NVIDIA just launched their new GTX 980M/GTX 970M GPUs, and unfortunately we were unable to get a notebook in time for testing… which just changed this morning a couple hours after the launch article went live. We've covered MSI's GM204 notebooks already, and now we have a sample GT72 sample from MSI for review. The GT72 Dominator is available in seven different configurations, two "Dominator" SKUs with GTX 970M and five "Dominator Pro" SKUs with GTX 980M. We received the GT72 Dominator Pro-208 for testing, which has the following specifications:

Once you get past the sticker shock, what we're looking it is a top of the line gaming notebook. MSI's GT72 is an overhaul of their previous GT70 design, with a new motherboard and chassis. The updates includes a slimmer and slightly lighter chassis with two cooling fans, six USB 3.0 ports (instead of five USB ports with two of them being USB 2.0 on the GT70), two mini-DisplayPort 1.2 ports (no VGA now), and a switch to M.2 SATA for SSDs instead of mSATA.

MSI also supports up to four M.2 SSDs now instead of three mSATA SSDs, with the option to go as high as a 1TB SSD array. I'm still not really convinced the RAID SSDs are the best solution for storage, and the cost of the SSDs looks to be quite high relative to 2.5" SSDs. For instance, the Samsung 850 Pro 512GB only costs $380 while MSI charges $350 to go from two 128GB SSDs to four 128GB SSDs (and 24GB to 32GB RAM). That said, the RAID 0 set of four SSDs should at least provide a hefty sustained throughput if that's what you need.

There is one concern with the configuration we've received for testing, and that's the choice of CPU. On a $3000 notebook, I'm a bit worried that the i7-4710HQ might be a bottleneck in some games. Of course, those are going to be games that tend to be CPU limited anyway (e.g. Skyrim and StarCraft II, which we're no longer running for precisely that reason). Still, we ran into cases where the previous generation GTX 780M was held back by the use of i7-4700MQ in the notebook we tested, and i7-4710HQ isn't much better.

I also find it curious that MSI has opted for the soldered onto the motherboard CPUs in place of the socketed i7-4710MQ. Perhaps it came with some space savings, but it means that whatever you start with will remain your CPU for the life of the laptop. On the other hand, I don't know many people who have upgraded notebook CPUs, so I suspect this will be more of a limitation for system integrators than for end users. Another concern is the lack of Optimus support; some people dislike Optimus and it can get in the way on occasion, but going back to manual switching at the press of a button (with a reboot in between) isn't necessarily great either.

Running our full suite of notebook tests obviously requires quite a bit of time, so we're not going to be done with the complete review of the MSI GT72 Dominator Pro for at least a few days. But considering this is first and foremost a gaming notebook, we felt a short preview of the graphics performance was in order. We've run all of our current crop of gaming tests (along with a couple extras for good measure).

Since we have a decent selection of MSI notebooks still available for testing, I've confined the reported results to those notebooks. That means we're looking at the GE60 Stealth Pro, GS60 Ghost Pro 3K, GT70 Dominator Pro (GTX 880M), and the new GT72 Dominator Pro-208. (Note that if you're just after the GTX 980M, the GT72 Dominator Pro-211 drops to a single 128GB SSD and 16GB RAM for $2300.) We're also looking to get a notebook with a GTX 970M for testing, but we haven't received one yet; performance should be pretty close to the 880M in most cases, though with potentially better battery life and support for new features like VXGI and DX12.

But first, let's unwrap this "present" and see what MSI has sent along....

MSI GT72: Unboxing and Initial Impressions

Since this is a preview, I figure starting out with unboxing is in order. Yeah, unboxing on AnandTech, but bear with me. I'll get to the notebook once it's unwrapped….

The packaging is typical MSI, with a mostly black box sporting the MSI and Dragon Army logos along with information on the specific configuration. The notebook actually ships in a box within a box within another box, and there's a moderate amount of padding around the notebook to help keep it safe during shipping. Within the main box, the notebook is protected from scratches by a nylon sleeve, and furthermore there's a plastic sheet protecting the top of the notebook with a cloth sheet (that can also work as a cloth for cleaning off dust) between the display and the keyboard. There's nothing too unusual to see with the packaging, so let's move on to the notebook itself.

Having tested and used the GT70 several times during the past year or more, I'm actually thrilled to see MSI finally update the GT70 with a newer chassis. While this is still a big notebook, it's noticeably slimmer than the GT70 and the keyboard and palm rest have been updated to look like a modern design. The touchpad in particular looks much nicer now, blending smoothly into the surface of the palm rest; there's no edge for you to feel when using the touchpad, but since most gamers will use a dedicated mouse I don't find this to be a serious concern.

As for the keyboard, it remains largely the same in terms of the keys, but gone is the glossy bezel surrounding those keys – hallelujah! The top of the chassis is also clean now, with no garish speakers or capacitive buttons for controlling multimedia, WiFi, fan speed, etc.; those controls are now to the left of the keyboard and they look far more discreet. My only remaining complaint is minor at best: I still want the Windows key to the left of the space bar; others probably disagree and it's easy enough to adapt, plus you can use the MSI Steel Series software to reprogram any key if you want (except for the Fn key, unfortunately).

There's only one real sore spot I have with the GT72: the display. It's a bit maddening to me that MSI now has the GS60 with either an AHVA (similar to IPS) 1920x1080 panel or an IPS 2880x1620, but the 17.3" GT72 still gets saddled with a TN panel. Where's the 3K or 4K treatment for the laptop that has the best chance of actually powering games at high DPI resolutions? Oh, this is probably about as good as TN panels get, but it's still TN and not something better. Part of the problem is that there really aren't many options for non-TN 17.3" displays, but I know Samsung at least has a PLS 1080p panel that could work. Hopefully in the coming year we'll see enough demand from notebook vendors in general that we start getting higher quality 17.3" panels.

Overall, the new GT72 chassis is a huge improvement in my book. It looks more like a beefed up version of the GS60/GS70, and the build quality is also good. In fact, the new GT72 almost looks like an Alienware M17x in some respects, though without so much of the angled front and back sides. This is still more of a desktop replacement than a laptop in my opinion, but compared to the competition (Alienware 17 and various Clevo notebooks), I think right now the MSI GT72 is the overall best looking high-end gaming notebook. It's also large enough and has sufficient cooling that it won't get uncomfortably hot in your lap, which is a problem with some of the slim gaming notebooks (e.g. Razer Blade and MSI's GS60/GS70).

MSI GT72: Ultra Quality Gaming Performance

Okay, that's enough small talk. I know most of you are really only interested in one thing: how fast is the GTX 980M? I've run a limited set of benchmarks on the system, basically testing at 1920x1080p "Ultra" and "High" settings. I've also increased the number of games being tested for this article beyond the usual five that we use for notebooks, simply because this is first and foremost a gaming notebook. PCMark and general system performance results might be nice to know, but I don't think anyone is going to buy the GT72 unless they plan on utilizing that shiny new GTX 980M. The new games are Batman: Arkham Origins, GRID Autosport, Metro: Last Light Redux, and Sniper Elite 3; I've also brought back Company of Heroes 2, which isn't something we normally test on notebooks. For now I'm comparing the GT72 with three other MSI notebook, and I've also tossed in a desktop i7-4770K (at 4.1GHz) with a GTX 970 as a reference; in theory, the GTX 980M shouldn't be too far off the GTX 970 performance.

For the sake of completeness, the settings used for Ultra generally include anti-aliasing, and in some cases that means SSAA (which can really pummel the GPU). Batman: Arkham Origins sets all the options to on/DX11, anti-aliasing is 4xMSAA, and PhysX is disabled. BioShock Infinite uses the UltraDX11_DDOF setting, Company of Heroes 2 has all the options at their maximum (including anti-aliasing set to High), and GRID Autosport has 4xMSAA enabled with the Ultra quality preset. For Metro: Last Light Redux, all settings are at maximum (including SSAA). And wrapping up, Sleeping Dogs uses the Extreme preset (which includes High SSAA), Sniper Elite 3 uses the Ultra preset with 4xSSAA enabled, and Tomb Raider uses the Ultimate preset (but without enabling SSAA – maxing out the settings drops the 980M by 7 FPS if you're wondering, so it's not a huge difference). Here are the benchmark results, starting with Ultra quality:

1920x1080 Ultra Performance

First, let me just say that the inclusion of the desktop GTX 970 is really something of a high water mark for mobile GPUs to strive for. Granted, it's a $329 part compared to a $2200+ notebook, but high-end gaming notebooks have never been particularly economical. The fact that the GTX 980M can come close to the GTX 970 is pretty impressive, and it also breaks 30FPS in every one of our test games – something no other mobile GPU has ever achieved.

Obviously there are still going to be games where cranking every dial up to 11 isn't going to work out so well. Metro: Last Light (and the Redux sequel) is a prime example of this, as enabling SSAA in particular can bring even the fastest desktop GPUs down to unplayable frame rates; games like Crysis 3 and The Witcher 2 can be similarly taxing with all the settings maxed. Of course, if we're talking about "normal" settings (e.g. not SSAA), the GTX 980M is able to handle pretty much anything you might want to throw at it. Dropping down to our High settings (which mostly means turning off anti-aliasing in terms of quality and performance, though there are also differences between High and Very High/Ultra in some titles), performance jumps well into the playable range.

In terms of average performance, the GTX 980M tops all mobile contenders by a sizeable margin. It's about 35% faster than the GTX 880M, 70% faster than GTX 870M, and a whopping 110% faster than GTX 860M. Interestingly, I was expecting performance to be closer to the desktop GTX 970, but it turns out the 980M only manages to deliver 81% of the 970 performance on average. GPU memory bandwidth may be a factor here (7GHz vs. 5GHz), and the desktop GPU is also being helped by a CPU that's clocked 17-28% higher than the i7-4710HQ (depending on how high the 4710HQ is able to turbo).

This is part of what makes me wonder if MSI went a bit too conservative on the CPU side of things, but then we're already pushing high frame rates with the 4710HQ and in most cases it's only going to be frame rates above 60 FPS where the CPU plays a significant role.

MSI GT72: High Quality Gaming Performance

While the GTX 980M does manage to break 30FPS in all titles at our Ultra settings, there are times when dropping things down a notch can provide a better overall experience. Our High settings do exactly that, and if you're playing on battery power the added FPS headroom should yield overall improved battery life when BatteryBoost is enabled.

Again, full disclosure for the High settings is that I generally skip MSAA and SSAA, though if FXAA is available I do enable that. For Batman: Arkham Origins the settings are the same as Ultra (all DX11 features and other rendering enhancements enabled except for PhysX), but FXAA High is used instead of 4xMSAA. BioShock Infinite uses the VeryHigh preset (DX11 path), and Company of Heroes 2 uses High Image Quality and Textures, no Anti-Aliasing, with Snow and Physics set to Medium. GRID Autosport uses the High present with no anti-aliasing, and Metro: Last Light Redux uses High Quality and Tessellation without SSAA. Finally, Sleeping Dogs, Sniper Elite 3, and Tomb Raider all use the "High" defaults (which includes High FXAA and "Medium" SSAA for Sleeping Dogs).

1920x1080 High Performance

Here's where "beyond 1080p gaming" is really an option, as without SSAA and/or 4xMSAA many of the games push into the triple digit frame rates. Company of Heroes 2 seems to run into a CPU bottleneck or some other limit, as even at lower settings it doesn't get much above 60 FPS, making it the lowest performing game in our High settings. Metro: Last Light Redux actually breaks well past 60FPS for a change, Sleeping Dogs comes in at just under 100 FPS, and everything else is at the point where stereoscopic 3D at 60+ FPS is a viable option (though that's not supported on the MSI GT72 display).

Average performance compared among the GPUs is actually about the same as at our Ultra settings, meaning in general the games we're testing are still mostly GPU limited at 1080p High – they're just hitting much higher frame rates now. The exception is the desktop system, where the GTX 970 lead over the 980M grows a bit more (it's 29% faster now vs. 24% faster at Ultra settings). If I were to do another test at Medium quality settings, I think we'd really start to see CPU bottlenecks show up, but it's not really worth the effort as most games are already running well above screen refresh rates.

Initial Thoughts

NVIDIA made some big promises with the GTX 980M, and in general they delivered. While the gap between the desktop GTX 980 and mobile the GTX 980M may end up being more than 25% in many cases, that's probably going to be more a case of CPU performance helping desktops than it is a lack of GPU performance. Overall, the GTX 980M bests the previous generation GTX 880M by over 30%, and in some cases it's as much as 45-50% faster, e.g. in Metro: Last Light Redux. Considering that's one of the most demanding games around, when the GPU is really pushed to its limits we'll likely see an even bigger margin of victory over previous generations of GPUs. And that's without even testing new features like DX12 support, VXGI, etc.

Of course, by the time we see games implement VXGI NVIDIA will likely have the next generation of mobile and desktop GPUs available. If you're already running a high-end gaming notebook, this is also a tough sell as 30-50% is certainly an improvement, but most gamers would be willing to drop a few settings in order to achieve high frame rates on anything from GTX 680M to GTX 880M. It's really a question of what you currently have and what level of performance you're willing to pay for. Gamers with GTX 680M and earlier will certainly be tempted, and the 980M should offer basically twice the performance of a GTX 680M. Notebooks also tend to wear out faster than desktops, so a three year old notebook is getting close to being due for an upgrade regardless.

Obviously we're still missing information on other elements like battery life, how well BatteryBoost works, and general application performance. I don't think that last one is really a concern, though – with three SSDs in RAID 0 and a quad-core Haswell CPU, the MSI GT72 is more than fast enough for mundane office tasks. Considering battery life has been rather hit and miss with MSI over the past couple of years, that's a bit more of a wild card, but the fact that NVIDIA has been using the GT72 as their demo notebook for BatteryBoost suggests it will make a better showing than the GT70 with 880M. Or perhaps not….

One interesting tidbit is that the GT72 doesn't actually implement NVIDIA's Optimus Technology. This will cause some controversy I'm sure, as a reboot cycle is now required to switch between the Intel HD 4600 and the GTX 980M, and many users will likely just leave the GTX 980M enabled and forget about the Intel Processor Graphics. (There's a button to the left of the keyboard that switches between GPUs.) I don't know (yet) what the end result will be in terms of battery life, but there are a few users out there that really dislike Optimus for a variety of reasons (e.g. it doesn't play well at times with things like the Oculus Rift, apparently). If NVIDIA can get power use of the GTX 980M low enough at idle that it doesn't impact battery life too much, though, this could be the best solution for gaming notebooks.

Right now, I have to say that I'm really impressed with the MSI GT72 Dominator Pro. I'd still love to see a slightly higher resolution display, and anything other than a TN panel would be preferable. 2560x1440 would be ideal in my opinion – 3K and 4K are too much right now, but 2560x1440 should be just about right for the 980M. Outside of that complaint and some concerns over the lack of Optimus support, there are really no other flaws with the GT72. It looks so much better than the previous generation GT70 that I suspect it may become difficult for retailers to move any unsold inventory. I've liked the changes that MSI made to the GE and GS lines, and it's great to see the GT series finally get a much needed overhaul. All we need now is a GT62, which could very well be in the works. I'll be back next week with the complete review, but if you can't wait that long this is looking like the gaming notebook to beat.