Don’t fto the sanction fool you — determination is thing stealthy astir this device.

The MSI GS77 Stealth has agelong been the portable enactment among MSI’s gaming elite, and portion that information remained dubiously existent with past year’s 5.4-pound GS76 Stealth, this year’s 0.79-inch-thick, 6.17-pound GS77 has efficaciously launched that thought into the sun. This laptop is big, thick, and bulky, and portion it lacks the light strips and LED grids that different showy gaming laptops boast, its RGB keyboard inactive makes precise wide that it’s for gaming supra each else.

This isn’t needfully a immense sound against the instrumentality — the GS76 was rather airy for what it was, and the GS77 has brought the Stealth bid backmost successful enactment with the remainder of the 17-inch market. It present weighs a spot much than Razer’s Blade 17 and Asus’ Zephyrus S17. And it’s astir the aforesaid value arsenic MSI’s much almighty GE76 Raider.

One tin spot wherefore MSI whitethorn person wanted to spell bigger due to the fact that the chips wrong person been frying conscionable astir each chassis they interaction this year. The exemplary we were sent includes a 12th Gen Core i7-12900H — 1 of the astir almighty mobile chips successful Intel’s past — paired with Nvidia’s RTX 3070 Ti, 32GB of RAM, and 1TB of storage, each powering a 240Hz QHD screen.

But the caller girth takes distant a large vantage that the GS77 utilized to person implicit these models: the GS77 Stealth appears to person mislaid immoderate of what made it desirable arsenic a “portable” buy. The keyboard is connected the level side, the touchpad is uncomfortably stiff, the artillery beingness isn’t good, and the instrumentality is excessively large and excessively dense to reliably bring anywhere. What we’re near with is simply a machine that asks galore of the aforesaid compromises arsenic the astir almighty gaming laptops connected the marketplace without bringing the aforesaid exceptional framework rates.

For much accusation connected our scoring, spot how we rate.

The superior vantage the Stealth has present is its price. My trial portion is presently listed for $2,899. To get this GPU successful the GE76 Raider (which has an adjacent beefier Core i9 arsenic good arsenic a fancier design) would beryllium $100 more, portion a QHD Razer Blade 17 with the 3070 Ti would beryllium a full $3,399.99. I’ve besides been capable to find GS77 models for as debased arsenic $1,799 (for a 144Hz 1080p screen, an RTX 3060, and 16GB of RAM), portion the cheapest Blade connected Razer’s site is $2,799 and the 12th Gen Raider starts at $2,299. Still, $2,899 is hardly a fund price, and it’s worthy knowing what compromises you’re making for that little cost.

First, the facet of the GS77 that’s an unquestionable betterment implicit past year: physique quality. I’ve had gripes astir MSI’s chassis successful the past, but the GS77’s basal and lid are some sturdy and unyielding. The trackpad collected immoderate fingerprints reasonably easily, but the remainder of the chassis wasn’t excessively overmuch of a magnet for them. It’s a nice-looking computer, and it didn’t prime up immoderate scratches oregon dents aft being battered astir successful a suitcase for a fewer days.

Other perks of erstwhile models remain. There’s a bully scope of ports including 2 USB-C, 2 USB-A, a headphone jack, HDMI, ethernet, and an SD paper reader. (The SD scholar is weirdly slower than it was past year, however, as different reviewers person noted.) The QHD show does marque games look great. There are a whopping six speakers inside, and portion they don’t present the champion audio connected the 17-inch market, my games inactive sounded beauteous good. I had nary occupation with the microphones, which enactment AI sound cancellation, and the webcam has a carnal shutter power connected the broadside for immoderate bid of mind.

But the touchpad’s different story.

That said, I truly can’t spot myself utilizing this instrumentality arsenic a regular operator for 2 important reasons: the keyboard and touchpad. The keyboard has beauteous lighting, but it is rather bladed to benignant on, with much of a spongy than a clicky feel. And portion determination is simply a fig pad, the keys are each a spot cramped arsenic a result. The arrow keys, successful particular, consciousness small.

And the touchpad is wherever I truly had trouble. It’s ample but was arsenic hard of a click arsenic I’ve ever experienced connected a touchpad. (And it’s rather large arsenic well.) I felt similar I truly had to thunk my digit down to get a click registered. I was adjacent to plugging successful a rodent (something I don’t bash erstwhile I’m investigating for productivity usage cases, arsenic a wide policy) due to the fact that of however overmuch I hated navigating with it. These aren’t unheard-of compromises erstwhile it comes to 17-inch gaming laptops, but they bash underscore however small I’d urge this to treble arsenic a regular driver.

The dragon’s inactive there, but it’s subdued.

When it comes to framework rates, however bash these specs stack up? With each sliders maxed out, Red Dead Redemption 2 ran astatine an mean of 60 frames per 2nd astatine autochthonal solution (technically 59.3, but we tin telephone it 60). That jumped up to 65 astatine 1080p. On Shadow of the Tomb Raider successful 1080p, we saw an mean of 83 frames per 2nd with ray tracing connected Ultra (its maximum setting) and 121 with the diagnostic off. At autochthonal resolution, these translated to 58 frames per 2nd (another fig we tin loosely telephone 60) and 86, respectively. All successful all, much than playable.

The GS77 enactment up an absurd 400 frames per 2nd connected the CPU-heavy CS:GO in 1080p and a inactive rather precocious 286 astatine autochthonal 1440p. The lone rubric that gave the crippled immoderate occupation was Cyberpunk 2077, which — astatine autochthonal resolution, astatine maximum settings, with ray tracing cranked up to “Psycho” — ran astatine 19 frames per 2nd (but achieved 33 astatine those settings successful 1080p).

All successful all, these are surely an betterment implicit the results from past year’s model, and they amusement that you shouldn’t person occupation moving astir modern games astatine QHD resolution, though they’re beneath what you tin get retired of pricier Core i9 and RTX 3080 machines. There’s a disappointing omission, though: the GS77 doesn’t enactment MUX. This constituent (which some the Raider and the Blade bash have) allows laptops to enactment adaptive features similar G-Sync and tin besides pb to a important show difference. It’s an unusual happening to exclude astatine this terms constituent and thing I’d ideate galore folks who are consenting to wage $2,900 won’t beryllium keen to compromise on.

See that small switch? That’s for the webcam.

When it comes to different workloads, the Stealth was much competitive. It completed our five-minute, 33-second 4K Adobe Premiere Pro video export trial successful 2 minutes and 15 seconds. The Raider bushed this time, clocking successful astatine 1 infinitesimal and 56 seconds, but it’s 1 of precise fewer laptops that has ever done so. Last year’s 3070 GS76 was 12 seconds slower. (These aren’t meant to beryllium apples-to-apples comparisons, arsenic antithetic versions of Premiere tin alteration implicit time; they’re much meant to springiness you an thought of however agelong an export mightiness take.)

The GS77 besides bushed the GS76, arsenic good arsenic the Blade and different originative workstations similar the Gigabyte Aero 16, connected the Puget Systems benchmark for Premiere Pro, which tests unrecorded playback and export show astatine 4K and 8K. (It did suffer to the Raider by a lot). This isn’t a laptop I’d urge radical usage for bureau workloads, truthful the GS77’s bully show present isn’t the biggest constituent successful its favor.

MSI’s bundle is decidedly not arsenic glitchy arsenic it has been successful the past fewer years, which is an encouraging sign. I had nary occupation adjusting instrumentality profiles and specified with the preinstalled programs. I did tally into 1 glitch wherever the surface started turning disconnected erstwhile I tried to tally games (a occupation connected a gaming laptop). MSI sent maine a replacement unit, which didn’t grounds that problem. Still, it’s not the benignant of happening we emotion to spot connected $2,900 products.

And past we get to what I spot arsenic the biggest compromise here: the artillery life. I was lone averaging astir 2 hours and 16 minutes of continuous usage connected this thing, with immoderate trials adjacent lasting nether 2 hours. That’s got to beryllium adjacent to the worst artillery tally I’ve ever gotten retired of a gaming laptop. While it’s mostly understood that cheaper laptops volition person little almighty chips successful them, having to springiness up artillery beingness successful summation to that powerfulness (the Raider lasted maine astir 2 hours longer with the aforesaid workload) is simply a pugnacious pill to swallow.

If you’re looking purely astatine framework rates connected paper, this laptop is simply a good buy. It tin tally each kinds of games astatine QHD solution without burning your basement down.

But the Stealth moniker, and the mode the enactment has historically been positioned, mightiness connote to immoderate radical that this instrumentality is simply a bully prime for much than conscionable gaming. It’s not; MSI’s changes to the Stealth enactment person made it much almighty astatine the disbursal of different features that made it, good Stealthy. It’s excessively large and dense to beryllium consistently carrying astir successful a briefcase oregon backpack, the artillery beingness isn’t usable for regular enactment distant from an outlet, and the keyboard and touchpad conscionable wouldn’t beryllium my prime to usage each day. This is nary longer truly a portable alternate to the Raider. It’s conscionable a much affordable mentation of the Raider.

Which is fine, if that’s what you’re after. But with the Raider delivering much almighty specs, amended artillery life, much RGB, and an MUX power for a mates 100 dollars more, I deliberation it delivers an all-around amended acquisition that volition beryllium worthy the wealth for radical buying successful this range.