19 ms·

New gaming laptop with innovative UI by Razer

292 points by zeratul 15y ago

iam 15y ago
But what will the battery life be? At least when the gaming laptops are big and bulky they also have a huge battery. This thing looks like it'll run out of juice flat in 1 hour.
- windsurfer 15y ago
  Depends on what you're doing. It's got a 60Wh battery, so it should last a little less than a macbook pro, so 2 to 7 hours.
  - unavoidable 15y ago
    Not while gaming it wont
    - windsurfer 15y ago
      Well gaming will make it last about 2 hours. It depends on what you're doing.
      - iam 15y ago
        Gaming laptop is for gaming.
bitmover 15y ago
It also looks to have an innovative lawsuit inducing ID. Seems pretty lazy to just anodized a MacBook Pro black, swap the logo and call it a day.
- icebraining 15y ago
  I didn't realize MacBook Pros had touchscreens on the keyboard...
  - bitmover 15y ago
    Look at this gallery of product shots: http://www.engadget.com/photos/razer-blade-0/ http://www.engadget.com/photos/razer-blade-0/ That is Apple's industrial design language. They could have made it look like anything and they chose to ape apple, that's lazy.
    - icebraining 15y ago
      Sure, it's very similar to the MBP, but it's not just a paintjob and a sticker - turning the trackpad into a touchscreen and moving it to the side of the keyboard is a big change.
    - artursapek 15y ago
      I think the presentation of it is more Apple-like than the design of the computer itself.
    - imgabe 15y ago
      Are you seriously proposing that Apple has some monopoly on the idea of a rectangle with rounded corners? There's only so many practical shapes that a laptop can be.
    - masterzora 15y ago
      I'm looking at this on an MBP right now and pretty much all of the details are different except for... a similar shape and keyboard type? What do you want out of them?
- aw3c2 15y ago
  It looks like a simple purist one color professional notebook. The curves are all different. As a apple zealot you surely see how the Macbook is a whole different league in terms of style and smart-term-that-ends-with-ility (and by that obviously different).
amelim 15y ago
The last thing the PC gaming community needs right now is another insanely expensive piece of hardware with a gimmick attached. I really cannot see this going anywhere within the community. I'm guessing that those who largely play the PC games that would require such high specs aren't likely to want to play them outside of their homes. Besides you can purchase a comparably spec'd desktop system for a quarter of the price. Heck, the most popular PC game at the moment (World of Warcraft) can be played on relatively cheap laptops already.
- marknutter 15y ago
  Man, geeks are a tough crowd. I for one applaud their effort to shake things up. You say there's no market for this, well they say they're building it for themselves. I think chances are good there are lots of people out there just like them.
  - A-K 15y ago
    Agreed! Expensive? Sure it is. But I applaud Razor for trying something daring. Given how slim it is, those specs are pretty outrageous.
    - mbrzuzy 15y ago
      I don't see anything about a CD drive. Perhaps that's how they were able to make it so slim.
      - Shenglong 15y ago
        Apple's getting rid of the optical drive too. I bought my laptop 2 years ago, and I don't think I've ever used my BluRay drive.
        buff-a 15y ago
        Which is a shame, because that's where I put my second HDD.
axxl 15y ago
I understand they say they don't care if there's no market, but I'm curious who's going to buy it. Pro gamers will not care about a trackpad, or dynamic key-screens, as they don't want to spend time looking at the keys when they're looking at the screen. They have everything memorized anyway. But they are the ones who can justify spending ~$3000 on a laptop. Casual gamers would like these features, but don't spend $2800 on gaming.
- zeratul 15y ago
  I would buy it if I had the money. I was looking to build a gaming desktop and that's what I would end up paying anyway. You're right it's not for a casual gamer but all Razer's products are not for casual gamers and somehow they can make living.
pazimzadeh 15y ago
Apple's legacy lives on in Razer. Finally, a company not afraid to build a quality product for fear of raising the price.
kprobst 15y ago
I love the idea of having a touchscreen instead of a touchpad. The possibilities! Just that one aspect of this box seems like highly innovative and hopefully a harbinger of things to come in the PC world.
kuviaq 15y ago
More info from engadget (including lots of pics): http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/26/razer-blade-hands-on-with-17-inches-of-gaming-greatness/ http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/26/razer-blade-hands-on-with...
- joss82 15y ago
  The pictures look like real ones here and not like CG. Thank you!
icebraining 15y ago
A $2800 laptop without an SSD and with a smallish (by current standards) hard drive?
typicalrunt 15y ago
This is a nice looking laptop. It's expensive, but it's the first of its kind so there's not market price set for it yet. I hope it's easy for programs to change the look of the multitouch display buttons. It almost bring the Optimus keyboard into the mobile realm!
watty 15y ago
Their advertisement took a stab at PC gaming vs console gaming and then they release a $2,800 device? This puts it in a different market (one that I don't think is very big).
- redthrowaway 15y ago
  Their advertisement had nothing to do with consoles. It was simply a statement that PC gaming is not dead. If you want to spend $400 and play games, buy a console. You're not the target market for pc games. Alienware made a name for itself selling $5k gaming rigs. They were incredibly successful at it. Since Dell bought them, their products have gotten crappier and crappier. If Razer wants to fill that void, more power to them.
  - theBobMcCormick 15y ago
    I certainly hope they succeed. Not only has Alienware's quality reputation been slipping, but they've always been absolutely hideous eyesores. This razer actually looks pretty sexy.
    - redthrowaway 15y ago
      Indeed. Compare the razer to Alienware's comparable offering, the m17x: http://www.thelaptopauthority.com/image/m17x.jpg http://www.thelaptopauthority.com/image/m17x.jpg The Razer Blade may be a fairly blatant MBP ripoff, but at least it looks good. Alienware seems to be pursuing the clunky F117-inspired look, complete with superfluous LEDs. This is, unfortunately, not unique to Alienware. Asus teamed up with Lamborghini to offer the VX7: http://rumors.automobilemag.com/files/2011/04/asus-vx7-lamborghini-laptop-rear.jpg http://rumors.automobilemag.com/files/2011/04/asus-vx7-lambo... Lamborghini makes beautiful cars, but I'm not keen on plopping one on my desk in the middle of class. The Razer looks like something I'd actually feel good about being seen with.
sbov 15y ago
Whenever I play a game with a laptop I use a real mouse. Anything else is a bit painful for me. Because of that, as a righty I'd rather have the dynamic buttons on the left side of the keyboard. Heck, make the whole keyboard dynamic. Then when you're playing a game, instead of an alphanumeric symbol on the key being displayed, the action it's bound to can be displayed.
- artursapek 15y ago
  A person using hotkeys probably never has to look at the keyboard, I don't know how useful a fully customizable keyboard would be.
  - sbov 15y ago
    I always have trouble remembering my lesser used hotkeys (e.g. if you have 20+), but maybe I'm the only one. A quick glance at the keyboard could make it easy.
- lukifer 15y ago
  If the trackpad is any good, and it supports gestures which can be bound, the trackpad has the potential to be as good or better than a mouse. And of course, nothing's stopping you from attaching a mouse to this, meaning the trackpad can now be used for something different. (The fact that it's an LCD trackpad is just screaming for it to be used as a dedicated map viewer/mover in Starcraft.)
  - bricestacey 15y ago
    Trackpads are surprisingly well suited for FPS. I was with a bunch of programmers recently and we started playing Urban Terror with our Macbook Pros and we did fine with our track pads. It was more difficult to 180 in an instant, but otherwise aiming was almost normal. Quality is obviously important. A $400 Dell laptop's trackpad would've been awful. Interestingly, a $5 optical mouse is a nearly optimal setup, which is why I doubt there is much attention on trackpads which cost much more.
artursapek 15y ago
"The hardest thing was convincing a manufacturing partner to consider our designs," Tan said. "No one wanted to do it. They all said there's no market, it's too expensive, no one wants this. Gamers would want something big, thick, and cheap." Serious gamers actually flesh out a lot of money on their setups. And I don't know much about any scenes except Starcraft 2, but I know those tournaments give out products from certain companies who sponsor the event as prizes, I could see this computer fitting in that way. SC2 game "casters" have been doing the same thing on their own, and it's normally equipment of this sort of high end pricing. The question here is can the gamers who build their own custom set-ups piece by piece be convinced to buy this kind of all-in-one package instead?
samlevine 15y ago
This is a great marketing gimmick for the keyboard they're selling: http://www.razerzone.com/swtor/keyboard http://www.razerzone.com/swtor/keyboard At around $200 this is a lot more likely to sell.
- DannoHung 15y ago
  Yeah, I'm a fool with too much money, but that keyboard looks SOOOO cool, like an almost reasonably priced Optimus.
- jarin 15y ago
  I really like the concept, but practically for MMO play it's faster to use the left-hand hotkeys or click buttons in the UI. I could see the video touchpad having a lot of awesome uses though (minimap, buffs, quest log, etc), and the buttons above the trackpad would be pretty useful for non-combat items like inventory, settings, character screen, crafting and things like that.
ConstantineXVI 15y ago
I've always found the idea of a secondary display on a laptop intriguing. Would be nice to be able to look down at the keyboard and have docs for whatever I'm working on already there, without having to page over to another screen or such. I would presume the screen has some sort of API (or at least a WebView mode) so this sort of thing would be possible. On the flip side, a 17" display means you have room to keep both on the screen at once, negating the extra display. 15" model please?
- Shenglong 15y ago
  You know what would be really nice on a gaming laptop? A foot pedal. It would actually be really nice for browsing too. As it is, I don't use my feet for anything... it's only intuitive that a foot pedal should be developed.
  - dman 15y ago
    Theyve been around for a long time - http://www.kinesis-ergo.com/fs-savant-elite.htm http://www.kinesis-ergo.com/fs-savant-elite.htm
  - agravier 15y ago
    That idea is at least as old as Emacs ;) random result for "emacs pedal": http://www.cb1.com/~john/computing/emacs/handsfree/pedals.html http://www.cb1.com/~john/computing/emacs/handsfree/pedals.ht...
Shenglong 15y ago
I can't believe it took this long to make a non-apple laptop that isn't ugly. Simple, sleek and smooth. It really isn't that difficult.
- jinushaun 15y ago
  Reading the quotes from Razer in the article, it really makes me angry at the big PC manufacturers and happy that HP got out. Nothing Apple does is truly that amazing or innovative. The difference is that Apple actually has the balls to try to produce a high quality product. Not expensive for the sake of being expensive like Sony, but quality worth paying for. HP and Dell would rather sell low margin crap at high volume than try at the high quality game. Go Razer! Glad they're the only PC company out there will the balls to compete on quality and innovation.
  - ConstantineXVI 15y ago
    Worth pointing out that until this announcement, Razer wasn't a PC manufacturer. Barring a concept laptop they showed at CES, Razer's only products have been mice, keyboards, gamepads, and headsets.
  - MaxGabriel 15y ago
    "Nothing Apple does is truly that amazing or innovative." That's absurdly unfair, companies like RIM didn't even think the iPhone was possible before it came out [1]. The iPad completely changed the "slate" market in an unimaginable way. People may or may not be wrong about a post-PC era, but its undeniably closely related to the iPad and its predecessor the iPhone (especially given Android's UI before and after the iPhone [2]). If your comment referred specifically to the laptop/desktop market, go back to the original Macintosh GUI, unibody design, the high battery life and relatively low cost of the Macbook Air (sure, they existed in the 90s as slim as an MBA but not with equivalent design or battery--and the rest of the market was into netbooks when the MBA came out anyway), touchpad gestures, and MagSafe. And when other companies announce these features, like Razer here, it usually ends with a $2800 Sure, you can name prior art on alot of these innovations but having 'balls' is PART of innovation--execution is just as important as the idea. [1] http://www.razorianfly.com/2010/12/28/rim-we-thought-apple-was-lying-about-the-iphone-in-fact-we-didnt-think-it-was-possible/ http://www.razorianfly.com/2010/12/28/rim-we-thought-apple-w... [2] http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-like-before-and-after-the-launch-of-iphone/ http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-l...
glhaynes 15y ago
I bet this'll be as successful as Windows SideShow. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_SideShow http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_SideShow) Games could already hook up to the pocket-sized multitouch high-res color screens that we all carry with us already. Why not start with that and, if there are actually some usages that work well, then consider building it into the device itself? Innovation != just stick another screen on there.
pkamb 15y ago
"Today, there hasn't been a single PC laptop that anyone has been passionate about for the longest time. It's not because there's no innovation, but [because] the big PC guys just don't want to innovate anymore," Min-Liang Tan, the CEO and Creative Director of Razer, told Ars. Completely true. For example Lenovo/Thinkpad stopped producing the 4:3 screens that all their business users loved. Too hard/expensive to produce, 16:9 screens are the future, etc. Until Apple produces millions and millions of 4:3 iPad displays. Now can we reopen the discussion? I don't think Razer's expensive hardware and new UI is the answer, but that doesn't mean every PC laptop needs to ship with a just a shitty touchpad and 2 buttons. How about a 3rd button? A mousewheel? Start small and build from there. The part I really don't understand is how the PC mouse industry is so innovative/over-the-top. 7 buttons, independent DPI controls, lazer tracking, ergonomic designs, etc. But then every laptop has the same terrible small touchpad and two badly-designed buttons. Seems like adding a 30-cent mousewheel to your case would instantly differentiate you from all your competitors.
- MartinCron 15y ago
  just a shitty touchpad and 2 buttons. How about a 3rd button? The Dell Precision laptops have two sets of three mouse buttons (above and below the trackpad). I still plug in a real mouse, though.
  - pkamb 15y ago
    True, the 'business' laptops with Trackpoints are the exception to this rule. They have 3 for some reason. That's basically why I only buy Thinkpads now.
- zdorab 15y ago
  I think part of the reason for the insane PC mouse industry is the relatively low cost of the periphreals and the (perceived) direct impact it has on the skill of the player playing a game. Where the PC gamer will drool over the 500$ amazing graphics card he can't afford, he can placate himself with a 70$ crazy ten-thousand button mouse. Why there isn't any innovation in laptop input devices I'm without a clue. It seems like there are so many better ways to input data than a touchpad and two buttons.
moe 15y ago
I can't really imagine anyone in the FPS/RTS crowd wanting to look down on their keyboard during gameplay. Normally you have to set their chair on fire if you want them to break eye-contact with the main-screen... Perhaps there are slower paced games where this makes sense, though.
- njhwang 15y ago
  For gaming, mostly agree. Although I think that the pretty graphics are mostly for show, the real power will be the ability to customize gestures for any application, and the utility you get out of these gestures can well be worth looking down at a "mouse screen." I'm imagining being able to manipulate a CAD model in isolation, freely rotating items in PowerPoint, redistributing power among throttle/lasers/shields using sliding bars (X-wing, anyone?)...I'm sure there are many more. I'd almost argue to keep a normal track pad for dedicated cursor navigation and have the awesome set of touchscreens as a peripheral. Then have an amazing API for software developers to do creative things with it, and have an amazing UI for the layman to create their own mappings. That might get adoption for this type of thing going faster.
- wtallis 15y ago
  Remember that with a laptop, your eyes don't have to move all that much to get to the keyboard. Still not likely for the hardcore FPS and RTS gamers, but this could be pretty useful for more casual gaming and things like WoW.
sandGorgon 15y ago
question - why is everyone making alumninium unibody notebooks ? Is carbon fiber not lighter and (arguably) just as strong. Is it just the design aesthetic that everyone is trying to reach out for or is there something else.
- falcolas 15y ago
  If I had to guess, I'd say that it's easier to cast and mill the aluminum unibody than it is to mold the carbon fiber. Probably cheaper, as well.
  - sandGorgon 15y ago
    hmm.. I honestly never thought that was the issue, given how popular graphite tennis racquets are. What about fiberglass then ? I even saw a show on TV, where they remade a car chassis by handfilling fiberglass filaments and the resulting could withstand sledgehammer blows. does fiberglass/carbon-fiber affect laptop cooling ?
    - deleted 15y ago
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    - falcolas 15y ago
      The processes for Fiberglass and carbon fiber are nearly identical (both use mats of the material and resins that have to be formed/cooked (in the case of carbon fiber)). I would imagine carbon fiber wouldn't conduct heat quite as well as aluminum, but I don't have any data on that.
      - SwellJoe 15y ago
        Fiberglass is a quite good insulator. So, if carbon fiber behaves similarly to fiberglass, it would be very poor for cooling, relative to aluminum.
- jinushaun 15y ago
  Because CF is still ridiculously expensive. It's cheaper now to make than before and you might see it around more often, but it's still an exotic material. Otherwise, we would see it everywhere.
mambodog 15y ago
The dynamic keys remind me of Art Lebedev's Optimus keyboard designs: http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/ http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/
phaus 15y ago
The laptop looks very nice as far as design goes, but as a 3k gaming machine it leaves a lot to be desired. I am starting to wonder if some of these technology companies are intentionally trying to lose money. The GT 555M is a mainstream consumer video card. It can be found on laptops around $700 and I doubt it will run BF3 well at anything higher than medium settings. As a $3000 gaming machine that hasn't even been released yet, it should have a 6990M or a GTX 580M. Finally, what kind of gamer who is willing to spend $3000 on a laptop is even going to use a trackpad? I wonder how much this ridiculous, unnecessary addition adds to the price of the system. To put things in perspective, an Alienware M17x with a 6990M starts at 1799, and an identical clevo/sager would run about 1600.
- dekz 15y ago
  So one has to fork out $3000 every 6mos/year instead of $700 to just upgrade a graphics card? Looks cool, doesn't seem practical to replace a gaming rig.
tomkarlo 15y ago
What if you're left-handed? Seems like you're kind of screwed on this one.
- OWaz 15y ago
  Maybe it would work better for a leftie. A left-handed person could keep their hand on the mouse and use their other hand for the trackpad interface when needed.
- xenophanes 15y ago
  razer makes quite a few right handed products. it's a trade off to make it better for 90% and lose some customers. i think in this case it's even more important than with mice. trackpad below keyboard instead of to the side is not so good for gaming.
- biot 15y ago
  They should make a keyboard with all the keys on the left side. That way, it won't tempt lefties into using their useless right appendage. [Disclaimer: I'm a lefty, though fairly ambidextrous.]
- sodiumphosphate 15y ago
  Personally, I'd like to see the trackpad centered between the two halves of a split keyboard.
blhack 15y ago
These guys took out an ad in The Wall Street journal drumming up hype for this release. Guys: I can buy a Sony Playstation 3 for a little over $200. Call it $300. I can then buy an large television for $1000, and a solid set of speakers for $200. That's $1500 all-in, for something that will play every single PS3 game flawlessly. Why would I spend $2800 on this? What I am getting for $1300? If it's the variety of PC games like minecraft, I can throw an additional $500 at a low-end gaming PC, hook it to my television, and play console and PC games. A gaming laptop? Why?
- eagleal 15y ago
  You can actually get a laptop with the same specs for about 900€. (the only thing that missed is the little touch screen on the right, and the 17", it was 15.6)
  - deleted 15y ago
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  - amalcon 15y ago
    The screen size is a pretty big difference -- the 17.3" is just under 23% bigger (in terms of surface area) than the 15.6. Of course, that's not $1500 worth of difference. I'd be interested to know where you found that, though. Newegg has exactly five laptops with 15.3"+ 1920x1080 screens with CPUs clocked for at least 2.5GHz. All are $1560+, which is about $200 more than 900 Euro. Two are out-of-stock Toughbooks, two are recertified MBPs, and one is an absolute beast of an Asus that still has substantially lower specs than this thing. You may have found me my next laptop, assuming it will ship to someone I know.
    - eagleal 15y ago
      If I remember correctly, should be an HP (sorry I can't find that damn model). I live in Italy, and I saw it in an Euronics ad.
- dstein 15y ago
  Selling expensive products to rich people is a lot easier than selling affordable products to poor people.
teashorts 15y ago
I don't get why they didn't produce the Switchblade [1] instead of this expensive overpowered monstrosity. [1] http://www.razerzone.com/switchblade http://www.razerzone.com/switchblade
- Kenan 15y ago
  From the looks of the pictures in the article I was certain it was the Switchblade, but now looking back at the old pics on their site, I realized that it's not the same Switchblade I saw months ago. In the article they even named it "Switchblade User Interface". They said from the beginning that the Switchblade was a concept, so I'm just glad they are releasing it earlier than I though.
daeken 15y ago
Anyone know if you can buy just the touchpad or the keyboard+touchpad? I don't want the laptop, but that looks awesome.
gcb 15y ago
eeekeyboard had this. was a total failure. i still want one. but the price point was just crazy.
ianl 15y ago
I think you are all missing the point. There already is a massive market for high end gaming pcs and laptops. Compare these prices and specs to what is available from Alienware or MSI. This laptop only misgiving is the fact it does not have an SSD. However, it is competitively priced in comparison to its competition and with a sleek sexy design this is a very interesting entry into the market.
- pragmatic 15y ago
  Exactly. And this is the first one. If this succeeds with the high end people (you know those that spend $4000 on a gaming pc), then the price will come down. This is the best thing I've seen in long time.
  - idle_processor 15y ago
    Some people use expensive hardware as a status symbol, and having something expensive with a flashy UI will probably appeal to them. I don't know how common this type of person is. Others spend a lot on hardware to eke out as much performance as possible. The Razer laptop will fail miserably with these people, because the specs obtained for the cost are abyssmal. ________________________________________________ Razer at $2800: 2.8GHz Intel® CoreTM i7 2640M Processor 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 Memory NVIDIA GeForce® GT 555M (2GB VRAM) ________________________________________________ Sager/Clevo at around $2700 (using xoticpc). 3.2-3.46GHz Intel® Core™ i7-960 8MB L3 Cache ATI Radeon DUAL (2) HD6990M's (4GB VRAM) 12GB - DDR3 1333MHz Dual Channel Memory ________________________________________________ The GT 555M's 3DMark 06 score is 10586.3. The Dual HD6690M has a score of 23292, more than double. I would have honestly expected at least a single GTX 570M (preferably 580) from a cutting-edge gaming laptop housing an NVIDIA card. The Sager will be a bulkier laptop, but my experience (with dragging an Asus G73 to and from university and work) is that carrying bags/backpacks mitigate the weight issue, and that bulk is never a factor. An inferior gaming experience due to weaker hardware, however, is. Sources: http://xoticpc.com http://xoticpc.com (for configuring/pricing a Sager/Clevo laptop) http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark... (for video card benchmarks)
- 15y ago
zerohp 15y ago
Instead of a handful of keys with tiny LCD's inside of them, I'd like to see a full keyboard that has e-paper on top of every key.
- smokinjoe 15y ago
  How much would that increase the cost of the product, though?
- ImprovedSilence 15y ago
  god, thats a sexy idea. but then again im the kinda person who choses laptops based on what their keyboard looks like. (ifi could get macbook pro style, with ubuntu, for not quite macbook prices, life would be good.) and by macbbok style, i mean yes, metal case, sexy keyboard, and awesome track pad features go a long way with me. and I dont think im too much of an outlier when it comes to asthetics. the pc world needs more innovation in this direction, and even if razor doesnt hit exactly the bullseye, its not giving up without a fight.
zobzu 15y ago
Incredibly thin and light for a gaming laptop mm? Arstechnica got paid to write that I guess. I can fit 4 light AlienWare gaming laptops of 13" for the weight of that 17". Even a big MBP is lighter... Odd.
- darklajid 15y ago
  You are really comparing a 17" gaming laptop with - 13" gaming laptops (really? Those are lighter?) - a popular 17" laptop that lacks in gaming power Why the snark?
crag 15y ago
:) No love for left handers. That's another reason trackpads are centered.

292 points by zeratul 15y ago

iam 15y ago

But what will the battery life be? At least when the gaming laptops are big and bulky they also have a huge battery. This thing looks like it'll run out of juice flat in 1 hour.

windsurfer 15y ago
Depends on what you're doing. It's got a 60Wh battery, so it should last a little less than a macbook pro, so 2 to 7 hours.
- unavoidable 15y ago
  Not while gaming it wont
  - windsurfer 15y ago
    Well gaming will make it last about 2 hours. It depends on what you're doing.
    - iam 15y ago
      Gaming laptop is for gaming.

bitmover 15y ago

It also looks to have an innovative lawsuit inducing ID. Seems pretty lazy to just anodized a MacBook Pro black, swap the logo and call it a day.

icebraining 15y ago
I didn't realize MacBook Pros had touchscreens on the keyboard...
- bitmover 15y ago
  Look at this gallery of product shots: http://www.engadget.com/photos/razer-blade-0/ http://www.engadget.com/photos/razer-blade-0/ That is Apple's industrial design language. They could have made it look like anything and they chose to ape apple, that's lazy.
  - icebraining 15y ago
    Sure, it's very similar to the MBP, but it's not just a paintjob and a sticker - turning the trackpad into a touchscreen and moving it to the side of the keyboard is a big change.
  - artursapek 15y ago
    I think the presentation of it is more Apple-like than the design of the computer itself.
  - imgabe 15y ago
    Are you seriously proposing that Apple has some monopoly on the idea of a rectangle with rounded corners? There's only so many practical shapes that a laptop can be.
  - masterzora 15y ago
    I'm looking at this on an MBP right now and pretty much all of the details are different except for... a similar shape and keyboard type? What do you want out of them?
aw3c2 15y ago
It looks like a simple purist one color professional notebook. The curves are all different. As a apple zealot you surely see how the Macbook is a whole different league in terms of style and smart-term-that-ends-with-ility (and by that obviously different).

amelim 15y ago

The last thing the PC gaming community needs right now is another insanely expensive piece of hardware with a gimmick attached. I really cannot see this going anywhere within the community. I'm guessing that those who largely play the PC games that would require such high specs aren't likely to want to play them outside of their homes. Besides you can purchase a comparably spec'd desktop system for a quarter of the price. Heck, the most popular PC game at the moment (World of Warcraft) can be played on relatively cheap laptops already.

marknutter 15y ago
Man, geeks are a tough crowd. I for one applaud their effort to shake things up. You say there's no market for this, well they say they're building it for themselves. I think chances are good there are lots of people out there just like them.
- A-K 15y ago
  Agreed! Expensive? Sure it is. But I applaud Razor for trying something daring. Given how slim it is, those specs are pretty outrageous.
  - mbrzuzy 15y ago
    I don't see anything about a CD drive. Perhaps that's how they were able to make it so slim.
    - Shenglong 15y ago
      Apple's getting rid of the optical drive too. I bought my laptop 2 years ago, and I don't think I've ever used my BluRay drive.
      - buff-a 15y ago
        Which is a shame, because that's where I put my second HDD.

axxl 15y ago

I understand they say they don't care if there's no market, but I'm curious who's going to buy it. Pro gamers will not care about a trackpad, or dynamic key-screens, as they don't want to spend time looking at the keys when they're looking at the screen. They have everything memorized anyway. But they are the ones who can justify spending ~$3000 on a laptop. Casual gamers would like these features, but don't spend $2800 on gaming.

zeratul 15y ago
I would buy it if I had the money. I was looking to build a gaming desktop and that's what I would end up paying anyway. You're right it's not for a casual gamer but all Razer's products are not for casual gamers and somehow they can make living.

pazimzadeh 15y ago

Apple's legacy lives on in Razer. Finally, a company not afraid to build a quality product for fear of raising the price.

kprobst 15y ago

I love the idea of having a touchscreen instead of a touchpad. The possibilities! Just that one aspect of this box seems like highly innovative and hopefully a harbinger of things to come in the PC world.

kuviaq 15y ago

More info from engadget (including lots of pics): http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/26/razer-blade-hands-on-with-17-inches-of-gaming-greatness/ http://www.engadget.com/2011/08/26/razer-blade-hands-on-with...

joss82 15y ago
The pictures look like real ones here and not like CG. Thank you!

icebraining 15y ago

A $2800 laptop without an SSD and with a smallish (by current standards) hard drive?

typicalrunt 15y ago

This is a nice looking laptop. It's expensive, but it's the first of its kind so there's not market price set for it yet. I hope it's easy for programs to change the look of the multitouch display buttons. It almost bring the Optimus keyboard into the mobile realm!

watty 15y ago

Their advertisement took a stab at PC gaming vs console gaming and then they release a $2,800 device? This puts it in a different market (one that I don't think is very big).

redthrowaway 15y ago
Their advertisement had nothing to do with consoles. It was simply a statement that PC gaming is not dead. If you want to spend $400 and play games, buy a console. You're not the target market for pc games. Alienware made a name for itself selling $5k gaming rigs. They were incredibly successful at it. Since Dell bought them, their products have gotten crappier and crappier. If Razer wants to fill that void, more power to them.
- theBobMcCormick 15y ago
  I certainly hope they succeed. Not only has Alienware's quality reputation been slipping, but they've always been absolutely hideous eyesores. This razer actually looks pretty sexy.
  - redthrowaway 15y ago
    Indeed. Compare the razer to Alienware's comparable offering, the m17x: http://www.thelaptopauthority.com/image/m17x.jpg http://www.thelaptopauthority.com/image/m17x.jpg The Razer Blade may be a fairly blatant MBP ripoff, but at least it looks good. Alienware seems to be pursuing the clunky F117-inspired look, complete with superfluous LEDs. This is, unfortunately, not unique to Alienware. Asus teamed up with Lamborghini to offer the VX7: http://rumors.automobilemag.com/files/2011/04/asus-vx7-lamborghini-laptop-rear.jpg http://rumors.automobilemag.com/files/2011/04/asus-vx7-lambo... Lamborghini makes beautiful cars, but I'm not keen on plopping one on my desk in the middle of class. The Razer looks like something I'd actually feel good about being seen with.

sbov 15y ago

Whenever I play a game with a laptop I use a real mouse. Anything else is a bit painful for me. Because of that, as a righty I'd rather have the dynamic buttons on the left side of the keyboard. Heck, make the whole keyboard dynamic. Then when you're playing a game, instead of an alphanumeric symbol on the key being displayed, the action it's bound to can be displayed.

artursapek 15y ago
A person using hotkeys probably never has to look at the keyboard, I don't know how useful a fully customizable keyboard would be.
- sbov 15y ago
  I always have trouble remembering my lesser used hotkeys (e.g. if you have 20+), but maybe I'm the only one. A quick glance at the keyboard could make it easy.
lukifer 15y ago
If the trackpad is any good, and it supports gestures which can be bound, the trackpad has the potential to be as good or better than a mouse. And of course, nothing's stopping you from attaching a mouse to this, meaning the trackpad can now be used for something different. (The fact that it's an LCD trackpad is just screaming for it to be used as a dedicated map viewer/mover in Starcraft.)
- bricestacey 15y ago
  Trackpads are surprisingly well suited for FPS. I was with a bunch of programmers recently and we started playing Urban Terror with our Macbook Pros and we did fine with our track pads. It was more difficult to 180 in an instant, but otherwise aiming was almost normal. Quality is obviously important. A $400 Dell laptop's trackpad would've been awful. Interestingly, a $5 optical mouse is a nearly optimal setup, which is why I doubt there is much attention on trackpads which cost much more.

artursapek 15y ago

"The hardest thing was convincing a manufacturing partner to consider our designs," Tan said. "No one wanted to do it. They all said there's no market, it's too expensive, no one wants this. Gamers would want something big, thick, and cheap." Serious gamers actually flesh out a lot of money on their setups. And I don't know much about any scenes except Starcraft 2, but I know those tournaments give out products from certain companies who sponsor the event as prizes, I could see this computer fitting in that way. SC2 game "casters" have been doing the same thing on their own, and it's normally equipment of this sort of high end pricing. The question here is can the gamers who build their own custom set-ups piece by piece be convinced to buy this kind of all-in-one package instead?

samlevine 15y ago

This is a great marketing gimmick for the keyboard they're selling: http://www.razerzone.com/swtor/keyboard http://www.razerzone.com/swtor/keyboard At around $200 this is a lot more likely to sell.

DannoHung 15y ago
Yeah, I'm a fool with too much money, but that keyboard looks SOOOO cool, like an almost reasonably priced Optimus.
jarin 15y ago
I really like the concept, but practically for MMO play it's faster to use the left-hand hotkeys or click buttons in the UI. I could see the video touchpad having a lot of awesome uses though (minimap, buffs, quest log, etc), and the buttons above the trackpad would be pretty useful for non-combat items like inventory, settings, character screen, crafting and things like that.

ConstantineXVI 15y ago

I've always found the idea of a secondary display on a laptop intriguing. Would be nice to be able to look down at the keyboard and have docs for whatever I'm working on already there, without having to page over to another screen or such. I would presume the screen has some sort of API (or at least a WebView mode) so this sort of thing would be possible. On the flip side, a 17" display means you have room to keep both on the screen at once, negating the extra display. 15" model please?

Shenglong 15y ago
You know what would be really nice on a gaming laptop? A foot pedal. It would actually be really nice for browsing too. As it is, I don't use my feet for anything... it's only intuitive that a foot pedal should be developed.
- dman 15y ago
  Theyve been around for a long time - http://www.kinesis-ergo.com/fs-savant-elite.htm http://www.kinesis-ergo.com/fs-savant-elite.htm
- agravier 15y ago
  That idea is at least as old as Emacs ;) random result for "emacs pedal": http://www.cb1.com/~john/computing/emacs/handsfree/pedals.html http://www.cb1.com/~john/computing/emacs/handsfree/pedals.ht...

Shenglong 15y ago

I can't believe it took this long to make a non-apple laptop that isn't ugly. Simple, sleek and smooth. It really isn't that difficult.

jinushaun 15y ago
Reading the quotes from Razer in the article, it really makes me angry at the big PC manufacturers and happy that HP got out. Nothing Apple does is truly that amazing or innovative. The difference is that Apple actually has the balls to try to produce a high quality product. Not expensive for the sake of being expensive like Sony, but quality worth paying for. HP and Dell would rather sell low margin crap at high volume than try at the high quality game. Go Razer! Glad they're the only PC company out there will the balls to compete on quality and innovation.
- ConstantineXVI 15y ago
  Worth pointing out that until this announcement, Razer wasn't a PC manufacturer. Barring a concept laptop they showed at CES, Razer's only products have been mice, keyboards, gamepads, and headsets.
- MaxGabriel 15y ago
  "Nothing Apple does is truly that amazing or innovative." That's absurdly unfair, companies like RIM didn't even think the iPhone was possible before it came out [1]. The iPad completely changed the "slate" market in an unimaginable way. People may or may not be wrong about a post-PC era, but its undeniably closely related to the iPad and its predecessor the iPhone (especially given Android's UI before and after the iPhone [2]). If your comment referred specifically to the laptop/desktop market, go back to the original Macintosh GUI, unibody design, the high battery life and relatively low cost of the Macbook Air (sure, they existed in the 90s as slim as an MBA but not with equivalent design or battery--and the rest of the market was into netbooks when the MBA came out anyway), touchpad gestures, and MagSafe. And when other companies announce these features, like Razer here, it usually ends with a $2800 Sure, you can name prior art on alot of these innovations but having 'balls' is PART of innovation--execution is just as important as the idea. [1] http://www.razorianfly.com/2010/12/28/rim-we-thought-apple-was-lying-about-the-iphone-in-fact-we-didnt-think-it-was-possible/ http://www.razorianfly.com/2010/12/28/rim-we-thought-apple-w... [2] http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-like-before-and-after-the-launch-of-iphone/ http://random.andrewwarner.com/what-googles-android-looked-l...

glhaynes 15y ago

I bet this'll be as successful as Windows SideShow. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_SideShow http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_SideShow) Games could already hook up to the pocket-sized multitouch high-res color screens that we all carry with us already. Why not start with that and, if there are actually some usages that work well, then consider building it into the device itself? Innovation != just stick another screen on there.

pkamb 15y ago

"Today, there hasn't been a single PC laptop that anyone has been passionate about for the longest time. It's not because there's no innovation, but [because] the big PC guys just don't want to innovate anymore," Min-Liang Tan, the CEO and Creative Director of Razer, told Ars. Completely true. For example Lenovo/Thinkpad stopped producing the 4:3 screens that all their business users loved. Too hard/expensive to produce, 16:9 screens are the future, etc. Until Apple produces millions and millions of 4:3 iPad displays. Now can we reopen the discussion? I don't think Razer's expensive hardware and new UI is the answer, but that doesn't mean every PC laptop needs to ship with a just a shitty touchpad and 2 buttons. How about a 3rd button? A mousewheel? Start small and build from there. The part I really don't understand is how the PC mouse industry is so innovative/over-the-top. 7 buttons, independent DPI controls, lazer tracking, ergonomic designs, etc. But then every laptop has the same terrible small touchpad and two badly-designed buttons. Seems like adding a 30-cent mousewheel to your case would instantly differentiate you from all your competitors.

MartinCron 15y ago
just a shitty touchpad and 2 buttons. How about a 3rd button? The Dell Precision laptops have two sets of three mouse buttons (above and below the trackpad). I still plug in a real mouse, though.
- pkamb 15y ago
  True, the 'business' laptops with Trackpoints are the exception to this rule. They have 3 for some reason. That's basically why I only buy Thinkpads now.
zdorab 15y ago
I think part of the reason for the insane PC mouse industry is the relatively low cost of the periphreals and the (perceived) direct impact it has on the skill of the player playing a game. Where the PC gamer will drool over the 500$ amazing graphics card he can't afford, he can placate himself with a 70$ crazy ten-thousand button mouse. Why there isn't any innovation in laptop input devices I'm without a clue. It seems like there are so many better ways to input data than a touchpad and two buttons.

moe 15y ago

I can't really imagine anyone in the FPS/RTS crowd wanting to look down on their keyboard during gameplay. Normally you have to set their chair on fire if you want them to break eye-contact with the main-screen... Perhaps there are slower paced games where this makes sense, though.

njhwang 15y ago
For gaming, mostly agree. Although I think that the pretty graphics are mostly for show, the real power will be the ability to customize gestures for any application, and the utility you get out of these gestures can well be worth looking down at a "mouse screen." I'm imagining being able to manipulate a CAD model in isolation, freely rotating items in PowerPoint, redistributing power among throttle/lasers/shields using sliding bars (X-wing, anyone?)...I'm sure there are many more. I'd almost argue to keep a normal track pad for dedicated cursor navigation and have the awesome set of touchscreens as a peripheral. Then have an amazing API for software developers to do creative things with it, and have an amazing UI for the layman to create their own mappings. That might get adoption for this type of thing going faster.
wtallis 15y ago
Remember that with a laptop, your eyes don't have to move all that much to get to the keyboard. Still not likely for the hardcore FPS and RTS gamers, but this could be pretty useful for more casual gaming and things like WoW.

sandGorgon 15y ago

question - why is everyone making alumninium unibody notebooks ? Is carbon fiber not lighter and (arguably) just as strong. Is it just the design aesthetic that everyone is trying to reach out for or is there something else.

falcolas 15y ago
If I had to guess, I'd say that it's easier to cast and mill the aluminum unibody than it is to mold the carbon fiber. Probably cheaper, as well.
- sandGorgon 15y ago
  hmm.. I honestly never thought that was the issue, given how popular graphite tennis racquets are. What about fiberglass then ? I even saw a show on TV, where they remade a car chassis by handfilling fiberglass filaments and the resulting could withstand sledgehammer blows. does fiberglass/carbon-fiber affect laptop cooling ?
  - deleted 15y ago
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  - falcolas 15y ago
    The processes for Fiberglass and carbon fiber are nearly identical (both use mats of the material and resins that have to be formed/cooked (in the case of carbon fiber)). I would imagine carbon fiber wouldn't conduct heat quite as well as aluminum, but I don't have any data on that.
    - SwellJoe 15y ago
      Fiberglass is a quite good insulator. So, if carbon fiber behaves similarly to fiberglass, it would be very poor for cooling, relative to aluminum.
jinushaun 15y ago
Because CF is still ridiculously expensive. It's cheaper now to make than before and you might see it around more often, but it's still an exotic material. Otherwise, we would see it everywhere.

mambodog 15y ago

The dynamic keys remind me of Art Lebedev's Optimus keyboard designs: http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/ http://www.artlebedev.com/everything/optimus/

phaus 15y ago

The laptop looks very nice as far as design goes, but as a 3k gaming machine it leaves a lot to be desired. I am starting to wonder if some of these technology companies are intentionally trying to lose money. The GT 555M is a mainstream consumer video card. It can be found on laptops around $700 and I doubt it will run BF3 well at anything higher than medium settings. As a $3000 gaming machine that hasn't even been released yet, it should have a 6990M or a GTX 580M. Finally, what kind of gamer who is willing to spend $3000 on a laptop is even going to use a trackpad? I wonder how much this ridiculous, unnecessary addition adds to the price of the system. To put things in perspective, an Alienware M17x with a 6990M starts at 1799, and an identical clevo/sager would run about 1600.

dekz 15y ago
So one has to fork out $3000 every 6mos/year instead of $700 to just upgrade a graphics card? Looks cool, doesn't seem practical to replace a gaming rig.

tomkarlo 15y ago

What if you're left-handed? Seems like you're kind of screwed on this one.

OWaz 15y ago
Maybe it would work better for a leftie. A left-handed person could keep their hand on the mouse and use their other hand for the trackpad interface when needed.
xenophanes 15y ago
razer makes quite a few right handed products. it's a trade off to make it better for 90% and lose some customers. i think in this case it's even more important than with mice. trackpad below keyboard instead of to the side is not so good for gaming.
biot 15y ago
They should make a keyboard with all the keys on the left side. That way, it won't tempt lefties into using their useless right appendage. [Disclaimer: I'm a lefty, though fairly ambidextrous.]
sodiumphosphate 15y ago
Personally, I'd like to see the trackpad centered between the two halves of a split keyboard.

blhack 15y ago

These guys took out an ad in The Wall Street journal drumming up hype for this release. Guys: I can buy a Sony Playstation 3 for a little over $200. Call it $300. I can then buy an large television for $1000, and a solid set of speakers for $200. That's $1500 all-in, for something that will play every single PS3 game flawlessly. Why would I spend $2800 on this? What I am getting for $1300? If it's the variety of PC games like minecraft, I can throw an additional $500 at a low-end gaming PC, hook it to my television, and play console and PC games. A gaming laptop? Why?

eagleal 15y ago
You can actually get a laptop with the same specs for about 900€. (the only thing that missed is the little touch screen on the right, and the 17", it was 15.6)
- deleted 15y ago
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- amalcon 15y ago
  The screen size is a pretty big difference -- the 17.3" is just under 23% bigger (in terms of surface area) than the 15.6. Of course, that's not $1500 worth of difference. I'd be interested to know where you found that, though. Newegg has exactly five laptops with 15.3"+ 1920x1080 screens with CPUs clocked for at least 2.5GHz. All are $1560+, which is about $200 more than 900 Euro. Two are out-of-stock Toughbooks, two are recertified MBPs, and one is an absolute beast of an Asus that still has substantially lower specs than this thing. You may have found me my next laptop, assuming it will ship to someone I know.
  - eagleal 15y ago
    If I remember correctly, should be an HP (sorry I can't find that damn model). I live in Italy, and I saw it in an Euronics ad.
dstein 15y ago
Selling expensive products to rich people is a lot easier than selling affordable products to poor people.

teashorts 15y ago

I don't get why they didn't produce the Switchblade [1] instead of this expensive overpowered monstrosity. [1] http://www.razerzone.com/switchblade http://www.razerzone.com/switchblade

Kenan 15y ago
From the looks of the pictures in the article I was certain it was the Switchblade, but now looking back at the old pics on their site, I realized that it's not the same Switchblade I saw months ago. In the article they even named it "Switchblade User Interface". They said from the beginning that the Switchblade was a concept, so I'm just glad they are releasing it earlier than I though.

daeken 15y ago

Anyone know if you can buy just the touchpad or the keyboard+touchpad? I don't want the laptop, but that looks awesome.

gcb 15y ago

eeekeyboard had this. was a total failure. i still want one. but the price point was just crazy.

ianl 15y ago

I think you are all missing the point. There already is a massive market for high end gaming pcs and laptops. Compare these prices and specs to what is available from Alienware or MSI. This laptop only misgiving is the fact it does not have an SSD. However, it is competitively priced in comparison to its competition and with a sleek sexy design this is a very interesting entry into the market.

pragmatic 15y ago
Exactly. And this is the first one. If this succeeds with the high end people (you know those that spend $4000 on a gaming pc), then the price will come down. This is the best thing I've seen in long time.
- idle_processor 15y ago
  Some people use expensive hardware as a status symbol, and having something expensive with a flashy UI will probably appeal to them. I don't know how common this type of person is. Others spend a lot on hardware to eke out as much performance as possible. The Razer laptop will fail miserably with these people, because the specs obtained for the cost are abyssmal. ________________________________________________ Razer at $2800: 2.8GHz Intel® CoreTM i7 2640M Processor 8GB 1333MHz DDR3 Memory NVIDIA GeForce® GT 555M (2GB VRAM) ________________________________________________ Sager/Clevo at around $2700 (using xoticpc). 3.2-3.46GHz Intel® Core™ i7-960 8MB L3 Cache ATI Radeon DUAL (2) HD6990M's (4GB VRAM) 12GB - DDR3 1333MHz Dual Channel Memory ________________________________________________ The GT 555M's 3DMark 06 score is 10586.3. The Dual HD6690M has a score of 23292, more than double. I would have honestly expected at least a single GTX 570M (preferably 580) from a cutting-edge gaming laptop housing an NVIDIA card. The Sager will be a bulkier laptop, but my experience (with dragging an Asus G73 to and from university and work) is that carrying bags/backpacks mitigate the weight issue, and that bulk is never a factor. An inferior gaming experience due to weaker hardware, however, is. Sources: http://xoticpc.com http://xoticpc.com (for configuring/pricing a Sager/Clevo laptop) http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark... (for video card benchmarks)
15y ago

zerohp 15y ago

Instead of a handful of keys with tiny LCD's inside of them, I'd like to see a full keyboard that has e-paper on top of every key.

smokinjoe 15y ago
How much would that increase the cost of the product, though?
ImprovedSilence 15y ago
god, thats a sexy idea. but then again im the kinda person who choses laptops based on what their keyboard looks like. (ifi could get macbook pro style, with ubuntu, for not quite macbook prices, life would be good.) and by macbbok style, i mean yes, metal case, sexy keyboard, and awesome track pad features go a long way with me. and I dont think im too much of an outlier when it comes to asthetics. the pc world needs more innovation in this direction, and even if razor doesnt hit exactly the bullseye, its not giving up without a fight.

zobzu 15y ago

Incredibly thin and light for a gaming laptop mm? Arstechnica got paid to write that I guess. I can fit 4 light AlienWare gaming laptops of 13" for the weight of that 17". Even a big MBP is lighter... Odd.

darklajid 15y ago
You are really comparing a 17" gaming laptop with - 13" gaming laptops (really? Those are lighter?) - a popular 17" laptop that lacks in gaming power Why the snark?

crag 15y ago

:) No love for left handers. That's another reason trackpads are centered.