Sorry, Razer... I’m not switching - Blade Stealth 2019 Review #Helpful Post

when the razorblades stealth was first

released several years ago I was like

WTF razor a laptop without a dedicated

graphics card I thought you guys were

like four gamers by gamers what's your

Excuse

but then between the hardware upgrades

and whether I'd like to admit it or not

the benefits of not having a GPU like a

slimmer design and better battery life

the stealth actually grew on me to the

point where for the last year my Blade

stealth has been in my backpack going

everywhere this job takes me so needless

to say I was stoked about the new 2018

razor blade stealth that is until I got

one it will not be going into my

backpack and I guess we should take a

look at why

save money on games and help support

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link in the video description I'm still

really undecided about razors new boxy

design language that's made its way from

the razor phone over to their laptops in

the last year and a half on the blade 15

it made a bit more sense to me because

there are thermal advantages oh and I do

appreciate the sliminess of the bezels

but on the stealth I'm gonna be carrying

it with me like in my hand a lot and the

sharp edges just aren't as comfortable

in the hand subjectively though it looks

damn fine with an exceptionally rigid

chassis and an overall premium feel and

they removed the lighting on the rear

Razer logo a change that will help users

avoid the potentially embarrassing

situation where they show up for an

important meeting and they've got like

this weird game arelooking thing on the

table compared to last year's model

there have been some sacrifices made to

the i/o HDMI being the notable cut but

with two USB see connections now one

with Thunderbolt 3 and both of them with

charging support along with two USB

Taipei's and a headphone jack it's hard

to complain too much about the extra

dongle that you'd have to carry what I

will complain about though is the

increase in power yes you heard me right

I hate that Razer made the stealth more

powerful and more power hungry by

including a dedicated GPU I mean sure

the MX 154 gig is better than nothing

but the issue here is that it's not in

an experienced changing way like casual

games like rocket League and dota they

will run in some cases multiple times

faster than onboard graphics but for

anything triple-a you can expect to run

at 720p resolution low settings and then

be thrilled if you get over 30 frames

per second one of razors other

justifications here is that it improves

performance for content creators for you

know editing videos on the going

such but I just don't see it like the

quad core Core i7 CPU is able to hold

its own pretty well in light video

editing on the old stealth or in the

surface laptop - but our guidance has

still always been that if you want to do

any serious video editing then you

should consider either the full-blown

razor blade or something like the asus

strix car which has six cores and a

full-blown gaming GPU for the same price

which brings us perfectly to the most

offensive part of all of this the fact

that the MX 150 is a $200 upgrade option

that must be selected in order to get

touchscreen functionality along with the

4k display option which adds an extra

$300 on top of the already ballooning

price on that note I hate the direction

that they've gone with the display

options in general here I mean sure 4k

is awesome and makes a difference on a

77 inch TV but on a 13-inch laptop those

extra pixels just mostly reduce battery

life and the most galling part of this

is that razor already had found a great

balance my 2017 model has an 1800 people

that has a noticeable boosting clarity

over 1080p without the drawbacks of 4k

and it has touch I mean if they were

gonna change things up why not do

something good like put in a taller

display like on the new MacBook Air and

the surface laptop to increase

productivity you know that second reason

why it has a dedicated GPU I mean they

added some stuff that we've been asking

for like Windows hello facial

recognition which is IMHO the best way

to unlock a laptop currently but then

they just continue to do more things

therefore frustrating like the webcam

next to it it's pretty schmitt to put it

mildly

and speaking of SH man the keyboard it's

great that they were able to backlight

the secondary functions I was really

excited when I saw this at CES but the

layout sucks and the switches

inconsistent so to start again the new

boxy design means that people with

larger hands will actually have their

palms rest on the sharp edge of the

laptop so we're not off to a great start

here and while the switches I would say

have above-average stabilization and a

nice tactile feel if a little bit mushy

the tactile bump happens before the

actual key actuation and the actuation

force is noticeably different from one

key to the next so I ended up having to

kind of Hulk mode type in order to make

sure that every stroke got registered

honestly though I could live with all of

that if it wasn't for the layout like

who thought this shift key was okay I

would actually like to speak to that

individual and I will personally pay for

him or her to attend both a typing and a

grammar workshop so that he or she can

become more familiar with the home row

method of typing and the importance of

proper capitalization like I've gotten

used to weird layouts before and I'll

probably do it again but this one is

just it's worse in ways that are just

unnecessary like if they had just kept

the key layout this keyboard might have

still gotten an a-minus or a b-plus but

as it is I think we're in c-plus

territory but let's bring it back for a

moment because you know what gets a

solid a plus this trackpad every other

Windows notebook maker should be paying

close attention right now and taking

note of how razer used all of the

available vertical space to enlarge

their touchpad it really does make a big

difference and it's awesome another area

where razer has beaten out most of the

competition is upgradability removing

the Stealth's bottom gives you easy

access to the solid 54 watt hour battery

which should be able to keep you going

for a full workday assuming you're not

gaming or video editing haha and you can

upgrade the m-dot to drive as well and I

mean okay the RAM is still soldered but

that really does seem more about the

state of the industry as a whole than it

does about

sort of razor because I'm finding myself

saying at least they didn't glue the

whole thing together

Microsoft bottom line though is this

I've actually been pretty hard on the

stealth for this entire review and some

people at Razer might even use the word

unfair but there is a reason for it the

price if you're making the most

expensive Windows Ultrabook you also

need to be making the best windows

ultrabook which means that we're gonna

go a little harder on it doesn't it so

the base price for this thing without

the GPU is fourteen hundred dollars and

for that kind of money

you could buy an XPS 13 or a surface

laptop to you get the same performance

along with better keyboards and screens

in either case then if you do throw the

GPU in here which I guess is razors kind

of main differentiating point you are up

to sixteen hundred dollars now for that

money you can buy a surface laptop two

and a Nintendo switch since then you can

get a better notebook experience and a

better casual gaming experience or you

could even get a 13-inch MacBook Pro

since somehow that's starting to look

like a reasonably priced option now and

then if you upgrade to the 4k touch

display which is when this thing does

finally become a very competent notebook

no touch on the lower end ones come on

it's up to 1900 US dollars at that price

you could get a surface book - 13-inch

with the much better gtx 1050 TI or like

basically any other perfectly good

notebook a Nintendo switch and take your

mom to a nice dinner or something it

really does seem like a better way to

spend your hard-earned dollars to me

since for my part even not having paid

for either of these it's pretty clear to

me which one is going back in my

backpack

at least until LG tries to knock it out

with the next gram normally these

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