While I haven't pushed laptop terribly quite yet, I'm pleased by the temps, I'm seeing the highs in the 70c range
Conclusion
I paid a hefty price, albeit still on sale and I mostly really like what I got, though I probably over-spec'ed it. I read enough about the PWM on the 144Hz that I shied away from the base model and since I was going getting the advanced model why not get the optical keyboards ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
Do I return it for a base RB with a RTX 2060? I'm looking at a price of 1,800 vs. 2450, a savings of 650. The thing is, I think I got a good model, I'd hate to trade it in for a one that could be problematic and then there's the PWM, I really don't want to deal with that. Since I just accepted delivery, I'll be putting this laptop through its paces over the next week and we'll see but at this point I'm leaning towards keeping it.
New owner Razer Blade 15" Advanced - initial thoughts
So I picked up a new 15" Advanced with optical keys on Amazon. The sale price of 2450 was hard to beat. I threw on the Amazon extended warranty/accidental care.
I've only had the laptop a little while, and I'm still loading software and games, but here's some of my observations.
Fit and finish, this is a thing of beauty, Very Mac like (in a good way), it feels solid the speakers are wonderful - I'm coming from a laptop where the speakers are pointed down - that never made sense to me.
Ports - Decent, I'd say the only thing that I wished it had was a SD card reader. internal expansion - I si
Internal expansion - a little disappointing only from the fact that base RB 15 has a NVMe and Sata connector, but the advanced only a single NVMe. It would have been nice to see two NVMe - maybe that's what we'll see in the 2020 update
The keyboard - the chroma on the keyboard is great. My thinkpad's backlighting considered be poor at best.. One thing that irks me is that on the optical keyboard, the secondary values are not illuminated, i.e., the @, #, or $. Additionally, I'm not sure if I'm a fan of the optical keyboard, its quite clicky for a laptop and travel seems rather shallow. I think it has more travel then the non-optical keyboard, so I guess that's a win.
I ran into some issues with the GPU but seemingly overcame them, thanks to this thread: Razer Blade 15 2019 Advanced Screen Goes Black after Waking Up
The screen is gorgeous, and I love the idea of a matte screen, I've used a glossy for so long that I have forgotten how nice it is not to see your reflection :) I've not used the laptop enough to say how buttery smooth the 240Hz is compared to 60Hz. I think I've been focused on too many other aspects.
I found the disk to be a bit slow, not overall but I was incurring periods of performance drops. Running Crystal Disk Mark seems to show decent values, so I don't think its a hardware issue, maybe a driver issue, or the system was doing its indexing as I was moving lots of files. In any event. I'll probably be looking to swap the SSD as 512GB is inadequate for this day and age
While I haven't pushed laptop terribly quite yet, I'm pleased by the temps, I'm seeing the highs in the 70c range
Conclusion
I paid a hefty price, albeit still on sale and I mostly really like what I got, though I probably over-spec'ed it. I read enough about the PWM on the 144Hz that I shied away from the base model and since I was going getting the advanced model why not get the optical keyboards ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
Do I return it for a base RB with a RTX 2060? I'm looking at a price of 1,800 vs. 2450, a savings of 650. The thing is, I think I got a good model, I'd hate to trade it in for a one that could be problematic and then there's the PWM, I really don't want to deal with that. Since I just accepted delivery, I'll be putting this laptop through its paces over the next week and we'll see but at this point I'm leaning towards keeping it.
While I haven't pushed laptop terribly quite yet, I'm pleased by the temps, I'm seeing the highs in the 70c range
Conclusion
I paid a hefty price, albeit still on sale and I mostly really like what I got, though I probably over-spec'ed it. I read enough about the PWM on the 144Hz that I shied away from the base model and since I was going getting the advanced model why not get the optical keyboards ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
Do I return it for a base RB with a RTX 2060? I'm looking at a price of 1,800 vs. 2450, a savings of 650. The thing is, I think I got a good model, I'd hate to trade it in for a one that could be problematic and then there's the PWM, I really don't want to deal with that. Since I just accepted delivery, I'll be putting this laptop through its paces over the next week and we'll see but at this point I'm leaning towards keeping it.
This topic has been closed for comments
Thabks for sharing your thoughts. I recently bought my RB 15 Advanced in Mercury White and it is a beauty to say the least. Like you, I contemplated returning for a base model but ultimately was happy with what I purchased. Curious, what are you using to determine temperature?
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pmai7I'm seeing temps in the 50 to 60c range doing light stuff and 70 maybe 80c playing some games - so far I've only played Skyrim and I realize that's not pushing the system too much
what are you using to determine temperature?
A couple of more thoughts,
I found the keyboard layout to be a bit frustrating, the up arrow position is non standard, and to be honest, I've hit that a few times, cause the cursor to up a line. I fixed it by swapping the / and up arrow keys in synapse
I noticed the screen going black and coming back while on Optimus, and I'm assuming its related to thee igpu and dgpu swapping. I think that's ok, as I mostly live on the dgpu so I changed the system as dgpu only
Those can be considered the negatives, the positives are
The fans are a lot quieter then my older lenovo, the speakers as mentioned are so much better and typing in low light is so much better with the backlight.
I'm really liking the larger trackpad and it seems better and more responsive then the Lenovo
Overall I've decided to keep the laptop instead of exchanging it for a lower-spec'd model. This is doing everything (and more) then I wanted and the only reason to go to the base model is for the second SATA port. I'll instead get a larger NVME SSD and replace the stock drive.
How about the fans? I had one with a broken left fan and I am not sure with the replacement. The fan noise is not really loud - I do not mean the airflow, I mean the noise from the fans itself - but I am not sure if this is normal at my unit.
DarthVader0That new optical key is my future Blade key, I’ll wait till my 2018 die. Unfortunately there’s no 2080 option, I’d choose best option on a laptop to keep it more future proof. That’s also reason why I still enjoy 2018 advanced, if I choose base model in 2018, last year maybe I wanted already an upgrade. Yes it was also difficult at first to getting used to right shift moving from Blade 14 and stealth 2016 nice keyboard layout but now I’m fine and yes trackpad I think one of the best on windows laptop, this’s coming from x MacBook [S]fanboy[/S] user.
So I picked up a new 15" Advanced with optical keys on Amazon. The sale price of 2450 was hard to beat. I threw on the Amazon extended warranty/accidental care. I've only had the laptop a little while, and I'm still loading software and games, but here's some of my observations. Fit and finish, this is a thing of beauty, Very Mac like (in a good way), it feels solid the speakers are wonderful - I'm coming from a laptop where the speakers are pointed down - that never made sense to me. Ports - Decent, I'd say the only thing that I wished it had was a SD card reader. internal expansion - I si Internal expansion - a little disappointing only from the fact that base RB 15 has a NVMe and Sata connector, but the advanced only a single NVMe. It would have been nice to see two NVMe - maybe that's what we'll see in the 2020 update The keyboard - the chroma on the keyboard is great. My thinkpad's backlighting considered be poor at best.. One thing that irks me is that on the optical keyboard, the secondary values are not illuminated, i.e., the @, #, or $. Additionally, I'm not sure if I'm a fan of the optical keyboard, its quite clicky for a laptop and travel seems rather shallow. I think it has more travel then the non-optical keyboard, so I guess that's a win. I ran into some issues with the GPU but seemingly overcame them, thanks to this thread: Razer Blade 15 2019 Advanced Screen Goes Black after Waking Up The screen is gorgeous, and I love the idea of a matte screen, I've used a glossy for so long that I have forgotten how nice it is not to see your reflection :) I've not used the laptop enough to say how buttery smooth the 240Hz is compared to 60Hz. I think I've been focused on too many other aspects. I found the disk to be a bit slow, not overall but I was incurring periods of performance drops. Running Crystal Disk Mark seems to show decent values, so I don't think its a hardware issue, maybe a driver issue, or the system was doing its indexing as I was moving lots of files. In any event. I'll probably be looking to swap the SSD as 512GB is inadequate for this day and age While I haven't pushed laptop terribly quite yet, I'm pleased by the temps, I'm seeing the highs in the 70c range Conclusion I paid a hefty price, albeit still on sale and I mostly really like what I got, though I probably over-spec'ed it. I read enough about the PWM on the 144Hz that I shied away from the base model and since I was going getting the advanced model why not get the optical keyboards ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ Do I return it for a base RB with a RTX 2060? I'm looking at a price of 1,800 vs. 2450, a savings of 650. The thing is, I think I got a good model, I'd hate to trade it in for a one that could be problematic and then there's the PWM, I really don't want to deal with that. Since I just accepted delivery, I'll be putting this laptop through its paces over the next week and we'll see but at this point I'm leaning towards keeping it.
I just want to re-address the fan noise, most of the time, its hardly noticable, and quieter then my old thinkpad, BUT it is more noticable if the fans go full blast and I've not played any games yet that have stressed the system to a point where the fans are running full blast.
I've had the laptop now for 10+ days and it has not only met but exceeded my expectations. Nothing is perfect and there are some things that could be improved but overall I'm quite happy with the laptop
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