Razer Blade 15 Review (i7-8750H & GTX 1070 Max-Q)

1. Introduction2. Testing and Performance3. Cooling, Noise and Battery4. Closing Thoughts5. View All Pages

There is no doubt the Razer Blade 15 is an impressive machine.

Not only is it rock solid thanks to its unibody anodised aluminium chassis, but it is also the smallest 15.6in Windows 10 clamshell laptop with discrete graphics. That means you can use the Blade 15 for both work and play, as it is very portable.

The overall design, too, is improved over the previous 14in Blade. Gone are the curvy edges and chunky bezels – instead, the Blade 15 has a squarer, more professional look. The side bezels have also been shrunk down to just 4.9mm, though the top and bottom bezels are a little thicker.

Battery life is also very impressive for a laptop of this spec, while the large trackpad is one of the best in the business. The Chroma keyboard also provides a good amount of tactile feedback whether typing or gaming.

We have two main issues with the Blade 15 – and the first is with the cooling solution. Razer has taken the unusual decision to use a vapour chamber instead of a more conventional heatpipe-based cooling setup. That in itself isn't a problem – as long as the chips are sufficiently cooled. However, in the case of the CPU at least, it is just running too hot. In the real world, this led to the CPU frequency dropping as low as 2.4GHz across all cores in an effort to stay cool.

Now, we have to stress that for gaming, it is not an issue – games simply won't tax the CPU nearly as much as an AIDA64 run, and in actual fact we saw some hugely impressive benchmark results for the Blade 15. The issue comes when we consider those who might want to video edit or render files with the Blade 15 – the reduced clock speed is going to negatively impact performance in a very noticeable fashion for those users.

The second issue is storage. When paying over £2100 for a premium gaming laptop, we expect more than just a single 256GB drive. What makes matters worse is the fact that there aren't even any extra M.2 slots or 2.5in drive bays, so you are stuck with that single 256GB drive unless you remove it for something else – and that still leaves paying for a drive you no longer have use for. Considering cheaper competitors from the likes of PCSpecialist and Cyberpower all have at least one spare M.2 or 2.5in drive slot, this is a poor show from Razer.

Those issues do get in the way of what is otherwise a premium, very well built machine. Gaming performance is excellent, too, but the reality is you will only be able to fit 3-4 games on the laptop at any one time, while those planning to run CPU-heavy tasks will also experience slow down.

You can buy one directly from Razer for £2149.99 HERE.

Pros

• Lovely aluminium body.
• Very portable.
• Trackpad is large, smooth and responsive.
• Decent keyboard with Chroma lighting.
• Fast 144Hz IPS display.
• Excellent gaming performance.
• Great battery life considering the spec.

Cons

• CPU slows down significantly under intense load.
• Only 1x 256GB SSD with no extra M.2 slots or 2.5in bays.

KitGuru says: The Blade 15 is a lovely machine to look at and use, but it is let down by the single 256GB SSD (with no room for expansion) and the CPU clock speed under sustained load.

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