Razer Announces Blade Gaming Laptop
by Andrew Cunningham on August 26, 2011 2:30 PM ESTRazer, a gaming-centric company known primarily for its mice and keyboards, today announced that they would be introducing a gaming laptop, the Blade, in Q4 2011.
The $2799.99 laptop is impressive not just for its specs (which include a 2.8GHz Core i7 2640M, an Optimus-equipped GeForce GT 555M with 2GB of GDDR5, a 17" 1920x1080 display and 8GB of RAM) and its dimensions (16.81" wide, 10.9" deep and 0.88" high, weighing just under 7 pounds), but for its striking design and its integrated multi-touch LCD panel, which can serve either as a touchpad or a second display. Also included is Razer's Switchblade User interface (see above the multi-touch panel in the photo above), which allows users to map in-game functions to 10 extra physical keys.
The Blade is expensive, and to be sure, its market niche is small, but it's nice to see a serious high-end gaming laptop that takes form factor and aesthetics into account - many gaming laptops, like the Toshiba Qosimo X775 we reviewed recently, definitely leave something to be desired in that department.
Source: Razer
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
21 Comments
View All Comments
twindragon6 - Friday, August 26, 2011 - link
Don't get me wrong the touch pad is cool. But why not just buy a Falcon Northwest, get custom paint and call it good!?! Where it the esata, hotkey bar, card reader, external out, etc.I could go on for days. A little OLED touch pad thingy isn't going to sway me into buying a jank laptop!
RaistlinZ - Friday, August 26, 2011 - link
$2,800.00?!?! The specs of this thing make it a mid-range gaming rig, something that should sell for $1,200 tops.thatlaptopguy - Friday, August 26, 2011 - link
This overpriced, underwhelming laptop is supposed to "save PC gaming"???? Bahahahaha.Jongtimson - Friday, August 26, 2011 - link
I also could wrote a whole page about this but instead I found someone who perfectly conveyed my feelings in one post. Mandatory: http://doughbills.blogspot.com/2011/08/razer-we-wi...Hrel - Friday, August 26, 2011 - link
I really like the look and design of this. But you can keep ur fancy screen double touch what not. You can also make it a little thicker. Give me a GTX560M with Optimus, 15.6" 1080p screen. USB 3.0 galore. I'd rather have a 10-key than that thing.P.S. SO HELP ME if you put blu ray in it!!!!!!!!!!! Just don't, kay? Kay.
Get the price to roughly 1200 bucks and I'd be pretty happy; on like newegg or something.
Mumrik - Saturday, August 27, 2011 - link
I must say... I think they missed the point.ChuckDriver - Saturday, August 27, 2011 - link
They charge $2,800 and it doesn't have a SSD standard. This looks big enough to accommodate two drive bays. If that isn't the case they could have at least installed a mSATA SSD for speed and a spinning disk for capacity.Johnmcl7 - Saturday, August 27, 2011 - link
...a gaming laptop taking aesthetics and form factor into account as the cooling system should be the top priority in the design to ensure the machine can cool its high performance hardware efficiently and quietly. I find it frustrating when higher performance machines make concessions for their looks and form factor leaving you with roaring fans and a machine melting through your lap as the cooling system struggles to keep the tempertures down. Some of the older machines were much chunkier which was less aesthetically pleasing but they could cool the laptop down far more effectively and given I buy a gaming laptop for gaming and not to look pretty that's where the priority should be as I doubt most people buy gaming laptops to melt down while gaming and look pretty while not gaming.John
Dustin Sklavos - Monday, August 29, 2011 - link
This is actually the one point I do think they got things right. Ignoring the dumber-than-a-box-of-rocks asking price for a laptop without an SSD, look at where they placed the vents: there's a wind tunnel that basically blows straight through the chassis, with a clear intake on one side and an exhaust on the other. If nothing else, this should be a big improvement on how laptops are traditionally cooled.Buckleys - Saturday, August 27, 2011 - link
This guy made an amazing post about the laptop: http://doughbills.blogspot.com/2011/08/razer-we-wi...Couldn't agree any more with his opinions