MSI GP62 Leopard Pro 7RD Gaming Laptop Review

Final Thoughts

Pricing

In a price range of about £750-£800 this would I feel comfortably fall within the budget gaming laptop criteria. If you needed a laptop capable of gaming, without being blown away, then this could make an excellent option on a lower budget.

Overview

The laptop combines an understated look with some very nice highlights. It may not blow someone’s mind at a glance and certainly doesn’t have some of the visual appeals of its competitors, but once they see that keyboard they will doubtlessly be impressed.

Performance

While this version included an i7 7700k which was excellent, the Nvidia 1050 just didn’t have the punch required to accompany it. While it largely coped with what our benchmarks threw at it, once it hit a wall (largely it’s small 2gb of VRAM) it struggled to keep up.

Design

I honestly can’t see anyone disliking this laptop. Its sleek, black, understated look combined with that beautiful laptop will make this appeal to all. I only had a couple gripes. One was the location of the scratchpad (I prefer a corner location rather than in front of the keyboard). The other was that the operation lights were on the underside of the front lip. The location of the these LED’s (for HDD operation, power and charging) makes their inclusion almost pointless. You can’t see them unless you stoop down or lift it up.

That being said, the inclusion of a DVD-drive was nice to see given that they are almost being phased out of laptop design.

Gaming and Something Working

The Intel i7-7700 easily handles the day-to-day operations you might have. Running multiple windows at times, I never felt the performance drop. My only complaint is that for such a fantastic processor, the Nvidia 1050 simply wasn’t a good match for me. The processor is streets ahead of the GPU in terms of matching performance.

Should I Buy One?

A nice gaming laptop if you are on a budget, but unless you are into the lighter load games, getting the 1050ti version is almost necessary. I almost hesitated to call this version a gaming laptop given that the 1050 was so completely overwhelmed by moderate to high-performance tests. While I love the processor performance, the standard 1050 simply struggles to compete. The 1050 version is simply a nice budget laptop – Pay the extra, get the 1050ti version.

Pros

• Sleek understated design.
• SteelSeries keyboard is a joy to behold.
• SSD makes start-up fantastically quick.
• Very quiet during non-intensive operation.
• A top quality processor.
• The inclusion of a DVD-drive is a highly pleasant surprise.

Cons

• The Nvidia 1050 is a poor match to the processor.
• Only 2gb of VRAM makes your gaming options limited.
• I dislike the location of the operation lights.
• The inbuilt speakers are poor. Music is very tinny.

Neutral

• I would prefer the scratch pad in a corner.
• The keyboard includes a number pad, but things get a little cluttered in that area.
• Exhaust can get a little noisy while at peak performance.
• The laptop has a fan boost button. A bit unnecessary since it generally just tends to turn on when required anyway.