MSI gs63vr 7rf

[markr54632]

Disclaimer I have the 7rf i7-7700hq, 1060 6gb, 16gb ram, 256 gb toshiba ssd, 2tb sshd (came with a 1tb hdd).

 

So I will start off this review with I ended up with this laptop because of a series of circumstances. I did not pick this laptop out. I had picked out a ge62vr 6rf which I liked until the daughter board burned out 5 months later. So I ended up with the gs63vr 7rf as a warrantee replacement.

 

The first thing I will mention about the gs63vr is I have had to exchange this laptop 3 times to get a good one. The first one thermal throttled within a couple seconds. The usb ports on the left were flaky. The second one the screen was mounted off center and did not close properly. It also thermal throttled within seconds and had a bad hdd. The third one seems to be okay.

 

The second thing to mention is if you are considering this laptop buy it from somewhere other than bestbuy. The bestbuy models have a horrible chimei display that is very hit or miss. The brightness varies between each one a lot. Color accuracy is horrid. This problem is specific to the models sold through bestbuy.

 

Performance wise: this laptop is okay. Once you get a good one it is pretty impressive. You are more likely to power throttle than anything else, but only under synthetic loads. Under realistic gaming loads it doesn't throttle.

 

Thermals: the first two would go from 50ish idle (way too high in my opinion) to 105 in the matter of a few seconds. As I use this as my primary laptop and under high cpu loads frequently. The third one idles at 38, averages 45-55 surfing the web, under 100 percent load it stays under 95 and power throttles before thermal throttling. These numbers are tolerable but not great.

 

The gpu on all three never gets above 83 which I never understood, but the cooling for the graphics card was consistent.

 

Aestetics: I really don't care for this ultrabook craze. It just means worse battery life and harder maintainence. For me this is not something I would pick out at all. I don't like the form factor. However if you get a properly assembled one which is a big if they look pretty sharp.

 

Durability: VERY FRAGILE. This is not a good laptop to carry around. The areas around the I/o are very fragile, especially under the ethernet jack. Pick up with both hands do not flex and use on a flat surface.

 

Upgradeability: it has all of the ports you could want. M.2 slot, sata hdd slot, 2 ddr4 slots. The downside is for anything but the hdd the motherboard has to be fully removed.

 

I/o: very good. It has everything you could need.

 

Battery life: seriously? Playing a game 45 in to an hour tops. Surfing the web or typing 2 hours or so.

 

Portability: you can take it anywhere so long as you pack it very very well, have a flat surface to work on, have a power outlet nearby supplying 200w continuous, and dont mind lugging a power brick that weight more than the laptop around.

 

Bloatware: the worst out of any laptop I have ever owned bar none.

 

Another quibble about this laptop is the fan speed and power control do not work out of the box. You have to install the msi update and dragon center update first. You cannot install these until you install the creators update. Not that anything tells you this.

 

Also the bios the laptop ships with doesnt allow the laptop to switch between dgpu and igpu properly. Right out of the box you have to go through msi's super unintuitive bios update procedure. It still doesn't switch back after playing doom, but that is the only game it does that on now (out of the box it has this issue with almost every game).

 

Overall I would give this laptop a 3/10. It is a cool concept very poorly executed by msi. It is my understanding that the 6rf model had much better thermals and overall higher quality.

[Fahim Foysal]

wow a 3/10. Do you plan to refund it?

[Steemax]

I actually have the Bestbuy model. Have had it for about 4 or 5 months now and it's great minus the screen as you pointed out. But I got mine on a very good sale so I couldn't pass up on the offer. 

 

Besides that I don't have any of the other issues you explained. The only time it has even slightly throttled was while running Player unknown. That's it. Build quality has been great, taken it on trips many times and flights just throwing it in and out of my backpack. 

[markr54632]

No, I cannot get a refund as it was a warrantee replacement. And I am glad that you got a good one. You must be very lucky. Most of the reviews I've read have mentioned at least 1 replacement or that they got a refund shortly after reviewing.

 

How have you not broken it when dropping? If you look at it wrong the chassis below the network port cracks.

[Steemax]

On 9/27/2017 at 2:56 PM, markr54632 said:

No, I cannot get a refund as it was a warrantee replacement. And I am glad that you got a good one. You must be very lucky. Most of the reviews I've read have mentioned at least 1 replacement or that they got a refund shortly after reviewing.

 

How have you not broken it when dropping? If you look at it wrong the chassis below the network port cracks.

Perhaps I got lucky. I've had it for a bit while now. It's traveled everywhere with me in a normal backpack (not even a special laptop padded back pack) with the power brick in the same compartment. I definitely don't baby it. No scratches dents or any physical issues. 

[markr54632]

21 minutes ago, Steemax said:

Perhaps I got lucky. I've had it for a bit while now. It's traveled everywhere with me in a normal backpack (not even a special laptop padded back pack) with the power brick in the same compartment. I definitely don't baby it. No scratches dents or any physical issues. 

The sad part is mine is babied. It always sits on a flat surface. I honestly dont trust it for anything other than playing games. So the only time it gets used is when I set it on the table or under the tv to play a game.

 

The only thing done to mine is I added my 2tb sshd to replace the 1tb hdd.