The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Most of the reviews for it that i get back from customers are pretty well received. Seems to be holding temps pretty well and the design is thin and portable.
I'm going to make a separate thread about it, but essentially it boils down to this. It's a great laptop, with shallow keyboard depth, great all around specs for gaming, but you'll see CPU significant throttling when CPU is under 100% load. This might be allievated with a LM repaste, but hard to say. Ultimately, it will be power limit throttled at some point no matter what though. This is pretty typical of thin and lights like this though. Gaming was fantastic with no throttling that I found so far. The build quality is mostly on point, though the chassis does creek here and there. I also don't trust the hinges to stay together. The one hinge on mine was already misaligned right out of the box. I'd suggest getting an extended warranty to cover any issues like that in the future.
Windows 10 is a lot more fluid with multi-tasking due to 6 cores / 12 threads. Multiple VMs running better. 1070 Max-Q is mostly good enough to see high fps in high/ultra. Can overclock to get more fps or better in ultra. Altcoin mining (ETH) with 1070 Max-Q is awesome - getting just under 30Mh/s with a bit of overclocking and still can browser/work without lag.
Screen has no bleed and bright enough. Still in awe staring at its thin bezel 15.6-inch screen in the chassis that's pretty much same size as my 14" GS43VR. Also wowed at its carrying weight for any 15.6-inch laptop let alone gaming. Thermal is good but can reach a bit over 90C for both CPU/GPU in full load. Cooler Boost 3 really cools and the baby jet sound is tolerable - most of the time. But re-paste with liquid metal just enhance the overall gaming experience running much cooler, or mining / working with custom cooling to keep relatively silent.
Key travel is too shallow and brings fatigue when doing text editing. Keyboard however is nicely centered with BIG and wide keys, which is important to keep blood pressure lower. Backlit keyboard is beautiful as the light leakage from under the keys is minimal.
Creaking in palm areas are easily muted with scotch tape wrapping the 5-6 hooks from bottom front panel into the upper panel.
The overly flex of laptop is not a major concern, although I don't like seeing bending when holding with finger tips at front corner. It's metal so won't crack like plastic/carbon. I don't think it'll have permanent dent from hard blow like my Macbook Pro. The 15 screws from bottom pass through circuit board and secured to the opposite (keyboard) panel actually provide great deal of structural re-enforcement. I live in California where houses are designed to deal with earthquake. Buildings are not made from brick but wood with enforcements throughout framing. So it'll flex, creak, but no crumbling when the big one hits. Same with the GS65.
Bought (pre-ordered) from Best Buy mainly because 1) competitive price albeit slight downgrade, 2) ability to exchange quickly if bad especially first production batch, and 2) OK with SATA SSD as I added a second (NVMe) SSD anyway, and 3) my favorite custom builders (some are here in this forum) had higher prices than MSRP so making Best Buy still better buy after tax.
The choice actually worked out as I had weird trackpad non-responsive issue. Sometimes the center of trackpad was not responsive (for couple of seconds). I thought it was trackpad driver or nVidia Optimus, but then the edges still works with middle doesn't. Took it back to Best Buy and exchanged it in minutes and the second one is perfect. I wish more retailer (e.g., Fry's) get involved with new products and be competitive with pricing albeit slight parts downgrade.
I just Received My Replacement From BestBuy. MSI must have done something because this one is Solid no creaks very impressed with it. Must be a new Batch. my First one was horrible with creaking and overall quality. I couldn't see spending $400 more for the Razer 15.6
I bought the
GS65 8RF-053 model last June. I installed an extra m.2 sata ssd in it (
WD Blue 1TB 3D Nand M.2 Sata) and I found out that the empty slot which is the
SSD 2 Slot only supports NVMe so I placed the
Samsung 500GB M.2 NVMe drive that came with the laptop on the SSD 2 Slot and place the new one to the
SSD 1 Slot which supports NVMe/Sata. Just a FYI for those who doesn't know it yet hehe. I don't know if it is like that on all models but with the 8RF-053 that I got, this is the case.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.
