MSI GS72 6QE Stealth Pro Gaming Laptop Review

Final Thoughts

Pricing 

At the time of writing, the MSI GS72 6QE Stealth Pro is available from Scan Computers for £1499.99. Around this price range, there’s hardly any competing products which feature an identical specification. The Gigabyte P35W v5 currently retails for £1279.99 and includes the same processor, memory capacity, and GPU. Towards the higher end market, you could select the Gigabyte P37X v5 which incorporates a 256GB PCI-E boot drive and GTX 980M for £1599.98. Saying that, the build quality isn’t as solid and lacks the useful extras bundled with the GS72 6QE Stealth Pro.

Overview

Aesthetically-speaking, the MSI GS72 6QE Stealth Pro is flawless and exudes such a premium feel. For instance, the brushed aluminium construction looks spectacular and I’m really fond of the striking black coating. Furthermore, the subtle lines accentuate the unit’s astonishing design and help to create a more sophisticated appearance. The MSI Gaming Dragon logo is instantly recognisable and showcases the laptop’s gaming capabilities in a subtle manner. On another note, the power button’s central positioning enhances the system’s sleek, stylish look. The GS72 6QE Stealth Pro is almost 9 percent slimmer than the previous iteration and measures a mere 19.9mm thick. This makes the laptop more portable and evokes a greater sense of pride when using it in public places. Honestly, this is my favourite aesthetic design from MSI thus far and it’s a work of art which deserves recognition.

The laptop’s 17.3-inch IPS display is pre-calibrated to achieve accurate colour reproduction and targets 100% sRGB coverage. There’s also a number of profiles including Anti-Blue, sRGB, Designer, Office, Movie and Gamer which tunes the screen to match your usage requirements. The press sample I received exhibited an excellent colour gamut and consistent white levels across various luminance settings. Also, the display didn’t contain any IPS glow or suffer from input lag. MSI have deployed a 4K model for an additional fee. I wouldn’t recommend opting for the higher resolution option though because it will be extraordinarily difficult to maintain a solid frame-rate while pushing so many pixels.

MSI decided to include an ergonomic chiclet keyboard based upon low travel distances with support for simultaneous key presses. As a result, the keys are optimised for professional players and respond without any latency. Not only that, the silver lining print shouldn’t fade by a large degree over time and allow the RGB backlighting to flow through the keys in an attractive manner. I was instantly mesmerised by the RGB illumination’s colour spectrum and couldn’t believe how many shades were visible. It’s even possible to set up custom macros, choose from various lighting effects and much more in the comprehensive SteelSeries Engine software. The laptop incorporates Dynaudio speakers and Nahimic virtual surround sound to produce a warm, balanced mix with a rich tonality. Clearly, it’s not a match for a set of dedicated headphones and the audio quality is limited by the laptop’s slim housing. Nevertheless, the volume output and clarity is superb and outclasses other laptops sporting a more basic audio solution.

The system’s i7-6700HQ processor is capable of impressive multi-threaded performance and offers a small boost compared to the previous generation. It’s not really going to be noticeable outside of synthetic testing and the main benefit revolves around Skylake’s support for DDR4 memory. MSI’s Cooler Boost 3 technology utilises four heat pipes to dynamically cool the CPU and GPU according to the current load levels. The system works remarkably well and managed to maintain wonderful thermals for a slim laptop. More specifically, the CPU didn’t exceed 90C under extreme stress and is 14 degrees cooler than its nearest rival. During idle conditions, the system is almost silent which makes for a thoroughly enjoyable user-experience. Once stressed, the fan RPM values suddenly ramp up and can become quite loud. To be fair, this isn’t a strange notion on laptops prioritising an ultra-thin design philosophy. While it’s certainly not the noisiest I’ve encountered, there’s still some room for improvement.

In terms of storage, the Samsung SM951 NVMe boot SSD recorded jaw-dropping sequential read/write speeds and is one of the highest performing drives on the market. The 256GB capacity is large enough to install the operating system and a number of your favourite games. The incredible speeds might not be that apparent when using basic applications, but they can load games faster and reduce video rendering times with large projects. The system’s 1TB mechanical drive is useful for mass storage purposes and able to support the huge file sizes typically seen in modern games.

Speaking of games, the laptop’s GTX 970M consistently achieved a fluid framerate while running demanding titles on extreme presets. The GTX 970M chipset is perfectly suited towards the machine’s 1920×1080 display which makes for a stellar gaming experience. Granted, the unit failed to maintain 60 frames-per-second in Metro Last Light but this is easily resolved by scaling back a few settings. I’m pleased to see the 6GB version used which could leverage extra performance or allow you to use higher graphical settings on games with high video memory requirements. Overall, the system’s GPU balances cost and performance in a proficient manner.

Pros

• Beautiful design
• Bundled extras offer unbelievable value
• Calibrated IPS display with good sRGB coverage
• Easily manages to attain fluid frames rates in demanding titles
• Excellent external multi-monitor support
• Exceptional NVMe storage performance
• Fantastic build quality
• Good temperatures
• Great software package
• Magnificent packaging
• Relatively light for a 17.3-inch gaming laptop
• Responsive trackpad
• Stunning RGB keyboard illumination
• Superb audio

Cons

• Can become loud during heavy CPU workloads
• Disappointing battery life

“The MSI GS72 6QE Stealth Pro is undoubtedly the best laptop I’ve reviewed thus far due to the incredible styling, impeccable build quality and astonishing attention to detail. Furthermore, the Dragon Fever extras are a wonderful promotion which adds a great deal of value to the current package”.

MSI GS72 6QE Stealth Pro Gaming Laptop Review

Thank you MSI for providing us with this sample.