The "New" Razer Blade

[Dackzy]

2 minutes ago, wcreek said:

My only experience with Acer was some cheap laptop from like 2008 or 2009. I recall it came with Vista but then my mom's upgraded it to Win 7 Ultimate. I gave it to my grandma back in like 2011 or something like that, don't know if she still has it or if it even still runs. 

 

My mom was looking for a new laptop because she was going to go and finish off her bachelor's degree (that didn't happen), I suggested that she go with something with an APU in it because she also wanted to play World of Warcraft, and Best Buy had this Lenovo at a pretty good price, but they were out of stock in a new in box Lenovo G50-45. So we went with an open box at another Best Buy. Besides all the bloatware and stuff Lenovo puts on their stuff, they've got a pretty good product otherwise. 

 

I kinda wished they had more stuff with APUs, I would love to get something from like their Yoga line (granted it was less than $1000) that had like something from AMD's new Bristol Ridge APUs, like an A9 or A12 or something like that.

You are lucky that you don't have more experience with Acer. Yeah a normal lenovo laptop has some bloatware like most other laptops from other companies. APUs are still going strong, I was close to getting a elitebook with a A12 pro APU in it not that long ago, since my T420s with a i7 and a dGPU does not do it for me anymore, but then I remembered that AMD will make new CPUs and APUs soon, so right now I am waiting for a nice 13-14inch laptop with a beast of a APU in it.

[handymanshandle]

2 minutes ago, Dackzy said:

You are lucky that you don't have more experience with Acer. Yeah a normal lenovo laptop has some bloatware like most other laptops from other companies. APUs are still going strong, I was close to getting a elitebook with a A12 pro APU in it not that long ago, since my T420s with a i7 and a dGPU does not do it for me anymore, but then I remembered that AMD will make new CPUs and APUs soon, so right now I am waiting for a nice 13-14inch laptop with a beast of a APU in it.

I kinda want to get a 1440p IPS monitor from them when I build my PC. It seemed like they've gotten a little better since 2008 or 2009.

 

APUs are great when you don't have the budget for a more expensive Intel CPU with a dGPU. It sounds like Intel has stepped up its iGPU game a little bit but the iGPUs on mobile APUs are still a lot better than the iGPUs on Intel's CPUs.

 

I kinda wished more laptops had APUs in them because they seem really hard to find. It seems like the A9 is suppose to replace the A8 and the A12 is suppose to replace the A10. Not really sure where the FX APUs are suppose to sit in relation to AMD's line of mobile APUs. 

 

But what I am sure about is that a Bristol Ridge A9 or A12 will still be way better than a Trinity A8 (my disassembled Samsung NP365E5C-S02UB) or a Beema A8 (the Lenovo G50-45).

[Dackzy]

2 minutes ago, wcreek said:

I kinda want to get a 1440p IPS monitor from them when I build my PC. It seemed like they've gotten a little better since 2008 or 2009.

 

APUs are great when you don't have the budget for a more expensive Intel CPU with a dGPU. It sounds like Intel has stepped up its iGPU game a little bit but the iGPUs on mobile APUs are still a lot better than the iGPUs on Intel's CPUs.

 

I kinda wished more laptops had APUs in them because they seem really hard to find. It seems like the A9 is suppose to replace the A8 and the A12 is suppose to replace the A10. Not really sure where the FX APUs are suppose to sit in relation to AMD's line of mobile APUs. 

 

But what I am sure about is that a Bristol Ridge A9 or A12 will still be way better than a Trinity A8 (my disassembled Samsung NP365E5C-S02UB) or a Beema A8 (the Lenovo G50-45).

1080p is more than enough for 17inch laptops or smaller and windows scaling is just so bad that it will be a pain in the ass a lot of times.

Well APUs are great when you want a 13-14inch light and "powerful" laptop, since they can beat even the best ULV i7 (the u series) and the iGPU (unlike intel) has support for many of the 3D programs you can find on the marked, so if you do 3D work (like me) and you want a small laptop for school, that has good/great battery life APUs are great. APUs are also great for HTPCs and low budget PCs.

We should see some great performance per watt from the new APUs, from what I have read.

[handymanshandle]

10 minutes ago, Dackzy said:

1080p is more than enough for 17inch laptops or smaller and windows scaling is just so bad that it will be a pain in the ass a lot of times.

Well APUs are great when you want a 13-14inch light and "powerful" laptop, since they can beat even the best ULV i7 (the u series) and the iGPU (unlike intel) has support for many of the 3D programs you can find on the marked, so if you do 3D work (like me) and you want a small laptop for school, that has good/great battery life APUs are great. APUs are also great for HTPCs and low budget PCs.

We should see some great performance per watt from the new APUs, from what I have read.

Oh I was talking about for a desktop. I wanted to get a 27" 1440p IPS monitor from Acer when I built my PC. 

 

Well Intel's IGPs/iGPUs architecturally aren't really standard. AMD from what I can tell is using similar architecture to some of their GPUs.

 

I want a 14" or 15" laptop that's fairly light and still can back a punch. For doing lightweight gaming like World of Warcraft or TF2 (probably even CS:GO) an APU (be it mobile or desktop) by itself is plenty.

 

Beema APUs seemed like they were pretty good. My Trinity A8 (A8 4500M) kinda struggled to play World of Warcraft but this Beema A8 (A8 6410) handles a lot, very well. Then again it is a couple years newer and using an AMD R5 iGPU rather than AMD HD iGPU. Bristol Ridge APUs though, should be pretty good though. In terms of price/perf. and perf./watt.

 

I kinda knew that APUs tended to perform better than Intel's ULV/U series CPUs. But what's dumb about those is that the only difference between at least the i5U and i7U is that the i7 just has a higher clock speed, it looks like Cache, iGPU, etc. are otherwise all the same and I'm pretty sure Intel charges a pretty penny more for the i7U CPUs just because they can.

[Dackzy]

24 minutes ago, wcreek said:

Oh I was talking about for a desktop. I wanted to get a 27" 1440p IPS monitor from Acer when I built my PC. 

makes more sense  

 

24 minutes ago, wcreek said:

Well Intel's IGPs/iGPUs architecturally aren't really standard. AMD from what I can tell is using similar architecture to some of their GPUs.

Intel iGPUs are all over the place that is why they don't have a "standard" and yes the APUs reminds a lot of how some of their GPUs are build up.

 

25 minutes ago, wcreek said:

I want a 14" or 15" laptop that's fairly light and still can back a punch. For doing lightweight gaming like World of Warcraft or TF2 (probably even CS:GO) an APU (be it mobile or desktop) by itself is plenty.

 

Beema APUs seemed like they were pretty good. My Trinity A8 (A8 4500M) kinda struggled to play World of Warcraft but this Beema A8 (A8 6410) handles a lot, very well. Then again it is a couple years newer and using an AMD R5 iGPU rather than AMD HD iGPU. Bristol Ridge APUs though, should be pretty good though. In terms of price/perf. and perf./watt.

I wish you good luck finding a nice laptop  

AMD iGPUs are called R5, R7 and maybe R9 (I can't remember if they have a r9) not HD like intel.

28 minutes ago, wcreek said:

I kinda knew that APUs tended to perform better than Intel's ULV/U series CPUs. But what's dumb about those is that the only difference between at least the i5U and i7U is that the i7 just has a higher clock speed, it looks like Cache, iGPU, etc. are otherwise all the same and I'm pretty sure Intel charges a pretty penny more for the i7U CPUs just because they can.

Well they have the same TPD and yet the APUs have better performance, the CPU side is about the same, but the iGPU side AMD wins. Oh yeah intel takes a premium for their i7

[handymanshandle]

2 minutes ago, Dackzy said:

AMD iGPUs are called R5, R7 and maybe R9 (I can't remember if they have a r9) not HD like intel.

I don't think they have R9 on APUs, but older APUs didn't have R5 or R7 iGPUs they had Radeon HD graphics.

 

So my A8 4500M had a Radeon HD 7640G, this A8 6410 has some kind of R5 on it.  

[Dackzy]

1 minute ago, wcreek said:

I don't think they have R9 on APUs, but older APUs didn't have R5 or R7 iGPUs they had Radeon HD graphics.

 

So my A8 4500M had a Radeon HD 7640G, this A8 6410 has some kind of R5 on it.  

Yeah I am talking new APUs. It has a r5 something  

[handymanshandle]

3 minutes ago, Dackzy said:

Yeah I am talking new APUs. It has a r5 something  

The Bristol Ridge FX might have an R9 on it. idk.

[avengement]

A lot of the comments here seem to just be bashing razer as a company instead of focusing on the specific product. That being said, does anyone have have any insight on the m.2 drives being offered in these newer laptops? All the reviews say that performance isn't the best comparatively to other drives so what is the best option if you are ordering this product?

 

Should I order the 256gb model and buy a different brand of m.2 drive instead of upgrading to the 512 gb? I'm not concerned about the price or value to money as I am used to paying the apple premium. Only considering coming back to windows since there hasn't been a new macbook refresh in over a year and I will be going to law school come the fall. My previous macbook air met my portable needs for 4 years but it would be nice to be able to play a game of heroes of the storm or hearthstone or other lightweight titles on the go while maintaining that really nice build quality that the blade seems to have and the great typing experience that is necessarily for someone who will be doing a lot of work on their laptop very soon.

[Syntaxvgm]

4 hours ago, Dackzy said:

Oh this joke of a laptop... JUST STOP IT IS SHIT....

Razer you can't make the cooling propperly and the QC is not there so yeah, stop making laptops, if I see one more razer laptop that needs to be fixed because you can't build a laptop propperly I will mail you and spam you untill you get the point.

Oh and for LTT, just stop you are making a joke of yourself, you don't test a laptop very well.

 

A Razer laptop might aswell be made by Acer, yeah they are so shitty. Don't even get me started on the joke of a keyboard, that shit is what you should get on a 400$ laptop, not on a 2k laptop. The build quality is also a god damn joke and so is the cooling and the quality controll.

 

 

Cooling...Lol someone has never tried any HP product ever made.

You do know that razer is cooling a higher wattage laptop CPU and a 970m in the same package that macbooks cool much less? Remember the mass macbook failure with AMD gpus? Yah, this thing is gonna be loud to keep this thin package. 

Honestly, I don't know where you get this hate for their laptops. I hate almost every one of their products, but these are much better than a lot of laptops I've had my hands on. "They can't make a laptop" yah, neither can 90% of the laptop manufacturers on the market. Clevo and Dell are about the only ones I've been consistently happy with, even then I've had my hands on some dell lemons and I haven't had my hands on enough clevos to be really sure of their consistency. I really think what razer is making is a lot better than a lot of their competition when it comes to gaming laptops, and I'd like them to continue. Unlike their shitty mice, shitty overpriced kailh switch keyboards, shitty rebranded overpriced mics, shitty overpriced headphones...you get the picture. 

Far as the keyboard goes, it's plastic...I think? If I remember based on the ones I've tried, It's plastic, though a pretty good plastic. I really wish they would be metal like the macbook keyboards, yea. Seemed to be much better to type on than other low profile keyboards though, even some of the metal ones like from ASUS. 

[vanished]

I've always wondered how Razer was even allowed to make laptops in that "case"; let's be perfectly honest here, it's an exact rip off of the macbook pro.  Like, take that shell, paint it black, and stuff PC hardware + windows in it.  Only difference is the Razer logo and that slight styling on the lid

[Syntaxvgm]

1 minute ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

I've always wondered how Razer was even allowed to make laptops in that "case"; let's be perfectly honest here, it's an exact rip off of the macbook pro.  Like, take that shell, paint it black, and stuff PC hardware + windows in it.  Only difference is the Razer logo and that slight styling on the lid

because apple doens't own thin metal laptops. They are actually really different, including the actual shape and the way they are cooled. 

Though yah if they sue over round corners I am surprised they dont sue over this.

 

[vanished]

3 minutes ago, Syntaxvgm said:

because apple doens't own thin metal laptops. They are actually really different, including the actual shape and the way they are cooled. 

Though yah if they sue over round corners I am surprised they dont sue over this.

 

I'd say there's a lot more similarities than differences.  At first glance, it really does look exactly the same, right down to the way the lid closes, and that little cut out by the trackpad for opening it, the curves, just... all of it.

[Syntaxvgm]

3 minutes ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

I'd say there's a lot more similarities than differences.  At first glance, it really does look exactly the same, right down to the way the lid closes, and that little cut out by the trackpad for opening it, the curves, just... all of it.

Really, they both feel really different to me in person. Even the trackpad if different, it has buttons (plural), and is not nearly as good as the macbook one. It's obvious that razer was imitating a macbook, but if apple is the only company that can make a metal laptop with round edges, that's a little far. 

Here's what people point out often- the lip. The lip on the razer blade is "so macbook"

Yah, fuck them for making a place to open your laptop.

In my opinion, a lot of these similarities are from there not being a lot of thin all-aluminum laptops out there. There's some. Oh, wait, they look like macbooks

 

 

[vanished]

1 minute ago, Syntaxvgm said:

*snip*

In my opinion, a lot of these similarities are from there not being a lot of thin all-aluminum laptops out there. There's some. Oh, wait, they look like macbooks

Well, I think that HP a lot less so, but fair enough

[Syntaxvgm]

1 minute ago, Ryan_Vickers said:

Well, I think that HP a lot less so, but fair enough

2011 macbook 

2012 HP envy 

 

I literally almost bought one of those HP envys because they reminded me of a macbook, though I admit my bais has a lot to do with color, I'm sure the razer blade would get a lot more shit in silver. 

[Bouzoo]

5 hours ago, don_svetlio said:

The GL502 Strix and GS60 are MUCH more competent gaming laptops. Blade 2016's heat issues are unacceptable for that price

Oh GL502 is also bad in that regard. It may not throttle, but from what I see the max temps on the body are 60-70 C tops, which is 20 degree hotter than my N550JK on some areas. Generally it's hotter than my N on surface. Never buy (ASUS) thin laptops with rear exhaust. Never. All ultra hot air hits the screen (or top cover if you want) instead of going away and under the cover like on G7xx since, and what does that get you? A ridiculously hot screen which results in dead pixels after a year of use. More precisely, all from dead, ultra bright pixels and many pixels here and there that just shine and are visible on a black wallpaper. Like the screen is dying. No need to mention movies or loading in games or anything similar. That in combo with infamous Asus screens is a perfect combo. I can't find the time to fix it, still have my warranty, but my god it's annoying. 

And the heat on the surface can become annoying as well, don't want to imagine what GL502 feels like. 

[kirashi]

5 hours ago, don_svetlio said:

The design has been around for a LONG time - you should be crediting Apple, not Razer. As for the keyboard, it's mediocre. The REAL award-winning keyboards are on business-class laptops like Vostro/Latitue, ThinkPad and Elitebook.

By that logic, Apple users should be crediting Pegatron / ASUS for the design of the MacBook Air was back from 2012.

I just like to think that the OEM brands we consumers recognize don't actually really design anything on a machining level, because that's what ODM's do. I am NOT saying Apple doesn't design things; they just don't do it without outside help from professionals who work with CNC machining all the time.

 

http://www.macworld.co.uk/news/apple/pick-us-or-asus-pegatron-told-apple-report-3336950/

https://www.engadget.com/2012/02/13/apple-forcing-pegatron-to-stop-production-of-macbook-air-lookali/

http://9to5mac.com/guides/pegatron/

[don_svetlio]

9 hours ago, Bouzoo said:

Oh GL502 is also bad in that regard. It may not throttle, but from what I see the max temps on the body are 60-70 C tops, which is 20 degree hotter than my N550JK on some areas. Generally it's hotter than my N on surface. Never buy (ASUS) thin laptops with rear exhaust. Never. All ultra hot air hits the screen (or top cover if you want) instead of going away and under the cover like on G7xx since, and what does that get you? A ridiculously hot screen which results in dead pixels after a year of use. More precisely, all from dead, ultra bright pixels and many pixels here and there that just shine and are visible on a black wallpaper. Like the screen is dying. No need to mention movies or loading in games or anything similar. That in combo with infamous Asus screens is a perfect combo. I can't find the time to fix it, still have my warranty, but my god it's annoying. 

And the heat on the surface can become annoying as well, don't want to imagine what GL502 feels like. 

Check the reviews. I was skeptical of the GL502 but it turned out to be quite a decent machine. Internal temps are around 75-80*C and the chassis ones are far lower than the Blade. Also, the fans are several times quieter than the Blade and the exhaust is not hitting the hinge. The N550's chassis is cooler cause it's a much thicker machine.

[Dackzy]

9 hours ago, Syntaxvgm said:

Cooling...Lol someone has never tried any HP product ever made.

You do know that razer is cooling a higher wattage laptop CPU and a 970m in the same package that macbooks cool much less? Remember the mass macbook failure with AMD gpus? Yah, this thing is gonna be loud to keep this thin package. 

First of this is about razer and doing a shitty job and there is no excuse for that, yes there are many more brands that also do a shitty job at cooling, but I compared it to Acer because most people know that they are shit at cooling expect their predator those are okay. Razer laptops have been a joke with cooling, they got a 15w CPU to thermal trottle that is GG WP Razer, there is no excuse for that at all, they need to get a brain and not make a joke of laptop. If you are on the laptop sub forrum you would know that I bash every single laptop that has bad cooling and bad build, because if a CPU runs hot, the life time of that CPU is going to be shorter than one that runs cool.

 

9 hours ago, Syntaxvgm said:

Honestly, I don't know where you get this hate for their laptops. I hate almost every one of their products, but these are much better than a lot of laptops I've had my hands on. "They can't make a laptop" yah, neither can 90% of the laptop manufacturers on the market.

Oh so it is okay to make laptops with quality problems? NO. Is it okay to make a laptop that thermal throttles? NO. Is it okay to take 2k for all of that and a keyboard that feels like shit? NO. 

 

9 hours ago, Syntaxvgm said:

Clevo and Dell are about the only ones I've been consistently happy with, even then I've had my hands on some dell lemons and I haven't had my hands on enough clevos to be really sure of their consistency.

Clevo is not a brand, they are a OEM that sells to brands like sager. Dell is kinda also a big joke when it comes to build quality, they really only have their latitude line up that is okay, but even in their business laptop lineup they have problems.

 

9 hours ago, Syntaxvgm said:

I really think what razer is making is a lot better than a lot of their competition when it comes to gaming laptops, and I'd like them to continue.

They need to step up cooling, build quality, quality control and keyboard game before I would even look at them. Sure they are made with good materials, but that does not mean that the build quality is high, you can build things out of the best materials ever, but if you put it shitty together you have shit build quality, just like Razer does and other companies.

9 hours ago, Syntaxvgm said:

Unlike their shitty mice, shitty overpriced kailh switch keyboards, shitty rebranded overpriced mics, shitty overpriced headphones...you get the picture.

A lot of people like their mice and keyboards. When it comes to mice sure they are not very well build all the time and they also have quality control problems like the rest of things, but razer has also made a big impact in MMORPG and FPS games with their mice like the deathadder and the naga, you cannot deney that, the deathadder has been the best mouse for fps games in a long time, it is no longer, but it is a nice size for guys or girls with big hands and it is far from just razer that makes shitty quality controled mice, logitech also has problems with quality control on their mice. Some people like the kailh switch more than the cherry mx and that is 100% opinion based, just remember that you could also get cherry mx boards from them, before they made their own switch.

Yes their headsets (mic),headphones (no mic) and speakers are shit and I also advice people to stay away from that crap, the sound quality is shit and the build is shit. 

9 hours ago, Syntaxvgm said:

Far as the keyboard goes, it's plastic...I think? If I remember based on the ones I've tried, It's plastic, though a pretty good plastic. I really wish they would be metal like the macbook keyboards, yea. Seemed to be much better to type on than other low profile keyboards though, even some of the metal ones like from ASUS. 

Most keyboards are out of plastic, but have a metal plate in them. They use platic because it is cheaper for them a lot of the time and metal can start to look like shit very fast depending on who is using the keyboard. Plastic is genrally the better material for things that will get in contact with human skin, because of the fat or what you would call it that covers our skin, if we did not have that our skin would dry out, but it is also not somethings that metal likes, since it can corrode it.

[Bouzoo]

55 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

Check the reviews. I was skeptical of the GL502 but it turned out to be quite a decent machine. Internal temps are around 75-80*C and the chassis ones are far lower than the Blade. Also, the fans are several times quieter than the Blade and the exhaust is not hitting the hinge. The N550's chassis is cooler cause it's a much thicker machine.

I did. Multiple times. Cooler or not, still doesn't change the fact that 60-70 C on the chassis is unacceptable for any machine. It's like the sun. Make the thing thicker even by 1 mm if it helps. And the hinge covers all back vents. All of them. But enough off topic. 

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, Bouzoo said:

I did. Multiple times. Cooler or not, still doesn't change the fact that 60-70 C on the chassis is unacceptable for any machine. It's like the sun. Make the thing thicker even by 1 mm if it helps. And the hinge covers all back vents. All of them. But enough off topic. 

Erm? The vents are NOT covered. Really man, check which laptop. Am talking about the GL50-2 not the G50-1. BIG difference.

[Bouzoo]

12 minutes ago, don_svetlio said:

Erm? The vents are NOT covered. Really man, check which laptop. Am talking about the GL50-2 not the G50-1. BIG difference.

I would post pics directly but they are ginormous. 1 2

It's a little bit better than my Asus, but they are still covered. 

[don_svetlio]

1 minute ago, Bouzoo said:

I would post pics directly but they are ginormous. 1 2

It's a little bit better than my Asus, but they are still covered. 

That's fine - they aren't blocked

[Bouzoo]

1 minute ago, don_svetlio said:

That's fine - they aren't blocked

I never said blocked. And I would say it's far from fine. Edited first pic.

 

Anyhow, /derail