HP has replaced the Victus 15, its popular budget gaming laptop, with a new model called the HyperX Omen 15. The new laptop starts at $1,199. The Victus 15 cost $800, sometimes less on sale. The $400 price increase comes from both better components inside and a global shortage of computer memory that has made parts more expensive The Verge.

The version HP sells through Walmart includes an eight-core Intel processor, an Nvidia RTX 5050 graphics chip, 16GB of memory, and a 512GB storage drive. The screen is sharper and brighter than the Victus 15's, with a fast 165Hz refresh rate (meaning the image updates 165 times per second, which makes motion in games look smoother). HP announced the Omen 15 lineup at CES in January 2026. More expensive versions are available with faster graphics chips and higher-resolution OLED screens The Verge.

In gaming tests, the RTX 5050 graphics chip handles modern games but struggles with the most demanding ones. Control ran at 70 to 80 frames per second on High settings with DLSS turned on. DLSS is Nvidia's technology that renders a game at a lower resolution and then uses AI to upscale the image, making games run faster without looking much worse. Cyberpunk 2077 managed 60 to 70fps on Ultra settings with DLSS Quality, and a feature called frame generation — which creates extra frames between real ones — pushed that to 95 to 105fps. More demanding games fared worse: Helldivers 2 held just above 60fps on Medium settings, and Battlefield 6 ran around 50fps on Medium The Verge.

The Omen 15 plays 2026's latest games, but on low-ish settings for the more demanding titles, and it leans heavily on DLSS and frame generation to get there.

Port selection is adequate but not generous. The right side has an ethernet jack for wired internet and one USB-A port. The left adds a headphone jack, another USB-A, and the power connector. The rear has an HDMI port for external monitors and a single USB-C port. That USB-C port does not support Thunderbolt, the fast connection standard that some competing laptops include for high-speed data transfer and external accessories. There is no fingerprint or face unlock. Inside, the laptop has two slots for memory upgrades and two for storage upgrades, so owners can expand beyond the base configuration over time The Verge.

HP still sells a Victus 15 with the same RTX 5050 graphics chip for $900, but it includes only 8GB of memory, which is a meaningful constraint for modern gaming. Older Victus 15 models with the previous-generation RTX 4050 remain listed at $1,399.99 on HP's site, though they have sold for much less in practice The Verge.

The price increase from the Victus 15 to the Omen 15 is partly due to what the industry has been calling "RAMageddon," a memory shortage that has pushed up the cost of DDR5 memory across the board. The base Omen 15 ships with 8GB of memory at its entry price, with the reviewed Walmart version doubling that to 16GB. HP's full Omen 15 lineup supports up to 32GB of memory and up to an RTX 5070 graphics chip, with processor options ranging from the Intel chip in the review unit to faster AMD and Intel options in higher-end models The Verge.

What the Omen 15 gains over the Victus 15 is a meaningfully better display, the ability to upgrade components, and a build quality that justifies the Omen branding. What it loses is the price point that made the Victus 15 a default recommendation for budget-conscious buyers. At $1,199, the reviewed version competes against midrange laptops that offer more ports, Thunderbolt connectivity, and biometric security. The RTX 5050 is an entry-level graphics chip, and the benchmark results confirm that.

For buyers who previously defaulted to the Victus 15 as a safe, affordable pick, the situation is now more complicated. HP has not replaced the Victus 15's old $800 price point with a true successor. The remaining Victus 15 at $900 comes with only 8GB of memory, which is not enough for 2026's most demanding games without an immediate upgrade. Buyers now face a choice between an under-equipped holdover and a $1,200 machine that performs better but costs 50 percent more.

In my view, the lack of Thunderbolt on the single USB-C port is a notable omission for a 2026 laptop at this price. Thunderbolt has been standard on competing midrange gaming laptops for several generations, and its absence limits the ability to connect external docks or graphics enclosures that could extend the laptop's useful life. For a machine positioned as an entry point into PC gaming, that narrows the upgrade path to internal memory and storage swaps only.

The Omen 15 is a competent gaming laptop with real upgradeability and a strong display for the price. Whether it fills the role the Victus 15 played, as the obvious budget pick, is less clear. The market it served has shifted, and the pricing has shifted with it.