Razer Blade (2014) Owner's Lounge

I'm with you there, and the shortage of PCIe lanes certainly points to the M.2 socket being wired to the SATA bus only. I'll chew on a RAM chip if a M.2 PCIe SSD works.

 

Tell me where all those lanes are going? Because there isn't much in that notebook that would use all the other lanes or as a matter of fact any lanes at all.

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Fair point - my comment was uninformed. There is a more in-depth discussion regarding why / why not the M.2 slot isn't wired up to the PCIe bus in this thread..

I'm purely speculating, but maybe there are other non-technical reasons for Razer to configure the M.2 socket for SATA only.

1. At the time of development, the forecast cost of PCIe SSD's was too high compared to SATA M.2 SSD's
2. Good supply of PCIe M.2 SSD's wasn't certain. Perhaps Samsung had obligations to sell the XP941 to Sony for the Vaio Pro 13 and didn't have enough leftover capacity.
3. Perhaps Razer had an existing contractual obligation with another supplier to purchase M.2 SATA SSD's and it would have been costly to break that contract.

Once again, the above is pure speculation and only informed by my observations of the dynamic between OEM's, distributors and manufacturers over the past 15 years in the RAM / Flash storage industry.

 

For those with spare msata drives, I've been using the MydigitalSSD msata USB 3.0 enclosure for the better part of the day. I have to say I really like it. Loaded a Crucial M500 256GB into it and I get the same benchmarks as if it were in my system. Been playing Borderlands 2 and Skyrim on it. It gets a little warm but nothing major. It's not a permanent solution but it's enough to get me by until I decide what to replace the 128GB drive with(if anything). Certainly will make a nice portable external drive.

 

These enclosures are certainly handy but we've found that SSD drives larger than 240GB/256GB do not play well in them and will cut-out or overheat (MyDigitalDiscount don't recommend using larger than 256GB SSD's in them for this reason). For larger drives you need to move up to an enclosure with a higher capacity/efficiency switching regulator like the one from Bplus.

 

Its a simple matter actually...

How much the wiring of those lanes would cost? This is the crux.

The whole idea about the NGFF is that its a transitional and thus somewhat backwards compatible with sata.

Given that and the possibility of using 2 connections simultaneously the sourcing of the pcie ssds is less of importance, because by the sheer logic it would always be the more expensive alternative. For several reasons including the controller and other things that need change due to the different interface, yes Im implying that the new tech is more expensive

So the pricing of the pcie ssds is only taken into account IF the wiring isn't too cost intensive and on such a limited PCB it is.

Aside that we also have to see how many pcie ssds that exist, and so far the xp941 is the only one more or less not as crippled by its controller, which is the same as the 840/pro/evo. That is unless the next gen has launched and I'm not aware of those.

Anyway another possibility is that they can opt for the specific connector due to thinking on sourcing a more bulk order given that NGFF is going to stay for sometime and thus lower the cost in the long run

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Speaking of mSATA drives in external enclosures, I've got an ordinary rotational external USB 3.0 hard drive (Seagate Backup+ Slim). Would I get similar speeds if it were an internal SATA hard drive? Like, when loading games and other applications off it?

Or would transfer speeds be markedly slower? I don't want to buy an mSATA SSD and then an enclosure just for increased speed. Coming from a laptop with such a hard drive, I actually don't mind slower speeds.

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I'm confused. So have we confirmed that it is not PCIe compatible? Or have all the threads in this forum just been winging it based on speculation? My assumption is that we wouldn't know until someone tried a PCIe specific card in the slot?

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Assuming the external controller isn't crap, it should be the same speeds internal and external. HDD speeds are nowhere near usb 3.0 capabilities.

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Nothing is confirmed. Merely educated speculation. When the folks from HIDEvolution post on this forum (as they told me they would when they figure it out) we will know for sure. They have a new Razer Blade, a XP941, and plenty of modding experience, so I'd say they are our best hope right now. They'll also be giving us the final word on the second slot.

 

FYI, engadget review is up ^^ ​​Razer Blade review (2014): a 'no-compromise' premium gaming laptop

 

Well I hope the battery life numbers wrong....4.5 hours? Maybe they had the brightness up too high or something...

 

Maybe they forgot to turn off the gpu lord knows when I first got my 2013 blade the gpu was actually running some programs like internet explorer so my battery run time was around 4 hours when someone told me to check and turn it off I was doing 6 hours on a single charge wifi browsing and watching streaming movies while having multiple tabs open.

 

Isn't it supposed to swap between the too automatically? the whole "Optimus technology" thing?

 

It flips to the nVidia GPU when a program on the list starts up. IE is on that list by default I believe, as is the Steam UI.

 

Why, exactly, is IE on that list?

 

Probably because it has GPU acceleration for page rendering and animations. I would imagine the iGPU would be enough in most cases.

 

Still, I think that the Review was preety good and for the increases and upgrades between this current Blade and last year's I'd be willing to take the hit in Battery life. I just wish the reviewer would've elaborated more on temperatures and cooling/noise while gaming but ayyy what can you do. I do hope that as you all are saying that the GPU was in fact on and that the battery life is even better but we'll see. Any current Blade owners want to comment on Battery life accuracy of around 4.5 hours?

 

After seeing this review I am fairly disappointed about the battery life. I think the battery life is what made the first generation of the Blade really good.

 

Well, it's just one review, perhaps they didn't have settings right. Hard to believe with Optimus it would drive the battery life down so much unless the screen is a major power drain.

 

I have been consistently getting 4.5-5 hours and that has been a mix of web surfing, MS Office, Adobe Lightroom, etc. And that is not a complete rundown, it usually means that I start at about 97% charge and run down to 10-15%. I have not been playing games on battery thus far, but will try that a bit this week. 6 hours should be possible given my short time with the laptop. It is not an exact science regardless of how much these pubs try to tell you that it is.

I should note that I did not have the 2013, so I cannot comment on the difference, but the results fit firmly with my expectations.

 

It's probably the screen. I would guess setting it on 1080p or 900p with medium brightness on power saving mode would probably add a couple more hours.

 

Have anyone tested the new Blade with the rift? Some say it will not work?

 

The lowest setting on the screen is still fairly bright in my opinion, so I also wonder how much juice this screen is pulling. Don't know anything about power draw of igzo though.

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That engadget review seemed to totally skip on heat or fan noise when reviewing or even check stuff like does the performance throttle with heavy usage etc.

Hard to call it a proper review and more like a preview in my opinion.

 

Changing resolution won't matter at all since all the pixels and backlight are active regardless. Dimming the backlight definitely can help though.

 

K. What battery tests do you want to see? I've got 2 webapps to finish tonight and a 7 page paper. I'll be using my rig for the grunt work, but I can test my blade on the side. Lowest brightness, no GPU, power saver, video playback?

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Have you customized the power saver mode for maximum power savings? I usually set up a super power-saver mode with everything turned down or off. There may be a few settings you can tweak to make the battery last even longer.

Otherwise, that sounds like a fine test.

 

I think power saver mode and remember to set it so that it never sleeps or hibernates. Changing too many settings makes it more difficult to be repeatable and less realistic IMHO.

 

If they had a browser that uses the dGPU and their battery rundown test used the browser, that would do it. Apparently at least IE is in the config by default to use the dGPU.

 

I'm cancelling my order, guys. It's been delayed to 15 May, and I've decided it's too expensive, after two weeks of mulling it over. I'm going to get a Clevo W230ST 13" laptop instead. Design-wise, it's nowhere near the Blade, but it's powerful, small, comparatively light and user-upgradeable. Thanks for the fun and discussion, I'll keep following just to keep up. Have fun with your Blades.

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Fully understandable. Have fun with your new Laptop!

 

Hope you enjoy it! They make great stuff for the price. My only complaints from my old one were the thickness and the funky stargate looking glowing trackpad design(I think only certain models had it)

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I believe you missed the point of setting the screen on lower resolutions. The processor will need to draw more power to push images at 1800p when compared to 1080p or 900p.

 

Hang on dude! There is green light at the end of the tunnel!

 

Ah, no, sorry mate. I've already pulled the trigger. The Blade is one hell of a laptop, but I don't really want to fork out S$3000 (with a student discount) for a laptop with 128GB capacity and no user-upgradeability. I'm on a parent-limited budget, and don't want to make them spend too much.

The Clevo is not as well designed, but to be honest, the benefits (i.e. 2 mSATA bays, 1 SATA bay, professional colour calibration and custom OS installation, for all under S$2700) outweigh the losses (i.e. GTX 870M vs 860M, and epic design). Have fun with your Blade, man.

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How adult of you, haha. I'm sure you'll like it as well. I wouldn't have pulled the trigger either except that for me in the states it was under 2K. I really hope you like your other device. And of course a 3rd/4th version of the Blade may always be waiting at the end of the road!

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Errr..,.. Razer makes a hollywood debut in two and a half men starring Bruce Willis's son who is playing around with his Mac (not pictured) that's a girl (lesbian). Geek with Razer is a geek.

 

Looks like the 17-incher. Pretty cool!

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How did you get yours so cheap?

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128GB model, 10% discount, $100 gift card.

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Pretty sure it is the 14 inch. Looks smaller than Ashton's Mac. Note he has blocked out his logo while the Razer logo is still there. Possibly looking for a new deal? Although isnt he flogging Lenovo netbooks or something. He plays a geek in this show who has made 2 different US$1bn fortunes - one before he bought this house and the other after waking before 10.30am one day because he got blown off by a date. It really is empowering stuff. You should watch it.

 

I have a question about running games on this laptop for you guys that own one: Can you run games at 1600x900 and have it scale to the display perfectly? I have a big concern about games not running well because of the resolution. I don't want to have to be changing desktop resolutions every time I want to run something...

 

The Engadget review mentions a problem with "some" games needing to have the desktop resolution adjusted manually to avoid windowboxing.

 

Engadget review was the same as my experience in the resolution switching aspect. Some games did require switching the system resolution to display correctly.

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As did I. I assume its a windows 8 thing or driver issue as I don't see how the hardware could be causing this requirement.

 

It's an Intel VGA driver thing. Try downloading the latest from Intel's website and it should fix it.

 

If anyone can let me know if that Intel driver update fixes any resolution issues I'd be more than grateful!

Edit: I just thought of a huge potential issue I could have with this laptop. It only has 1 audio jack doesn't it? How do you use a headset with it?

 

My m550 512gb is here.

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The same thing happens on my desktop with dell 24 4k screen.
It s not something related only to razer blade.