MSI claims 'world's first' with a 17-inch thin and light laptop packing RTX 20 series graphics

MSI focused on two specific laptops during its CES 2019 press conference in Las Vegas. Available now, the GS75 Stealth is supposedly the world’s first gaming laptop to feature a thin and light 17-inch form factor packing NVIDIA’s new GeForce RTX 2080 for mobile. The PS63 Modern, also available now, targets content creators, providing the performance they need in a lightweight design.

GS75 Stealth

The GS75 Stealth showcased during the press event measured 0.75 inches thick and relied on NVIDIA’s RTX 2080 with Max-Q GPU. Later an MSI representative said during a booth tour that the company chose Max-Q vagrants of the RTX 2080 and 2070 to extend battery life and keep thermals low. If you’re wanting the full-blown RTX 2080, MSI offers plenty of other thicker laptop models.

Cooling the innards in the new Stealth are seven heatpipes and three fans sporting 0.2mm blades. The overall design is 60 percent smaller than the typical 17.3-inch gaming laptop while its cooling system supposedly provides 45 percent more airflow. It only weighs 4.96 pounds.

MSI sells the GS75 Stealth in seven configurations, all of which pack an eighth-generation Intel Core i7-8750H six-core processor. Two configurations have the RTX 2060, two have the RTX 2070 with Max-Q, and the remaining feature the RTX 2080 with Max-Q. According to the specifications.

Despite its slim size, the GS75 has enough space for three stick-shaped SSDs: Two SATA models and one NVMe PCIe model. Knowing you’ll eventually want to swap those SSDs out for larger capacities, the laptops provide easy access on the bottom for upgrades.

MSI’s new thin and lite gaming notebook relies on an “IPS-level” panel s with a native 1,920 x 1,080 resolution at 144Hz, surrounded by 5.2mm bezels. Complementing this screen is a colorful keyboard with customizable per-key RGB illumination supplied by SteelSeries. You’ll also see a 35-percent larger, highly responsive trackpad mocking a smartphone with support for more than 10 multi-finger gestures.

MSI didn’t want gamers to mostly rely on headsets for a great audio experience. The speakers have a one-inch passive radiator design supporting 24bit/192kHz audio sampling. Other notable features include DDR4 system memory clocked at 2,666MHz, USB Type-C connectivity at 10Gbps, a thinner power brick, and a battery promising up to eight hours on a single charge.

In addition to the Stealth laptop, MSI refreshed its GT, GS, GE, and GL Series laptops with RTX 20 Series graphics as well.

PS63 Modern

Promising up to 40 percent faster content creation, the PS63 Modern is part of the company’s “Prestige” family launched in Q2 2018. It features a 15.6-inch “IPS-level” display with a 1,920 x 1,080 resolution and “close to” 100 percent support for the sRGB color space. Backing this display is an older GeForce GTX 1050 Ti discrete graphics chip with 4GB of dedicated video memory.

On the system memory front, you’ll see 16GB clocked at 2,666MHz while storage consists of a 512GB SATA-based SSD. The port complement includes one USB Type-C (5Gbps), two USB Type-A at 5Gbps, one USB Type-A at 10Gbps, HDMI output, a Micro SD card reader, and an audio jack.

Other notable features include bezels measuring just 5.6mm thick, a 38-percent smaller power brick, a battery promising up to 16 hours, and a fingerprint reader. This laptop measures just 0.63 inches thick and weighs 3.6 pounds.

A MSI representative said during our booth tour that the company is stressing to make hardware specifications front and center so content creators know and understand what they need. The rep said many just purchase what peers currently use, which may or may not meet their requirements. That pushed MSI to heavily promote hardware specifications in its Prestige family as it does with its gaming products. This is why Discovery Channel is now partnering with MSI.

Related: Best MSI laptops to buy in 2019 – gaming, creation, and workstations

According to MSI, you’ll receive commemorative gifts stemming from a partnership with Discovery Channel when you purchase this laptop. Both are “celebrating the spirit of discovery” and our first venture into space.

In addition to the PS63 Modern, MSI introduced the PS42 Modern and the P65 Creator with a 4K HDR screen.