I don’t normally preorder video games, however I used to be so desirous to play Starfield that I made an exception. I shelled out further money to play the sport a meager five days early. There was only one drawback. I might be out of city at a nerd con for these very same 5 days. Fortunately, the Razer Blade 14 laptop computer made it potential for me to do each.

Razer’s newest gaming laptop computer packs AMD’s beefy new Ryzen 9 7940HS processor, Nvidia’s RTX 40-Series GPU, and as much as 32 GB of RAM. It’s an absolute sledgehammer of specs that’s able to tearing by way of probably the most demanding video games you’ll be able to play. That’s nice! My plan to play Starfield in a lodge whereas I used to be on trip meant I wanted all the power I could get.

Portable Powerhouse

Nearly each facet of the 14-inch Razer Blade feels premium in a approach that few laptops with out an Apple emblem on them pull off. The aluminum chassis is sturdy and smooth, with a clean and spacious trackpad. There’s a USB-A and USB-C port on each the left and experience facet of the machine, making it handy to plug in peripherals regardless of the place you set it up.

While the Blade can cost through USB-C, all that horsepower beneath the hood requires a bit extra power than your typical charging block can present. The laptop computer comes with its personal proprietary charging cable that plugs into the left facet, in addition to a considerable energy block—the scale of brick that you simply’d anticipate to see subsequent to a console just like the PS5. If you’re planning to play on this factor whereas it’s charging, you’ll in all probability want that hefty block. That generally is a damper on its portability, however for charging whereas it’s idle, USB-C can suffice.

Yet, in my testing, I solely often wanted to fret in regards to the charging state of affairs. The Blade 14 holds a 68.1 watt-hour battery which Razer claims will give the laptop computer as much as 10 hours of battery life for a “full day of work or play.” That’s clearly going to be lower down fairly a bit when you run that 4070 graphics card at full throttle on a sport like Starfield, however I nonetheless managed to play for a number of hours with out even interested by battery life.

Luminous Luxury

If I have been a much less disciplined author, I may spend this whole evaluation speaking in regards to the show on this laptop computer. The Razer Blade 14 incorporates a 16:10 IPS show with a dense 2,560 x 1,600 decision. The slightly-taller-than-usual facet ratio has a refined however actual impact on how video games really feel. It’s sort of like when movies switch to Imax for motion scenes, however on a regular basis.

The display screen goes nearly all the best way to the sting with barely any bezel, and it’s nearly agonizingly vibrant. I stored it at round 30 to 40 % brightness more often than not, and even then it typically felt too vibrant. Its stellar distinction ratio contributed to this sense fairly a bit. For a display screen that may put out almost 500 nits of sunshine, the black ranges are so deep that on darker elements of a picture, the display screen feels prefer it disappears in a darkish room.

The coloration copy on the display screen is equally spectacular. Razer says that the show reproduces one hundred pc of the DCI-P3 color space, which is a flowery approach of claiming that it’s able to displaying some ridiculously wealthy colours. In reality, colours seemed so good on this display screen that it took me quite a bit longer than it ought to have to note that Starfield’s coloration grading is kind of awful.

After I bought again, I moved Starfield play over to a different PC, however even whereas taking part in on greater shows and extra highly effective machines, I discovered myself lacking the Blade. A 14-inch display screen could be slightly small by gaming laptop computer requirements, but it surely’s such an expensive show that it makes a few of my favorite monitors in my home really feel subpar.

Oh, sure, and as if that weren’t sufficient, it additionally reaches a 240-Hz display screen refresh fee. Not that this mattered a lot while playing Starfield, however when taking part in a couple of rounds of Overwatch 2, I’d by no means skilled something smoother.