MSI GS60 Ghost/ Ghost Pro Thread

Awesome. Thanks for the video. Some questions if you can answer?

What sort of battery life are you seeing when not gaming? I (and I suspect others) are interested in this as a daily office/productivity laptop which can also game. So battery life does matter, unlike a purely gaming laptop.

How's the noise when idle and when gaming?

What's the little hole between the ethernet port and the fan intake?

I assume those temps were stock - you hadn't replaced the thermal paste?

Those look like M.2 SSDs. If they are, are they standard M.2 slots (support both SATA and PCIe) so you could put two PCIe SSDs in there and get a ~2 GB/s RAID-0?
Samsung XP941 M.2 PCIe SSD Review (512GB) - New Ultra Standard Exceeds 140K PCMark Vantage Score | The SSD Review

SDC324C is a Samsung panel (SDC = Samsung Display Corp). From Googling, this seems to be a new panel also being used in the 2014 Samsung Book 8 refresh (NP870Z5G), and possibly the MSI GT60. Can you confirm it's an IPS like Google hints? Do you have any tools to measure its gamut?

1152 shader cores in the GPU confirms it's a Kepler 860m.

 

Awesome review Ken, one of the best I've seen out there.

Back to the point, I'm a little disappointed about this machine Kepler 860M, average battery capacity, odd mSATA form, and above all still a pain to re-paste and upgrade (I wouldnt mind take it apart, but I'm sure most of the users would not).
Beautiful design though, and if you're not too fuss about the matters above, I think this is a great unit!

edit: makes no sense to me that the GE60/70 got Maxwell 860M while the supposed best seller GS60 gets "only" the Kepler version...perhaps the Ghost Pro model will get the updated GPU...
My only hope is now that P34G V2

 

Ken, can you tell us anything about noise levels? Are the fans running constantly, or do they stop when surfing on the web etc?

 

wow excellent review ken..

oh man that was a huge mSATA

ken how long the battery life when normal use and intense gaming ?

 

Thanks for the quick review Ken,

1 suggestion, take the focus off auto!! haha.

To bad about kelper

 

I really want to buy this. Only concern to me is Kepler vs Maxwell. I'm comparing this to the GE60 which I know is a little bit chunkier but it has Maxwell. Still need to know battery life. Therefore if the GE60 is built similar what's your vote in the 15.6 war? Maybe neither option.. ...

GS60 Pros:
Lighter, Thinner 4.5lbs/5.13lbs w/powersupply
Sexy Looking
Better Cooling even with Kepler (Dual Fan)
5083 Peformance Bench

GS60 Cons:
Kepler based GPU
More money
----------------
GE60 Pros:
Maxwell GPU
200 cheaper if similar configured
5185 Performance Bench

GE60 Cons:
Chunkier 5.4lbs/6.10 w/powersupply
Not as sexy
Cooling is not as good (Single Fan)

 

The biggest problem that I have with the GS60 is it´s unusual resolution of 2.880 x 1.620. What options do I have in regards of downscaling the resolution for gaming?

 

Well 2/3rds of 2880x1620 is 1920x1080 I don't know if that means that scaling down will look any better or not.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk

 

No problem.

I haven't test battery life yet since the video was done late night but I am guessing should be around 3~4 hours.

The pin hole are for EC reset if you update the EC.

Yes the temps were with stock thermal paste. everything was stock settings on all of our unboxing videos.

Yes the SSD from the link you posted will work on GS60.

The screen is Samsung 156HL01-102 (SDC324C) , they can't call it IPS because IPS is trademark from LG. but it's IPS equivalent.

Thanks.

Performance wise they are both about the same with Kepler or Maxwell. It's not easy to upgrade components I think due to the thin design, you have flip the MB which is quite difficult.

I haven't notice much noise when I was doing the video, but I can check again tonight.

Yeah something wrong with the camera last night.

 

@GenTechPC

Thanks for the review!
The temps seem good on both the GPU and CPU right?

I am happy with the 1080P "IPS" screen.

If you can get back to us on the load and idle noise that would be great.

I'm not familiar with mSATA, but does that work like an ordinary HD? The stock "128GB mSATA SSD SATA III 6Gb/s" would have the same performance as the Samsung 840 Pro? That would contain the OS correct? The other 1TB would just be data storage I assume right?

 

Yes the temps looks good with stock thermal paste.

I'll check again tonight with the idle and load noise.

The SSD works just like regular hard drive and it's the OS boot drive.

 

Do you have benchmarks on the mSATA SSD?
I'd like to know the 4k reads and writes if possible.

Thanks again bro, I might but this from you guys over at GentechPC. Do you guys offer any type of student or military(veteran) discount?

 

Here's another review

Google Translate

Will repasting help even more with the temperatures?

 

My two main concerns with this laptop is the 3k display and the GPU.

1. The good thing is that downscaling to 1080p should work just fine. But what about running at full 3k res? I heard that windows 8.1 scaling is pretty bad. What kind of negative effects does this have?

2. Have there been any reviews between the 870M vs 860M (maxwell)? How big is the performance difference and will the 860 run significantly cooler? Do they even offer maxwell or only keplar for GS60?

I have also been looking at the GS70. The main reason i'm considering the GS60 is because of the IPS display.

 

The GS60 vs GS60 Pro, I don't see the spec difference

 

...that one says max RAM is 32 but thats not right right?

 

I'll test SSDs as well.

Yes we do offer student and military discounts.



QUOTE=ACEFSPADE;9599998]Here's another review

Google Translate

Will repasting help even more with the temperatures?[/QUOTE]

Yes repaste with IC Diamond will help with temperatures for sure. I did it on GE60 with 860M Maxwell and the temperature drop from 90C + to low 70C.

It only has 2 RAM slots and the chipset only supports 8GB max per slot so the max RAM on GS60 is 16GB.

 

Yes repaste with IC Diamond will help with temperatures for sure. I did it on GE60 with 860M Maxwell and the temperature drop from 90C + to low 70C.




It only has 2 RAM slots and the chipset only supports 8GB max per slot so the max RAM on GS60 is 16GB.[/QUOTE]


Hi Ken, Please PM as I am interested in purchasing from GentechPC but have a few questions. thanks

 

Hi Ken, Please PM as I am interested in purchasing from GentechPC but have a few questions. thanks[/QUOTE]

I can't send you PM since you don't have enough post. you can email me.

 

Hello All

Wow i must say the gs60 looks impressive, just a few questions.

Does anyone know how the acoustics are under heavy load (mostly gaming)?

Will there be either a gs60 or a gs70 with maxwell in the near future?

Regards
Chaca

 

Great review, and looking forward to some SSD benchmarks, battery life, fan noise, and temps with new thermal compound applied.

Have you guys heard anything regarding the gs60 pro with the 3k display and an 870m? I feel like if we're getting Kepler in gs60, it might as well be 870m (but not sure how long the wait will be on that).

Again, thanks for the great review.

 

How much of a performance gain would going from a 860M to an 870M?

 

nvidia gtx 860M = gtx 770M
nvidia gtx 870M = gtx 770M + 15% so performance of this is somewhere between 770M and 780M


And i dont think there will be any GS60 model with GTX 870M ... I was told by MSI presenter/marketing guy that only GS70 will come with 870M

 

Not sure about those particular nunbers, but apparently the 860M is 40% faster than the 760M, and the 870M is 30% faster than the 770M.

Nvidia 800M laptop graphics launches, with added ShadowPlay | bit-tech.net

 

Interesting,

Thanks for the info guys. Depending on the noise for both idle and load, I might pick this laptop up to upgrade my Asus G46VW. What are your guys opinions?

 

ASUS G series su*ks in every point ... design, weight, battery life, display quality, terrible keyboard...

in my opinion MSI GS60/70 Pro would be the best change for your asus but you must consider that its not GT series

 

@charliex3,

Thanks for your input, I agree with you on the battery life, and weight. But the design imo is decent considering it's dual cooling, the keyboard is ok, and for the display quality I have a 1080P IPS display on mine which is decent. So I guess it's a case by case basis.

But yeah seems like overall GS60 seems like a good upgrade

 

It's not a fair comparison by comparing an older performance SKU to a new upper-mid SKU.
The G46VW might had rocked your sky when you got it.
GS60 simply covers another segment of market that wants portable powerhouse with a style (eg; group that don't want to get Apple).

 

MSI GS60-2PEWi716SR21 W8.1 (Art.-Nr. 90546374) - Notebooks / Laptops - computeruniverse

Looks like the high end GS60 with the high res screen comes with the 870 by default. It's a lot of money but I might actually consider it, if we are stuck with a keplar.

Any chance that the 860m is keplar in these beasts, because the 870m is also available for the board? Maybe that way they saved money and could go with one design?

 

First of all its KeplEr -_- not KeplAr ...

and in all GS series is used Kepler architecture ... secondly, if there will be available GS60 with 870M, it will overheat like hell even after repasting ...

 

Ah ok nice thanks, been spelling that wrong my whole life then!

 

And so it begins!

MSI GS60 Ghost $1699.99 @ NewEgg.com

Detailed Specifications:

 

In for one, exactly what I was looking for. Hopefully I can post a mini review sometime soon (though knowing newegg who knows if it's really in stock)

 

Where is the 4th USB port hiding? On every photo I only count 3

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I317 using Tapatalk

 

Must be an error on NewEgg. AFIK there are only 3. That's what it says on the MSI site too. There are 4 on the GS70, though.

 

A GS60 with GTX 870m 3gb here.

MSI GS60 laptop notebook - GS60 2PC-029AU - GS60 2PE-056AU - GTX 860M 2GB or GTX 870M 3GB graphics

Do you think Msi ships them out with 870 as stock or is it changed by the retail company?

 

I have the feeling MSI is going to drop a Pro version that comes with 870. With the dedicated GPU fan, and looking at 860 temperatures, it can handle it. Not saying that it wouldn't be better with Maxwell chips though.

 

Hopefully it won't be long before the gs60 pro 3k 870m version comes out since msi updated their news site with it:
MSI Global - Computer, Laptop, Notebook, Desktop, Motherboard, Graphics and more

It's going to be either that or the P35W, or I guess the P34G or y50 if i want a maxwell 860m. I definitely don't see the point of a kepler 860m if you can get the 870m.
Between the P35W and gs60pro, it comes down to a few (small) things:
gs60 pro: higher res screen, m.2 sata, full metal build, killer nic, ever so slightly thinner & lighter.
p35W: swappable ODD/HDD caddy, looks more professional/subdued , less wide & long, somehow a bigger battery, probably cheaper

Not even going to entertain razer since 8GB of RAM is not nearly enough, and I need at least 2 drives so I can dual boot for work/personal.

 

I would've preferred my GS60 with an 870m, but something tells me they'll be pairing it up with the 3k screen. Besides the added cost I'm not confident the 870m can play the latest and greatest smoothly at that sort of resolution, and if this screen is anything like the one in my buddy's Yoga, scaling down to 1080p looks downright nasty. For me 1080p screen with the 870m would be the ultimate combo, but even if that spec will be available, it's not out just yet. Remember, there is always something better just around the corner

 

It looks like they will have that... at least here in Europe:
MSI GS60-2PEi716SR21 - Core i7-4700HQ 2.40GHz (Win 8.1/GTX 870M) - 0016H2-SKU2 de Notebooks billiger notebook.de

Hmm I was wondering, is the down scaling still really that bad with that high of a bit depth? That's depressing to hear... such a pointless thing on a laptop like this in that case.

 

It might be why they are using a kepler 860M version as they use the same core and it keeps the motherboard the same.

 

I can't tell if i'd rather the 1080 or 3k screen on a 15in laptop. I'm currently using 1080 on 15in with no scaling, and I have no issues there....but I think 3k would make things too small without scaling, then again, I've never seen a 3k screen on a 15in laptop before, so it's all speculation. I'm also wondering what the difference in the screen quality is (I think the gamut on the 1080 is only like in the 6x%?), and the difference in the battery drain. Usually when I game on my laptop, it's hooked up to a 1080 24in external monitor, so I'm not too worried there regarding the extra strain of the 3k monitor on the gpu (though I'm sure games look great in 3k). Choices choices.... hopefully some more reviews will come out with the 870 and 3k display.

 

Here is the results with repasted with IC Diamond:

CPU drops from 82C to 74C (8C difference)

GPU from 74C to 66C (8C difference)



Haven't test the noise yet because I am going to buy a sound level meter tomorrow and test it with the meter.

 

I'm going to get either this or a Razer, not sure yet and I haven't owned laptops from either company yet either.

 

Nice results there. These chips will certainly want a good paste job.

 

Seriously, great results! It also looks like 3d mark 11 score goes up 25 points, closer to the Maxwell score of 5085 on the p34g v2.

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25 points is within run variation

 

After how much time you have to repaste it again?

 

I'm pretty sure that's due to someone at MSI being lazy and doing a cut and paste of another laptop's specs (maybe the GS70?) to their GS60 specifications page, and failing to edit it with correct info in a few spots. AFAIK, the GS60 also doesn't have 2x miniDisplayport, nor S/PDIF. The error has been propagated to nearly every retailer's spec page.

 

Nice! huge difference in temps.
We're you using the fans at the highest settings(Turbo Fan) or did you just use the stock fan profile during the test?