YouTuber tests RTX 5050 in HP Victus laptop, reveals performance gains in Cyberpunk 2077, but with a catch

YouTuber Dawid Does Tech Stuff recently got hands-on with the new RTX 5050 laptop GPU inside an HP Victus gaming laptop. The test system runs an AMD Ryzen AI 5 340 processor and includes a 144 Hz display, dual-fan cooling, and 8 GB of VRAM.

When running Cyberpunk 2077 at 1080p Medium, the RTX 5050 maintained close to full GPU utilisation while drawing around 70 W. Dawid says gameplay felt noticeably smoother, with fewer frame drops than expected. “This is a gaming laptop in max performance mode and it’s staying cool and quiet,” they noted. Compared to the RTX 4050-powered Alienware they tested earlier, thermals here were a clear step up.

According to Dawid, there’s a tradeoff. They observed that the paired Ryzen AI 5 340 chip bottlenecked the GPU in certain titles. In Counter-Strike 2, for instance, the RTX 4050-powered laptop delivered better performance, largely due to stronger CPU output rather than GPU advantage.

The bump to 8 GB of VRAM is what made the biggest difference over the RTX 3050, enabling The Last of Us to run at mid-60s FPS on high settings, up from the low 40s on older GPUs. But according to Dawid, that’s where the upgrades end. A closer look at the specs revealed little change: CUDA cores, shader units, and clock speeds were all nearly identical to the 4050.

Stalker 2 showed the biggest leap, 66 to 103 FPS, a 56% gain over the 4050. Doom: The Dark Ages crossed the 60 FPS mark with DLSS, though gains were more modest at 23%, likely driven by higher power draw and better thermals. The Last of Us saw the most improvement from the extra VRAM, smoothing out stutters and load times. Across all tests, Dawid noted that the 5050 ran cooler and quieter than the 4050.

Nvidia’s performance chart didn’t help either. As the YouTuber points out, the comparison was made against the RTX 3050, but without specifying whether it was the 4 GB or 6 GB variant. That detail matters, and without it, the gains look better than they probably are.

The creator claims that the RTX 5050 isn’t a generational upgrade. In their view, it doesn’t deliver more performance by architecture alone, but benefits instead from a higher power ceiling, better thermals, and 8 GB of VRAM. In titles like Cyberpunk 2077 and Stalker 2, they observed meaningful gains, provided the price is right.

They describe the card as “usable.” For the conclusion, it’s best to watch the full video to get the complete context of what the RTX 5050 is capable of, and what it isn’t.