Lookin at a Razer Blade 14 - Am I Insane? TALK ME DOWN

botfly10

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So, its coming up on time for me to get a new laptop. I have milked the one I have for 5 years and its on its last legs. That much is for sure.

Here is the thing tho, as I have been looking around, I keep coming back to the razer. Here are the specs:

14" 1080 IPS screen
i7-7700HQ
geforce 1060 6gb
16 gb ddr4
512 gb M.2
lots of ports
13.6 x 0.7 x 9.3 inches
$2100 as configured

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This model is a 2017 refresh that moved up to Kaby Lake as well as solved QC problems with the 2016 Skylake models. Personally, I like everything about it except the bezel and the fucking stupid logo (that I would cover with a dbrand skin or sticker).

Here are my needs/use cases:
Heavy multimedia: playing HD video on an external projector while light editing pics in gimp, 3-4 power points open and intermittent editing, 10-20 chrome tabs open, email, several word docs, multiple .pdfs in an editor suite open, music player open - all at the same time - and yes, its necessary for me to have all that shit going at the same time.

Almost no gaming on the laptop. Maybe 3-4 weeks out of the year. No video rendering or any shit like that.

Also, I need my shit to be compact enough to be comfortable in a backpack, carrying between meetings under my arm, and look professional. It has to have build quality to survive the abuse of daily commutes in a backpack. I have to have a screen size between 13.3" and 14" at 1080p. Can't be outside that range, its the sweet spot for me. Has to be relatively thin.

And I need my laptop to never hiccup or lag or stutter. Shit has to be snappy all the time. I ALWAYS have an audience at work and its critical I have zero downtime waiting for the computer. Don't care about battery life, as long as I can get a couple hours in a pinch. I plan on keeping my next laptop for around 5 years.

So, is the Razer fucking stupid for my use case? Am I ripping myself off? Will something with link a i7-7600U and integrated graphics be enough?
 

Crystallas

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If that's what you fancy, go for it.

I get so many mixed reviews from reliable friends on Razer build quality, that I would be hesitant to drop 2k on anything from them. But you know me, I'm not a Windows user, although I suppose you could put win10 on an Oryx Pro https://system76.com/cart/configure/oryp3 Which looks like you can one-up the Razer in many areas for the same price.
 

botfly10

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Yeah, my first laptop was a sager (not that its the same as system76) that had the modular, no bullshit approach to laptops.

But frankly, my biggest attraction to the razer is the form factor along with the performance. I like the "blackbook pro" look. As dumb as that is.

As far as build quality, I know people have very mixed experience with the mice. But with the blade 14s, reactions are pretty universally positive within specific revisions.

I would pull the trigger now, but my only reservation is really how much overkill is this laptop really? My current laptop is a 5 years old, running a 3rd gen i7 3517U. I guess I don't have a good sense of how far that line of dual core chips has come along with integrated graphics.

The i7 7500U is pretty common now and comes with intel HD 620 graphics. I just don't have a sense of the capability of that chip.
 

czman

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From what you typed, it seems like fast read speeds is the most important thing. I think getting the M.2 with will be where you see the biggest gains from your old system. You can probably go with almost any decent CPU/video card.

It looks like everything you are going to be doing will be single threaded so you can probably go with a AMD CPU if you want, might save some money if you are willing to wait a few months.

I think you should focus on a large m.2 and a the fastest ram possible (ddr4), maybe even 32 GB. That will probably give you the biggest bang for you buck as far as what you stated you do. The video card can probably even be integrated if you want to reduce noise/heat/power consumption.

If you want to stay on windows 7/8.1 you will need to get a Skylake CPU.

I don't have a particular laptop in mind though.
 

Crystallas

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There is no point in delaying. If you want to run windows, just use windows 10. You can tweak it to some extremes to work like XP or 7 if you really wanted without ANY 3rd party shells (Classic Shell is just really awesome and makes it easy-mode). Therefore just get the Kaby Lake laptops, they are not just better performers, the married components on skylake based laptops have quirks that require a hefty amount of workarounds, to say it nicely. And AMD has nothing that is worthy of purchase in 2017 on the mobile front. When Zen based APUs come out (IF AMD can release them in good timing before Intel starts to use AMD GPU cores), then that changes the whole market.

Iris graphics are really good now. The Intel HD APUs used to be snails, but the 500+ on 5th gen i5/i7s are worthy as GPU cores, so much so that some semi-demanding games are comfortably playable.
 

Crystallas

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I don't mean to be this persistent contrarian. But if there was ever a widely-sold-brand board-maker that I fully hated (strong word), it's Gigabyte. I've lost maybe a full year of my life (no exaggeration) to one company from the sheer amount of customer service/quality control/RMA problems (and they don't give a shit about it) plus the years of clients that specifically ask for gigabyte branded products (because their 17 year old son said they were good after reading some review on reddit by a 20 year old kid who has built a total of three systems in their life and acts like they know everything). Hundreds of Gigabyte boards, maybe a couple that had no issues, the rest had to be RMA'd, dumped, or features were broken and simply ignored. But, they build to hackintosh guidelines more than other board-makers, so I know, they have a very loyal following because of that.
 

czman

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I guess one of the real questions is: does the price matter? Is the company buying this for you? Is this going to be depreciated to 0 the day you buy it and mean the saving $800 is negligible? Are you getting reimbursed to a specific cost?

It sounds like you are going to customer sites and want to give presentations that have minimal delays and want a sleek put together appearance.

I have an M.2 and I have run some tests. Mine does get the 3.2GB sequential reads. On sequential reads the increase from 7200 to SSD is actaully a smaller increase than from SSD to m.2. Well at least in my system.

If you get an M.2 you will notice an significant improvement. My guess is you could get almost anything with an M.2 and be in great shape.
 

botfly10

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Well, I am less concerned about price overall than I am about getting a laptop that is absurdly overpowered.

More specifically, will I even notice a difference between a i7 7700HQ with a gtx 1060 VS a i7 7500U with intel HD 620 graphics in my use case scenario? Assuming storage and ram speeds are equal or otherwise negligible.

Basically, I am looking at 2 different tiers (ultrabook vs laptop I guess) just wondering if its totally unnecessary to get something from the higher tier. Like would I be paying for performance that I'm never really gon tap into.
 
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Crystallas

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The HD/Iris 6xx are also excellent in their own right, but that damn 1060 is like going from small-but-fast Mario to big+favorite power up.

You can beat the game with small Mario, but dat power-up doh.
 

botfly10

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Yeah, I am hearing from other people that for my uses, I probably should stay away from "U" (ULV) suffix chips and stick with the regular intel mobile chips - "H" suffix
 

botfly10

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So after looking around obsessively, I have gotten a little freaked out by the razer 14. It still sounds like previous problems were taken care of with this revision, but there is a history there with older models of shoddy design and components. Also, the heat is a bit alarming. And that fucking bezel is just awful.

Lately, I have been looking more at the Dell XPS 15 9560.

Specs:

15.6" 1080p display in a 14" body
i7-7700HQ
GTX 1050
16 GB ram
512GB PCIe
Killer 1535 nic
9-10 hr battery
$1600

Anyone have experience with these? I love the specs and love the big screen that they fit in a 14 inch body cause there are no bezels. Thermals are way more moderate than the razer. Mid 70s instead of mid 80s under load.

The previous model (8550) had problems but they all turned out to be driver related and associated with the new skylake platform and windows 10 conflicts. Seems like those have been resolved although the new big win 10 update has been reverting some peoples drivers to earlier, broken versions.

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Crystallas

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<3 the last four generations of XPS.

The best product from Dell by far IMO.
 

botfly10

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Yeah, I'm pretty sure thats what I'm gon go with.
 

botfly10

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just to follow up

I got the dell xps 9560 and love it. Had it about a year. Only complaint is there is they use a weird modded audio diver for no apparent reason, tho it hasn't given me any problems.

The xps is a tad heavier and a tad thicker than competitors in the same tier, but it is build like a tank and nothing is soldered to the board. I get zero heat throttling and its quiet.
 

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