MSI Intros New Gaming Laptop And Dock For Discrete GPU

jasong

jasong

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Seriously I think this is awesome:
MSI Intros New Gaming Laptop And Dock For Discrete GPU

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MSI introduced the GS30 Shadow, the company's newest gaming notebook that packs the latest fourth generation Core i7 processor and a 13.3-inch screen. MSI also introduced a "GamingDock" built for the GS30 Shadow that houses a discrete graphics card. This dock will be released in January 2015, and the laptop is expected to launch in the USA sometime before that.

The laptop include the previously mentioned 13.3-inch anti-glare screen, which has a 2560 x 1440 resolution. There's the Core i7 processor with Iris Pro graphics (MSI didn't specify the model number), up to 16 GB of DDR3L memory (up to 1600 MHz), two M.2 SSDs with Super Raid and an HD webcam capable of 30 frames per second at 720p.

The new gaming laptop also includes a backlit keyboard, two USB 3.0 ports, an SD card reader, an HDMI 1.4b port, gigabit Ethernet and Wireless AC and Bluetooth 4.0 connectivity. There's also a microphone and headphone jack and a built-in 4-cell Li-ion battery. The laptop weighs 2.86 pounds and measures a super-slim 0.78 inches in height.

"The amazing graphics powered by Intel Iris Pro is designed and targeted to the majority [of] gaming titles and the performance is more than double while compared with previous generation," the press release said. "With support to DX11.1, OpenCL 1.2, OpenGL 4.0 and enhanced 4k x 2k, the GS30 Shadow sets the new benchmark for gaming notebooks and makes every user gaming everywhere."



According to the announcement, the GamingDock doesn't come with a pre-mounted desktop graphics card; that's for the customer to buy and install. The company didn't provide specs, but there appears to be a speaker on each side, as well as USB ports. The company also hinted at the possibility that other laptops could use this dock, as well. Presumably, the main connection between the dock and laptop will be through USB 3.0.

At press time, MSI hadn't provided any pricing info, but we've reached out to the company for more answers, particularly about the GameDock.
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Never again. My MSIGX60 performs well but damn is there limited support for it. You can't have another OS, you can't get new drivers.
 
Ser_Bunnylot said:
Never again. My MSIGX60 performs well but damn is there limited support for it. You can't have another OS, you can't get new drivers.
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As knifeninja says.. they're looking to get a LOT more support in South Africa soon. Sorry you've had bad experiences though, if you have any issues you can contact me and I'll get in touch with the MSI guys directly. They're quite serious about improving their presence here :)



It seems like MSI are aiming to get the full bandwidth out of this dock:

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2014/09/12/msi-gs30-gamingdock/1

MSI's secret? The GamingDock, a bulky desktop chassis onto which the GS30 Shadow can sit. When it does, the laptop gains access to a desktop graphics card, connected over what MSI claims is a full-bandwidth PCI Express x16 port. During docking, the machine will perform exactly the same as a desktop machine - allowing for the difference in performance between Intel's desktop and laptop Core i7 chips, of course.
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I've no idea how they'll get that port to work, but I'm really intrigued. The dock is pretty huge but for certain scenarios I can imagine it being a very elegant solution. Say for instance you needed the notebook to work and travel, and you could get an ultrabook dimension machine for that - then get home and plug it in and you've got a 2k full scale gaming machine with desktop-class graphics and an audio dock.
 
There's a video of it in action over here:


The laptop is very nice looking - slim and nice keyboard, trackpad, led's on the front lip. She suggested pricing of $1000 and another $2-300 for the dock but I don't know if that's realistic.
 
I received this teaser now from MSI and I thought the best place to drop it was here. Your guess is as good as mine though :D

Desktop graphics... Notebook CPU?

So, we found this thing in the office. Apparently, it is a notebook, with a… Desktop GPU? At PCI-E 3.0 x16, no less.
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What might this wizardry be? Any takers?
 
KnifeNinja said:
Awesome idea, can't wait to see notebooks performing to the level of desktops, go MSI!
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I had a Qosmio x305 back in 2008 that kicked most desktops behind (Had 2 x 9700 in SLI). Just look at the latest offerings X70, also sure you can get some decent Alienware lappies that will knock most desktops out of the way.

Problem is not performance as much as its price...
 
jasong said:
I received this teaser now from MSI and I thought the best place to drop it was here. Your guess is as good as mine though :D

Desktop graphics... Notebook CPU?

So, we found this thing in the office. Apparently, it is a notebook, with a… Desktop GPU? At PCI-E 3.0 x16, no less.
View attachment 13498
What might this wizardry be? Any takers?
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Well its pointless, the whole point of a laptop is portability, so now they've given you an external port for a desktop gpu which probably also has its own power supply (Even more weight and less portability)...Makes little to no sense. On top of that laptop cpu's are weaker than the desktop equivalents, so I expect some fantastic bottlenecks.

We are now finally getting into a generation of laptops where the gpu's are getting within 20% of their desktop counterparts, which is fantastic, but now MSI and Dell (Alienware) are both pulling this crap.
 
The Joker said:
Well its pointless, the whole point of a laptop is portability, so now they've given you an external port for a desktop gpu which probably also has its own power supply (Even more weight and less portability)...Makes little to no sense. On top of that laptop cpu's are weaker than the desktop equivalents, so I expect some fantastic bottlenecks.

We are now finally getting into a generation of laptops where the gpu's are getting within 20% of their desktop counterparts, which is fantastic, but now MSI and Dell (Alienware) are both pulling this crap.
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I don't know, I can totally see the appeal of it. If you have a BYOD situation at work and you want a pro ultrabook, then you can come home and plug it into the dock and optionally a full sized monitor and you've got a full on gaming setup. It's the mullet of notebooks:
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If it was my cash and I had to get a laptop (for some stupid reason) I would opt to go for the new MSI Stealth (GTX970 Version).
External gpu solutions for laptops have been done in the past and it failed miserably, I don't think this will be any different.

Oh and I hate mullets..lol
 
The Joker said:
If it was my cash and I had to get a laptop (for some stupid reason) I would opt to go for the new MSI Stealth (GTX970 Version).
External gpu solutions for laptops have been done in the past and it failed miserably, I don't think this will be any different.

Oh and I hate mullets..lol
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Well it's definitely a niche thing but personally it would be a nice option. I reckon part of the success will depend on how seamlessly it transitions between modes. If it's much more complicated than plug and play it will be very offputting.
 
Interesting. I think it will work similarly to Optimus where it writes directly into the integrated GPU buffer?
BTW - I saw some benchmarks on Iris Pro. It's really impressive. Beats the Kaveri AMD APU.
 
The GS30 and dock are on display at CES with some more crucial details and hands-on at Anand:
http://anandtech.com/show/8817/msi-announces-gs30-shadow-laptop-and-gpu-expansion-dock
One of the very interesting looking laptops from MSI is their upcoming GS30, which carries on the thin and light theme of the GS series but extends that down into a 13.3” chassis. The core laptop uses a Crystalwell i7-4870HQ processor, which means it should have decent integrated graphics performance but nothing earth shattering. Along with the Haswell-based CPU comes support for up to 16GB of DDR3L memory, RAID SSD storage, and a 13.3” 1080p anti-glare IPS display. All of that is well and good, but where things get interesting is when we get to the expansion dock.

Similar to the Alienware 13, the GS30 will have support for an expansion dock that supports full size desktop GPUs. MSI says it should work with all desktop GPUs, from lower end models all the way up to GTX 980, and Titan/Z/Black, as well as various AMD GPUs. The dock uses a proprietary connector, and the laptop sits on top of the dock rather than interfacing through a cable. The dock isn’t just for a discrete GPU either, as it supports an additional 3.5” hard drive, Killer Gigabit Ethernet, and it includes two speakers. I’m not convinced about the need for the speakers or networking support, especially considering the laptop already has a Gigabit Ethernet jack, but the additional four USB 3.0 ports certainly don’t hurt.

If you’re curious how MSI is interfacing with all of these extra devices and whether there will be sufficient bandwidth, the answer is that the dock uses a full x16 PCIe 3.0 based connector. That means not only is there plenty of bandwidth, but the discrete GPU will also be able to run at maximum performance. Interestingly, MSI noted that with certain high-end GPUs (e.g. Titan class and above), there may be a minor drop in performance on the laptop unless you also connect the laptops AC adapter. The dock itself comes with a 450W PSU, which should be plenty to run any GPU, HDD, USB peripherals, and still leave sufficient room to power the laptop, but until we can do some actual testing with the final hardware it’s not clear why there would be a need for the added power.
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Some potential negatives are also mentioned:
Note also that the GS30 cannot “hot-dock” – you have to power down the system before undocking, or there could be problems. Also, when docked the laptop’s internal display is disabled (for now?) and only an external display connected to the discrete GPU can be used.
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To me this is honestly the most intriguing MSI notebook offering.
 
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