Aorus X9 Review - Review 2022 - Linville Houldlat

Laptops with two graphics cards are few and far between, simply they tend to catch the middle when they enter the scene. Such is the example with the Aorus X9 ($3,799), a high-cease gaming laptop carrying dual Nvidia GTX 1070s. It's expensive, but slimmer than similarly powered laptops, and has some high-stop features like a 4K display, mechanical LED keys, two SSDs, and 32GB of retention. It'southward certainly non the nigh cost-effective pick, and I accept some qualms about the keyboard, battery, and two-card complications, but it's extremely effective for 1080p and 1440p gaming, and tin can practise the job in 4K as well. The Alienware 17 R4 is a more sensible, fast high-end buy if you lot have coin to spend but don't want to get to the very top of the range, but the X9'south performance is upwards there with the all-time.

Fly Similar An Eagle

17-inch laptops are traditionally bulky, hefty affairs, and that'due south even more true for dual-bill of fare systems. The single about impressive aspect of the X9, and then, is its relatively slim course considering the power inside. It's 0.9 inches thick at its slimmest portion (the forepart end, where it tapers off) and i.18 inches thick at the back, while measuring 16.9 inches wide and 12.4 inches deep. It weighs vii.ix pounds, which is respectable for a 17-inch laptop and especially good for a two-carte setup. The Alienware 17 ($1,299.99 at Dell) is 1.xviii inches thick and weighs 9.77 pounds (which makes the X9 look slim and light), while the Origin EON17-X is 1.6 inches thick and weighs 8.half dozen pounds. The dual graphics version, the EON17-SLX, cranks up to ane.9 inches and 12 pounds, to give you an idea of how well the Aorus does in this respect.

Aorus X9

Design- and build-wise, the X9 is solid, and even though the deck is plastic, it doesn't feel inexpensive or flimsy, while the aluminum chapeau has a premium feel. The Omen 17's ($899.99 at HP) busier blueprint isn't for me, while the EON17-Ten (i,716.00 Base Configuration at ORIGIN PC) is, conversely, very plain. There's often a battle between evidence-your-power aesthetics and also much restraint in laptops of this class, and the X9 is somewhere in between. Information technology has some personality in its design, but isn't over the acme with it, fifty-fifty if in that location are several influences going on. The lid evokes the hood of a sports car, every bit do the vents, only the touchpad bears bird imagery, and the bottom ventilation is too cut out in the shape of a bird spreading its wings. The black and gray coloring keeps it relatively muted, as opposed to the common and more ambitious red and black color scheme, simply the lid and deck have some angled edges and line piece of work to continue it interesting. The corners are trimmed with LEDs for a splash of color, and there's a bar of skinny LED lights below the display equally well. The Alienware 17'southward lighting is a bit classier, and the build more premium for a pricey laptop, but the X9's design earns a thumbs upward overall.

Aorus touts the X9 equally the thinnest laptop with a true mechanical keyboard, just I don't dear the result. Information technology has some tactile feedback and adequately deep key travel, just offers a strange typing experience overall, as the keys have a plastic feel and are somewhat mushy when pressed. It'due south not overtly bad per say, it's only non very satisfying and doesn't feel especially high-quality. The keys are individually backlit, and included software allows you lot to fairly hands modify the effects and colors of each, as well equally the chassis lighting. The LED bar tin can be used to show the battery level, as well as the GPU and CPU usage or temperature, a novel (if not the most useful) feature. There are preset effects for the whole keyboard, including a music way that will pulse the chassis lighting to the crush of any music playing out of the laptop. The laptop's quad speakers (two speakers and two woofers) are upwardly to blasting those tunes, with loud and clear audio quality.

Aorus X9

The 17.iii-inch screen is a 4K, In-Plane Switching (IPS) panel with solid clarity and color vibrancy. It's not an especially eye-catching screen, and the matte finish dulls the picture somewhat, but information technology's still sharp. In most laptops, a 4K screen is something of a waste material for gaming as the graphics hardware can't accomplish shine frame rates at that resolution, but the X9 can make decent use of it with the dual cards, as you'll see in the testing section below. Exterior of gaming, you get a 4K screen for watching movies or Boob tube (as long as you lot have the native 4K content), which is ane reason other laptops include it in the first place.

Internal storage is fast and plentiful in the form of ii 512GB NVMe SSDs. They're not bundled in a RAID setup, showing upward instead every bit 2 split drives. Additionally, you can remove the X9'south bottom panel and insert your own difficult drive to an open bay, keeping the speedy storage only calculation a few terabytes of room, if you need it. That should put gamers concerned with large installation sizes at ease, since the included 1TB may fill up faster than you think. This model is a Newegg exclusive, but it will be available with one 512GB SSD and a 1TB hard drive from other retailers for $3,649.

There are a variety of ports on the system, equally you lot'd await for a larger laptop that has the real estate to not exclude anything important. On board are iii USB iii.0 ports, 1 USB-C port, a USB-C port with Thunderbolt 3, a mini-DisplayPort connection, an HDMI port, an SD card reader, an Ethernet jack, and a headphone jack. Other connectivity includes dual-ring 802.11ac wireless and Bluetooth 4.1. Aorus supports its laptops with a ii-year warranty.

Soaring Speeds

In add-on to the ii GTX 1070 graphics cards in SLI (Nvidia'south dual-graphics term), the X9 packs a two.9GHz Intel Cadre i7-7820HK processor and 32GB of retentivity. In other words, it's quite fast. Its PCMark Work Conventional score, which measures general productivity, is high, generally speaking, just especially so when you consider the enervating 4K brandish, which consistently lowers scores on this test. Its multimedia test results were equally quick, better than average for gaming laptops, which are already superior to more standard machines. When you're not gaming on the X9, you can comfortably complete media work and side projects without being frustrated its speed is costing yous time.

Aorus X9 BM

Obviously with dual graphics, all eyes will be on 3D and gaming performance. Its scores on 3DMark's Cloud Gate and more demanding Fire Strike Extreme were amidst the highest nosotros've recorded for laptops, if not merely past virtue of dual-card laptops being adequately uncommon. Recently, only the EON17-SLX (two,177.00 Base Configuration at ORIGIN PC) and MSI GT83VR 7RF Titan SLI, both with 2 GTX 1080s, were able to acme its numbers. On the Sky and Valley gaming tests running at ultra-quality settings, 1080p was unsurprisingly a breeze, averaging more than 100fps (frames per second) on each.

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4K is where information technology gets interesting, as the dual cards are still not quite capable of consistently striking 60fps. Given that, in that location's a skillful argument to be fabricated that a single GTX 1080 may be more cost constructive if you lot can't accomplish that peak anyway, but it was able to state in the 50s consistently. That'south a loftier, shine frame charge per unit, it's just non the ideal and becomes noticeable with fluctuation. In comparison, the EON17-Ten'southward single GTX 1080 averaged but 29fps and 37fps on Sky and Valley in 4K, and so the difference is articulate. The ii cards will serve you well if yous decide to play at 1440p, too, and all of this was backed up in some real-game tests. The Sectionalization ran at 53fps on Ultra at 4K, while Rise of the Tomb Raider (DX12) even broke the mold at 66fps. So, while dual cards may not always reach 60fps and are certainly non the most cost-effective option, ii 1070s is a performance-constructive option.

Aorus X9 BM

I would be remiss non to mention the complications of SLI in the current market place, as well. Back up for two cards between games is inconsistent at best, and getting machines to always activate and utilise both properly tin can be a hurting. To its credit, the X9 had a improve time of information technology than some systems and didn't give me many issues on the games I tested, but that can change depending on specific titles and with software updates. Because of the complications, manufacturers (and fifty-fifty Nvidia itself) accept been shying away from SLI of late (when it one time seemed the next logical step for about systems), particularly when the newest single cards are and then powerful. As I said, it wasn't especially bad on the X9, but some new games simply don't take back up for SLI at launch, and sometimes it never arrives.

Where the components really killed the laptop was battery life. The Aorus X9 only lasted for 1 60 minutes and 8 minutes on our video-playback rundown test, which is one of the shortest results nosotros've recorded. With a 4K display and cards in SLI draining power, information technology's hardly surprising, simply working off the charger is far from this laptop's strong suit. The EON17-SLX ran for 2:06, the EON17-X for 2:17, and the MSI GT83VR 7RF Titan SLI for ii:15, so the X9 is final among some very short-lasting laptops. Information technology may be somewhat slimmer and lighter than others for taking with you when traveling, simply you're not going to be able to use it for long while in transit.

Solid Gaming Performance for Enthusiasts

The Aorus X9 is not a mass-appeal laptop, and volition probable concenter only a small niche of enthusiasts. That's true for most expensive gaming laptops, but especially so here, where SLI laptops have some complications that many prefer to avert. Plus, the benefits versus the cost are debatable. All of that said, the X9 does what information technology does well, and is adequately nicely designed. I wouldn't put this laptop upwardly for best value, but it is very effective for 1080p and 1440p gaming, and one of the best options nosotros've tested at 4K too. The keyboard could be better, and the battery life is almost nonexistent, just if you lot have the money for all just the most expensive laptops out there, the Aorus X9 is worth a look.

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