Despite the hopes of many industry analysts, the Steam Machine project, which promised all the benefits of PC gaming with no headaches, led to a paltry set of middling gaming PCs. Valve mothballed the strategy in 2018. Of course, that’s not the end of the story. Far from it.

To say that CES was a PC show this year is an understatement. We spent time with dozens of laptops in Las Vegas, and these are our favorites across nine key categories.