MSI GS70 2QE Stealth Pro review

The screen is a Full HD TN panel. It’s a good performer, and our calibrator reported sRGB coverage of 84.4 per cent. Contrast levels were high as well, and we recorded them at 1062:1. This, combined with reasonably low black levels of 0.25cd/m2 made for a fairly pleasing image, although the actual colour balance was slightly off, with reds and pinks losing out to oversaturated blues and greens. These aren’t things you’ll notice while gaming, but you’ll want to bear them in mind if you’re going to be doing colour sensitive work. The panel’s matt coating makes viewing easier when in brightly lit conditions but it leaves a slightly messy grain over some brighter colours. It’s not noticeable most of the time, and the easy viewing granted by the matt coating is probably worth it.

The rest of the MSI GS70’s build is superb. The chassis is plain, but the simple addition of MSI’s red dragon Gaming Series badge draws the eye in and sets it apart from the Chillblast Helix. It’s very thin at 21.8mm when closed, although how useful this is on such a large laptop is questionable. Aside from the display outputs, you get gigabit Ethernet, three separate 3.5mm audio jacks, four USB3 ports and a card reader.

The speakers are DynAudio branded and include a subwoofer. For a laptop, they’re surprisingly good, with reasonable bass presence and a very high maximum volume. That’s not to say they’re anything close to a good pair of external speakers, and in all likelihood a serious gamer will be using a proper gaming headset most of the time, but at least they’re there for when you’re catching up on TV or streaming video.

Battery life is pretty poor, even for a gaming laptop. Our light-use test took it from a full charge to empty in just 2 hours and 58 minutes. Expect less than half that when playing games.

There are various ways to increase power efficiency, including two confusing and conflicting sets of power options. The Shift tool, which is found as a shortcut on the keyboard, lets you choose between three modes: Green, Comfort and Sport. What these do exactly is never explained, even in the manual. There’s also a System Control tool which lets you choose from even more modes, including Movie, Presentation, Game, Office and Eco Off. Meanwhile, the Dragon Gaming Centre application, yet another piece of software, allows you to switch “High Performance” on and off. All these things seem to do is override the Windows 8 power settings you’re likely to be familiar with already. We’d recommend leaving all of those settings alone.

CONCLUSION

Overall, we’re impressed with the MSI GS70 2QE Stealth Pro. It’s supremely powerful thanks to Nvidia’s latest graphics chip but manages to maintain its elegance with its slim and relatively light chassis. Like any early adopter, you do have to pay a premium for this. We’d say the investment is probably worth it, because you’re likely to be able to run the latest games on higher settings for longer, and a laptop like this is a long-term investment.