New MSI gaming laptop? What do you think? GT70 Dominator Dragon-1886

tommyturner12

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Recently, I've been searching around for some gaming laptops to use as a desktop replacement. I've already cut out:

-Sager: Haven't seen many reviews, though it's VERY cheap and VERY powerful, I don't trust buying from a rather, smaller, company, than the other widely trusted brands(ASUS, MSI, Lenovo)

and

-ASUS: Much more expensive than what you're paying for in hardware, though it has great cooling and build quality, the price/performance ratio doesn't cut it.

Obviously, Alienware is gone. As is Toshiba, Dell, XP, and unfortunately Lenovo (Lenovo makes pretty good gaming laptops, but not for me).

That leaves one top notch quality company left, MSI. Everyone knows MSI makes laptops designed specifically for gaming. They also know that they throw in insanely powerful specs at a cheap cost.

Now, I've heard all the talk about the cooling issues with MSI. I don't find that to be 100% relevant. The thing is, for the specs, MSI gaming laptops stay pretty cool, and with some better thermal paste, a cooling pad, and Turbo Boost on, you can cool the laptop temps dramatically by up to 20°C. Not only that, what I love about MSI is that they have incredible ventilation. It dissipates all of the heat away from crucial components, and the keyboard also stays nice and cool, too. I'm pretty sure I'm okay with cooling for now.

My budget is $1400, and I'll stretch the extra $50 at the MOST. The laptop I've been looking into is a bit different than the others. It is a GT70 Dominator 895, except with a 4810MQ and a red chassis. It's referred to as the GT70 Dominator Dragon-1886. I've found literally ZERO reviews on it, so here are the links:

http://www.amazon.com/MSI-GT70-DOMINATOR-DRAGON-1886-17-3-Inch/dp/B00LJEJZSY/ref=pd_sim_sbs_pc_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=1KEM9PDSET0Y57QYCJ8F

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?gclid=Cj0KEQjwrqieBRCln82Rgufz7I0BEiQAPNjAI6giyyvVri3L9xv8vGcaWewrb9fAPdh5hnZHBC9lsroaAjvS8P8HAQ&Item=N82E16834152602&nm_mc=KNC-GoogleAdwords&cm_mmc=KNC-GoogleAdwords-_-pla-_-All+Gaming+Notebooks-_-N82E16834152602&ef_id=UruDBAAABPDZ9SMa:20140720034526:s

So, at $1450, it comes packed with an Intel i7 4810MQ, a GTX 870m with 3GB VRAM, 8GB upgradeable RAM, a 1TB HDD, along with Windows 8.1, a 17.3" screen, and a 1080p HD screen resolution. I'll add an SSD later along with 16 more gigs of RAM to maximize the experience.

Now, you may be wondering why I didn't just go $50 cheaper and get the NORMAL GT70. The reason is because that at almost $1500, at the price you're paying, anyone deserves some eye candy with what they pay for. I love the red color to the chassis, along with the 4810MQ CPU. Sure the 4810MQ isn't that much better than the 4800MQ (about 3-5% better), but I don't care.

Now, I'd love to hear you're opinions on the MSI GT70 Dominator Dragon-1886. Should I bite the bullet and grab it? If I do, which I've basically just convinced myself I would, I'll put a review up on Youtube and add a nice, well written out response on Amazon and/or Newegg. I'll update this post in about January and give you the links to the review. Maybe, if I save the money to buy a high quality camera, I'll do an unboxing. I hope by that time there'll be some reviews out there.

Also, it comes with a free mouse and mouse pad.

Leave your thoughts below. Please, do not address the fact that desktops are better, or ASUS is more bang for buck, etc. I've made up my mind. I just want to know what you guys think. Sorry for the long post! Had to get it in one try :p

Cheers!





 
Solution
For gaming, only thing off top of my head Maxwell vs kepler is power consumption to performance. Gaming on battery is almost not a thing you can do on the 870, as it would only last for 45 min on battery, but the 870m requires to much power for the battery to be able to give. While the 860m can typically play same game same settings as while plugged in, with minimal problems and for a lot longer. Example, my 880m I cant play borderlands unless I drop settings. I just do quick drop to 720p and I play on high settings. I'll get maybe 45 min. When I had my asus JM with 860m. I could play borderlands 2 1080p on high settings, and for a good hour and half to two hours.

But for cuda support, Maxwell is cuda 5, kepler is cuda 3. For...

Blaise170

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Sager isn't a small company, they are quite well known for their notebooks, as they've been around since 1985. I highly recommend them. Asus laptops on the other hand are not as nice as they sound and their returns process is absolutely horrid. Just Google "Asus RMA complaint".

As for MSI, the GT70 is an amazing machine. The one you are looking at is their newest model so it won't have as many reviews as the previous.
 

Dblkk

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Oct 30, 2013
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I currently have the MSI GT70 dominator pro 890. It has the i7 4810 and gtx 880m. I have just come from a asus g750 jz (880m), before that JS (870m), and before that one a JM (860m).

I went through all the asus models and ended with the msi. Only because while rendering and working on 3d animation and 4k video editing. A 100% cpu load led to 100c and thermal throttling. The MSI is great, don't get me wrong. But I still prefer the asus.

The MSI while gaming will lead to 92c on the graphics card and thermal throttling. The processor will always be fine. I have repasted, use turbo fan, and a cooling pad. That 92c doesn't change.

The asus gpu 870/880m never went above 80c. Never, the 860m barely got over 75c at the highest. The asus with 870m is almost on par with the throttling 880m of the msi, and the 880m asus beats out the msi 880m.

The build and everything with the asus is just a++. The msi I an A. I love my msi, it does what I need. But if it were strickly gaming, I'd go back to the asus in a heartbeat.

I would get the Asus if I were you. Get the JM with 860m. Its the best performance/power ratio. Best battery life gaming or office usage. Gaming on 860 will get you 1.5-2 hours. Office light/moderate use 5.5 hours. Msi gaming will get you 1 hour, office/moderate use 3.4-4 hours.
 

tommyturner12

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Apr 30, 2014
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Wow, thank you for the quick responses guys. So it looks like I'm getting two different opinions here.

Dblkk- Hmm, so it looks like you lean towards ASUS. 92c while gaming on the MSI? I've read some Amazon reviews, and most say there system never reaches over 80c under heavy load. Maybe you have a "defected" machine? I've also seen a review that said the fan position was messed up, and it blew all the air away from the CPU over top the GPU, resulting in a system shutdown sometimes and extreme throttling if under 100% load. Maybe yours is the same, just a bit less serious?

Anyways, I will not be playing extremely graphically demanding games. Skyrim, my main gaming priority, will be played on High settings (no AA) and will be played with a nice amount of mods, but none that affect performance. Will that cause heavy load on the GPU? I don't think so as much as if it were Battlefield 4 or Metro: Last Light. Will it be okay there? I'd like to hear from you guys.

Anyways, given that it has 4 star review on Amazon, the same as the ASUS, I think I'll get a bit better with my money if I go MSI. But I'd like to hear your opinion on that Dblkk. Otherwise, I have heard lots of complaints on how disgraceful the ASUS customer support is. That is one main reason I do not want to buy any product from them. At $1500, you would like some help and a friendly welcome to the family hello, not a "Send it back, wait 3 days for your $1500 defected product to return". I've also heard of many great compliments on MSI's hand, when it comes to customer support at the least.

Anyways, what do you guys think? I'll let this thread go on until about Thursday, and I'll make my decision there.

Cheers!
 

Dblkk

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I think that both companies are the same in terms of service. They follow the same guidelines. Ive dealt with Asus service several times, and not just for these laptops. And its been what you would expect from a service company. I've also called msi several times asking about the voiding of the warranty once you break the seal, needed to do so in order to open the bottom to add ssd or anything even. they've been great as well. And it doesn't void warranty if you open it up, just as long as you don't physically damage something in the process.

The MSI gaming at 92c, that's not defective, that's 100% honest. You can read any professional review as well, and they will say the same thing. Repasting led my cpu to run 10c cooler while max load, just as the reviews also stated. GPU still hits the 92c, but as the professional reviews also state, that we don't know what the max temp was before or after repasting. As its limiting it to 92c. So before paste it could've easily have gone to lets say 100c, and after repasting it goes to 95c? Don't know. But this is how Nvidia designed their chips. Running boost 2.0, automatically boosts the gpu making it run all out until a certain thermal limit which this case is 92c, same goes for desktop NVidia chips but those thermals I believe at 70c.

Its not bad nor do I experience any lag or anything while playing. And I can watch my gpu core load go from 989mhz(boost) to the 920-940mhz (stock). Rarely on most games does it dip down to 850mhz. But crisis and assassins creed to drop pretty consistently to 850mhz, normally bounching back and forth between stock and 850mhz.

http://youtu.be/sz4x0WDdZ5o?list=UUPK63knGJdy2JjENqaBmOyw

Video of Assassins creed, it was taken with shadow play not gamecaster. That way I could use hwinfo and rivaltuner to display cpu temps and load, gpu temps and load, and fps. When you watch the video if you look at top left of screen, you will see the hardware monitoring.

I love my MSI, and I have no complaints. Its a great machine. I do still think and say that the asus is better. And I think that the 860m is the best gpu for gaming in a laptop now. I think the Asus JM is and should be the #1 gaming laptop right now. The 870m and 880m are just overclocked last years models, still on kepler, not Maxwell. Maxwell is great. The JM is superb quality.

But if you want the highest specs for your price, then yes msi will give you that. Asus will give you a better overall laptop with great specs as well. But either way you'll be happy.

http://dragonarmy.msi.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=5
here is the msi gt70 forum 'official one' feel free to browse the different threads and get a feel for what users actually have to say about their laptops

http://rog.asus.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?157-G750-GX550-G550-and-G56-Gaming-Notebooks
here is the asus g750 forum 'official', feel free to browse as well.
 

tommyturner12

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Wow, great speech. I still may go for the MSI. I think I can deal with the temps. That seems the only real problem right now. Other than the temps, the MSI has amazing sound quality, great screen quality, and also have those eye candy features, specifically the LED's :p If you think ASUS is better, than you may be right. But right now, I'm not sacrificing 30% of GPU just because it runs at about 10c more.

Cheers!
 

Dblkk

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I get your thinking, but it running 10c more, also makes it throttle. So 860m vs 870m performance isn't like the chart says. It will still be an improvement yes, but not what you might think. Also, the asus with 860m is Maxwell with all new architecture, goodies, the 870m is kepler rebadged from last year and core clock bumped a bit.

This is typed on an msi gt70 895. Haha, but gaming asus hands down, and the JS model with 870m actually competes benchmark wise with the msi with 880m. Because of running 10c hotter.
 

Dblkk

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Either way you'll be happy!

I love my msi, loved the asus more but single cpu fan on asus couldn't cool it for a render session. Msi can, ill deal with graphics throttling as long as my cpu doesn't run throttled at 2.4ghz.
 

tommyturner12

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Your making this so hard! Argh! But still, I'm leaning towards MSI. Design, sound, price, and that amazing keyboard make it hard to sway away just because of a throttle. And still then, if it throttles to 860m performance, it still performs great. I've heard of the whole Maxwell thing better than Keller. Tell me, what does the 860m have better than the 870m? Sounds interesting. But, again, I'll repaste, buy a cooling pad, and put on Turbo Boost. If that doesn't work, then I'll have to deal with it ;P
 

Dblkk

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For gaming, only thing off top of my head Maxwell vs kepler is power consumption to performance. Gaming on battery is almost not a thing you can do on the 870, as it would only last for 45 min on battery, but the 870m requires to much power for the battery to be able to give. While the 860m can typically play same game same settings as while plugged in, with minimal problems and for a lot longer. Example, my 880m I cant play borderlands unless I drop settings. I just do quick drop to 720p and I play on high settings. I'll get maybe 45 min. When I had my asus JM with 860m. I could play borderlands 2 1080p on high settings, and for a good hour and half to two hours.

But for cuda support, Maxwell is cuda 5, kepler is cuda 3. For rendering, not sure about gaming, it makes a drastic change in rendering times. Makes up for the lesser cores and actually renders just a tad quicker than my 880m.

No offense, and this is all personal preference/taste. But asus design, sound, and amazing keyboard, not the msi. MSI has colorful keyboard yes, but its not the same quality as asus. Plus even though the asus is only white, the backlite turns on as soon as you turn on your laptop. The msi is software controlled and doesn't light up until your well into windows.

Fan noise will be the biggest difference. Gaming on msi is quite loud, while the asus is noticeable.

Cooling pad wont do jack, and repaste will drop cpu temps like 5-10c, but wont effect gpu. It may throttle down down less, but it still runs at thermal limit. Which just shows that before a repaste the temp would've went way higher than 92c, and after repaste temp might have gone just over 92c. Don't know but I do know that it still maxes. Turbo fan doesn't help while gaming.

I know im making this hard, imagine what I was going through in my own head. lol.

I started asus at best buy, cpu overheat while rendering, thought maybe just that specific laptop, then exchanged, next one same. So exchanged for one on a fresh shipment thinking maybe that production line itself was bad, nope. So thought maybe its just best buy or the jm so went to amazon and got the js. Went through 2 thorugh them, same thing, got the jz, same. Went msi.

This is all 100% full out rendering cpu load, and 60% gpu load. The asus does perfect gpu cooling, poor cpu. The msi does good cpu cooling, poor gpu. I'm a profesonal application user so ill take good cpu temps over gpu. Which is why I recommend the asus to you. It is the better gaming laptop.

If I could, id trade my $2500 msi gt70 and get a asus jm 860m that wouldn't throttle my cpu. I loved the notebook. The new msi gt72 looks good, more like the asus than the gt70. But the dual fan setup, that's where both asus and alienware fail, for cpu temps. So im not even going to risk it, which is why 2 weeks before the gt72 ships I bought (for same price) the gt70.

Now I love my notebook. And I will 'deal with it' temp and fan wise. And that's totally fine with me. So I know it would be fine for you to. All this is just recommendations on what I all went through the past 6 months, and not pushing you to asus, but just making you think about all aspects, good and bad, and to make a knowledgable decision. so once you get your laptop or months down the road, you don't regret your decision.

but if you think the msi wins on design sound and keyboard ( think opposite but w/e ) , and you can deal with fan noise and higher temps (haven't noticed any glitch or lag in gamplay because of it) , AND THE BIGGEST THING IS YOU PLAN ON PLUGGIN IN WHEN PLAYING AND BATTERY PLAYING ISNT A PLAN, then get the MSI. I have it, I love it. I loved the asus just a bit more, but im happy and it does exactly what I need it to do.

I only stress the playing on battery as its a 860 vs 870 laptop choice and although a step down, that's where the 860m really shines.
 
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Dblkk

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Yea, I love technology. And have been searching for the perfect laptop that can render, edit 4k video, and play some games as well. That's been going on since summer of last year. Starting first off with the Samsung ativ book8, then MacBook pro retina, and down the list. I put every laptop through the ringer. I'm very picky and im very cheap, so if I spend 1k+ it better be perfect.

That said, both the MSI and Asus are worth the price you pay. Both very solid, very well built. Each one of those two are just blow for blow.
Better gpu -msi, better gpu cooling - asus
upgradability and access to components - msi, more solid construction - asus
multicolored keyboard with software control - msi, instant on, white - asus
clear crisp speakers - msi, louder and not bad speakers - asus

And I could keep going. But Asus, MSI, Dell (alienware), theyre all very solid, very good laptops. The msi takes a hit for quality (we'll rate it an A) vs dell/asus (give them a A+) , but it offers components hundreds less than the others, so value MSI A+, others A. Dell is very solid, but at hundreds of dollars more than the Asus, which is hundreds more than the MSI. So you really need to be a fanboy for the Dell, just saying.

One thing that I very much dislike on msi, is the 180w power adapter. The components require 200-210W, which msi 'fixed' by using this nos software. That uses battery power, while plugged in, to help make up for that 20-30W that's needed at max. That's stupid, and asus, alienware, gigabyte, origin, ect they all ship with 230-240w power adapters.

No way a deal breaker, but that's my one 'why' moment with msi.
 

ZerockX

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Aug 5, 2014
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@Dblkk
Wow im really amazed about ur massive experience with little gaming folks. Im going to buy one next week and seriously im stuck with the choice between the GT72 and the G750JZ. The GT72 seem to fix his brother issue - the heat. The design of both kinda similar. The advantage of GT72 is it's a bit lighter, thinner and for me, looks better. So what do u think? Looking forward to seeing our opinion.
 

Dblkk

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I've been following the GT72 since it first leaked about 4 months ago. It's an awesome machine, and cooling wise is even better than the asus. Honestly, given that theyre both the same price, the msi offers more. You get gamecaster for 6 months, you get 4x msata card vs asus 2x, better cooling, quieter cooling, plus msi is easy to open up and do things with, asus is a whole complete tear down. I'd go msi gt72 100%.

But on that note, next month NVidia is releasing the new Maxwell 970 and 980m models. Might not be released right away, but im sure the gt 72 and asus g750 have models waiting to launch. If you can, id wait just a few more months and get the brand new gt72 and the brand new grpahics card.
 

ZerockX

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The 900M will be introducing in October, so im pretty sure it will be till next year that i have the chance to touch one. That's just too long since im going into university. I will not be worry about the new 900M cuz im going to build a desktop (perhaps next year, and that's when i join the race of the technology. Thanks for your opinion!
 

Kdos

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Aug 13, 2014
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I really dont see an 870 competing with the 880 because of 10c, that's just ignorant. The cooling system works efficiently, I know I own one and run it like a race car.

Hardware wise, 880 is well superior to the 870 and has more vram as well!
If you want to check out tested 3Dmark scores:

http://www.xoticpc.com/custom-gaming-laptops-notebooks-gaming-laptops-ct-118_96_98.html

And scroll down. You will see about 4000 points difference, which is significant.
 

Dblkk

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Nice, took two weeks to find this?

Benchmarks show one thing, actual gaming is a whole other category. Having shadowplay footage from my jm js and jz models still on hhd, and owning those same games on my msi gt70, I can say that no the js doesn't beat the gt70, but it is darn close, within 5fps. Plus, if its a demanding game, after 30-45 min, the js will then take the lead in average fps.

Crysis, Assassins creed bf. Start out on ultra 950mhz 93c on the msi, at 42 fps. After 20-30 min, sitting at 820mhz, 93c, and 32fps. Asus js, starts and stays between 30-35fps. The jz starts and stays around 46fps.

All this with turbo boost on with the msi, sounding like a race car. While the asus....yea......... you can hear it
 

Kdos

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Yeah I only just joined this.

I don't think that is solid evidence or a credible story, sounds like an isolated case. Unless you are operating a laptop on a bed spread or something that's going to insulate the heat, performance would never drop (in normal, serviceable circumstances) that much overall, unless it throttles; and providing the right environment, it should not.

Yes the msi gt70 has an ambitious cooling system, however it works and can be seen to be more efficient than using more space for two fans and adding power usage in the mix. Adding a single much larger heat sink for both (gt70) have their pros and cons with cooling efficiency and power consumption however, the level of problems you are referring to would indicate a defective machine or a severe lack of cooling through an unsustainable environment, ie heat sink blockage, fan malfunction, thermal paste failure.

I agree, the asus has a better cooling system, however this would not enable such a drastic performance increase. These chips are made to handle temperatures up to 100 c and then throttle as per normal operation, like most cards. In saying that, both cooling systems are sufficient enough to prevent this from happening. So I doubt the power/heat issue is a common problem.

And benchmarks are directly related to gaming. Gaming is rendering, that is what these benchmarks are designed to test, and to the extreme. They simulate all forms of rendering the card will output and are designed to put maximum load in this environment on the cards. There are also multiple different 3d tests out there to gauge gpu/cpu performance. To say "actual gaming is in a whole other category" is naive at best.
 

Dblkk

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Well, then you should probably read some or any professional reviews done on the MSI GT70. You'll see that every single one says that the laptop while gaming gets hot, hits 93c, and thermally throttles, negatively effecting performance. Which is why the Asus g750 "JZ" model, just blasts past the fps of the msi. Just google it, im sure toms has a review along with all other major notebook review sites. They will all state this.

"Unless you are operating a laptop on a bed spread or something that's going to insulate the heat, performance would never drop (in normal, serviceable circumstances) that much overall, unless it throttles; and providing the right environment, it should not. "
Well either your in Alaska or someplace freezing or I don't know what your talking about. As all professional reviews as well as myself, laptop is on a cooling pad and in a air-conditioned room. And graphics will throttle on 8/10 games played and using NVidia's recommended settings.

Or maybe you just have the '1' golden notebook that msi made somehow way better than any other, and you don't have any of those issues.

Plus benchmarks put on a synthetic load, not actual. Again, if you google benchmarking vs gaming, you'll find that benchmarks provide a close performance indicator, but not an actual. Tell me how a P score in 3d mark is going to relate to gaming/settings/performance? Asus even states that benchmarking shouldn't be done, and any thermals or performance results (good or bad) are null in void on their laptops. As they are not real world programs, and will never relate to real world loads on the machine.

You could also go to youtube and check out a lot of user reviews of the msi and gameplay and watch those frames drop.
 

MichaelCaleb21

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May 11, 2014
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Can the cpu of the gt72 be swapped for a better one? I'm an architecture student so i need a good cpu that can handle rendering and modelling, the gt70 looks good but i'd rather go for a newer model, the gt72, but the cpu isn't as good.