Aero 15X Opinion and couple game benchmark

Not so long time ago I received aero 15X and here is my opinion about it.

Specs:

GPU: 1070 Max Q design

CPU: Intel i7 7700HQ

RAM: 2x8 2400

SSD: SAMSUNG_MZVKW 512GB

Network adapter: Intel(R) Dual Band Wireless-AC 8265

Battery: 94 Whr, 15.2 V

Chassis

First impression was that it was made of metal (it was very cold when it came). Keyboard is solid and pleasant to type but “s” and “e” squeak when pressed at angle. Display does shake a little after enough force applied. Good air cooling solution. Thin, light and small bezel makes this laptop look professional.

Display

I’m not a professional video / photo editor so keep that in mind.

Colors seems pretty natural to me. Display response time is just on edge of point “where it is not noticeable” you won’t buy a laptop for Pro gaming anyway. From my testing response time is 12-16ms. Did not liked contrast ratio and black levels – they were poor to my eye, was expecting a little more from IPS panel. Viewing angles are top notch.

Performance

Due to fast SSD it takes only 16 to start operating this machine. Software tasks such as Adobe Premier / After effects are no problem for aero 15.

Game performance:

Dota 2 (max visuals, no upscaling) – 180 fps

Counter Strike Global Offensive (max visuals, no upscaling) – 180 – 210 fps

Call of Duty WWII (max visuals, no upscaling) – 120 fps

The Division (max visuals, no upscaling) – 60 fps

Hellblade Senua's sacrifice (max visuals, no upscaling) 60 – 80 fps

Ghost recon wildlands (max visuals, no upscaling) – 40 fps

Emissions

Temperatures while gaming: CPU – 80-86, GPU – 80

Fan are loud – 50 db while gaming.

Heat distribution is great. Top panel (above keyboard) is hot, keyboard is chill (you can feel chilled air stream from F3/F4, 3 and 4 keys), palm rest and touchpad do not get warm.

IO Is good enough for me, but mini display is odd - HDMI and thunderbolt is more than enough, could be other one USB.

Speakers sound decent but have some harsh noises. I want to point out that imaging is accurate that’s very was not expecting that from a laptop.

Battery life

I was looking firstly at dell xps 13 because I need very good battery life but then I discovered Aero 15X. As I investigated it is the longest lasting laptop with dedicated GPU (excluding nvidia MX series)

Gigabyte software – very good features and very bad performance. Smart Update is just very bad. After updating Smart Manager from v2 to v3 it stopped working (cannot find a way to fix it). Fan control and other option is great but you need to get rid of Smart update (update download is very slow, recommends to update to older version - nonsense).

Service from HIDevolution:

I bought it with “minimal back light bleed screen” and was not disappointed maybe I just was lucky – other people in this forum was not happy about their 100$. Also, it came with Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut on CPU, Gelid GC Extreme on GPU. Laptop came with not working speakers. Firstly, I thought that it was software issue but after I did everything what is possibly could affect speakers it I contacted HIDevolution support. Turns out that driver connector was off was easily fixed with their support team. Service is great and responsive.

Thanks Donald for consultation.

 

I don't know about your smart manager problems, but I think smart update might be trying to download it from the asian server. If you download the software through gigabyte's support page, it's much faster. As for older updates, manufacturers usually don't keep up with updates unless it's something they have control over like the BIOS.
Hope that helps.

 

Thanks for the review. I'm about to pull the trigger and am a little concerned about the software issue you encountered, but the next post gave me a small sense of relief. I will be using this over the course of 5-6 years most likely, over that time I will probably be using mostly for work/web browsing/basic stuff but I have some spare time for the next 6 months and plan on playing a bunch of games. Figure now is the time to get something that has great battery life for everything else besides gaming and when I am gaming can keep up with the big boys. Also I must say most of the 'gaming laptops' I've encountered look terribly silly alá the Predator but this one has a simple, professional look. I was between this and the XPS 15 and it is a tough choice, but the fact that the XPS has the 1050 and a more average battery life make the added cost worth it. I'm still worried about the feel of the keyboard but at a certain point you just have to pull the trigger I think. Anyway, thanks again. Enjoy!

 

It's sad how difficult it is to find something powerful that wasn't designed by and for a 12 year old.

 

I couldn't find more info on this, was it a promotion of some kind?

 

I was in the same situation. I did not wanted to take XPS 15 because of very slow response time (ghosting issue). Take a look at Omen HP it has lower battery life + it have 120 hz panels (g sync) but that means that you will not get optimus. If you want max battery life take Aero 15/15x. There is dell inspiron 7000 gaming (1050TI) good battery life, does not look too gamish but build quality is not ideal especialy considering if you will but a laptop for 5 years.

Yes it was until 25 of September.

 

Quoted for emphesis although it isn't just the designed for 12 year olds thing for me, I travel extensively and don't want my laptop to garner any attention or worse scream "Please mug this man, he has an expensive gaming laptop". But yeah, nowadays you could probably move some laptops just by offering a reasonably competitive machine on the high end that is designed to look professional. I know my short list did not include any of the more garish offerings some of which would have otherwise been considerations.