MSI GT76 Review! HIDevolution Makes it Right!

5Ghz 9900k and 200w RTX 2080.....come on in!

-If you really want one of these with this spec, Liquid Metal is really the only way to go. You'll retain your warranty and have a legendary laptop. Without it I can only recommend the 9700k and RTX 2070. That 2070 is the 115w version. It's a pretty compelling spec actually considering how cool it could potentially run ;)

-Battery life. The power limits are locked in the bios at this time but then can be brought down (not up) with ThrottleStop. Setup a profile to run on battery and limit PL1 to 25w and Pl2 to 15w. Have all 16 threads boost around 1600mhz. Do not run MSI Afterburner on battery as it'll constantly ping the dedicated GPU. Start with these tweaks and disable what you don't need for your own personal unplugged time. Doing this gave me an additional 60 minutes unplugged.

-Two Power Supplies are connected with a rubber grommet and into the physical dongle. It's not possible to run the GT76 with 1 PSU. We're not quite there yet. Many of us on the forums have contact a company that has the capability to make a single large PSU for laptops. They have the PSU but not the proprietary connection. Let's see what happens in the future.

-This is not as large as it seems and I hope this review revealed this. I've had 17" desktop replacements and this felt smaller thanks to the new design.

-BIOS is in its infancy. HIDevolution and MSI both know this. 1.03 was far better overall as 1.06 wasn't sleep stable and often would need powered down to work correctly. This was left out as it'll get fixed and this information in the video would be irrelevant. This channel is a provided service so these details are placed in the description to better serve the community.

-The Acoustic tuning was AWESOME! But please understand that Liquid Metal really made this happen like you saw in this video. You can do this same thing without Dragon Center in about 80% of the titles I tested. It actually runs quieter and as a result the GPU fan was eventually triggered in 20% of the titles. So the Dragon Center combined with the Liquid Metal provided consistent Acoustic Tuning noise and Performance.

-Soldered GPU and socketed CPU is a flip flop from the previous Titan laptops from MSI. MXM GPU's are really hard to get and extremely expensive. Stephen has a MXM 1080 and to get a 2080 into it is over $1200. Not an ideal solution unfortunately. Desktop CPU's on the other hand are not held for ransom.

CPU wattage settles at 150w. Temps at load here in Handbrake are already pushing the boundary even with Liquid Metal. We can take ten GT76 laptops at their peak 150w overclock limit will be different. Some will do 4.6, some 4.7 and some 4.8. Binning CPU's is an actual service provided by a few companies. It's nothing to worry about and performance out of the box with LM is amazing anyway. But, this makes quite the case for a 9700k and it's the sku i'd buy if it were my money. It's not that I wouldn't rather have the 9900k, it's because the 9700k is good enough for me and i'm not made of money.

-Overclocking to 5Ghz yields an 8% average increase to the minimum FPS. Some titles did nothing and others did a bit more. Your in-game settings affect this too. I could talk about this in a video for hours and it wouldn't matter. There's not enough depth out there to reveal how this works as it's endless. Too many games and unique in-game preferences along with updates to skew results.

Why the desktop CPU? It doesn't have to honor the limited TDP like mobile cpu's. Having 150w to work with not only smashes through Handbrake, it also feeds the GPU better maintaining a higher minimum frame-rate.

MSI has left a little on the table here without a MUX or a straight connection from the dedicated GPU to the display. There's a technical bottleneck when having to pipe the image through the iGPU first. It's the only thing that the AW51m has to standout above the GT76.

As of today I would still prefer the GT76 for superior cooling, proper fan control with its dedicated hardware button and solid software functionality. Yeah, have you seen AW Command Center on the 51m yet? Yikes!

[TheAgentAssassin]

EVERY gaming laptop needs a dedicated max fan button.

[nadavcohen]

Why on earth would they release a top tier high end gaming laptop without gsync? This couldve been the perfect machine.

[OWNORDISOWN]

Perfect review ! Amazing laptop. Shame there is no Gsync and a full SD card reader. Thanks for showing what a 9700k will be like 👍

[amirbahalegharn]

this is by far your best job..great in-details review...Fantastic review just like the unit itself....there wasn't a question unasked(9700K simulation, cinebench hyperthreading scores and 5ghz scenarios were all great info you did give unlike many).mentioning fan acoustic&4.0ghz clock with fan curve was awesome too. thanks for your exceptional work.

[timofaust]

Great review. Just bought myself the Helios700 a month ago and have to say that I love that we now finally live in a time where you can have amazing gaming performance at business trips. Hopefully there will be better solutions in the future when it comes to heat efficiency, so they become super powerful AND relatively quiet. I also hope they quit all the RGB shenanigans, as they only cost the customer extra money and I turn them off anyway.
PS: I do not understand why you still have such a small audience at that quality!?!

[Terreos]

Hot damn! Can I have that? Please? Tell Donald from HID I'll take good care of it. 😁

I love how this can have a 4k display unlike the Area 51m. Makes alot more sense that only offering 1080p screens. No G-sync is really a negative for the 4k panel though. I get they were trying to give ya best of both worlds with optimus, but this thing is a mobile desktop in laptop form. Should really release some models with g-sync.

[CaptainCoffee]

Nice review, thanks for helping me make my decision to pull the trigger on spending the extra $$ for HID. Btw, anyone mention that you look a LOT like Jordan Rudess from Dream Theater?

[Almighty_Flat_Earth]

GT 75 has the best keyboard layout ever, i mean offset arrow keys with angular cut out gives the laptop a real god like gamer look, but GT 76 keyboard is plain old. Hey msi, why don't you just keep the stunning looking offset arrow keys of GT 75 ??? And the red accent color is missing at the back side vent which is present in GT 75.

[josekennycallejasramos]

Nah they doesn't do it good, i bought a laptop from them, with 40gb ram at 3200mhz, (8gb solded) and the 32gb ram at 3200mhz doesn't work, very Bad service

[panaceabofelopolai]

Please do a full review on the Alienware Area 51M and later on do a comparison between the GT76 and Area 51M ... Anyway that's was an awesome review mate...Thanks a lot for the review...

[ilooi]

Welp.. waiting for that moment in time, where Gaming Lineups manufacturers .. actually use better pasting. I`m not even considering the LiquidMetal here... simply, better pasting. 90% of market gaming laptops today, are getting better thermals with repasting. What's up with that ? MSI, ASUS, ACER, HP?

[bradhaines]

loved that tuning to 40db, the numbers really dont tell the difference unless you understand how the scale works. if only these had a ryzen version option, the customizeability would be insane

[alpcantopcu]

Great in depth review, sweet machine but lack of G-sync let alone it not being directly routed through the GPU is a salt on injury. Thanks for the vid

[tomgjonaj]

What made me stick with my 51m is the fact that this laptop has no gsync, which boggles my mind !

[DavidGameson]

Hi Bob, thank you for this review. I go to HID and order this amazing laptop. One of the best review on YT ever.

[neosrt]

MSI GT76 HIDevolution=technical term for Ultra badass gaming laptop. 2 ginormous power bricks with Liquidmetal already applied inside..with what is a beautiful high tech looking chassis and desktop hardware..oh yeah.

[chadwickmccarty]

Jiminy Cricket this is an impressive laptop. She's a beaut that causes one to drool.

[MinerDolan]

Crazy machine! Love seeing Alienware and MSI compete for the title of best high-end desktop replacements. Hopefully we can see some of the thermal innovations trickle down to thinner laptops!

[StavrosZorbas]

Great review! i dont know what's better overall. This or the Asus G703 as a desktop replacement. I have the Asus G750 myself for 6 years and its still one of the fastest machines from 2013 (note that i have 2 ssds in RAID 0).

[nevosa]

Why this video so fucken perfect thank uuuu for your review ❤️❤️❤️❤️ 😇