My GX640 Review

** Review of MSI GX640 **

Alright! ... well first off lets cover the upgrades I put into this guy from the basic configs u can get:

- Intel® Core™ i5-540M, 2.53-3.06GHz
- 160GB Intel G2 X25-M Solid State Drive
- 6X Blu-Ray Reader + 8X DVDRW/CDRW Super Multi Combo Drive
- IC Diamond Thermal Compound for CPU + GPU

Also downloaded catalyst 10.4 drivers and disabled powerplay.

1. Build:

I have to say its a really nice looking laptop, went from an Asus G2S-A1 to this so the difference in weight and size seemed dramatic at first.

The metallic brush mixed with the red paint give it a nice look, I love the touch panel controls but I find they sort of tried to give it too much of an AlienISH kind of futuristic 1990s thinking theres going to be flying cars in 2000 kind of look ... I preffer a cleaner look, personal opinion lol

The screen is amazing, bright, crisp clear and viewable from many angles.

So as for the quality of the build.. I love the PC in about 95% of its looks, size, weight, quality ... the only thing that bugs me a little is the keyboard (I was already aware it was not the best) for the following 2 reasons: the FN and CTRL key are annoying but can get some use to.. instead of using my pinky to hold CTRL I now use the finger next to it so I adapted quickly and the other thing is the keyboard keys near the bottom sort of sticks and snaps when you apply medium pressure, its not THAT annoying but you wounder if its gonna last long..

Its not the end of the world but with a slight effort and a small build upgrade, MSI would have won many hearts over with this.

2. Performance, Temps and Fan:

For the performance... A+++ .... nothing else to add, this baby chewed through Starcraft 2 like a blender with a poor banana in it, I will test more games soon.

- Idle: CPU approx ~50 / GPU ~60
- gaming (1.5 hour): CPU 76 / GPU 86 (playing Starcraft 2 beta max settings/resolution)
- 3D Vantage v1.0.2 Trial version Results: CPU Score 7880 / Graphics Score 7023 / GLOBAL: P7219 3DMarks (The Temps: CPU: 73 / GPU: 79) .. I dont know if these are high or low for this computer, maybe I got bad settings lol n00b )

So it would seem like thermal paste upgrade doesent do much, guess we will see in the long run

The only thing I find annoying is that if i wanna leave the computer on to download things overnight I find that the fan will start and stop about 20 times a minute ... is there any quick fix to that and maybe some instructions on how to do it?


Overall, I love the computer and the nags wont hold me from gaming haven, its weight wont drag me down and to listen to movies on my lap, well the exaust is on the side so it seemed fine when I left it there for a while

Rating for overall Device: 9.4/10

small but annoying things like the keyboard, fan noise and better heat distribution .. although not dramatic (is a good compromise for whats under the hood), would have made a PERFECT laptop, even for those who are more picky and finicky but it should not get you to stray from it.

top that with 3 years warranty and 1 year accidental with a damn crazy base price? u got yourself a deal

 

Thanks for the review, maybe you could add in some pictures for comparison

 

nice review ;//

 

downclock the gpu overnight when ur dling... u can try 100/100.

i think it would get rid of the fan issue.

use the amd gpu clock tool
basically u can just make a icon that down clcoks it, and a icon that upclocks it for easy use.

 

Really low temps, good review also add pics!!

 

yeah you can find some directions for making a best of downclocking gpu (625/1000 just won't go to 100/100 straightly, you need step point of 300/300 between this)

Also, some additional impressions: battery keeps surprising me when using more and more. While it takes quite long to fully charge the notebook, but it stays about 3 hours with minimal brightness and for work purposes (text editing etc)

 

200/300 is my current favorite; lower clocks don't seem to make much difference, and I like 200/300 because it's roughly the same ratio as 625/1000.

Indeed, the battery life is great for a notebook of this class - with a downclock, it's unparalleled among high-end gaming laptops.

 

Can you achieve 200/300 straight from 625/1000 without middle step?

I hope my battery will also be great like the one of my last notebook (LG S1 6 celler). After 3,5 years of using it still keeps the notebook going for 2 hours in simple tasks. All my friends who bought HP's, Dell's etc. have already replaced their batteries or just don't use them (only plugged in).
So, my little brother is happy with my old lappy which is in almost new condition after 3,5 years of daily usage.
I hope no less from this GX640 - good battery performance (of course with additional treatment like periodically discharging), nice overall performance (processor&gpu) and upmost build quality meaning long lasting joy in trying notebook's capabilities in newest games and apps.

While the bonus backpack begins to tear apart ( ), but gaming mouse is really nice and provides lots of joy. Speaker problems are in the past and right now I can enjoy the very best of this notebooks's advantages.

Love my GX640

 

Yeah, I don't have any trouble switching directly between those clocks.

 

how do you downclock? app suggestion? steps? thanks I wanna downclock to 100/100 for night downloads

 

This is your best bet. With AMD GPU Clock tool, you can also launch it with command line options to set the clock speed directly, which allows you to make shortcuts.
You can also do it with CCC profiles if you unlock ATI Overdrive, as described here. The profiles have the advantage of letting you fiddle with the voltage, but I've found they're a little more difficult to work with.

 

hmm I see that I need to modify these settings:

<Feature name="CoreClockTarget_0">
<Property name="Want_0" value="40000" />
<Property name="Want_1" value="40000" />
<Property name="Want_2" value="40000" />
</Feature>
<Feature name="MemoryClockTarget_0">
<Property name="Want_0" value="50000" />
<Property name="Want_1" value="50000" />
<Property name="Want_2" value="50000" />
</Feature>

but will they affect a CCC profile that I want? made on custom called "Night Downloads"

and I cant seem to modify anything on that page, weird

 

Yeah, the AMD GPU Clock tool is easier to use, so I'd stick with that.

 

hey guys, i am new on this site , i have a questions regarding overclocking of ATI 5850 on MSI gx 640, have anyone overclocked it yet? its core clock is 625 MHZ but i think ill be able to push it to 700Mhz (and get the performance of 5870), this laptop has not came yet, but just wondered. but i have another msi lappy with 8600GT and i could push it from 500Mhz to 640 Mhz and i only get around 75C which is really cool. How overclockable is 5850??? thank you

 

Try the card before overclocking it, it's a good card you won't need to overclock it for the most of the games

 

Awesome review, that units temps are perfect to be honest,

the ic is fine, and those temperatures are great.

The 5850 should OC great tbh, but it doesnt need it as barna says, its a pointless move i believe.

 

I OC'd mine to 725/1100. Runs stable. I tried 750 but had some issues. 725/1100 seems to be a sweet spot.

 

I set my computer to 100/100 last night and it was really silent, core and gpu temps dropped almost 10 degrees ran quiet as a church mouse.

only thing is that torrent downloads really sucked all night (approx 10kbps for the 3 downloads) and when I put everything back to normal settings they skyrocketed to 300kbps .... related or not?

 

definitely not GPU related...
and... most likely not CPU related
:\
must've gotten hold of a good seed when they "skyrocketed"

 

probably just a coincidence then.. bah! cant wait to try Bioshock 2 and Fallout 3 on it

 

Hehe, so you definately enjoying it then sasha?

BTW those games will run with their eyes closed .

 

yep gaming is starting to come back for me! especialy with starcraft 2.

any new games coming our that are worth checking out? the games I love are usually FPS and RTS ... I can do RPG sometimes but not too complicated/long

 

u gotta try Heroes of Newerth...if you like multiplayer

No game is more interesting, complex, intricate, and fun.

for FPS, i just got done playing GTA IV, Crysis, and now im on Bioshock(which is amazing, has this eerie 50's feel).

 

Heroes of Newerth looks like warcraft 3 DOTA games XD

 

its entirely based of dota

 

Bad Company 2 if you like FPS, with great multiplayer. Settlers 7 just came out as well. And of course SC2, and the other blizzard games out in the next year, the new wow expansion, And Diablo III sometime next year.

 

just confirmed I can play Bioshock2 max settings and runs like butter on toast ... fallout 3 should be smooth too, I wanna try a graphicaly demanding game on it.. might put crysis

 

please do

 

It'l love crysis .

 

I was woundering about something ... I disabled powerplay since I got it when I installed 10.4 ... I also set windows to "do nothing" when the lid is closed but when I did close it last time the screen went black ... I had to reboot computer to get anything back on ... when I did powerplay was back on, GPU settings were at 100/1000 and had 1X PCI .... how can powerplay automaticly enable itself ??


also, the "moon" LED on the front right end of the computer (where there are 3 LED indicators) is always lit for some reason ... anyone knows what this means?

 

Try metro 2033 as well!