At the same time that MSI sent the GT76 Titan DT 9SG, they also sent us the GE65 Raider 9SF. The new GE65 is naturally not as thick as the GT series, and not as thin as the GS series. Although it uses the Intel’s top-of-the-line i9-9880H CPU and the Nvidia 2070 full version graphics card, with a 144Hz/240Hz e-sports screen and a thin-bezel design, 16G DDR4 memory and 1TB PCIe NVMe SSD + 1TB HDD. The design of the 7-heat pipe system inherits MSI’s exclusive cooling design, which can handle the temperature of the machine well, establishing a comfortable gaming experience, but can convenient gaming compete with desktop performance?
Product Specification
GE65 Raider 9SF Tech Specs from Official Website
https://au.msi.com/Laptop/GE65-RAIDER-9SX/Specification
Product Unboxing
Package Appearance
The outer packaging is still packed with yellow recycled carton
The inner box is made of black cardboard. Unlike the GT series, there are no lines and patterns on the GE series box
The laptop is protected by a thick and shock-proof foam, and the main body is wrapped by a double-layered suit which has an anti-static layer and a black fabric layer
Product Analysis
Compared to the previous-gen GE63 8SF, 9SF has taken off the RGB L-shaped decorative strip on the A panel, replaced with two I-shaped red-light strips, and changed the red dragon shield in favour of a silver metal onel
The D panel has increased the heat dissipation
The maximum opening angle is about 130°
The 240 Hz B panel has the thin-bezel design, using a full-sized keyboard and a large-sized Key-separation designed touchpad
The RGB Per-key keyboard comes from Steelseries
The 2.2(2x2W Speaker,2x3W Woofer) sound system is still from Dynaudio
The GE63 nameplate sticker
The rear side of the laptop has a GT series like design, which increases the area of the cooling and prints the ‘Raider’ nameplate
The power supply is the 280W ABP-280BB from Delta, the output is 20V, 14A
The laptop overall weight: 2.36KG
The power adapter package overall weight: 1.03KG
I/O Analysis
The laptop front side – the thickness of 27 mm, the three indicators in the middle are wifi, battery, and hard drive
The laptop rear side – The heat sink cover is redesigned and enlarged
The laptop right side – I/O is 2 x USB3.2 Type-A Gen1, a full-size SD (XC/HC) card readers and the power jack
TThe laptop left side – I/O is the Kensington lock port, Killer Gb LAN, an HDMI(4K @ 60Hz), a mini DP, a USB3.2 Type-A Gen2 and headphone + microphone port
Hardware & Software Introduction
HWiNFO64 System details
Aida64 CPU details
Thaiphoon Burner – Memory Details
LAN chip – Killer E2600 Gigabit LAN
WIFI Card – Killer Wi-Fi 6 AX1650x with Bluetooth v5
SSD – 1TB Samsung PM981
HDD – 1TB Seagate Barracuda
Screen Panel – 15.6″ IGZO Panel, 1080P 240Hz manufactured by Sharp
Run-time Benchmark Test
CPU-Z snapshots
CPU-Z Benchmark – according to the result, there is around 80% performance compared with a desktop version i9-9900K
GPU-Z snapshots
AIDA64 Memory & Cache benchmark
Cinebench R15 Results – Single core & multi-core
Cinebench R20 Results – Single core & multi-core
FURMARK test result
SSD Benchmark – TxBENCH
3DMark Fire Strike Extreme : 9,009
3DMark Fire Strike Ultra : 4,720
Unigine Superposition (Extreme 1080P) : 4,602 | Avg FPS : 34.42
Final Fantasy XV – Benchmark (1080P,HQ pack) : 8,074
Overclocking Test
Since the MSI Dragon Center provides overclocking options, we definitely need to use it. In all tests, fan cooling is selected to Auto mode and Cooler Boost mode if necessary
We also enabled the Ultimate Power Performance setting in Win10
None Overclocking Idle – Fan Auto mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 3,600rpm | CPU package Temp : 59°C | CPU average FQ ≈ 3.1Ghz
None Overclocking – Aida64 Stress FPU – Both Auto and Max cooling, CPU Overheat and throttled
Fan Speed ≈ 5,520rpm | CPU package Temp : 99°C | CPU FQ ≈ 3.6Ghz (Max 23% loss)
In MSI Dragon Center, under Turbo mode, we have maximised all OC settings both on CPU and GPU
Overclocking Idle – CPU Overheat and throttled – Fan Auto mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 4,400rpm | CPU package Temp : 81°C | CPU FQ ≈ 4.3Ghz (Max 7% loss)
Overclocking Idle – Fan Cooler Boost mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 5,500rpm | CPU package Temp : 51°C | CPU FQ ≈ 4.7Ghz
Overclocking – Aida64 Stress FPU – CPU Overheat and throttled – Auto Mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 4,800rpm | CPU package Temp : 99°C | CPU FQ ≈ 3.9Ghz (21% loss)
Overclocking – Aida64 Stress FPU – CPU Overheat and throttled – Fan Cooler Boost mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 5,520rpm | CPU package Temp : 97°C | CPU FQ ≈ 3.7Ghz (Max 22% loss)
PRIME95 Test – CPU Overheat and throttled – Fan Cooler Boost mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 4,485rpm | CPU package Temp : 84°C | CPU FQ ≈ 4.6Ghz (3% loss)
overclocking GPU & CPU – Furmark Normal test – Fan Cooler Boost mode turned on – CPU Overheat and throttled
Fan Speed ≈ 5,600rpm | GPU Max Temp : 72°C | GPU Max Clock ≈ 1.21Ghz | Max Memory Clock ≈ 1.75Ghz | CPU Max Temp : 78°C
3DMARK Test – CPU Overheat and throttled – Fan Cooler Boost mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 5,500rpm | CPU Avg package Temp : 68°C | CPU FQ ≈ 4.7Ghz (Max 16% loss)
UNIGINE Superposition Test – Fan Cooler Boost mode turned on
Fan Speed ≈ 5,500rpm | CPU Avg package Temp : 65°C | CPU FQ ≈ 2.3Ghz
Overclocking summary
The MSI GE65 Raider 9SF is only average in terms of heat dissipation. Compared with the GT76’s 11 heat pipes and the double-layer 4 fan design, GE65’s 7 heat pipes are a bit weaker, which causes overheating and throttling issues for the CPU and GPU overclocking. Although the Intel i9-9880H has only 45W TDP and running together with an overclocked RTX 2070, the total power consumption close to 160W.
In actual use, Aida64’s single FPU test will lead to overheating issues for your CPU, in some AAA games, the temperature of CPU and GPU will probably remain at 70°C – 75°C. There is no throttling, and during gameplay, it is recommended to turn on the Cooler Boost mode to prevent overheating. However, after ray tracing is turned on, if the DLSS setting is not opened simultaneously, the in-game fps will be extremely low. When we connected a external 4K monitor to test more 2K and 4K games, their in-game fps is around 30 and sometimes will drop below 25. After the DLSS is turned on, the fps is just barely acceptable.
SUMMARY
We really like the overall design of the MSI GE65, which is thinner and packs a punch compared with other brands at a similar level. As a portable gaming device, the GE65 has a powerful and balanced hardware configuration.
For the design, the mould of thin-bezel designed GE75 is feasible to apply on the GE63 directly, but it is unbelievable that the 15-inch thin-bezel design has forced MSI to give up previous heatsink module. However, MSI made the decision to directly cut off the right outlet in order to use the old heatsink mould. Due to the limitation of the laptop body size, the volume of the right fan’s air chamber has been compressed again. Even if the heat-dissipating module on the right side was castrated, the body of the laptop will still be unable to cope with the power interface. Therefore, the power interface and the rest I/O ports on the right side were moved to the front half.
In the heat dissipation design, GE65 uses a ‘7 copper tubes + double fans’ design, but this mould has only a single air outlet on the right side, which is about 25cm² of the specification and a 45W TDP. The part of CPU’s copper tube is actually shared with the graphics card, so as long as the graphics card has a high temperature, this i9 has frequent throttling issues.
In terms of price, AUD$4,599 has a $1,000 higher than the previous generation GS65 Stealth 9SF. It should be noted that the GS65 Stealth 9SF uses the i7-9750H and a Max-Q version RTX 2070 graphics card, and the rest of the hardware is basically similar to GE65 9SF, and the whole machine is lighter and thinner, and the heat dissipation has very good control. Although the performance of GE65 exceeds the GS65 9SF, the cost-performance ratio suffers.
In general, MSI has always been a bridgehead of the laptop field and likes to be the first to innovate, but it is always copied by other manufacturers in the future. Although the laptop has integrated some components from other manufacturers, it also weakened MSI’s brand cohesion. Cohesion is a magic weapon to ensure that a brand has a long-lasting market, and we also believe MSI will continue to improve its brand cohesion and brand image in the future.
EPIC PC RATE SCORE: 82/100
EPIC REWARD: EDITOR’S CHOICE
GE65 Raider 9SF OFFICIAL WEBSITE: HERE