Is the Razer Blade's screen really that horrible?

I have to stand corrected then, that's poor.

 

I am quite interested in the RB14, but this screen issue is blocking me from making a choice.
I'd like to have some first-hand experience, but i live out of the US and stores here don't sell it.
Would you know of other computer models that share a similar panel ? I gather that some Dell XPS and HP Envy do, but would you happen to have more details ? As in a precise model or series so i can go check it out for myself.

 

Review Dell XPS 14 Ultrabook - NotebookCheck.net Reviews, the razer`s screen is matte though so slightly higher contrast and better out door visibility, a bit grainy for my liking but it definitely does a good job at removing glare.

 

In short, the display portion of the review is spot-on.

 

Dell XPS 14?

 

EDIT: Posted in wrong thing. My apologies.

 

I find that the screen isn't that bad at all. Certainly could be nicer in terms of viewing angles and colour gamut, but in itself it's a poor reason to not buy it in my opinion.

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hahaha. this thread is epic. guys.

the screen on the blade 14 is perfectly fine. dont get caught up in all the hype from the retina/dell/alienware hype. yes its a tn panel. yes it has limitations. but if you're sitting in front of it playing or working it's fine.

if color accuraccy is 'critical' you can always connect a high end monitor for proof work etc.

nothing comes close to the blade for raw performance vs size vs weight vs battery vs portability vs the screen.

if you want the perfect screen there are other options but the other options will sacrifice the essence of what makes the blade the best all round performance notebook in the category.

it's been around long enough that anybody can go to a store and see for themselves that the screen is fine.

don't listen to forum warriors who are searching for the perfect notebook - it doesn't exist.

the 'normal' person looks at my blade and their reaction is one of awe. nobody says 'man that notebook is epic but the screen is terrible ' they just say 'man that is awesome, where can i get one?'

 

I agree with Zero. I have a blade 14 and I still got caught up in all of the hype and went out and purchased a rMBP. After about a week or so I realized that the rMBP just didn't hold up against the blade. I quickly proceeded to return the rMBP. Ooh by the way the Macbook was the maxed out 15" so it was a close to Apples to Apples as possible. No pun intended.


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What didn't you like about the rMBP? I prefer doing work on my late 2011 MacBook Pro 13, partly since I like OS X.. Maybe I need to try to see one in person.

 

My roommate has the newest top tier rMBP 15. Got it roughly the same time I bought my Blade. The screen is a LOT nicer, but some stuff scales funky. When you bootcamp Windows, the rMBP heats up a bit, since the Nvidia GPU is the only option there. Also, the power button is where the delete button is for most other laptops, so my roommate has accidentally turned off his laptop that way. However, the CPU is quite a bit more powerful, so some more CPU bound games actually do better.

 

Can someone tell me about the quality of the Pro's Screen?

 

I know you are trying to justify spending 2k on a laptop with the screen quality of a 200 dollar netbook. I bought the blade as well. The screen is absolutely horrid. I am not exaggerating. The angles, the COLOR (the important one) is as pitiful as my samsung chromebook. I still have my blade, as well as 2 MSI GT60s 20D's and now a Gigabyte P34G. The blade sits in the corner collecting dust unfortunately. I wanted to love it. I really did, it really is a beautiful machine, spec wise and aesthetics, however, the WORST thing that the designers could screw up on was that panel choice. I guess for some, that is very important.

 

I'll take that Razer Blade off of your hands if it's just collecting dust

 

if its a Blade 17 with a quad core ill trade for my m17x r2 with extra parts cpu heat sink fans ect. if interested send me a message and ill send some pictures and stuff and maybe we can work out a deal

 

Been debating getting the razer 14 and this thread in particular.
Current/previous laptop was a 2012 Sony Vaio S 13 premium
I looked at the gigabytes (p34 and p35), considered waiting for an Aorus, lenovo Y40/y50.. even considered an msi gs70.
No matter what I picked there was to be a compromise. In the end I decided to take a chance on the blade 14s screen. Everything else was perfect, could i live with it though.........

My blade arrived on Friday.
Love it!
The display is better than the Vaio. Colours are good. And viewing angles horizontally are better, while vertical are about the same if not slightly better.

Taking into consideration everything else, I can definitely say this screen doesn't detract from the awesomeness that is the razer blade.

Don't believe the naysayers... this is the dogs bollox of laptops. Nothing else comes close

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I must say that your Viao screen must have really been crappy if the Blade's screen is better. As much as I like my Blade, the vertical viewing angle is pretty bad.

 

Vaio screen was acceptable but yeah, not the best either.
But it's 1 bad thing compared to lots of other good ones with the blade.
Overall I would love better viewing angles, but this is acceptable to me. I was worried that this was going to be unusable - it's not, far from it.

 

I had the blade 14 back in August and some people in here are not understanding the issues with the panel correctly. The TN technology and the HD+ resolution itself is not the problem, as a matter of fact, the 1600x900 resolution is perfectly adequate for the size.

The real problem I had with the display of the Razer 14 is the quality of the Panel itself and has nothing to do with its resolution or being that it's a TN panel. The problem is that it's such a lousy looking screen that the black levels are horribly high (I think more than 2.0cd/m) where the display looks cloudy and fuzzy and the blacks looks grey. Another bad thing I didn't like about the display is the aggressive anti glare coating that made the screen look horribly grainy/sparkly like grease was smeared all over it.

I had high quality TN matte panels in the past and it wasn't as grainy as the Razer 14 and my former sony vaio s13p. So again, the problem isn't the viewing angles or because it's a TN panel or not FHD, the real problem is the severe low quality display with high black value cd/m levels, aggressive graininess/sparkly effect, low color gamut and not even close to covering SRGB.

 

You said it more eloquently than I did when I returned my Blade 14" last summer. The display is embarrassing for a laptop of otherwise exceptional quality.

 

So is the display good or bad? I'm getting mixed results here.

 

What I'm gathering is that it's good enough for single user at a narrow viewing angle.

 

The screen isn't great. I wouldn't know how bad it is compared to every screen, but its definitely the worst out of the 5 laptops I've owned/used. However, it is perfectly usable for gaming IMO.

I would say good enough, though would have expected a nicer screen for the price.

 

I'd agree with good enough
Not the worst, far from the best

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Bad. I've never owned a laptop with a worse screen

 

Just got my Blade this weekend Saturday. I was on a Macbook pro 13 Retina which i have passed on to my wife. The Blade's screen is not so bad. Its not great but for gaming, which is what this machine excels at its perfect. Coming from the Retina, which btw I didn't even use at retina resolutions ( i would set it at 1920x1080 using rdm ) I expected to be a major let down on the Blade. It is a matte finish and viewing angles aren't so hot. But to be honest its no deal breaker in my opinion.

 

I couldn't find a place to see one of these in person. Maybe I'll spot one in the wild somehow and be annoying while someone is sipping their latte.

 

I believe some BestBuy stores have them on a display. At least down here in Miami they did.

 

So a direct comparison between it and the Retina MBP 13, how bad is the screen? Because I'm on the fence and currently have a rMBP 13 too.

 

I tried stopping by one in Manhattan, no dice. It's all "ship to store" looking online and trying various cities that have stores, so my guess is they don't bother giving it a place in the store anymore. Looking at all the notebooks outside of Apple's that best buy had it's easy to see why. It was nearly double the price of any other windows notebook. Most best buy shoppers probably didn't see the value in it.

 

Same here, before I ordered mine (which will be here in about 6 hours) I went to a BB store to look at a Asus I saw on their website (didn't like it was all plastic) and to see if they had a RB for me to look at. They had the Asus but no RB. I'm sure the screen is fine, it may not be the best but I'm sure there is worse. I don't think it's fair to try to compare these to a HackBook anyway. I despise Apple with every fiber in my being, the RB is a thin gaming laptop, where the Hackbook is more for photo and editing. It's kinda like trying to compare a sports car to a SUV, both are good at what they are built for, but you can't judge one by the others standings. You can't fairly compare those two.

 

I wont sugarcoat it. Its not retina at all, but not many laptops are.You will tell a difference for sure. Will it sway you not to buy I cant say. For me, I'm somewhat picky and I think about it like this. Yes my macbook pro's screen was awesome but the power the Blade pushes is worth it. I guess you could say it could be better but its defiantly not bad.

 

I'd have to agree with you on the mac/razer comparison. I believe Best Buy wont be carrying them in store anymore. How are you enjoying yours ?

 

Were you replying to me? I haven't bought one yet. I've narrowed it down to rMBP 15 vs this. Siding with the blade since I do have a 2011 mbp 13 for my OS X fix. I prefer working on OS X, and I can bootcamp windows, but I like the pairing of a 765M and 900p.. I'll ponder some more.

 

Well if you are mostly going to work on it, I don't see why or how the Blade is going to be a good choice at all.

The screen isn't great, but I had the "advantage" of making my switch to the Blade 14 from the Dell XPS M1530. The screen quality was pretty much the same other than a slightly higher res.

Your average person (ie not most of us) looking at the screen wouldn't fault it at all.

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I want something light and powerful that I can take my Dev environment with me everywhere and game as well. I'm actually keeping a close eye on the MSI GS60 at the moment. Should be released next week.

 

The MSI GS60 looks cool. I myself ultimately choose the Blade for the size and build along with very powerful specs. whatever you choose enjoy it and get your game/work on!

 

I basically have an exact replica of my Dev env on both is OSX and Win.. If rather go with windows since it will be replacing my hulking 9lb windows monster..

 

Just got my Razer Blade 14 in the mail, the screen is horrid. The worse part is that matte texture to it, it looks like there's a ton of fingerprints smeared all over the screen, or like there's a super cheap screen protector over it. The colors and viewing angles I can deal with, but even typing this, the screen is disgusting. It's distracting how smudged it looks. I had the laptop for all of 5 minutes, and I already know it's going back.

Worst part about the laptop is how the power brick has a very loud, constant, high pitched, EEEEEEEEEEEE noise the whole time it's plugged in.

If you're on the fence about the screen, don't buy it. It's as bad as what you hear and worse. If you still want it, Razer has a 14 day money back guarantee so order it knowing you can send it back for a refund. I have a feeling you'll be disappointed though.

 

I didn't find the screen that bad. Yes it's the worst part of the Blade 14 but it's what I would just call "ok". The colors and contrast aren't great, but the brightness and matte is awesome. Too many screens are glossy nowadays and I hate it.

Mine didn't have any smudges or anything, the screen is perfectly matte and clean. I will say while I love the aluminum finish on exterior, I have seen smudges there. My solution was to order vinyl protector or the top/bottom and inside, I'll see how that goes.

While I haven't used my charger much yet since I have it stowed away in my travel bag (I am using a larger old one I had sitting around from m14x maybe??) I did plug it in and could only hear a very, very, quiet noise if I held it right up to my ear. I would never have known about the sound if I hadn't read about it on here. Maybe some of them are louder than others? My hearing has always been excellent so I'm not just deaf.

I can understand wanting to be picky on a premium machine, so if it's not what you wanted or are unhappy you should return and get something that fits what you need.

 

I didn't mean that the screen had smudges on it, but yet that it looked like the entire screen was a smudge. I (somehow) get a lot of smudges on my desktop monitors, and they always catch my eye and distract me. With the Blade 14, the entire screen would distract me and it looked exactly like a smudge on a desktop monitor but covering the whole screen. I've never had a matte display before, but if that's an example of 'perfectly matte' I will never buy one again in my life. The reviews saying it looks like a Chinese quality screen protector were very true for me.

The charger did have the quiet noise you described, but it also came with another noise I haven't heard anyone complain about yet. It was loud, and it sounded like a constant ringing in the ears. It was so bad that I could not leave it plugged in. If you've ever been to a loud concert and had your ears ringing on the drive home, that's exactly what it sounded like the whole time.

 

Got my wife's RB 14 yesterday and finally fired it up today. While the screen is not quite as nice as the RBP its not nearly as bad as I thought it was going to be after reading some of these posts. It is quite useable and the wife likes it just fine.

 

If you was referring to me, I love mine. Plays everything very well and feels like a very sturdy build. I know you can get laptops with better specs, bt I needed portability and power, and the RBP was the best match for me.

 

There has to be some discrepancies between Blade 14 screens. With the one I had, there wasn't a person I showed it to that didn't say the screen was awful. Either way, I'm extremely jealous of those who love their Blade 14. I really wish I could love it as much as you guys

 

I've wondered this too since the reports seem so different. Honestly it wouldn't surprise me if they were the same and it's just that we all have different expectations and different vision. What may bother one person, may not bother the next.

Totally different example but it's like mouse trackpads, I want real buttons at bottom and no push button trackpad itself. Some people really want no buttons and a pushable trackpad. The lack of one feature may bother someone and not another, just like an "ok" screen that's not great may not bother some.

I used HWinfo64 to get info on my screen, it's a "AU Optronics B140RW01" also says (Manuf) "B140RTF [Dell P/N XYH93]". If anyone wants to check to see if theirs is different. This was purchased new a week ago if that matters.

 

Mine is absolutely the same:

AU Optronics B140RW01
B140RTF [DELL P/N: XYH93]
Date Of Manufacture: Week: 0, Year: 2011

My Blade is one of the very first ones. Ordered 30 mins after the the website went live.

 

So my wife has been using the RB 14 for a couple of days and I have played with it a good bit as well and can honestly say the screen we got is really good. Don't know if we hit the panel lottery jackpot or if Razer changed the screen or what but the screen we got is almost as good as my RBP. Viewing angles are actually pretty good. One thing that is doesn't do is get nearly as bright as the reviews I have read. Its max brightness is closer to the RBP. Her on the go laptop was and m11x R1 and the screen on the RB 14 is 1000 times better than the one in the m11x. Needless to say she is very very happy. The fact that we got the RB 14 256Gb for $1600 is just icing on the cake. Great little notebook and well worth every penny.

 

Would you mind and check the info of your screen with HWInfo64?

 

Figure i'd attach mine also for reference.

 

HWInfo reports exact same for me - and mine is only 1 month old.

I suspect you're right..
I don't think the display is anything wonderful - but I don't hate it. I don't see the smudging so many folks complain about, just matte grain.. Maybe it's the same. Vertical viewing angle is bad, but so have the previous laptops i've owned, and I rarely have an issue with it. I keep brightness 2 steps above bottom and have yet had to increase beyond it. Yet when I do go full brightness it's still sharp for me.