Introduction
PC gaming is going through a mini revolution with more mini-ITX computers, like the Origin Chronos Z, to the lightweight Alienware 13 and the coming storm of Steam Machines. Now, the latest machine to join this trend is the Origin EVO15-S.
This thin and light notebook marks a big departure from the bulky gaming beast such as the Origin EON17-S we're used to seeing from the PC builder. Instead, the laptop is just over half an inch thick with a new thin and light chassis designed by MSI and used to great effect in the MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 3K.
Despite the thin profile of this svelte machine, the EVO15-S is still packing an Intel Core i7 processor, one of Nvidia latest Maxwell GPUs and no less than three storage drives. That's a lot of power stuffed into one small package, but is the EVO15-S as sweet as it sounds on paper?
Design
You might notice it looks exactly like the MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 3K, and you would be right – mostly. Upon closer inspection the Origin machine differs greatly with a thinner aluminum frame (dimensions we'll get to on the next page) complete with an anodized finish, where as MSI's offering was clad in brushed aluminum. Origin has also opted for a much simpler red backlight for the keyboard as opposed to the Ghost Pro 3K's fully customizable RGB keyboard deck.
Aside from these differences, the EVO15-S still inherits most of the Ghost Pro 3K's dashing good looks. The notebook is largely made of metal, save for the fat bezels around the screen and the underside of the laptop. It'll never match the quality and rigidity of a unibody Apple MacBook Pro 15-inch Retina, but the Origin laptop still feels solid throughout.
Once again, like the MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 3K, this Origin rig also looks the part of a high-end laptop more so than a gaming machine. This is a machine you'll easily be able to take out of a bag at a coffee shop without drawing too much attention – that is until you start playing Dragon Age Inquisition, like I did. The only thing I don't appreciate about the laptop's design is the way its aluminum sides simply end to a sharp edge. It's not a detail you'll notice unless your turn over the laptop, but I've seen other manufacturers create a cleaner transition between metal and plastic before with a defined and stylish edge.
A series of bright LED's adorn the front edge of the EVO15-S to keep users informed of how the laptop is operating. Likewise the ring of light surrounding the power button flips between blue and red, the latter of which denotes when the laptop kicks it into high-performance mode for gaming.
Welcome to the wind tunnel
One of the biggest annoyances with the EVO15-S is that its fans scream in a deafening tone when they're spinning at full speed. It's not an exaggeration to say the laptop sounds like a jet under load. Worse yet, there's no escape: the laptop's two main intake fans draw air from the top of the laptop through the speaker grill-esque perforations strewn across the keyboard deck.
While the fans are plenty loud, the good news it's all done in service to keep the laptop nice and cool. Lap scorching temperatures were a big problem we experienced with the Ghost Pro 3K and turning up the fans has pretty much corrected the issue on the Origin. I just wish it were a little quieter. You can partially drone out the sound by pumping up the volume on the notebook's downward pointed speakers, but you're best bet for good acoustics is to throw on a pair of headphones.
Specifications and performance
You would be mistaken to call the Origin EVO15-S and the MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 3K twins. For starters the Origin is smaller in every way, measuring 15.35 x 10.47 x 0.78 inches, whereas the MSI comes in at a larger 16.5 x 11.3 x 0.85 inches. Despite these differing dimensions, both machines come in at the same 4.3-pound weight.
The EVO15-S is also a bit more compact than the Gigabyte P35W v2, which measures in at 15.16 x 10.63 x 0.83 inches and weighs 5.07 pounds thanks to the built-in optical drive. Still this laptop is a bit larger than most contemporary 15.6-inch laptops, so it might be a tight fit even for bags designed to carry notebooks of this screen size.
Here is the Origin EVO15-S configuration given to TechRadar:
Spec sheet
- CPU: 2.5GHz Intel Core i7-4710HQ (quad-core, 6MB cache, up to 3.5GHz with Turbo Boost)
- Graphics: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M (6GB GDDR5 RAM), Intel HD Graphics 4600
- RAM: 16GB DDR3L (1600MHz)
- Screen: 15.6-inch, 1920 x 1080 eDP Wide View Angle Matte Display
- Storage: Dual 128GB M.2 SATA SSD in RAID0 (256GB Total); 1TB HDD (7,200 rpm)
- Ports: 3 x USB 3.0 ports, mini DisplayPort, HDMI, Headphone jack, Microphone jack, Ethernet
- Connectivity: Intel PRO Wireless AC 7260 + BT Wireless LAN Combo
- Camera: Built-in 720P Video Camera
- Weight: 4.3 pounds
- Size: 15.35 x 10.47 x 0.78 inches (W x D x H)
What you're looking at is a stock EVO15-S available for a cool $2,299 (about £1,466, AU$2,741) with a free one year part replacement and lifetime support plan. Our review unit came with a few extras, including a copy of CyberLink PowerDVD 14 Ultra and a wooden shipping crate bumping up the price to $2,389 (about £1,523, AU$2,848). I'd recommend skipping these superfluous options and getting the surprisingly inexpensive upgrade to a 3840 x 2160 glossy IPS display, which only brings the cost of this machine up to $2,499 (about £1,593, AU$2,979).
In the grand scheme of gaming laptops, the base EVO15-S a pretty well priced machine, especially considering it comes with two 128GB SSDs raided together as well as a 1TB 7200rpm hard drive. This laptop also is packed with a speedy 2.5GHz Intel Core i7-4710HQ and one of NVIDIA's latest and most efficient mobile GPUs yet, the GeForce GTX 970M.
Of course, there are plenty of options. If you've got the cash to burn, you could pick up a top end MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 3K for $1,849 (about £1,179, AU$2,210) on Amazon. It won't have Nvidia's latest and greatest Maxwell graphics chip, but it still comes packing a capable GTX 870M, 2,880 x 1,620 IPS screen, plus the same Intel Core i7 processor.
The Gigabyte P35W v2, meanwhile, is available for $1,749 (about £1,115, AU$2,090) at B&H Photo. For your money, you'll get an equally specced machine as the MSI with the same CPU and graphics card, plus the bonus of a Blu-ray writer if you're a creative artist in need of producing physical media.
Performance
With such a powerful chipset humming inside the laptop, I never experienced a single hitch, even when asking the EVO15-S to juggle a dozen tasks at a time. I was also able to play Shadow of Mordor at a decent 45 frames per second (fps) on ultra settings, just a slight step behind the 60 fps on my own desktop rig, fitted with a Core i5-3750K and GTX 970. I was also able to easily coax this portable gaming rig to play Dragon Age Inquisition at 60 fps after a bit of dabbling in the graphical settings.
Benchmarks
- 3DMark: Ice Storm: 85,137; Cloud Gate: 18,777; Fire Strike: 5,559
- Cinebench Graphics: 100.97 fps, CPU: 649 points
- PCMark 8 (Home Test): 3,239 points
- PCMark 8 Battery Life: 2 hours and 2 minutes
- Bioshock Infinite (1080p, Ultra): 71 fps; (1080p, Low): 165 fps
- Metro: Last Light (1080p, Ultra): 28 fps; (1080p, Low): 101 fps
As expected, the Origin put up some of the best scores we've ever seen from a gaming laptop. The 3D Mark benchmark shows us just how much more weight Nvidia's new mobile Maxwell parts can pull with such Cloud Gate and Firestrike scores.
By comparison, the Ghost Pro 3K completed the Cloud Gate with 16,865 and the Fire Strike benchmark with 4,334. Meanwhile, the Gigabyte scored 15,010 points in Cloud Gate and 4,297 points on the Fire Strike test.
The results from the crucible we've come to know as Metro: Last Light on Ultra are even more telling. The EVO15-S is the first single mobile GPU machine we've ever seen play this taxing game at an average 28 fps. Comparatively, the MSI rig was only able to render the benchmark at a stuttering 18 fps while the Gigabyte P35W v2 performed even worse with just 14fps.
I have to also stress that this notebook outpaces the Alienware 18, which ran the benchmark scene at 26 fps. In simpler terms; the EVO15-S, with just one graphics card and slower processor, is schooling a $4,166 (about £2,434, AU$4,443) rig equipped with two-tier Nvidia GTX 880M GPUs and a 2.9GHz Intel Core i7-4910MQ processor. That is amazing.
Pixel perfect
As if the EVO15-S' excellent gaming performance wasn't enough, Origin has also equipped its thinnest laptop with equally pleasing 1080p screen. Even at a quarter brightness, the display is more than bright enough to counterbalance bright sunlight.
Meanwhile, the anti-glare coating does an excellent job at subduing reflections and glare. The screen also produces a wide color gamut and stellar contrast.
Running short
The only area I find the Origin EVO15-S lacking in is battery life. PCMark 8 quickly drained the battery in a matter of 2 hours and 2 minutes. The Origin laptop also ran for a short lived 2 hours and 18 minutes with my own regular everyday tasks of browsing on Chrome, writing in Microsoft Word, some Lightroom image editing and playing the opening minutes of the new Game of Thrones adventure game.
The MSI GS60 Ghost Pro 3K, on the other hand, managed to hang on for 2 hours and 58 minutes despite the power needs of the higher-resolution 3K display. Lastly, the longest lasting machine crown goes to the Gigabyte P35W v2, with its 4 hours and 3 minutes-long run time.
Bundled software
Origin has done a great job of limiting the preloaded software, even going so far as to stick with just one audio controller, as opposed to the usual requisite two to four (seriously).
- Soundblaster Cinema: The included sound profiles and underlying audio controller. Unlike some other audio tools, Creative has made and excellent visually driven interface.
- Hotkey Config: Of course when you have a gaming laptop there has to be a tool for setting up macros and here's your go to application.
- PowerDVD 14 Ultra: Less bundled and more like optional extra software; I'm personally not sure why Origin decided to include this particular application with the EVO15-S since it does not even have an optical drive. Even if I were to plug in an external drive, I would rather use Zoom Player as it's a much more robust piece of software.
Verdict
Dolling out over two grand for a mobile gaming machine is a lot of money to spend on a laptop, but the EON15-S is one of those unique packages that manages to deliver on all fronts. It comes with enough power to rival a desktop. Meanwhile, Origin got all the other key components right, from the screen to the speakers and keyboard, and even an excellent trackpad.
We liked
The Origin EVO15-S hews closely to the design of MSI's GS60 Ghost Pro 3K, yet it improves on the formula with a marginally smaller package and a less stain-prone anodized finish. It's missing a few features like the hypnotic fully RGB keyboard, but it still a very thin and well built platform.
Nvidia's latest Maxwell chipset has given mobile cards a major boost and this is very evident from the benchmark results. What more, the Nvidia GTX 970M powering the EVO15-S, it truly closes the performance gap between gaming laptops and desktops just a little bit more. After overclocking the card, I was able to run even the most taxing modern games at 60fps with all the graphical flourishes turned on and set to ultra.
We disliked
Short battery life is almost part and parcel to the gaming laptop experience, but the EVO15-S ran dry surprisingly sooner than its competitors. At most, you could look at three hours of battery life with ECO mode turned on the Origin machine. Rigs like the MSI laptop ran longer despite power demands of a 3K display. I was also expecting slightly better performance, as the GTX 970M's desktop counterpart is an extremely power efficient GPU.
Another thing that turned me off from the Origin laptop is the incredibly noisy fans. Luckily, there's an easy fix for the problem by downloading the SpeedFan application to manually control fan rpms while monitoring temperatures throughout the laptop.
Final verdict
There's plenty to like about the EVO15-S, and while it comes at an expensive premium, it's one of the few laptops that are well worth the expense. This Origin machine is one of the thinnest and lightest gaming laptops you possibly buy.
Meanwhile, it does not skimp at all with some of the latest cutting edge parts, an excellent 1080p panel for all types of media, three storage drives and 16GB of RAM. Plus there's also the option to throw on a 4K screen for a marginally priced upgrade.
In time, more and more gaming PCs will be outfitted with Nvidia's latest GPUs, but for now, the Origin EVO15-S is one of the best-performing gaming laptops for a reasonable price.
from www.techradar.com
