For a laptop with >15 Watt peak consumption, a fan based design is easier to get working on the first attempt: maybe the fan will rotate faster than strictly necessary, but it will work.
On the other end, it generally takes a couple of iterations to get a fan-less design right, because you can't simply slap an oversized heatsink into a mobile device.
On the other end, it generally takes a couple of iterations to get a fan-less design right, because you can't simply slap an oversized heatsink into a mobile device.