Razer Blade (2017) Review

[Julio Franco]

I'm a big fan of Razer hardware. Their peripherals are top notch, in particular their outstanding Deathadder mice, while their laptops have surprised me in terms of how solid and well built they are. Razer seems to know what gamers are after and the latest Razer Blade is no exception.

Read the full article here.

https://www.techspot.com/review/1400-razer-blade-2017/

 

[oldikes]

Why does this review seem to care more about having bezels than how hot the thing runs...? its kinda laughable to me. all microscopic bezels do is add to the fragility of the device IMO, but even if you do have an obsession with less bezels, decent cooling is a order of magnitude more important...

Gotta say though, that black aluminum is a damn nice look. hope more products go that route.

 

[Jyrkz]

Only good thing is that it looks good.

 

[amstech]

Why does this review seem to care more about having bezels than how hot the thing runs...?.

It doesn't sound like you read the review.

its kinda laughable to me.

I know those are huge bezels I find them laughable too, they didn't need to be that big.
Your paying top dollar for a laptop, you should get maximum real estate.

all microscopic bezels do is add to the fragility of the device IMO

So your not sure?

, but even if you do have an obsession with less bezels, decent cooling is a order of magnitude more important...

Which he mentioned several times in the review.
Sorry ike but I gotta mess with ya here, you sound grumpy.
Not liking the clash update? Snowmobile not running? Your girl sleeping with another woman? Something must be the cause of all this rage, don't take it out on Scorpus the Eloquent.

 

[oldikes]

It doesn't sound like you read the review.


I know those are huge bezels I find them laughable too, they didn't need to be that big.
Your paying top dollar for a laptop, you should get maximum real estate.


So your not sure?


Which he mentioned several times in the review.
Sorry ike but I gotta mess with ya here, you sound grumpy.
Not liking the clash update? Snowmobile not running? Your girl sleeping with another woman? Something must be the cause of all this rage, don't take it out on Scorpus the Eloquent.

he mentions heat once , bezels at least thrice.

Fact of the matter is, I cant think of a single gamer that actually gives a crap about bezels. I know thats anecdotal, but im pretty certain if I asked any one of my gamer friends they wouldn't be able to either. What people do hate is a laptop that you cant set directly on your lap, or on your bed, or on any soft surface because itll get to warm, because whatever surface is partially blocking the exhaust. no one outside of tech journalists and people that give enough of a crap to read about tech that they arent in the market for gives a crap about bezels on a non-touch focused device.

The fact that he mentions the noise of the cooling system in the summary, but not its apparent inadequacy even at that noise level to cool the device well, is pretty telling to me. Sure he mentions heat in the appropriate section, but he seems far more concerned about noise and bezels. 80+ degrees in a normal gaming section (yes, even though its a laptop) is far more a dealbreaker than "muh bezels" or "I cant believe you can actually hear the fans if you dont have headphones in wtf"



But hey, its easier to accuse me of not reading or being grumpy lmao. Must be fun to be a person who instantly resorts to petty insults.

 

[Squid Surprise]

It doesn't sound like you read the review.


I know those are huge bezels I find them laughable too, they didn't need to be that big.
Your paying top dollar for a laptop, you should get maximum real estate.


So your not sure?


Which he mentioned several times in the review.
Sorry ike but I gotta mess with ya here, you sound grumpy.
Not liking the clash update? Snowmobile not running? Your girl sleeping with another woman? Something must be the cause of all this rage, don't take it out on Scorpus the Eloquent.

he mentions heat once , bezels at least thrice.

Fact of the matter is, I cant think of a single gamer that actually gives a crap about bezels. I know thats anecdotal, but im pretty certain if I asked any one of my gamer friends they wouldn't be able to either. What people do hate is a laptop that you cant set directly on your lap, or on your bed, or on any soft surface because itll get to warm, because whatever surface is partially blocking the exhaust. no one outside of tech journalists and people that give enough of a crap to read about tech that they arent in the market for gives a crap about bezels on a non-touch focused device.

The fact that he mentions the noise of the cooling system in the summary, but not its apparent inadequacy even at that noise level to cool the device well, is pretty telling to me. Sure he mentions heat in the appropriate section, but he seems far more concerned about noise and bezels. 80+ degrees in a normal gaming section (yes, even though its a laptop) is far more a dealbreaker than "muh bezels" or "I cant believe you can actually hear the fans if you dont have headphones in wtf"



But hey, its easier to accuse me of not reading or being grumpy lmao. Must be fun to be a person who instantly resorts to petty insults.

He mentions bezels when talking about the display - which is certainly relevant as it could easily have a 15" display instead.... Since he pretty much otherwise thinks this is an awesome laptop, I see no issue with that.

He DOES mention heat a few times - looks like you didn't really read the review..... He also mentioned that it doesn't impact on performance or throttling - if you aren't holding it on your lap, it won't be an issue.

As for the noise, he also mentioned that - if you have headphones, not an issue...

 

[erickmendes]

Now let's see it running with a 6 cores/12 threads Ryzen inside...

 

[oldikes]

He mentions bezels when talking about the display - which is certainly relevant as it could easily have a 15" display instead.... Since he pretty much otherwise thinks this is an awesome laptop, I see no issue with that.

He DOES mention heat a few times - looks like you didn't really read the review..... He also mentioned that it doesn't impact on performance or throttling - if you aren't holding it on your lap, it won't be an issue.

As for the noise, he also mentioned that - if you have headphones, not an issue...

He mentions heat once, noise 3 times. Id certainly hope there arent throttling issues on any laptop that price, that shouldnt even have to be mentioned.
Im pretty sure at this point I read the review more carefully than either of you.

 

[Vladislav]

(...) if you aren't holding it on your lap, it won't be an issue (...) As for the noise (...) if you have headphones, not an issue...

Moreover, if you wear orange sunglasses, the color shift won't be an issue, and if you connect with WiFi only, no Ethernet port is not an issue either.

When the novelty of bling-bling wears off the bitterness of being stuck day after day with an expensive, noisy, hot, poor screen and no Ethernet port will remain. But, apparently it is "another fantastic laptop from Razer", so the "don't judge me, love me" market is there.

 

[Brenton]

Personally for me the biggest issue I see is the no ethernet port.
I mean it's a gaming laptop... since when do gamers prefer wifi? Not sure if you guys get it better in the states but here in Aus wifi is drop out nightmare and when you can avoid it for gaming you really try to, even besides random drop outs wifi tends to be a slower speed and will often spikes it's download rates. Between a slighty bigger thickness or having that port... it's a no brainer in my opinion.

Other then that though the other minor things don't really bother me, but in all honesty I don't really get the whole using laptops for gaming thing anyway.... unless I was mega rich and could own both

 

[Darth Shiv]

Why does this review seem to care more about having bezels than how hot the thing runs...? its kinda laughable to me. all microscopic bezels do is add to the fragility of the device IMO, but even if you do have an obsession with less bezels, decent cooling is a order of magnitude more important...

Gotta say though, that black aluminum is a damn nice look. hope more products go that route.

Because you can always stick something under it to allow airflow but you can't do anything about a 14" screen with large bezel. It has a GTX1060. Look at other laptops with that power. There aren't many close to this build quality, form factor and with that graphics power.

No ethernet? Yeah that's a pretty basic thing.

The absolute killer for me is Razer support and reliability. They have a *terrible* reputation for after sales support and quite frankly their software team is the worst I've seen since Creative and Intel integrated graphics. It is scary bad. Don't just take my word on it. Look into Synapze. System instability (BSODs), macros that don't work and so on. YEARS later and still garbage.

 

[Squid Surprise]

He mentions bezels when talking about the display - which is certainly relevant as it could easily have a 15" display instead.... Since he pretty much otherwise thinks this is an awesome laptop, I see no issue with that.

He DOES mention heat a few times - looks like you didn't really read the review..... He also mentioned that it doesn't impact on performance or throttling - if you aren't holding it on your lap, it won't be an issue.

As for the noise, he also mentioned that - if you have headphones, not an issue...

He mentions heat once, noise 3 times. Id certainly hope there arent throttling issues on any laptop that price, that shouldnt even have to be mentioned.
Im pretty sure at this point I read the review more carefully than either of you.

Actually, he mentions heat TWICE.... once after the benchmarks, and again in his conclusion.... how much more should he be mentioning it as he also states that it doesn't impact performance and doesn't throttle?

He stated that his only real issue was the display - the color handling actually, so it makes sense that he would mention it the most...

 

[Arris]

Personally for me the biggest issue I see is the no ethernet port.
I mean it's a gaming laptop... since when do gamers prefer wifi? Not sure if you guys get it better in the states but here in Aus wifi is drop out nightmare and when you can avoid it for gaming you really try to, even besides random drop outs wifi tends to be a slower speed and will often spikes it's download rates. Between a slighty bigger thickness or having that port... it's a no brainer in my opinion.

I haven't used ethernet (other than NAS to router) for any computing device in my home for over 6 years.
I found that powerline adapters weren't great, eventually upgrade to an AC2600 device. And now run around 800mbps wifi on Surface Pro 3, desktop and phone. If you analyse wifi signals in your area, choose a less congested channel, turn of aggressive roaming settings, boost the power of the signal from router you have very few issues with spikes/dropouts etc.. I even do backups from my desktop to the NAS over it without issue, that I used to do with a very long ethernet cable. If you do research and are a bit tech savvy wifi isn't a bad option nowadays.

 

[Theinsanegamer]

Personally for me the biggest issue I see is the no ethernet port.
I mean it's a gaming laptop... since when do gamers prefer wifi? Not sure if you guys get it better in the states but here in Aus wifi is drop out nightmare and when you can avoid it for gaming you really try to, even besides random drop outs wifi tends to be a slower speed and will often spikes it's download rates. Between a slighty bigger thickness or having that port... it's a no brainer in my opinion.

I haven't used ethernet (other than NAS to router) for any computing device in my home for over 6 years.
I found that powerline adapters weren't great, eventually upgrade to an AC2600 device. And now run around 800mbps wifi on Surface Pro 3, desktop and phone. If you analyse wifi signals in your area, choose a less congested channel, turn of aggressive roaming settings, boost the power of the signal from router you have very few issues with spikes/dropouts etc.. I even do backups from my desktop to the NAS over it without issue, that I used to do with a very long ethernet cable. If you do research and are a bit tech savvy wifi isn't a bad option nowadays.

or, OR, you use ethernet and dont have any issues. Amazing, right?

At the bare minimum, they should include a USB->ethernet adapter.

 

[Arris]

Yes, everyone wants to be sat in their living room with a big cat5 cable draped across the room
With a static device the ideal situation is ethernet obviously, but in most cases people will prioritize convenience over efficiency. I mean they buy these ultra slim non upgrade-able devices with sub-optimal graphics solutions after all don't they?

Personal experience after moving to a well configured 802.11AC networking solution is that I generally experience more issues with my ISP than I do with my wifi.

 

[Brenton]

Personally for me the biggest issue I see is the no ethernet port.
I mean it's a gaming laptop... since when do gamers prefer wifi? Not sure if you guys get it better in the states but here in Aus wifi is drop out nightmare and when you can avoid it for gaming you really try to, even besides random drop outs wifi tends to be a slower speed and will often spikes it's download rates. Between a slighty bigger thickness or having that port... it's a no brainer in my opinion.

I haven't used ethernet (other than NAS to router) for any computing device in my home for over 6 years.
I found that powerline adapters weren't great, eventually upgrade to an AC2600 device. And now run around 800mbps wifi on Surface Pro 3, desktop and phone. If you analyse wifi signals in your area, choose a less congested channel, turn of aggressive roaming settings, boost the power of the signal from router you have very few issues with spikes/dropouts etc.. I even do backups from my desktop to the NAS over it without issue, that I used to do with a very long ethernet cable. If you do research and are a bit tech savvy wifi isn't a bad option nowadays.

I'm not saying wifi is bad mate, I know it has come a lomg way but not all of us live in the U.S and have the luxury oh high speeds and lots of data to go with it. Here in aus if you want wifi with a mobile service its hexy, for example my current plan is $99 per month for 16gb download and a $10 charge for every gb I go over, yes you read that right amd yes it's insane.
As far as wifi from our modem goes, unless you want to fork out an extra $500 for your own the company gives you a very basic one for $100 as part of their plans and the wifi on those.... lets just say I'd prefer to have no internet at all...

 

[Arris]

I'm not saying wifi is bad mate, I know it has come a lomg way but not all of us live in the U.S and have the luxury oh high speeds and lots of data to go with it. Here in aus if you want wifi with a mobile service its hexy, for example my current plan is $99 per month for 16gb download and a $10 charge for every gb I go over, yes you read that right amd yes it's insane.
As far as wifi from our modem goes, unless you want to fork out an extra $500 for your own the company gives you a very basic one for $100 as part of their plans and the wifi on those.... lets just say I'd prefer to have no internet at all...

Ouch, that's pretty painful pricing. I think currently in Scotland I'm ~£26(45 AU$) for 60Mbps up, 20Mbps down unlimited so count myself as lucky. And yes, the supplied equipment by providers is usually pretty poor. My current provider gave me a "Technicolor" branded router that had almost no user configuration available, it quickly got recycled as it is provided as part of the package at no additional cost. Hope things improve with connectivity in your part of the world.

The brand Tp-Link doesn't seem to be listed in amazon Australia but I'm using a Tp-Link Archer AC2600 router and a NETGEAR A6210 AC1200 802.11ac USB adapter for about around 280 AU$ all in (although I'm sure stuff might be even more expensive than just doing GBP to AUS conversion). Some of the best mid/lower range WiFi networking kit I've owned.

 

[Explz]

Linus said the weight is at 4.13 pounds because the display assembly was changed, not because the chassis is lighter.

 

[funglebuddy]

Why does this review seem to care more about having bezels than how hot the thing runs...? its kinda laughable to me. all microscopic bezels do is add to the fragility of the device IMO, but even if you do have an obsession with less bezels, decent cooling is a order of magnitude more important...

Gotta say though, that black aluminum is a damn nice look. hope more products go that route.

Because you can always stick something under it to allow airflow but you can't do anything about a 14" screen with large bezel. It has a GTX1060. Look at other laptops with that power. There aren't many close to this build quality, form factor and with that graphics power.

No ethernet? Yeah that's a pretty basic thing.

The absolute killer for me is Razer support and reliability. They have a *terrible* reputation for after sales support and quite frankly their software team is the worst I've seen since Creative and Intel integrated graphics. It is scary bad. Don't just take my word on it. Look into Synapze. System instability (BSODs), macros that don't work and so on. YEARS later and still garbage.

I bought the laptop in this review and not more than an hour into updating it bluescreens. I am an IT guy so I know how to fix this but having a shoddy refurb product says alot about the company. for a few dollars less I could have gotten the acer predator which has the same specs for 1000 and has better support.