MSI had a lot to show off, including a ‘niche of a niche’ – a backpack PC for VR (it was actually announced just before HP’s Omen X: Everything Optional on HP’s Omen Laptop).
There was little in-depth detail about most of the products – possibly because there were so many! Unlike HP, though, it confirmed that the Backpack PC is a real product that will be released, and named after the graphics card being used: Nvidia’s GTX 980, although MSI hopes to upgrade this to the new GTX 1080. The whole unit weighs less than 5kg, despite the metal frame and dual batteries.
Those batteries appear to be more powerful than the ones that HP is using in its concept, able to run VR games for up to an hour and a half, or power up to five hours of video viewing.
Continuing with the VR theme were two Titan SLI gaming laptops, the GT83 and GT73, both designed for VR. Both meet the VR Ready criteria. The GT83 is the most powerful, using GTX 980 SLI graphics and supporting MSI’s Matrix Display technology, which enables up to three external displays to be driven by the unit. The step-down model, the GT73, uses dual GTX 980M cards and also supports external displays.
Another laptop was the GS63 Stealth Pro – a Computex Best Choice Golden Award winner. Billed as the world’s lightest gaming laptop, at 1.9kg, the model is 17.7mm thick. It has a cooling system using five heat pipes and Whirlwind Blade fans. Dual thermal modules keep the Core i7 processor and GTX 970M graphics card cool.
MSI’s last laptop was the GS73, using GTX 970M graphics and a similar cooling system to the GS63.
Two all-in-one PC series for the gaming market were also shown off. These feature Core i5 or i7 processors and GTX 960M, 970M or 980M graphics. One of these, the Gaming 24, is available with an UltraHD display. Both the Gaming 24 and Gaming 27 feature the Nahimic Audio Enhancer (providing virtual surround sound, frequency leveller and voice leveller when using headphones).
