A Worthy Desktop Replacement? - MSI Raider GE78HX Review

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Full System Specs - MSI Raider GE78HX 13V / 13VH
CPU - Intel Core i9-13950HX
Memory - 64GB DDR5-5200
GPU - Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 (175W)
Display - 165Hz 2560x1440p OLED
Storage - 1TB NVMe SSD

Timestamps:
0:00 - Introduction
0:50 - Design, Materials, Build Quality
2:00 - Inside, Keyboard, Touchpad
2:29 - Connections
3:20 - Intel Core i9-13950HX Performance
4:23 - Gaming Performance (175W RTX 4080)
7:04 - 240Hz 1600P / QHD+ IPS Display Quality
7:56 - Display Response Times, Input Latency
8:45 - SSD Performance
9:18 - Battery Life
9:52 - Webcam, Speakers
10:30 - Thermal Performance
11:52 - Software
12:30 - MSI, Stop Automatic Data Collection!
13:00 - Pricing and Final Thoughts

Disclosure:
- This product was provided by MSI for the purpose of testing. As per my own guidelines, they don't get any say about anything in this video or any of my other reviews. It's not sponsored by them, they also didn't get to preview this video beforehand, or any other nonsense like that. My reviews reflect my own views, nothing more, nothing less.
- Amazon links I provide are (typically) affiliate links. Using these does not cost you anything at all. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. This means they do provide me with a small commission when you decide to buy a product, at no cost to you.

#MSI #GE78HX #gaminglaptop

[abrahamdavidcabrera]

I also drag this laptop with me around every day and it's fine.Anyone who has issues with the weight of this laptop may want to invest in a gym membership.

[phasestar]

Good review, we've been looking at the slightly lower end version with the 4070 for better battery life and a bit less heat and noise. Thanks for calling out the automatic data collection.

[temax]

Woww..what a review! Seriously! You covered everything. I am speechless. You are incredible. Please, keep doing this amazing job. Bravo!

[michaelthompson]

While pricey, there is a market for these things and for many living in confined apartments etc, these laptops do make sense. I feel a lot of the increased pricing on this years laptops is a combination of: 1) small increase of BOM costs, 2) Manufacturers taking C19 demands as reason to profiteer from unrealistic demand and 3) Ngreedias outlandish GPU costs and product segmentation this generation.

[Brogboolius_Maximus]

Very comprehensive review, thanks! In particular, thank you for talking about fan noise and how much it drops with the less aggressive profile.

Costco has this for only $2699 with the 4080, so seems like a good deal.

[pigtorlai]

Please do a review for the recent msi raider ge78hx 14v

[ElJuli]

an incredible machine. Tmpting to get it tomorrow at microcenter.

[RussianPlus]

I bought it. Pretty good but can get hot. CPU 95c during games and rendering

[blakmaneshall]

Just got one on the Amazon MSI store on a weekend sale with 24% off... for the capabilities this monster has for animation, 3D and motion design, it was a really good deal.

[fearless_H]

Happy birthday, hope it was an amazing one 🎉
I'm glad you spoke about the software and data collection, it's definitely something I consider. Please do it for all laptops?

[tzovlask]

There is that added feature that if you lug it around everyday you can skip gym. I like to alternate each hand with curls and pop it on my back to work shoulders, neck and upper back. Im a big boy now 😅

[NumNumzzz]

I just got this laptop not so long ago, it's amazing. The weight is not so bad

[teddym]

Excellent Review. I ended up with the GT77 as I wanted 4K and Mech Keyboard, and the first thing I did was delete the Raid in bios and do a fresh install and config it as 2x2TB drives (no Norton, yay, and MSI thankfully do provide ALL drivers on the download page. In Win 11 Pro I also have windows update drivers disabled and it worked great, it didn't force overwrite anything with older versions. You can do this easily in Win Pro with gpd.sys and don't need to worry about the registry. If anyone needs tips on this please let me know in a comment).
Raid has absolutely no benefit for game loading times, and furthermore, to take advantage of the transfer speed in file copies, you'd need a source or destination drive just as fast, and that's not going to happen. i.e. the entire thing is pointless and I hope MSI think that one through and offer us G-Sync instead next time LOL.
(Just to clarify, Crystal Disk Mark gave me 11.5K Read and 10.5K write in Raid 0 mode, and as two identical Samsung 2TB non raid disks they both get the same exact score of 7.1 Read and 5.5 Write).

[choco]

Thank you for the video. It was very helpful!

[outlet]

Desktop PCs still have one important advantage over laptops, upgradability. Your new figurine, whatever it is, looks great!

[zarrar]

I brought this laptop but am sad cux i couldnt buy 4090 which was out of stock and also a bit expensive
But still am happy
Its my first high performing laptop

[joelconolly]

I enjoyed that front RGB. Really looks like Fast anx Furious but it's for laptops 😂.

[tiunchi]

If you watch jarrod tech's recent video, he shows that in 4050, 4060 and 4070 laptop GPUs, they dont perform any better if they have higher TDP. All these 3 laptop GPUs performance maxed out at 100w. The reason is these GPUs hit voltage limit. So no point purchasing higher TDP GPUs when you looking for these 3 GPUs.

[mikeoleksa]

I know this is not on topic, but I wanted to put a couple of M.2 SSDs on your radar, if they aren't already. The Solidigm P44 Pro and Solidigm P41 Plus are getting quite a bit of attention with their claims of performance improvement after new drivers and software were released. I can say with almost 100% certainty that Solidigm P41 Plus is a renamed SK Hynix P41 Platnium and the Solidigm P44 Pro is an improved follow up SSD to the P41.

[tclark]

$3900, is too much. I get it, it's a high-end laptop, but wow. I bought a gaming laptop a few years ago. It wasn't "top of the line" but it was pretty decent. I paid about a 30% premium over building my own, but I wanted the laptop because I travel between 2 homes and didn't want to spend 2x building 2 gaming machines. At $3900 it's close to 2x what it would cost to build my own gaming rig, so it makes the decision that much harder. I could build 2 desktop machines for around that same price and probably get a little better performance (and less noise).