gamers feel passionate about – and it’s something that requires some pretty high-tech kit to help you stand out from the crowd.
Luckily from you, OMEN has all the tech you could possibly need to start streaming from beefy top-of-the-range desktops to lightning-quick gaming keyboards and mice. But there’s one product line that flies under the radar when it comes to streaming – the OMEN 15.
Look, we hear you. Laptops pale in comparison to desktops, but let’s be honest, not everyone has an office or gaming room where they’re surgically attached to their souped up gaming rig. Some people need the freedom of a laptop that they can use for work, gaming, and, of course, streaming – and, well, the OMEN 15 range offers just that.
The OMEN product line has a laptop catered for pretty much everyone, but in this case, the OMEN 15-ek0005na, which comes jam packed with an Intel Core i7-10750H, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2070 Super, and 16GB of DDR4 RAM is the one we’re going to be focusing on. While the laptop is a fair investment retailing at £1,600 in the UK, it’ll do absolutely everything you throw at it, making it perfect for your next big streaming adventure.
One person who knows this all too well is Frankie Ward. You might know Frankie from the big stages of esports events, but in her spare time she does a lot of streaming – all with OMEN kit.
“I’ve been streaming on OMEN devices for nearly two years now, and OMEN has never let me down,” she says. “My OMEN 15 is fantastic because it’s really lightweight for a gaming laptop, so I take it around the world to events I’m hosting. But outside of prepping for broadcasts, I can use it to game and relax when I’m not on camera. It has a 144hz monitor, so I just plug in my wireless OMEN Photon mouse and I’m ready to frag in Counter-Strike.”
The portability of the laptop is perfect for content creators like Frankie, who are always on the move. Plus, when viewers are on the lookout for silky smooth streams and high-quality setups, having capable hardware can make all the difference.
One of the benefits of the OMEN 15 is that it comes with a 720p webcam, meaning you don’t have to skimp on the quality while you’re out and about. “The built-in webcam is fantastic for a laptop,” Frankie adds. “I used it for filming interviews remotely for a broadcast recently. I just use the headset mic on my OMEN Mindframe Prime and I’m good to stream.”
The laptop’s graphics card also gives streamers access to the NVENC encoder, which helps alleviate some of the heavy lifting from the laptop’s processor. It does this by accessing an independent section of the graphics card, meaning your games won’t drop frames while streaming. It even means you’re more likely to get a higher frame rate and better image quality all round. Ideal, we know.
The laptop also comes with the OMEN Command Centre – OMEN’s own monitoring app, which allows you to check your laptop’s load and temperatures. If you’re a stickler for information, this is a great thing to have open in the background of your streams as you can keep an eye on the overall performance of your rig.
Plus, if you do have a little bit of a home setup on the go, you’ll be able to plug this baby in, and make use of additional screens and monitors. And hey, let’s not forget you’ll be able to stream wherever you go in the world. See, we told you it’s handy.
And if that’s not enough to seal the deal for you, this particular model comes free with an OMEN Photon wireless gaming mouse and OMEN Outpost Qi charging mouse pad if you order it from the HP store. That’s a hardware bundle worth £224 – so you’ll be saving some pretty pennies on peripherals there too.
Gaming laptops might not be your first purchasing thought when you’re looking up how to stream on Twitch, but there are some real underdogs out there – and the OMEN 15 is exactly that.