Best Buy have listed a $750 Intel Iris Xe powered “CyberPowerPC Gamer Xtreme Gaming Desktop” on their site, and it has already sold out. While the Intel Iris Xe may not be a graphical powerhouse, this budget gaming system comes with an 11th Gen Rocket Lake CPU.
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The Intel Iris Xe GPU is interesting, despite its lack of pixel prowess. The Xe DG1 is just visible in the top PCIe slot of the machine pictured on Best Buy’s site, is a passively cooled card with 4GB of LPDDR4X VRAM, and 640 shading units spread across 80 execution units. Best Buy doesn’t supply a pic of the back of the PC, but we’d expect DVI-D, HDMI, and DisplayPort ports, in line with the Asus card already revealed.
The PC in question is a Gamer Xtreme Gaming Desktop from CyberPower going for $750, with an 11th-gen Intel i5-11400F (six cores, 12 threads, boost up to 4.4GHz) with the ‘F’ designation meaning it doesn’t pack integrated graphics. There’s 8GB of RAM and a 500 GB NVMe SSD, so you know you’re not looking at a particularly highly powered model here. Similar money gets you PCs with GTX 1650 GPUs, and the benchmarks that leaked a few months ago don’t look brilliant.
Still, while this is perhaps not the kind of PC that would have us dancing in the streets, it’s an important moment in the history of GPUs: Xe is here, there are now three players in the market, and with the launch of the DG2 cards, built on the more powerful Xe-HPG architecture with hardware-accelerated ray-tracing later this year, things are about to get really interesting.
The HP Elite Folio is a long-lasting, quiet laptop/tablet combo, but it offers a middling performance for a high price.
For
+ Versatile design
+ Runs very cool and quiet
+ 3:2 Display
+ Full-sized stylus charges in keyboard
+ Long battery life
Against
– Display could be brighter
– Windows on Arm has app compatibility issues
– Middling performance
– Few ports
– Pricey
There are a few laptops that fall into what I call an “executive notebook.” These are high-end, sometimes overly designed business laptops that you rarely see the rank-and-file office worker use. The new HP Elite Folio ($1,747.20 to start, $2,063.36 as tested) seems destined, with its vegan leather exterior and high price tag, for the C-suite.
HP has gone with Windows on Arm here, which means that the laptop runs quiet and has excellent battery life. But even as Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors get more powerful and Windows on Arm slowly improves, there are still compatibility and performance sacrifices, so it’s not always fitting for the
best ultrabooks
.
But for those who rely on a stylus for writing on-screen or want a versatile form factor for various situations, you may be able to overlook that as long as you don’t use compute-heavy software. And if you value style, of course.
Design of HP Elite Folio
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HP’s new Folio means business. Or at least, it looks like it. The HP Elite Folio is a new, more professional take
on a previous design
. This laptop isn’t clad in metal, but rather polyurethane vinyl — or, as you might call it, vegan leather. Or as I call it, “
pleather
.” Unlike the old
Spectre x360 13
, which used real leather and came in brown, this is a more subdued black.
The result is a notebook that looks a bit like a briefcase, minus the handle, of course. If it didn’t have an HP logo on the lid under some stitching, I’d expect to see an intern carrying their resume in it. There’s no place to put your thumb to easily open the laptop, so I typically found myself requiring two hands to do so, which was a pain.
With the laptop open, it looks more traditional. There’s a 13.5-inch, 1920 x 1280 display in a 3:2 aspect ratio with a surprisingly thick bezel on the top. The deck features a backlit keyboard and also includes a spot to store and charge the included HP Slim Pen. This is a page straight out of the playbook Microsoft used with the
Surface Pro X
.
But the Surface Pro X is a true 2-in-1 detachable, and the Elite Folio has a different trick up its sleeve. The screen is on a hinge, and it can be brought forward into an easel mode that covers the keyboard but leaves the touchpad clear. You can also slide it further forward to be a tablet. (You could, if you wanted, also flip the screen upside down on the back of the device and use the display to watch videos or give presentations. This isn’t listed among HP’s options, but it works.)
The laptop looks like leather, but it doesn’t feel like it. It’s soft to the touch but definitely has a plasticky feel. For those wondering, yes, I did smell the laptop. While it pulls off a leather look, it can’t match the real thing’s fragrance.
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I can’t speak to how well this will hold up over months and years of use. In the immediate sense, it did manage to pick up minor scuffs or schmutz on my desk, but I could wipe it off with a damp cloth.
Port selection is extremely minimal, with a USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-C port on either side of the laptop and a 3.5mm headphone jack on the right side.
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HP’s notebook is 2.92 pounds and measures 11.75 x 9.03 x 0.63 inches. That’s similar to the Lenovo Flex 5G (2.9 pounds, 12.7 x 8.5 x 0.6 inches), a convertible 2-in-1. The Microsoft Surface Pro X is 2.4 pounds (with the keyboard attached) and 11.3 x 8.2 x 0.3 inches. An Intel-based clamshell, the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Nano, is 2 pounds and 12.7 x 8.5 x 0.6 inches.
HP Elite Folio Specifications
CPU
Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2
Graphics
Qualcomm Adreno 690 (integrated)
Memory
16GB LPDDR4-4266 SDRAM
Storage
512GB PCIe NVMe SSD
Display
13.5-inch, 1920 x 1280 touchscreen
Networking
Qualcomm QCA639X Wi-Fi 6 Dual Band and Bluetooth 5, Qualcomm Snapdragon X20 LTE Cat 16
Ports
2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-C, 3.5mm headphone jack, nano SIM card slot
Camera
720p IR
Battery
46 WHr
Power Adapter
65 W
Operating System
Windows 10 Pro
Dimensions(WxDxH)
11.75 x 9.03 x 0.63 inches / 298.45 x 229.36 x 16 mm
Weight
2.92 pounds / 1.32 kg
Price (as configured)
$1,998.72
Windows 10 on Arm
The HP Elite Folio uses the latest Windows on Arm platform, the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2. That comes with its benefits (long battery life, quiet), but in terms of performance and app compatibility, it’s certainly lacking.
To be clear, that’s the case on all Windows on Arm laptops at the moment. Apple has used Arm too on its most recent laptops with its
M1
chips, with far greater success.
Windows on Arm can run 32-bit apps, but not 64-bit apps. That functionality is coming but is currently limited to Windows Insider builds, which you’re unlikely to see in a business environment. An increasing number of apps are running natively on Windows on Arm, including Office, browsers like Edge and Firefox, and some of Adobe’s, but the rest require emulation. Others that run natively include the popular media player VLC, Netflix, Twitter, Skype, and Windows Terminal.
Perhaps the most reliable place to get apps that work on the processor, native or not, is through the Windows store, which largely filters apps that don’t work with Arm.
Productivity Performance of HP Elite Folio
Here, we’re comparing the Folio, which has an 8cx Gen 2, with two other Arm laptops, the Lenovo Flex 5G with the last-gen Snapdragon, and the Microsoft Surface Pro X with SQ1, Microsoft’s entry-level offering. We also tossed the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Nano in the mix for a business notebook using an x86 platform, namely Intel’s 11th Gen processors.
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On Geekbench 5, which measures overall system performance, the HP Elite Folio notched a single-core score of 792 and a dual-core score of 3,115. The Lenovo Flex 5G’s 729/2,923 suggest the newer chip has its advantage in multi-core workloads, though this test is run through emulation, which has to be kept in mind. The Surface Pro X isn’t in this test, as we were still running Geekbench 4 when we tested it. The ThinkPad X1 Nano’s scores were 1,473/5,155, with the test running natively.
The Elite Folio transferred 25GB of files at 666.5 MBps, faster than both the Flex 5G and ThinkPad X1 Nano. The Surface Pro X was run on an older, 5GB version of the test, and that was the slowest of the batch.
Our Handbrake test currently doesn’t run on Arm chips, though it is starting to be included in early “nightly” builds. Our Cinebench R23 stress test is also incompatible with Arm. These will change when 64-bit support becomes a finalized part of Windows 10.
Display on HP Elite Folio
I’m glad that HP went with a 3:2 display on the Elite Folio. Simply put, 3:2 is the best aspect ratio for productivity laptop displays because the extra height lets you see more content on your screen at once. This 13.5-inch touchscreen has a resolution of 1920 x 1280.
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I found the laptop to be bright enough for productivity, but when you switch to multimedia, it’s a mixed bag. In the trailer for Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, the color red popped in car paint, lights and a number of outfits. But a series of dim scenes in a montage made me wish I could turn up the brightness (though the dimness made for great contrast in a scene with purple backlighting).
HP’s screen covers 70.7% of the
DCI-P3
color gamut, which is just about in line with the Surface Pro X and ThinkPad X1 Nano. The Lenovo Flex 5G was more vivid at 81.4%
The Folio was the dimmest of the bunch with an average of 390 nits. The Surface Pro X was the brightest, measuring 448 nits.
Keyboard, Touchpad and Stylus on HP Elite Folio
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HP has implemented a keyboard with 1.3mm of travel into this small device. I didn’t have any issues with travel, but when I typed, I felt that the keys were a bit too stiff. It didn’t stop me from typing quickly; I hit 110 words per minute on the 10fastfingers.com typing test. But accuracy suffered slightly.
The 4.2 x 2.6-inch touchpad uses Windows precision drivers, and with a smooth, metal surface, I found it responsive and easy to glide my fingers against. Simple navigation and more complex gestures worked on the first try. It clicks a bit louder than some other touchpads, but I can get over that.
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HP’s Slim Pen lives in a dock above the keyboard, which also keeps it charged. It’s long and flat, more like a carpenter’s pencil than your standard writing instrument. It has a rocker on the side, which can be unwieldy because of how thin the buttons are. The button on the top, however, is easy to access. That comes at the expense of using it as an eraser like the Surface Pen, however.
I found that the Elite Folio’s screen offered solid palm rejection. The Pen uses Wacom drivers and offers 4,096 degrees of pressure sensitivity. HP claims it fast charges in 30 minutes, though in my use, it’s home in the laptop meant it was always topped off.
Audio on HP Elite Folio
HP’s partnership with Bang & Olufsen on its speakers continues to bear fruit. While there’s no software to tune the speakers yourself, they sound decent considering how thin this device is.
For instance, when I listened to Chvrches’ “He Said She Said,” the crashing drums, synths melodies and vocals were loud, clear and crisp. There was, however, a distinct lack of bass, which is a problem on many laptops.
One downside, however, is that the speakers vibrate a lot, and I could feel it under my hands on the touchpad and keyboard. While this isn’t unique to this laptop, it was far more distracting on the Folio than other devices.
Upgradeability of HP Elite Folio
In theory, the HP Elite Folio is upgradeable. HP has a video showing the process:
This is aimed at service technicians, and for good reason. The design means you have to do things in a weird order, like removing the pen slot from the keyboard before opening the
chassis
.
The RAM is soldered to the motherboard, but the SSD is upgradeable. The only rub there is that to actually change out the storage, you have to remove the entire thermal system. Some enthusiasts may be comfortable with that, but for most people, that’s a step too far.
Battery Life
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The Elite Folio’s Arm processor excels in the one place you would expect it: battery life. On our test, which involves browsing the web, running OpenGL tests and streaming video over Wi-Fi, all at 150 nits, the Folio lasted for 15 hours and 21 minutes. It was outclassed only by the Lenovo Flex 5G, using a last-gen Snapdragon processor, which ran for 17:30.
Microsoft’s Surface Pro X with the SQ1 ran for 9:30, while the Intel-based ThinkPad X1 Nano lasted for 12 hours flat.
Heat on HP Elite Folio
Because we couldn’t run our Cinebench R23 workload due to compatibility issues, we took the HP Elite Folio’s skin temperatures following 15 minutes of streaming video from YouTube. The fanless system was quiet and kept very cool.
The center of the keyboard, between the G and H keys, measured 27.8 degrees Celsius (82.04 degrees Fahrenheit). The touchpad was cooler at 26 degrees Celsius (78.8 degrees Fahrenheit).
The hottest point on the bottom of the laptop measured 30.3 degrees Celsius.
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A
720p
webcam in an executive notebook after more than a year of white-collar workers have been doing their jobs from home? Excuse me?
Stills and trial video from my desk, even in good lighting, were grainy. And colors, like a blue shirt I was wearing, were overly dark.
There is a physical webcam privacy switch, which covers the camera but doesn’t cut power to the hardware like some other HP laptops. It’s very small, and you need to use your fingernail to move it in either direction.
There are also IR sensors to log in to Windows 10 with facial recognition. This worked well, with the exception that you need both the cameras and the IR sensor for this to work. If you close the privacy cover, you can’t use it to log in. That’s a choice you have to make between privacy and convenience.
HP has limited the amount of software it includes on this laptop, which is a benefit, especially on an enterprise laptop. There are no crappy antivirus software trials or ports of phone games.
The two big pieces of software are HP Pen Settings, which lets you pair the included stylus and customize its functionality; and HP QuickDrop, which lets you send files and photos across your laptop and smartphone.
HP Pen Settings has a number of clever options, including assigning commands that would be useful to go through slides or play media while giving presentations. There’s also a way to get a virtual dial on the screen when holding a button down.
While this laptop has Microsoft Office preinstalled, at least it doesn’t include links to sponsored Microsoft Store applications.
HP sells the Elite Folio with a 1-year warranty. It can be boosted to three years for an extra $75.
As of this writing, HP is selling the Elite Folio in both a ready-to-ship configuration and customizable configurations.
The quick-ship one is $1,889 with the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2, 16GB of RAM and 256GB SSD, as well as an LTE modem.
We reviewed it with 16GB of RAM, a 512GB storage and an LTE modem. That runs for $2,063.36.
If you want a 1,000-nit display with HP’s Sure View privacy, that’s an extra $169. A 4G modem is $201, while a 5G modem is $444.
The base model, with Windows 10 Home instead of Pro, 8GB of RAM, 128GB SSD and no mobile connection is $1,747.20.
Prices on the Folio seem to be fluctuating on HP’s website, so they may vary after this article was published.
Bottom Line
The HP Elite Folio review has a versatile design and, if you’re into the office chair aesthetic, a fake leather exterior that fits in any office.
HP’s Slim Pen is nice, and the fact that it is full-sized and can still charge by sitting in the system is a big plus for anyone who does a lot of writing on screen. The different screen modes will also be helpful for people who use touch screens a lot.
But while relying on the Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2 means long battery life and quiet operation, there are a series of small sacrifices that are made, largely based on Windows on Arm and app compatibility. Some apps work, some are emulated and 64-bit apps, while coming, aren’t ready for prime time right now, without downloading a beta version of the OS. These aren’t problems unique to the Elite Folio — they’re the same on the Lenovo Flex 5G and the Microsoft Surface Pro X.
If the chassis, touch screen and functionality allowed by the display-on-a-hinge design will make your job easier, this is worth considering. But for many, an x86 business notebook, like the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Nano with an Intel processor, can run more software, do it faster, and is cheaper in some configurations.
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 is so good that it makes us wonder why Dell didn’t team up with AMD on a laptop sooner.
For
+ Strong gaming performance
+ Excellent productivity performance
+ Unique chassis
+ Not too costly for it power
Against
– Internals run hot
– Middling audio
– Bad webcam
It’s been 14 years since Alienware’s used an AMD CPU in one of its laptops, but AMD’s recent Ryzen processors have proven to be powerhouses that have generated a strong gamer fanbase. It also doesn’t hurt that AMD-based laptops have frequently undercut Intel in price. Point being, times have changed and now Team Red can easily compete with the best gaming laptops that Intel has to offer.
So it makes sense that Alienware’s finally been granted permission to board Dell’s UFO. And with the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5, it’s getting a first class treatment.
Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 Specifications
CPU
AMD Ryzen 7 5800H
Graphics
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 6GB GDDR6, 1,702 MHz Boost Clock, 125 W Total Graphics Power
Memory
16GB DDR4-3200
Storage
512GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD
Display
15.6 inch, 1920 x 1080, 165Hz, IPS
Networking
802.11ax Killer Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2
Ports
USB-A 3.2 Gen 1 x 3, HDMI 2.1, USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 x 1 (DisplayPort), RJ-45 Ethernet, 3.5mm combination headphone/microphone port
Camera
720p
Battery
86 WHr
Power Adapter
240W
Operating System
Windows 10 Home
Dimensions(WxDxH)
14.02 x 10.73 x 0.9 inches (356.2 x 275.2 x 22.85 mm)
Weight
5.34 pounds (2.42 kg)
Price (as configured)
$1,649
Design of the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
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Unlike other recent Alienware laptops, the m15 R5 Ryzen Edition only comes in black. The “lunar light” white isn’t an option here. Still, it’s a bold design that puts the emphasis on the laptop’s build quality rather than on decoration, and it pays off. The m15 R5 feels sturdy in the hand and its smooth edges give it a unique premium flare. It’s not too plain, since lighting options for the Alienware logo on the lid plus a circular LED strip along the back rim add a touch of flair. On that note, the stylized “15” on the lid is stylish, though it can look a bit much like a “13” from the wrong angle.
Hexagonal vents that sit above the keyboard and along the back also give the m15 R5 a bit of functional decoration and help make up for the small and well hidden side vents. The keyboard on this model has four-zone RGB, but it can be a little dim in well-lit areas.
This laptop veers on the large and heavy end for systems with an RTX 3060. At 14.02 x 10.73 x 0.9 inches large and 5.34 pounds heavy, it’s generally bulkier than the Asus TUF Dash F15 we reviewed, which has a mobile RTX 3070 and is 14.17 x 9.92 x 0.78 inches large and weighs 4.41 pounds. The Acer Predator Triton 300 SE, which manages to fit a mobile RTX 3060 into a 14 inch device, is also especially impressive next to the m15 R5. Granted, both of those use lower-power processors designed for thinner machines. Specifically, the Acer is 12.7 x 8.97 x .70 inches large and weighs 3.75 pounds.
The Alienware m15 R4, which has a 10th gen 45W Intel Core i7 processor and an RTX 3070, is 14.19 x 10.86 x 0.78 inches large and weighs 5.25 pounds. That leaves it not as bulky as the m15 Ryzen Edition R5, but about as heavy.
Port selection is varied, although distribution differs from my usual preferences. The left side of the laptop only has the Ethernet port and the 3.5mm headphone/microphone jack, which is a shame as that’s where I typically like to connect my mouse. The back of the laptop has a few more connections, including the DC-in, an HDMI 2.1 port, a USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A port and a USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C port that also supports DisplayPort. The right side of the laptop has two additional USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A ports.
Gaming Performance on the Alienware M15 Ryzen Edition R5
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Our review configuration of the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 came equipped with an 8-core, 16-thread Ryzen R7 5800H CPU and an RTX 3060 laptop GPU. It’s the first time we’ve tested a 45W CPU with an RTX 3060 and, to that end, we’ve decided to compare it to one 35W laptop with an RTX 3070 CPU, the Asus TUF Dash F15 with an Intel Core i7-11370H, and one 35W laptop with an RTX 3060 GPU, the Acer Predator Triton 300 SE with an Intel Core i7-11375H. We’ve also thrown the Alienware m15 R4 into the mix, which has a 45W 10th gen Intel CPU and an admittedly more powerful RTX 3070, plus a significantly higher price tag than any other competitor even on its cheapest configuration (the thing starts at $2,149).
I played Control on the Alienware laptop for a half hour to get a personal feel for gaming on the system. I tended to fall between 60 – 70 fps at high settings throughout, and turning ray tracing on using its high preset dropped that to 30 – 40 fps. The fans are certainly noticeable but aren’t ear-splitting, and the laptop neither got hot-to-the-touch nor did it spray hot air on my hands.
In Shadow of the Tomb Raider’s benchmark running at highest settings, the m15 Ryzen Edition R5’s CPU seemed to do it a favor, as its 73 fps average only barely fell behind the m15 R4’s 77 fps average. The Acer laptop was next in line with 61 fps, while the Asus laptop was significantly behind all other options at 54 fps.
Scores were a bit more even in Far Cry: New Dawn’s benchmark running at ultra settings. While the m15 R4 hit 91 fps, everything else was in the 70s. The m15 Ryzen Edition R5 had an average of 79 fps, while the Asus scored 74 fps and the Acer reached 73 fps.
The m15 Ryzen Edition R5 fell to third place in the Grand Theft Auto V benchmark running at very high settings, where it hit an 82 fps average and the Asus laptop achieved an 87 fps average. The Acer laptop was significantly behind at 72 fps, while the m15 R4 was significantly ahead at 108 fps.
Red Dead Redemption 2’s benchmark running at medium settings saw the m15 Ryzen Edition R5 once again stay in third place, though by a more significant margin this time. The R5 achieved a 53 fps average, while the Asus led with 61 fps score. The Acer was once again behind at 48 fps, while the m15 R4 stayed ahead at 69 fps.
We also ran the Alienware M15 R5 Ryzen Edition through the Metro Exodus RTX benchmark 15 times in a row to test how well it holds up to a sustained heavy load. During this benchmark, it hit an average 56 fps. The CPU ran at an average 3.63-GHz clock speed while the GPU ran at an average clock speed of 1.82 GHz. The CPU’s average temperature was 90.36 degrees Celsius (194.65 degrees Fahrenheit) and the GPU’s average temperature was 82.02 degrees Celsius (179.64 degrees Fahrenheit).
Productivity Performance for the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
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While Alienware is a gaming brand, the use of a 45W AMD chip does open the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 up to high productivity potential.
On Geekbench 5, which is a synthetic test for tracking general PC performance, the m15 Ryzen Edition R5 hit 1,427 points on single-core tests and 7,288 points on multi-core tests. While its single core score was on the lower end when compared to the Asus TUF Dash F15’s 1,576 points and the Acer Predator Triton 300 SE’s 1,483 points, the Alienware blew those laptops away on multi-core scores. The Asus’ multi-core score was 5,185, while the Acer’s multi-core score was 5,234.
The Alienware m15 R4 was a bit more even with its AMD cousin, scoring 1,209 on single-core Geekbench 5 tests and 7,636 on the program’s multi-core benchmarks.
Unfortunately, the m15 Ryzen Edition R5 couldn’t maintain that momentum for our 25GB file transfer benchmark. Here, it transferred files at a 874.14 MBps speed, while the Asus hit 1,052.03 MBps and the Acer reached 993.13 MBps. The m15 R5 hit speeds of 1137.34 MBps.
The m15 Ryzen Edition R5 was the fastest contender in our Handbrake video encoding test, though, where we track how long it takes a computer to transcode a video down from 4K to FHD. The m15 Ryzen Edition R5 completed this task in 7:05, while the Asus took 10:41 and the Acer was even slower at 11:36. The m15 R5 almost caught up to its AMD cousin with a time of 7:07.
Display for the Alienware M15 R5 Ryzen Edition
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Our configuration for the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 came with a 15.6 inch 1920 x 1080 IPS display with a 165Hz refresh rate. While it boasted impressive gaming performance and strong benchmark results, it still proved problematic for viewing content.
I watched the trailers for Nomandland and Black Widow on the m15 Ryzen Edition R5, where I found the blacks to be shallow and the viewing angles to be restrictive. In my office during the daytime, I couldn’t easily see the screen’s picture unless I was sitting directly in front of it. Turning my lights off and closing my curtain only extended viewing angles to about 30 degrees. Glare also proved to be an issue in the light, although turning lights off did fix this problem.
Colors were bright enough to pop occasionally but not consistently, with bolder tones like reds and whites holding up better than more subdued ones. Here, Black Widow came across a bit more vividly than the naturalistic style of Nomadland, so this screen might be better suited for more colorful, heavily produced films.
Our testing put the m15 Ryzen Edition R4’s color range above its closest competitors, the Asus TUF Dash F15 and Acer Predator Triton 300 SE, though not by much. With an 87.3 DCI-P3 color gamut, it’s only slightly ahead of the Asus’ 80.6% DCI-P3 score. The TUF Dash F15 had a starker difference, with a 78.5% DCI-P3 color gamut.
Our brightness testing saw the Alienware pull a more solid lead. With an average of 328 nits, it easily surpassed the Acer’s 292 nits and the Asus’ 265 nits.
The Alienware m15 R4 blew all of these systems out of the water, although the OLED screen our configuration had makes the comparison more than a bit unfair. Its DCI-P3 gamut registered at 150% while its average brightness was 460.2 nits.
To test the m15 Ryzen Edition R5’’s 165Hz screen, I also played Overwatch on it. Here, I had a much more pleasant experience than I did when watching movie trailers. The game’s bright colors appeared quite vivid and the fast refresh rate was perfectly able to keep up with the 165 fps I was hitting on Ultra settings.
Keyboard and Touchpad on the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 configuration we received has a 4-zone RGB membrane keyboard, though other configurations do offer mechanical switches made in collaboration with Cherry. You can currently get that upgrade for an additional $98.
The membrane nature of this keyboard didn’t mean it wasn’t impressive, though. Keys have a noticeable resistance when pressed and 1.7mm of key travel gives you plenty of tactile feedback. I consistently scored around 83 words per minute on the 10fastfingers.com typing test, which is impressive as my average is usually around 75 wpm.
In an unusual choice, the Alienware’s audio control keys sit on the keyboard’s furthest right row rather than being mapped to the Fn row as secondary functions. Instead, the Page Up and Page Down keys that would normally be found there are secondary functions on the arrow keys.
The 4.1 x 2.4-inch touchpad doesn’t fare as well. While it has precision drivers and is perfectly smooth when scrolling with one finger, I felt too much friction when using multi-touch gestures to pull them off comfortably or consistently. For instance, when trying to switch apps with a three-fingered swipe, I would frequently accidentally pinch zoom instead.
Audio on the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 has two bottom firing speakers that are loud with surprisingly decent bass, but tend to get tinny on higher notes.
I tested the m15 Ryzen Edition R5’s audio by listening to Save Your Tears by The Weeknd, which easily filled up my whole two bedroom apartment with sound. I was also surprised to be able to hear the strum of the song’s bass guitar, as it’s not uncommon for other laptops to either cut it out, make it quiet, or give it a more synth-like quality. Unfortunately, higher notes suffered from tinniness and echo.
Upgradeability of the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 is easy to open and has plenty of user customizability. Just unscrew the four screws closest to the back of the laptop, then loosen the four screws on the front (we used a PH0 Phillips Head bit).
Gently pry the case off, and you’ll see the networking card, two swappable DIMMs of RAM, the M.2 SSD and a second, open M.2 SSD slot (if you don’t buy the laptop with dual SSDs).
The only tradeoff here is that the SSDs are in a smaller, less common M.2 2230 form factor (most are 2280) , so you’ll probably need to buy a specialized drive for this laptop.
Battery Life on the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 is a power hog, with half the non-gaming battery life of the RTX 3060 and RTX 3070 35W laptops we tested it against. This shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise, since it also has a 45W CPU, but don’t expect to be able to spend too much time away from an outlet.
In our non-gaming battery test, which continually streams video, browses the web and runs OpenGL tests over Wi-Fi at 150 nits of brightness, the M15 Ryzen Edition R5 held on for 3:29. That’s about 3 hours less time than we got out of both the Asus TUF Dash F15, which had a 6:32 battery life, and the Acer Predator Triton 300 SE, which lasted for 6:40.
The Alienware m15 R5, with its 45W Intel chip, also had a shorter battery life than our 35W laptops, though it was slightly longer than the m15 Ryzen Edition R5’s. It lasted 4:01 on our non-gaming test.
Heat on the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5’s surface temperature was impressively cool during non-gaming use but could get toasty in select areas during our gaming benchmarks. For our tests, we measured its temperature both after 15 minutes of streaming video and during the sixth consecutive run of the Metro: Exodus extreme benchmark.
The laptop’s touchpad proved coolest during the video test, registering 81.1 degrees Fahrenheit. This was only slightly behind the center of the keyboard’s temperature, as the typer hit 85.5 degrees Fahrenheit in between the G and H keys. The bottom of the laptop was warmer, hitting 90.9 degrees, although the center-left of the display hinge is where it was hottest, registering 101.1 degrees Fahrenheit.
Our gaming test saw a mild jump in temperatures in all areas except the bottom and the hinge, where numbers spiked much higher. The touchpad was 83.3 degrees Fahrenheit and the center of the keyboard was 90.9 degrees Fahrenheit. By contrast, the bottom of the laptop was now 121.5 degrees Fahrenheit and the hot zone on the hinge was now 136.1 degrees Fahrenheit.
Despite these higher numbers, though, the laptop never became too hot to touch while gaming. It did feel pleasantly warm, however.
Webcam on the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
The Alienware M15 R4 Ryzen Edition’s 720p webcam is, like many premium gaming laptops, a bit of an afterthought. Regardless of lighting conditions, its shots always have a blocky and fuzzy appearance. Adding light also adds a distracting halo effect to silhouettes, while dimming your surroundings will just bring down detail even further.
Software and Warranty on the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 comes packed with software, although most of it serves a genuinely useful purpose.
Most of these are apps like Alienware Command Center, which lets you customize lighting and thermals as well as set up macros. Some are less useful than others — Alienware Customer Connect simply exists to get you to fill out surveys — but apps like Alienware Mobile Connect, which lets you easily mirror your phone’s screen, transfer its files or take phone calls from your laptop are definitely a standout. It might be easier to navigate these functions if they were all centralized into one hub app rather than being their own standalone programs, though. My Alienware tries to be this hub app, although it’s mostly just a redirect to Alienware Command Center with a bunch of ads on the side.
This laptop also comes with typical Windows pack-ins like Microsoft Solitaire Collection and Spotify. Its default warranty is limited to one year, although you can extend it at checkout.
Configurations for the Alienware M15 R5 Ryzen Edition
Our configuration of the Alienware M15 R5 Ryzen Edition came with an AMD Ryzen 7 5800H CPU, an RTX 3060 laptop GPU, 16GB of RAM, a 512GGB SSD and a 1920 x 1080, 165Hz display for $1,649. That actually puts it towards the lower end of what’s available.
You can upgrade this laptop’s CPU to the Ryzen 9 5900HX, which has the same thread count but boosts up to 4.6 GHz, and its GPU to an RTX 3070 laptop card. Memory options range from 8GB to 32GB, while storage options range from 256GB to 2TB. You can also add on an additional SSD with the same range of options, making for up to 4TB of total combined storage.
There’s also a 360Hz version of the FHD display available, as well as a QHD version with a 240Hz refresh rate and G-Sync support.
Perhaps the most interesting option that wasn’t included on our configuration is the mechanical keyboard, which features physical ultra low-profile switches made in collaboration with CherryMX.
These upgrades can raise your price up to $2,479, with the display and keyboard upgrades being the most costly components in Dell’s customization tool. The Cherry MX keyboard will add $98 to your price at checkout, while the QHD display costs $78. The FHD @ 360Hz display is only available on the highest preset option, which locks you into a Ryzen 9 5900HX chip and starts at $2,332.
By contrast, the low end of this laptop starts at $1,567.
Bottom Line
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 proves that Team Red and Alienware make a strong pairing . While it’s not quite the beast that the minimum $2,149 Alienware m15 R4 is, it still manages performance that equates to and sometimes beats peers in its price range on most titles, all while rocking Alienware’s unique premium looks. At $1,649 for our configuration, it’s an easy premium choice over the $1,450 Asus TUF Dash F15. And if you prefer power over size, it’s also a better option for you than the $1,400 Acer Predator Triton 300 SE.
While it’s certainly not the most portable contender and could do with more even port distribution and stronger audio, its 45W CPU lends it just enough of an edge on power to make it a solid first step into Dell’s flagship gaming brand.
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This is an iMac unlike any other iMac we’ve seen before, and it all comes down to the M1 chip.
Sure, there are some other differences between this 24-inch iMac and the 21.5-inch model from 2019 that it’s replacing. There are better microphones and better speakers. There are fewer ports, and some of them have moved around. The screen is bigger and better. The keyboard now has TouchID. But the M1 is the star of the show.
It’s not just the performance increase. It’s not just the fact that you can run iOS and iPadOS apps natively on the system. It’s not just the new advanced image signal processor, which helps create better low-light images than I’ve ever seen from an integrated webcam. It’s also the groundbreaking efficiency with which this processor runs, which has enabled Apple to create a slim, sleek, and quite unique iMac chassis.
Whether you actually get every upgrade here depends on the configuration you choose. The entry-level iMac is $1,299 for 256GB of SSD storage, two Thunderbolt / USB 4 ports, 8GB of unified memory, and a seven-core GPU — but that’s only available in four colors and doesn’t come with TouchID. The model I tested bumps the storage up to 512GB and the memory up to 16GB. It has two USB-3 ports in addition to the two Thunderbolt, an eight-core GPU, Touch ID, and a gigabit Ethernet port (which is in the power brick). I also received both the Magic Mouse and the Magic Trackpad with my model. You’d need to pay a total of $2,028 to get everything Apple sent me (and which I’ll be sending back, for the record).
In short, this device costs money. And it’s true that you’d get similar performance and save a few hundred bucks, if you just plugged a Mac Mini into an external display. But this iMac has almost everything that most people need in one package: processing power, sure, but also a camera, speakers, microphones, a keyboard, a mouse, a trackpad, and a display. And they’re all good. This is a computer you can plonk on your desk and never think about again. And for some of the iMac’s target audience, that’s probably worth the extra money. You’re paying for simplicity.
The new iMac is completely redesigned, but instantly recognizable
The M1 processor uses what’s called a “hybrid” configuration. The easiest way to conceive of this is that most competing Intel and AMD chips have a number of equally “okay” cores, where Apple’s M1 has four very fast cores and four lower-powered high-efficiency cores. This allows M1 devices to deliver arguably the best performance-per-watt in the world. It also means that they’re nearly unbeatable in single-core workloads.
That advantage bore out in our benchmark testing. This iMac model achieved a higher score on the Geekbench 5 single-core benchmark than any Mac we’ve ever seen before — even the iMac Pro. That means if you’re looking for a device for simpler everyday tasks that don’t scale to every available CPU core (and that largely seems to be the demographic that Apple is trying to sell this machine to), there has literally never been a better iMac for you to buy.
You can see the rest of our benchmarks below:
Apple iMac 24 (2021) benchmarks
Benchmark
Score
Benchmark
Score
PugetBench for Premiere Pro
372
Cinebench R23 Multi
7782
Cinebench R23 Single
1505
Geekbench Multi
7668
Geekbench Single
1739
Geekbench OpenCL
19114
These results help illuminate where this iMac fits into Apple’s all-in-one lineup, and where its limitations are. The 24-incher is a significant improvement over the 21.5-inch iMac in both single-core and multi-core workloads. And it’s very comparable in graphics tasks — which is quite impressive, given that the 21.5-inch iMac has a discrete GPU and this one relies on what’s integrated with the M1.
On the other end, these results (with the exception of single-core performance) are not close to what we’d expect from the 27-inch Intel iMac with discrete graphics. In this comparison, multi-core results are more important. They indicate that the 27-inch iMac is going to do much better on the types of tasks that owners (or prospective buyers) are likely to be doing: intense multitasking, computations, design, video work, and other more complex loads that may leverage the GPU.
There are other limitations that may put some workloads out of reach. As is the case with the MacBook Pro and Mac Mini, you can’t configure the iMac with more than 16GB of memory and 2TB of storage; we wouldn’t recommend those specs to anyone who regularly edits 4K or 8K video, for example. The memory and storage are soldered, so you can’t upgrade them after purchase. Only one external display is supported (up to 6K resolution at 60Hz). Ports are also bizarrely limited; the base model has just two Thunderbolt / USB-4 ports and a headphone jack, while more expensive models have an additional two USB-3 ports and Gigabit Ethernet. These all may be reasons Apple is pushing this iMac as a “home and family” PC, even though its processor is clearly capable of all kinds of professional work.
The M1 processor’s efficiency allows the iMac to get away with a thin design and minimal fan noise, and still maintain performancePhoto by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge
Another way to interpret these numbers is that I was getting effectively the same performance out of this machine as we got from the M1 MacBook Pro and the Mac Mini. That’s completely unsurprising, since these devices all use the same processor. But it’s a good proxy for gauging whether the iMac can handle your work: if you expect you could get a task done with the M1 MacBook Pro, you should be able to do it on this.
More anecdotally, I was able to use my test unit for all kinds of daily tasks, from emailing to YouTube to amateur photo and video work. I was able to hop between over 25 Chrome tabs with Cinebench looping in the background, with no stutter or slowdown whatsoever. If you’re buying the iMac for this kind of thing, I can’t imagine you’ll see too many spinning wheels.
During this testing process, I also got a sense of just how well cooled this chassis is. On thinner laptops that I test often (including the fanless MacBook Air), you’ll see performance decrease if you run heavy tasks over and over again. None of that on this iMac: I looped Cinebench R23 as well as a Premiere Pro 4K video export several times over and never saw scores go down. It took a lot to get the fans going — they were checked out during my daily office multitasking. When they did spin up, mostly while I was working in Premiere, I could barely hear them. They were quieter than the background hum of my refrigerator. That’s quite a quality-of-life improvement over prior Intel iMacs.
The M1’s advantage, after all, has never been raw power; it’s the combination of power and efficiency. We saw much better battery life in the MacBook Air and MacBook Pro than we did in their Intel predecessors. Battery life obviously isn’t a concern with the iMac, but efficiency certainly is. Chips are limited by two things: the power available and how well their systems can keep them cool. They vent almost all the energy they use as heat, and because the M1 has such incredibly high performance per watt, Apple doesn’t need a heavy-duty cooling system to keep it from frying itself. Because it doesn’t need that heavy-duty cooling system, Apple has finally been able to redesign the iMac from the ground up.
The iMac’s chassis is so thin it looks like a big iPad minus the touchscreen
This iMac is sleek. Even though it has a 24-inch screen, it’s close in size to its 21.5-inch predecessor. Apple reduced the screen’s borders by close to 50 percent in order to squeeze the bigger screen into the compact chassis. This device is also 11.5 millimeters thick, or just under half an inch — which is quite thin as all-in-ones go. Next to the 27-inch iMac, it looks like a tablet on a stand.
Size isn’t everything; this iMac also comes in seven colors. There’s blue, green, pink, orange, purple, yellow, and the boring silver we know and love. I’m not quite convinced that the jazzier models will fit in outside of especially stylish homes and offices. But I will say: I’ve never seen so many of my friends, or so many people on TikTok, as excited about a tech product as they seem to be about the colored iMacs. The hues are a nice change, aren’t obnoxious, and are clearly a hit with certain crowds.
Some traditional iMac touches remain, of course. The bezels are still substantial compared to those of some modern monitors. You can’t raise or lower the display height — the built-in stand only allows tilt adjustments. (You can also buy it with a built-in VESA mount adapter.) And there’s still that pesky chin, though it’s no longer emblazoned with the Apple logo.
Pretty much every other notable part of the iMac has been upgraded in some way. There’s a 4.5K (4480 x 2520) Retina display, a step up from the predecessor’s 4096 x 2304 Retina display (though both have effectively the same pixel density). It has Apple’s True Tone technology, which automatically adjusts colors and intensity based on your surroundings.
But the screen is also another reminder that this iMac doesn’t have “Pro” in its name. Twenty-four inches is on the small side as screens go; most of the best external monitors are 27 inches or larger these days. Professionals on The Verge’s video team also noticed some vignetting on the sides of the screen, which caused issues with off-angle viewing — we had a similar issue with Apple’s Pro Display XDR. Of course, neither of these limitations were a problem for my untrained eye; I thought the display looked great, with sharp details and plenty of room for my Chrome tabs and apps.
Elsewhere, Apple has upgraded the camera, microphones, and speakers. The company claims that they’re the best camera, mic system, and speaker system that have ever appeared in a Mac. I’d believe it. The six-speaker sound system is easily on par with a good external speaker. I played some music in my kitchen, and it was audible all over the house. Percussion and bass were strong, and I felt very immersed in the songs. It also supports spatial audio when playing video with Dolby Atmos.
The new camera has a higher resolution and better picture quality for video calls
I don’t have too much to say about the three-mic array except that nobody on my Zoom calls had any trouble hearing me. But the webcam was a very pleasant surprise. The iMac has a 1080p FaceTime HD camera, which has a higher resolution than the 720p shooter that lives in the 21.5-inch iMac (as well as the MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, and many other AIOs). The M1 also lends a hand here: its built-in image signal processor and neural engines help optimize your picture in low-light settings.
I wouldn’t say I looked amazing on my Zoom calls — parts of my background were sometimes washed out, and the image looked processed in some dimmer areas. But I was visible and clear, which is better than you get from most webcams these days. And the difference between this webcam and the grainy mess the MacBook Pro has is night and day.
The iMac is the computer to get if you just want to buy it and not think about it for the next five to ten years
When I review a computer, my task is usually to figure out for whom that computer is made.
But all kinds of people use iMacs, from college students to accountants to podcast producers to retired grandparents. And this model has arguably the most widespread consumer appeal of any iMac that Apple has made in recent years. So it’s much easier to figure out for whom this iMac isn’t made.
It’s not for people who can’t handle dongles and docks; I kept a USB-C to USB-A dongle next to me on my desk while I was testing the iMac, and I used it very frequently. It’s not for people who already own a 27-inch iMac, because it would be a downgrade in display size and quality, port selection, upgradability, and raw power. And it’s not for people with serious performance needs.
It’s not for people who are looking for the very best value for their money. Most folks won’t need the specs and accessories that I tested here, but even $1,299, the base price, is certainly more than plenty of people want to spend on a computer. The base Mac Mini is $600 cheaper than the base iMac; plug that into a monitor and some speakers (you can find plenty of good ones for well under $600), and you’ll get the same M1 performance at a massive discount.
And that, right there, is the biggest reason that this iMac, despite its power, is primarily targeting the family market. Because it’s asking you to pay more in order to do less. You’re paying $600 not to have to research and budget out monitors, speakers, webcams, docks, keyboards, and mice. You’re paying not to have to arrange thousands of things on your desk. You’re paying for a device where everything, out of the box, works well. You’re paying to eliminate fuss.
Tech enthusiasts (especially those who want to pop their machines open and make their own upgrades) may see that as a waste of money. And for them, it probably is. But they’re not the target audience for this Mac — even if its specs might suit their needs.
Could Apple have done more with this iMac? Of course. I was hoping to see a 30-inch, 6K iMac with a powerhouse 12-core workstation chip this month as much as the next person. But I have faith that we’ll get one in the future — and in the meantime, I’m glad Apple released this. It’s not earth-shattering in its design; it doesn’t redefine its category. But it’s fun. It improves upon the 21.5-inch iMac to offer a simple, attractive, and very functional device for users across all kinds of categories. It’s not the iMac to beat — but it is the iMac for most people to buy.
Blending Optane memory and QLC flash, Intel’s Optane Memory H20 is an innovative M.2 NVMe SSD that delivers a unique caching experience. It is ultra-responsive to most consumer workloads, especially repetitive tasks.
For
+ Optane caching improves system responsiveness
+ Rivals high-end NVMe SSDs in light and mixed workloads
Against
– Low endurance
– Optane caching not beneficial in all workloads
– Limited to specific systems and 1TB maximum capacity
– Slow sustained write performance after the SLC cache fills
– Lacks AES 256-bit encryption support
Features and Specifications
Not too long ago, Intel killed off most of its client Optane products to focus on one — the Optane Memory H20. The H20 marries the company’s latest QLC flash with Optane Memory to provide fast performance for most client workloads, but it can fall short in large sequential transfers. It’s a clever blend of innovation and technology, bringing improvements over the Optane Memory H10, but it still isn’t quite something that has fully won us over for day-to-day use. It also isn’t available for stand-alone purchases at retail, so it doesn’t make our list of Best SSDs.
Data caching isn’t anything new. For years, Intel has accelerated performance through data caching via various implementations. The company even has competition in the space from software vendors like Enmotus. My first experience with this technology started with the company’s Smart Response Technology a decade ago, which allowed you to use an SSD to cache data from an HDD for faster retrieval. But that was just the beginning.
Intel further refined the technology to leverage its very own Optane Memory to offer unparalleled response times compared to traditional SSDs. The company released products like the M10; low-density, fast access Optane SSDs for use with supported systems. Shortly after, Intel progressed to new designs.
Two years ago, the company released the H10, a dual-controlled, hybrid SSD that was very unique and unlike anything we’ve seen before. The idea was simple: combine the best of both worlds onto a single, slim M.2 SSD stick – high-density NAND flash for capacity along with bleeding-edge Optane Memory for speed. However, our initial impression of the NVMe SSD was rather underwhelming compared to the best SSDs available.
Since then, the company has tweaked and tuned the Rapid Storage Technology caching software with multiple optimizations and improvements. Concurrently, the company focused on advancing the H-series hardware, too. Today, we analyze the latest version of the software in use with the H10’s successor, the H20. Leveraging essentially what is an Intel SSD 670p in conjunction with a newer Optane controller, and of course, that sweet, sweet Optane Memory, Intel’s Optane Memory H20 is quite similar to the H10, only improved.
When Optane caching is enabled, the SSD aggregates the performance of both storage mediums for fast peak performance and fast access times. Intel’s H20 is an OEM-only-oriented product, however, meaning that it is highly unlikely you would ever find this SSD on sale in retail outlets. Still, they may trickle down to eBay or similar marketplaces, so purchasers of systems containing this unique SSD can upgrade their capacity.
Specifications
Product
H20 512GB
H20 1TB
Capacity (User / Raw)
512GB / 512GB
1024GB / 1024GB
Form Factor
M.2 2280 S3
M.2 2280 S3
Interface / Protocol
PCIe 3.0 x4 / NVMe 1.3
PCIe 3.0 x4 / NVMe 1.3
Optane Controller
SLMXT
SLMXT
Optane Media
1st Gen 3D Xpoint
1st Gen 3D Xpoint
Optane Capacity
32GB
32GB
NAND Controller
SM2265
SM2265
DRAM
DDR3
DDR3
NAND Flash
Intel 144L QLC
Intel 144L QLC
Sequential Read
3,300 MBps
3,300 MBps
Sequential Write
2,100 MBps
2,100 MBps
Random Read
65,000 IOPS
65,000 IOPS
Random Write
40,000 IOPS
40,000 IOPS
Security
Pyrite 2.0
Pyrite 2.0
Endurance (TBW)
185 TB
370 TB
Intel’s H20 comes in limited capacities of just 512GB and 1TB, and both models come equipped with 32GB of Optane Memory. Intel rates both for the same up to 3.3/2.1 GBps read/write speeds and up to 65,000/40,000 random read/write IOPS at a queue depth (QD) of 1. While the sequential figures aren’t groundbreaking, no flash-based SSD comes close to delivering the same random IOPS performance at low QDs.
As it is an OEM-only product, the pricing for the device is not clear, but the company states it will ship in June for PCs priced at roughly $800 and up. Additionally, the H20 comes with tight hardware requirements. The H20 is only compatible with 11th-Gen Intel Core series processors and Intel 500-series chipsets or newer. Also, you will need Windows, Intel’s RST Driver 18.1 or newer, and there is no planned retroactive support for previous-gen systems.
The H20 supports Pyrite 2.0 security but lacks AES 256-bit hardware-accelerated encryption. It also supports S.M.A.R.T. data reporting, Trim, and is rated to consume as little as 35mW at idle to reduce power consumption and heat generation.
A Closer Look
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Intel’s H20 comes in an M.2 2280 single-sided form factor. The drive interfaces with the host over four PCIe 3.0 lanes and communicates via the NVMe 1.3 protocol. The H20 takes advantage of the same components found in the company’s 670p and a newer and faster Optane controller. As with the H10, the H20’s SSD controllers are given two lanes each, meaning that sequential performance is limited if you don’t enable Optane Memory acceleration.
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Silicon Motion developed the NAND controller specifically for Intel and the company’s 144L QLC. The SM2265 is a dual-core, four-channel NVMe controller that interfaces with the flash at fast speeds of up to 1,200 MTps, roughly double the speed of the previous-gen flash. The drive does have DRAM, but very little – our 1TB sample contains only 256MB of DDR3.
Intel’s 144L QLC uses a floating gate design with three 48-layer decks stacked atop each other. Each deck can operate as SLC or QLC. Each deck can also be erased without disturbing the data on other decks, which helps reduce latency spikes caused by garbage collection. It also has four planes for handling parallel data operations and a few new reading and writing techniques to improve responsiveness.
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Intel made revisions under the hood of the Optane Media controller, too. It features both performance and power management improvements that reduce overall power consumption, something that is needed when handling power-hungry Optane media on an M.2 form factor in its own right, and even more important when combining it with the secondary storage components. The Optane Memory is still first-gen media, however.
Intel is starting to get its legs again. The company, which initially had issues with its 10nm chips, has released its first eight-core, 10nm Tiger Lake-H processors that are ready for gaming and high-end productivity notebooks.
For its 10th gen chips, Intel used a 10nm process (“Ice Lake”) for ultrabooks but used a 14nm chip (“Comet Lake”) for these enthusiast machines. Now, we have time to see what Intel’s 10nm SuperFin chips can do on the high end. Like the U-series Tiger Lake chips, these use Willow Cove execution cores paired with a UHD Graphics 750 engine that’s powered by Intel’s Xe architecture.
It comes at a crucial time. AMD’s
Ryzen 5000 series
(“Cezanne,” on a 7nm process) has proven powerful and, among gamers, popular. During current hardware shortages, some of the
best gaming laptops
have been nearly impossible to find. Intel claims that it has already shipped more than 1 million of its chips to its partners and that it will come in more than eighty different laptop designs.
The 11th Gen H-series processors include Thunderbolt 4 (and
USB 4
) and Resizable Bar support, and are notably Intel’s first eight-core laptop chips that work with PCIe 4.0 SSDs. AMD’s competing Zen 3 mobile chips are still on PCIe 3.0.
A lot is riding on Tiger Lake H’s success. Intel has already called its 11th generation the “world’s best gaming laptop processors,” and now, with the help of a sample unit, we’ve had a chance to see if those claims ring true.
How We Tested Tiger Lake i9
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Our Tiger Lake-H testing was performed on an Intel-branded sample “white box” system, similar to our early testing of Tiger Lake-U and Ice Lake. This isn’t a review of the Intel Core i9-11980HK processor inside so much as a performance preview of what you can expect from upcoming systems that will be available to buy. Our full reviews will come when we see the i9-11980HK and other 11th Gen CPUs in computers that are on sale.
Intel loaned reviewers these systems with the knowledge that they are pre-production systems that aren’t necessarily representative of final systems, which may have more finished drivers.
Unlike previous Intel sample systems, this one couldn’t toggle between TDPs. Many of Intel’s 11th gen processors will be configurable by the manufacturer, ranging from 35 to 65W (the Core i9-11980HK is a 65W, overclockable processor that peaks at 110W (PL2). In HWInfo, our unit showed a PL1 of 65W and a PL2 of 109W.
We did our testing on the suite we use to test gaming laptops to get an idea of where something specced similar to this sample system might fall. We had a limited amount of time with the system, so we could only run some tests. Some, like battery life, are more important on actual systems that will be on sale than this early sample.
Intel Reference Design for Tiger Lake i9 and Competitors
The Tiger Lake-H i9 reference design came with the following specifications:
2x 512GB Phison SM280512GKBB4S-E162 PCIe Gen 4 SSD
Display
16-inch, 2560 x 1600 (16:10)
Networking
Killer Wi-Fi 6E Ax1675X
Ports
2x Thunderbolt 4, 2x USB Type-A, microSD card reader, 3.5mm headphone jack
Battery
90 WHr
Operating System
Windows 10 Pro
Yes, Intel’s sample system paired its top-end GPU with a mid-range Nvidia GPU. It’s an odd pairing on paper, but one that allows for slim systems. Intel claims that this will enable “thin enthusiast” laptops, which fall in between ultraportable notebooks with its H35 processors and the big, thick machines that include the most intensive graphics cards.
From our reviews database, we chose to compare a number of different laptops depending on the task. For gaming, we broke out the
Acer Predator Triton 300 SE
with a 35W i7-11375H and the Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 with a Ryzen 7 5800H. Both of these also use RTX 3060 GPUs, like the reference system.
For our productivity benchmarks, we also included some other, bigger systems that may have more powerful GPUs to compare against a range of processors, including the Ryzen 9 5900HX in the
Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 G733
; the Intel Core i9-10980HK in the
Alienware m17 R4
; and the 35W Ryzen 9 5980HS in the Asus ROG Flow X13.
Acer Predator Triton 300 SE
Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5
Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 G733
Alienware m17 R4
Asus ROG Flow X13
CPU
Intel Core i7-11375H
AMD Ryzen 7 5800H
AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX
Intel Core i9-10980HK
AMD Ryzen 9 5980HS
GPU
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 Max-Q, 75W TGP
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3060 125W TGP
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080, 130W
Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080
AMD Radeon Graphics (integrated)
RAM
16GB DDR4-3200
16GB DDR4-3200
32GB DDR4-3200
32GB DDR4-2933
32GB LPDDR4x-4266
Storage
512GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD
512GB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD
2x 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD
512GB Boot, 2TB (2 x 1TB RAID 0) SSD
1TB M.2 2230 NVMe SSD
Display
14-inch, 1920 x 1080, 144 Hz IPS
15.6 inch, 1920 x 1080, 165Hz, IPS
17.3-inch, 1920 x 1080, 360 Hz, IPS
17.3-inch, 1920 x 1080, 360 Hz
13.4-inch, 3840 x 2400, 16:10, 60 Hz, touch
And here’s how the CPUs all stack up on paper:
Cores / Threads
Process Node
Base Frequency
Max Turbo Frequency
TDP
Intel Core i9-11980HK
16-Aug
10nm SuperFin
2.6 GHz
5.0 GHz
45 – 65 W
Intel Core i9-10980HK
16-Aug
14nm
2.4 GHz
5.3 GHz
45 – 65 W
Intel Core i7-11375H
8-Apr
10nm SuperFin
3.3 GHz
5.0 GHz
28 – 35W
AMD Ryzen 7 5800H
16-Aug
7nm FinFET
3.2 GHz
4.4 GHz
35 – 54W
AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX
16-Aug
7nm FinFET
3.3 GHz
4.6 GHz
35 – 54W
AMD Ryzen 9 5980HS
16-Aug
7nm FinFET
3.0 GHz
4.8 GHz
35W
Productivity Performance of Tiger Lake i9
We started out with our productivity suite to test the Core i9-11980HK to its 10th Gen counterpart, the highest-end Intel H35 processor and a series of AMD Ryzen competitors.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
On Geekbench 5, the Tiger Lake-H system started strong, pushing the highest single-core (1,649) of the bunch and beating the next highest multi-core score by more than 1,000 points (9,254). The next closest was the AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX in the Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 G733, which also had 32GB of RAM.
The Core i9-10980HK, the 10th Gen chip from Intel, was in a close third on multi-core, though in single-core other Ryzen laptops surpassed it.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The Intel sample system was also the fastest system to complete our Handbrake test, which transcodes a
4K
video to 1080p (with one caveat: we removed laptops with far more powerful GPUs, which could have some effect. If you left in the Ryzen 9 5900HX, it was faster at 6:11 in the Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 G733).
It was (unsurprisingly) significantly faster than the 35W Core i7, and also ahead of the Ryzen 7 5800H and 35W Ryzen 9 59080HS.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
The Intel sample system contained a pair of 512GB Phison PCIe Gen 4 SSDs, which the Core i9-11980HK can take advantage of. It was one of the speedier laptops in our test pool, but the Asus ROG Flow X13 was actually a little bit faster in our 25GB file transfer test.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
To check stability over a longer duration, we ran Cinbench R23 for 20 runs. The cooling, which was exceptionally loud during all of the tests (and sometimes while the sample system was doing absolutely nothing) kept it stable.
It started at a high of 11,846.31 while largely settling in the 11,600 range. During the Cinebench stress test, the CPU ran at an average of 3.5 GHz and an average temperature of 85.77 degrees Celsius (186.39 degrees Fahrenheit). While the chart looks largely stable, the monitoring tool HWinfo reported that the CPU was being thermally throttled for the majority of the test. This is the downside of putting a high-wattage processor in a slim system, and also explains the constant fan noise.
Gaming and Graphics Performance of Tiger Lake i9
In this system, Intel paired its top-of-the-line mobile processor with an RTX 3060 Max-Q. It’s a questionable decision for this kind of performance preview, as our first impression didn’t give us the chance to see what happens when this chip is used with a more powerful graphics card that would take full advantage of its capabilities. So our test pool here includes other laptops with an RTX 3060, either full or
Max-Q
.
On most of the benchmarks we ran, this thin and light notebook performed almost identically to what you would expect from Intel’s 35-watt Tiger Lake H processors that were launched earlier this year. That is, at
1080p
. We also ran the tests at the laptop’s native 2560 x 1600 resolution.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
On Shadow of the Tomb Raider (highest settings), the Intel sample system ran the benchmark at 62 frames per second, within one frame of the Acer Predator Trion 300 SE with H35. The Alienware m15 Ryzen Edition R5 with a full RTX 3060 Max-Q won out at 73 fps.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
We saw a very similar pattern on Grand Theft Auto V (very high settings). Intel’s system matched the Acer but fell behind the Alienware. On both Shadow of the Tomb Raider and GTAV, the Intel system was still playable above 30 fps at 2560 x 1600 on the same settings.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Tiger Lake-H finally had its moment on Far Cry New Dawn (ultra settings), running at 91 fps, beating out both the Predator (73 fps) and AMD-based Alienware (79 fps) at 1080p. At native resolution, the sample system was still over 60 fps.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
But on Red Dead Redemption 2 and Borderlands 3, we were back to the same old tale, coming extremely close to the H35 laptop. On RDR 2‘s medium settings, it ran at 48 fps at 1080p and 33 fps at 2560 x 1440.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
On Borderlands 3‘s “badass” quality settings, the game ran at 56 fps at 1080p, falling about 10 frames behind the Alienware. Intel’s sample system ran the game at 37 fps at 2560 x 1600.
Lastly, we ran the Metro Exodus gauntlet that we run in our laptop review. We have laptops play through the benchmark 15 times on the RTX preset (1920 x 1080) to simulate a half-hour of gaming. Intel’s CPU ran at an average of 3.38 GHz with an average temperature of 64.71 degrees Celsius (148.48 degrees Fahrenheit). There was some throttling, but not as often as during the Cinebench R23 stress test. The GPU ran at an average of 1,188.23 MHz and 64.21 degrees Celsius (147.58 degrees Fahrenheit).
Cooling Tiger Lake i9
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
Unlike with some previous early Intel samples, we were allowed to crack this one open to show it to you.
The laptop has three fans, while even most gaming laptops stick to two larger ones. That may explain the decibels. But what’s also fascinating is that the motherboard in the reference platform has been placed effectively upside down. This means that we can’t see the full cooler, including the heat pipes. That would require far more disassembly.
There are still serviceable parts, but they are connected to the edge of the board. Notably, there’s only one 512GB SSD that’s easily accessible. The other one must be on the other side of the motherboard.
Impressions of Tiger Lake i9
As always, it’s extremely difficult to get a complete picture of how high-end, Tiger Lake-H chips will run in laptops that OEMs will start selling today. Our testing was done under extremely limited time, and only used one new 11th Gen H-series chip.
To complicate things, this reference design is meant to represent a new “thin enthusiast” sector for Intel, which meant we couldn’t see how the Core i9-11980HK will perform at its best, in a thicker laptop with more elaborate cooling. Of course, every laptop is unique, so the processors may perform slightly differently based on size, cooling and other factors. We hope to be able to see a bigger, flagship gaming system with this processor for a fuller idea soon.
In productivity testing, our early benchmarks show a leap for Intel and its 10nm SuperFin process, especially in multi-core workloads. But AMD’s best, the Ryzen 9 5900HX still puts up a fight in some areas.
In gaming, we’ll really have to wait. What we now expect from finalized thin systems is that they won’t run games much differently from H35 variants unless those titles really hit the CPU hard.
As usual, the best way to truly tell is when we start testing laptops with a Tiger Lake-H that you can actually buy. As those hit our labs, we’ll see a wider variety of laptop designs and the full range of 11th Gen H-series processors.
After you’ve gone through the process of building Chia Coin plots on a PC (see how to farm Chia Coin), there’s no need to waste the electricity and tie up expensive computer hardware keeping those plots connected to the Internet. Instead, it’s best to take an external drive or drive(s) with the plots on them and hook them up to a Raspberry Pi where they can stay online, without gulping down too much juice.
In this tutorial, we will create a custom Raspberry Pi Chia farming device powered by the latest Ubuntu 64-bit release for the Raspberry Pi. The unit is designed to be hidden away, farming Chia Coin silently while we go about our lives. As such we chose to house the Raspberry Pi 4 inside of a passively cooled case. Our choice this time was the Akasa Gem Pro which has great cooling for the SoC, PMIC and PCIe chip and a rather tasteful, if unusual design.
For This Project You Will Need
Raspberry Pi 4 4GB
Raspberry pi case, perhaps one of the best Raspberry Pi cases, with cooling
An external USB storage drive or SSD / HDD with USB 3.0 caddy.
16GB Micro SD card or larger
Raspberry Pi Imager tool
Accessories to use your Raspberry Pi 4
Installing Chia On Raspberry Pi 4
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
1. Install Ubuntu 21.04 to a 16GB micro SD card using the official Raspberry Pi Imager tool. You can also try a headless installation.
2. Connect your keyboard, mouse, screen and Ethernet cable. If you did a headless install, you can skip the keyboard / mouse / screen. Boot your Raspberry Pi 4 and complete the Ubuntu 21.04 installation process. Reboot the Raspberry Pi for all the changes to take effect.
3. Open a terminal and update the software repositories, then upgrade the system software.
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt upgrade -y
4. Install the openssh server to enable remote monitoring via an SSH session. After installation this will automatically start the SSH server as a background service.
$ sudo apt install openssh-server
5. Install and start Byobu, a terminal multiplexer that will enable us to log out of the Pi and leave our Chia farm running.
$ sudo apt install byobu
$ byobu
6. Make a note of your Raspberry Pi’s IP address and hostname.
$ hostname -I
7. Install the Git version control software and a number of essential dependencies to build the Chia application.
9. Change directory to chia-blockchain and run the installer.
cd chia-blockchain
sh install.sh
10. Activate the Chia virtual environment and create a new Chia config.
$ . ./activate
$ chia init
11. Connect your USB 3.0 hard drive containing your Chia plot to the blue USB 3.0 ports on the Raspberry Pi 4. The drive will mount to a directory inside of /media/.
12. In the terminal change directory to your USB drive. Our test drive is at /media/les/Chia/
$ cd /media/YOUR USERNAME/DRIVE NAME
13. Add the plot from your USB drive to the Chia config using the 24 word key, created when the plot was created. Enter the command and then type the 24 words with a space between each word.
$ chia keys add
14. Start farming the plot; this will also start services for your wallet. This command will only show that the process has started.
$ chia start farmer
15. Use this command to see the process of syncing our machine to the network and to confirm that farming has begun. The command will update every two seconds. This command can be stopped by pressing CTRL + C.
$ watch 'chia show -s -c'
16. Press F6 to detach from the current Byobu session. This releases us from the running session but it keeps the previous command to view our farming progress running in the background. Should you wish to go back to that Byobu session type this command.
$ byobu
It will take some time for the Pi to sync with the Chia network but it will still continue to farm as it syncs. Right now if you wish, you can unplug the monitor, keyboard, mouse. Leaving just the power, network and USB 3.0 drive connected. Your Pi will happily farm Chia quietly in the corner of the room. But to access the Pi we now need to use SSH, a secure shell terminal and for that we need to instal a client on our computer.
Should you ever need to manually start the Chia farmer, for example after a reboot, start byobu and repeat steps 14 to 16.
How To Remotely Access Your Raspberry Pi Chia Coin Farm
1. Install PuTTY on your PC. PuTTY is used to make remote serial connections, SSH, with our Raspberry Pi 4.
2. Open PuTTY and in the Host Name or IP Address field enter the hostname or IP address of your Raspberry Pi 4. Click Open.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
3. Enter your username and password to remotely login to the Raspberry Pi 4.
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
4. Open the Byobu session to see the current progress.
$ byobu
Auto Mount USB Drive on Boot
Should we need to power off our P, or there is power loss, we need the drive to automatically be ready to farm Chia with little interaction. It is best to connect your keyboard, mouse and screen for this part of the project but it can also be done remotely using an SSH connection.
1. With the USB drive connected, open a terminal and list all the attached devices. Our device is sda1 which is connected to the mountpoint /media/les/Chia. Make a note of your mountpoint, we will need this later.
$ lsblk
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
2. Run this command to identify the UUID of your drive. Copy the text which starts UUID=. For example our UUID was UUID=”b0984018-3d5e-4e53-89d9-6c1f371dbdee
blkid /dev/YOUR DRIVE
(Image credit: Tom’s Hardware)
3. Open the filesystem configuration file, fstab with sudo.
$ sudo nano /etc/fstab
4. Add this line to the end of the file. Add your UUID after the =, and leave a space before entering the mountpoint. Here is how our drive is configured.
UUID=b0984018-3d5e-4e53-89d9-6c1f371dbdee /media/les/Chia/ auto nosuid,nodev,nofail,x-gvfs-show 0 0
Icy Dock has developed the industry’s only U.2 to USB 3.2 Gen 2 adapter, which lets you connect an enterprise-grade U.2 SSD to any desktop or laptop with a USB Type-A or Type-C port. The EZ-Adapter Ex MB931U-1VB targets people who need to transfer data from an enterprise-grade SSD to a PC or those who use U.2 drives as recording medium and need to transfer videos to a computer. But PC builders may be attracted to the adapter too.
The U.2 form-factor (SFF-8639) was developed primarily for business and mission-critical server and workstation applications that have very strict requirements for connectivity, thermals, reliability and hot-plug capability. Today, U.2 drives used in servers and workstations and more. For example, select Blackmagic cameras with the Ursa Mini Recorder attached can use U.2 SSDs as storage medium.
A big market for the EZ-Adapter Ex MB931U-1VB are content creators who have to transfer loads of data from one PC to another (or from a camera to a PC). 10GbE networks used in studios are fast, yet a PCIe 3.0 x4 interface of U.2 SSDs is a lot faster, so it makes sense to use U.2 SSDs as flash drives. There are also people who might prefer to use enterprise-grade SSDs as their direct attached storage (DAS), due to their higher endurance and reliability.
But another potential market comes from PC DIYers. U.2 SSDs tend to be very expensive when bought from the IT channel, but they can also be found on sites like eBay for considerably cheaper. Depending on the model, U.2 drives are designed for read-intensive, write-intensive or mixed workloads. Even after some time in service, most U.2 SSDs will have plenty of resource left. Furthermore, such drives are tailored for sustained, rather than burst, performance. As a result, even used U.2 SSDs may be faster and more durable than cheap consumer-grade drives rated for 0.2 DWPD over a three-year period. Hence, it makes sense to consider U.2 SSDs for DIY DAS applications.
Yet, connecting such drives to PCs is complicated, as only select desktop workstations have U.2 ports (or M.2 to U.2 adapters), and not all of them have adapters that can house a U.2 drive. Furthermore, there are no laptops with U.2 slots.
(Image credit: Icy Dock)
Icy Dock’s EZ-Adapter Ex MB931U-1VB is based on the ASMedia ASM2362 controller. It can house any U.2 SSD and connect it to a PC with a USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A or Type-C connector.
(Image credit: Icy Dock)
The EZ-Adapter Ex MB931U-1VB adapter is available now for $150 from Amazon. A power adapter and USB-A and USB-C cables are included.
It seems like Adata’s decided to lace up its boots, put on its cowboy hat, and ride the bullish Chia Coin market until it finally stops bucking. The company published a press release today extolling the virtues of its latest high-capacity SSDs and memory products in a bid to convince miners to choose its products over the competition.
Adata said in the release that its XPG SX8200 Pro Gen3 x4, SX8100 Gen3 x4, and GAMMIX S50 Lite Gen4 x4 SSDs as well as its DDR4-3200 and XPG GAMMIX D45 3600 32GB modules “have been tested for Chia mining by ADATA engineers on the latest Intel Z590 and AMD X570 platforms to guarantee seamless performance.”
We reported yesterday that Adata’s SSD and DRAM orders increased 500% month-over-month in April due to the Chia boom because the cryptocurrency, which has been pitched as a more environmentally friendly alternative to Bitcoin, prizes storage and memory performance over sheer computational power.
“While the sudden increase in SSD demand is quite unexpected,” Adata president Shalley Chen said, “we are not at all surprised that Chia miners are turning to our high-capacity storage products for their unique needs. At ADATA, we have always been focused on developing and offering high-quality, high-performance, and high-capacity devices to meet the needs of discerning users, whether they be PC enthusiasts, gamers, creators, or crypto miners.”
With the rise of Chia, PC builders have to worry about sourcing yet another part because of cryptocurrency. At this point, we’ll be lucky if mining doesn’t make its way to headsets, keyboards, and mice.
Phison said earlier this week that SSD prices would rise because the cryptocurrency’s boom has coincided with supply issues. We’ve known Chia’s likely to have an outsized influence on the storage market for weeks, especially since farming can quickly wear out some drives.
Until the price of Chia falls, however, that’s unlikely to dissuade miners. CoinGecko said the cryptocurrency’s value had risen nearly 50% over the last week, and it doesn’t show any signs of dropping soon. It makes sense for miners to buy as many drives as possible to maximize their potential profits in the short term.
Minisforum is known for its ultra-compact form-factor (UCFF), highly integrated PCs primarily designed for offices or living rooms. Apparently, the company does not want to stop there. This week, it introduced a rather extraordinary product for itself. Not only is the Minisforum GameMini an attempt at cracking our best gaming PCs list, but it’s also an open-case gaming PC aimed at enthusiasts.
The Minisforum GamiMini appears to be quite a powerful rig. It uses Gigabyte’s Aorus B550I Pro AX motherboard carrying an AMD Ryzen 5 5600X (6 CPU cores,12 threads, clock speed of 3.70 GHz – 4.60 GHz, 32MB of L3 cache, 65W). The board also packs 32GB of dual-channel DDR4-3200 RAM and a 1TB Kingston KC2500 M.2 SSD. The system is also equipped with an AMD Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card sitting on the opposite side to the motherboard. The PC is powered by SilverStone’s SX650-G power supply, so it can be upgraded fairly easily.
Since the GamiMini is an open system, Minisforum doesn’t have to worry too much about cooling the Ryzen 5 5600X, a 65W CPU that can pretty hot, or the rather power-hungry Radeon RX 6700 XT graphics card that’s rated for up to 230W TGP. Both components use rather modest air coolers.
As far as connectivity is concerned, Minisforum’s GameMini has everything that we come to expect from a Mini-ITX PC these days. The Aorus B550I Pro AX motherboard has a Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.1 module, a GbE port and multiple USB connectors.
Minisforum traditionally funds development of its PCs using a crowdfunding platform, so it hasn’t yet discussed pricing of its GameMini or a final release date.
(Pocket-lint) – We couldn’t have been more excited when we heard that the original Mass Effect trilogy was to be remastered for a new collection. But must admit to feeling slightly deflated when we realised the games weren’t to be remade completely.
That means, while the graphics and gameplay have undergone extensive tweaking, they haven’t been completely reimagined for modern consoles. After experiencing what’s possible with the superb Final Fantasy VII Remake, that seemed to be a backwards step to us. Initially, at least.
However, just a couple of hours into ME1, we soon realised why the development team decided on a fresh coat of paint and refinements rather than renewal. The trio just wouldn’t be the same games otherwise – unlikely to have retained the character of the originals. Warts and all.
So, in remastering the original Mass Effect games to 4K HDR, adding all downloadable content (DLC) released over the original games’ lifespans, and slathering on some clever technical glue to match it all together, we get the original trilogy at its best. All the while retaining exactly what made them special in the first place.
Plot points
Something that didn’t need refinement is the story. BioWare has always been a master at storytelling and characterisation. Go further into its past and you can see just how well Baldur’s Gate and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic hold up today – purely thanks to their narratives and clever, interwoven scripting.
The latter game was clearly a huge influence on Mass Effect (and itself heavily rumoured for a remaster). However, free from the restraints of the Star Wars lore book, the studio managed to rebottle lightning – several times.
There are many characters you encounter in the Mass Effect games, not least Shepard him or herself – who you play as throughout – but perhaps the most impressive of all is the universe that BioWare created.
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It took a blank canvas and built its own sci-fi saga, complete with new alien species, political factions, historical mythos and much more. And there’s nary a trade dispute in sight – well, not one that any of the trilogy is hinged on. It’s so complex and involving, it has inspired comic books, fan fiction, even a whole range of cosplay enthusiasts. It will also grip you from the very start.
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That’s partly thanks to the speed at which the main story thread reveals itself – which we’ll spare you because you’ve either already played the games first time around and know it already, or want to discover for yourself and therefore avoid spoilers. But it’s mainly thanks to the superb dialogue and neatly woven nature of the games across the entire run.
Many games have adopted inter-threading plots and character development over the years, but few do it quite as well as the Mass Effect series. It enables you to take your lead character – whether created from scratch or using presets – from one game to the next after each completion, literally picking up from where you left off. In addition, actions you make in each chapter have ramifications on the next.
EA / BioWare
By the time you get to Mass Effect 3 and, specifically, the ending, you could experience several key differences to someone else’s journey. It feels organic and, for us, still represents many of the studio’s finest moments.
The same is true with character development and relationships in the game. Each main non-playable character (NPC) in the game forms bonds and relationships with your lead character, depending on your conversational and practical choices. That could end in a friendly or romantic bond, or with them keeping you at arms-length. It results in you empathising with each of your in-game team members more so than in most games – role-playing games (RPGs) or otherwise.
When those NPCs are in peril or decisions on their fate are presented you are genuinely moved or troubled. It’s what made Mass Effect so superb in the first place, and continues to resonate now.
Ch-ch-changes
Of course, that can also be said of the original trilogy releases, each of which being still available through backward compatibility (on Xbox and PC, anyway). Of perhaps more interest are the numerous changes and improvements to this collection.
EA / BioWare
As with many repackaged collections of older games, all of the original DLC from Mass Effect 1, 2 and 3 are present – bar one. Pinnacle Station from ME1 is not present, as the version available to BioWare while putting together the Legendary Edition turned out to be corrupt and it couldn’t find the original files.
Still, you get over 40 DLC packs integrated into the games (where possible). That includes promo weapons and armour.
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The games are also presented with a new launcher, with all three accessible from the same screen. On PlayStation all games are installed to be played from the off, on Xbox (the version tested here), you need to download ME2 and ME3 from the launcher itself. This allows you to save disk space when you are only playing ME1.
Once you start the games, you notice a couple of changes to the options. The first Mass Effect has perhaps the biggest alterations, in that it has the options, plus character creation and models of the subsequent titles. BioWare changed a fair bit in the three years between ME1 and ME2, so the later benefits have now been adopted.
EA / BioWare
That also includes combat. The Mass Effect series combines deep, involving dialogue-based storytelling with action combat sequences. These are third-person and generally use a duck-and-cover mechanic. The first game, however, had clunky, under-realised combat that was tricky to use. We went back to the Xbox 360 original to check for ourselves and found that aiming – especially through the sniper rifle – was a twitchy affair. It has been greatly improved now, with the lessons learned for the sequels being implemented.
The look during combat – the user interface (UI)– has also been unified across the series now. However, ME1 still has some unique foibles. There’s unlimited ammo, for starters, with cooldown times for weapons instead. That was ditched later in the series. On the whole though, it has been polished into a more playable form for sure, which is great to revisit.
Another thing that helps is higher frame rate. While the graphics have been made higher-res and new lighting effects added, to suit the 4K consoles especially, enhanced frame rates make the most difference to gameplay. It differs depending on the format, but the games are now playable in up to 60 frames-per-second on consoles thanks to a ‘favour frame-rate’ option. The Xbox Series X even gets up to 120fps.
EA / BioWare
You do have a resolution drop to get the best frame rates, but it’s very much worth it. We’ve been playing the game largely across Xbox Series S and X, which run the game in backward compatibility but somewhat optimised. We favour frame-rate on the S, which gives up to 1440p and 60fps, while we switch to ‘favour quality’ mode on the X for 4K 60fps. Both run beautifully.
If you’re a PC owner with the right spec, you can even get up to 240fps and run the game in an 21:9 aspect ratio, but we haven’t been able to test that ourselves.
Graphically speaking
In terms of the new graphics themselves, there is a marked improvement, naturally, but you will still have to put up with a lot of the shonkiness of the originals.
EA / BioWare
The artificial intelligence (AI) upscaling process used for many of the texture upgrades did a fine job of creating details that were just fuzzy before, while the manual touching-up work produces excellent character models especially.
However, don’t expect a game that looks like Returnal or Miles Morales. It must be remembered that the original games were released between 2007 and 2012 and, while highly polished, they still look dated. Animations especially are janky. But they are liveable too.
Lighting has been greatly improved through, with the first Mass Effect showing the most change. Outdoor scenes are particularly impressive, with great use of lens flare and recoloured vistas that look significantly better than before. Plus, high dynamic range (HDR) has been added for further saturation and contrast boosts.
That’s not to say it’s all good. Sometimes the picture sharpening does the game a disservice. The Normandy (your space craft) can look overlaid onto a background now, whereas its blurriness helped it blend in before.
EA / BioWare
There are also the occasional annoying bugs or glitches – some old, some new. We’ve experienced some texture pop-in when a level loads, scenery clipping, or the odd character jerking about when faced with unsteady terrain. Sometimes team members just steadfastly refuse to follow you until you save and reload. But, there’s nothing that can’t be worked around or overlooked.
In all honesty, the original games had their fair share of caveats too, but we never minded at the time.
Hit the motherload
Another of the more significant improvements that you get with the Legendary Edition is loading times. Anyone who’s had to sit through the Citadel elevator loading issues of the original Mass Effect will understand just how thrilling it is to finally run the game from an SSD (on console).
We can’t comment on loading times for Xbox One or PS4 (or even PS5, as we’ve not played that copy) – although each are meant to be greatly enhanced too – but our experience of loading on both Xbox Series consoles couldn’t have been any better.
EA / BioWare
When stepping into any of the elevators on the Citadel, it is mere seconds before you reach the next area. This used to take a minute or more. In fact, all the clever tricks BioWare added to help alleviate the loading pain – such as in-elevator conversations or tannoy announcements – are now superfluous. You can still listen to them, but a skip option is also available as they are no longer needed to paper the cracks.
The same is true with loading in other areas of each of the games. Space travel, for example, is almost instant. Even the games load superfast at the beginning, once chosen on the launcher.
There are also many other smaller, often imperceptible tweaks (like an increased number of autosave points), so we could go on and on. It’s worth stressing though, that all of these have been made to improve and existing experience, not replace it. And, as life-long game fans ourselves, there is something altogether noble in that.
Verdict
We’ve played several hours of each of the three Mass Effect games in the Legendary Edition, but haven’t yet completed them this time around (we have in the past, a couple of times). However, we think we’ve seen enough to be able to give an honest opinion.
This collection is like a masterwork or remastering of one of the great music albums. It doesn’t go completely to town, or likely far enough for some, but the subject matter has been treated with the reverence it deserves. Let’s face it, you’d be hard pushed to find better scripting or storytelling out there, even in the biggest budget, most modern games. That’s where the Mass Effect trilogy’s real heart lies – and you can slather on as much polish as you like, but that’s what will draw you back.
Newcomers might initially baulk at the in-game visuals and their many caveats, but once the story grips they’ll find themselves as enamoured as we all were first time around. As for the rest of us, this is like revisiting an old friend and regaling memorable tales – all 100 plus hours of them. Wonderful.
back in February, now has full specs, pricing and is opening pre-orders for the machine. It will come in three configurations, starting at $999.
That base model has an Intel Core i5-1135G7 processor, 8GB of DDR4 RAM, a 256GB NVMe, Wi-Fi 6 and will run Windows 10 Home. A $1,399 performance configuration bumps the processor up to an i7-1165G7 and doubles the RAM and storage to 16GB and 512GB, respectively. A professional model, starting at $1,999, has an i7-1185G7, 32GB of RAM, a 1TB SSD, support for vPro and runs Windows 10 Pro.
There will also be a DIY edition, starting at $749 barebones, that you build yourself from a kit and customize with parts and modules.
Each laptop will also have a 3:2, 2256 x 1504 display, 1080p webcam with a privacy switch, a 55Wh battery and a keyboard with 1.5 mm of key travel, all features you might find in one of the
best ultrabooks
. The entire motherboard is replaceable to allow upgrades to future generations of processors, which are typically soldered to the board on laptops.
Pre-orders are starting today in the United States, and Canada will come soon, with Asia and Europe coming before the end of the year.
But like most tech companies, Framework hasn’t been immune to supply chain issues, which it says will “limit the number of Framework Laptops we have available at launch.” The company will take its pre-orders in small batches to ensure it can fulfill orders. The first batch, Framework says, will ship in July, with more to come. A pre-order requires a $100 refundable deposit, and the balance will be paid when it’s ready to ship.
While the Framework Laptop sounds promising on paper, other small computer vendors have faced issues with fulfillment. Eve Devices, for instance, had issues fulfilling its Eve V, and some potential buyers have proven far more cautious around its Spectrum monitor and second-gen convertible. But Framework is acknowledging the difficulty in sourcing parts right now, so at least it’s being straightforward there.
Silicon Power is a Taiwanese hardware manufacturer founded in 2003. In enthusiast circles, they are well known for providing high-quality flash storage products at reasonable pricing. Silicon Power’s various product lines include DRAM modules, SSDs, flash drives, and portable storage.
Today, we are taking a look at the Silicon Power XD80, which is the company’s new high-performance PCIe Gen 3 TLC-based SSD that was announced last month. The XD70 is based on a combination of a Phison E12 controller paired with TLC flash from Toshiba. A UnilC DRAM chip provides 512 MB of storage for the mapping tables of the SSD.
The Silicon Power UD70 comes in capacities of 256 GB ($48), 512 GB ($78), 1 TB ($126), and 2 TB ($243). Endurance for these models is set to 380 TBW, 800 TBW, 1665 TBW and 3115 TBW respectively. Silicon Power includes a five-year warranty with the XD80.
Specifications: Silicon Power XD80 2 TB
Brand:
Silicon Power
Model:
SP002TBP34XD8005
Capacity:
2048 GB (1907 GB usable) No additional overprovisioning
The modular Framework Laptop is now available for preorders, with prices starting at $999 for a fully assembled computer or $749 for the DIY Edition, which adds the option of paying less upfront if you’re willing bring your own RAM, SSD, charge, and Wi-Fi card.
For prebuilt systems, Framework is offering three starting configurations. There’s the entry level, $999 Base, which offers a Core i5-1135G7 processor, 8GB of RAM, a 256GB NVMe SSD, and Wi-Fi 6. The Performance model, starting at $1,399, ups the processor to a Core i7-1165G7 and doubles the RAM and SSD storage. And the Professional configuration, starting at $1,999, has a Core i7-1185G7, 32GB of RAM, 1TB of storage, and Windows 10 Pro.
Whether fully prebuilt or DIY, the Framework features a 13.5-inch 2256 x 1504 screen, a 1080p 60fps webcam, a 55Wh battery, and a 2.87-pound aluminum chassis. Ports are handled through a customizable expansion card system, which allows users to select up to four from a selection of USB-C, USB-A, HDMI, DisplayPort, and microSD slots. There’s also the option to add extra storage through removable USB-C SSDs, too, and Framework promises more port options in the future.
To preorder, Framework is only asking that users put down a $100 deposit, with the first laptops set to ship at the end of July. Preorders are only available in the US for now; Canada is promised in “the next few weeks,” and European and Asian availability is set for later this year. Additionally, Framework warns that due to the ongoing global supply shortages, it’ll have limited supply at launch but plans to do its preorders in batches that should ship throughout the year.
Framework is obviously a new company with an untested platform here. It is offering a 30-day return guarantee and a one-year limited warranty, though, which might help anyone deciding whether to plunk down the cash for a new computer.
A senior U.S. senator on Tuesday filed a formal enquiry with three makers of hard drives — Seagate, Toshiba, and Western Digital — asking whether they complied with a regulation that requires them to obtain a license to sell HDDs to Huawei.
Republican senator Roger Wicker this week decided to find out whether Seagate, Toshiba, and Western Digital believed that the new rule “prohibits shipment of hard disk drives to Huawei or any affiliate without a license” and the status of all license applications to ship their products to Huawei. The senator told Reuters that he was “in a fact-finding process … about whether leading global suppliers of hard disk drives are complying.”
Last August the U.S. Department of Commerce imposed new rules that required any company that sells hardware, software, equipment, or any other asset designed and/or built using American IP to Huawei to obtain a special export license from the U.S. government. Such licenses are usually reviewed with a presumption of denial policy, so they tend to be especially hard to get.
Last September two U.S.-based makers of hard drives had different views on the new rules. Western Digital said that it ceased to supply HDDs and SSDs to Huawei and applied for a license, whereas Seagate initiated an investigation to find out whether it actually needed a license.
Toshiba is a Japan-based company, so it might be a little easier for the company to work with Huawei. Still, since Toshiba uses loads of technologies developed in the U.S. (e.g., it has IP related to 3.5-inch HDDs that it obtained from Western Digital), it has to get a license from the U.S. DoC anyway.
Huawei sells thousands of different products, many of which need an HDD or an SSD to function. While there are solid-state drives that use solely Chinese technologies, HDDs are made by three companies in the world using machinery and IP designed in the USA. While Huawei said it had stockpiled enough components to keep its businesses running for a while, in eight months almost any stock should have been depleted. Therefore, the senator wants to find out whether Huawei procures HDDs on open market, or continues to be supplied by manufacturers themselves.
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