XMG NEO 17 (E23)

[cadaveca]

XMG's 2023 update to their NEO 17 laptop is in my hands, bringing with it a platform change from AMD to Intel. Also new is the possibility of a 175 W RTX 4090, while the popular OASIS watercooler gets completely re-vamped for 2023. What does nearly $5000 USD get you in the laptop form factor? We find out!

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[Chaitanya]

Surprising keyboard is getting hot even with additional cooling that this laptop has.

 

[Ferrum Master]

The mainboard looks pretty meh for 5K product. Weird to see the CPU being screwed on in a triangle. Battery module spaghetti is inexcusable, it looks like they put it in as a afterthought.

Good to see our Dave though... but you should invest in some camera

 

[Denver]

It doesn't have the portability, autonomy away from the charger expected in a laptop, nor does it have anywhere near the performance (and hardware flexibility) of a Desktop that costs half that price. In fact, with U$ 5k I would buy a high-end desktop and a decent mid-end laptop with good autonomy and capable of running games.

The existence of this type of product is a mystery, surpassed only by the strange case of people who buy it... The set of components should easily pull more than 300W and heat all the internal components to the limit... Can this laptop endure for at least the full two-year duration of its warranty?

Ps: I know that anyone who buys a $5k laptop probably doesn't care about durability. I'm just curious.

 

[SOAREVERSOR]

It doesn't have the portability, autonomy away from the charger expected in a laptop, nor does it have anywhere near the performance (and hardware flexibility) of a Desktop that costs half that price. In fact, with U$ 5k I would buy a high-end desktop and a decent mid-end laptop with good autonomy and capable of running games.

The existence of this type of product is a mystery, surpassed only by the strange case of people who buy it... The set of components should easily pull more than 300W and heat all the internal components to the limit... Can this laptop endure for at least the full two-year duration of its warranty?

Ps: I know that anyone who buys a $5k laptop probably doesn't care about durability. I'm just curious.

Worse than that people don't buy 5k laptops to run games. They buy them for work. They are also not buying this.

 

[Space Lynx]

Worse than that people don't buy 5k laptops to run games. They buy them for work. They are also not buying this.

they prob just made a hundred of these for super rich people that buy things to play with then toss to the side after a year.

thats like 300k profit if you only sell 100 or so of these based on my estimates. crazy how much volume scales.

edit: its possible my math is off, i suck at math

 

[cadaveca]

Worse than that people don't buy 5k laptops to run games. They buy them for work. They are also not buying this.

There is a worthy market for devices such as this. When it comes to high-end 4090 laptops, you can spend the same amount and not get watercooling, on the Razer Blade 18. The Alienware M18 is also in this market segment, also without the cooling abilities, but keeps the nice 5k asking price.

Use one of those other 4090 laptops, and game on it. Your ears will bleed from the fan noise, and a headset is almost required, unless you like having your neighbors hear your gaming laptop that you have to crank the volume on to hear against the fan noise.


The NEO 17, at load, with the OASIS attached, barely spins up the fans. Other laptops without the aid of watercooling possible, just simply lose when gaming, or under any load. This is something that as a laptop user, I feel is really valuable. You know, since becoming a full-time laptop user, I wouldn't go back to a desktop. It's just not worth it. Do also keep in mind that you'll have to watercool said desktop to provide the same break from fan noise that you get with the NEO 17, and simply put, that's a pain in the you-know-what, but it IS worth paying for. That's a big part of why watercooling exists... it greatly reduces fan noise.

 

[Readlight]

One data storage device for 6000€!

 

[TheinsanegamerN]

Surprising keyboard is getting hot even with additional cooling that this laptop has.

Honestly, it makes perfect sense. See:

The mainboard looks pretty meh for 5K product. Weird to see the CPU being screwed on in a triangle. Battery module spaghetti is inexcusable, it looks like they put it in as a afterthought.

Good to see our Dave though... but you should invest in some camera

Dell used those 3 screw mounts for years, and they SUCK. Pressure to the die is horribly uneven. Which resulted in high CPU temps (which we see on this one) and also hot keyboards because heat was not being removed efficiently.

Kinda shocked to see such a garbage design on a laptop this expensive, but then again that's Clevo for ya'.

There is a worthy market for devices such as this. When it comes to high-end 4090 laptops, you can spend the same amount and not get watercooling, on the Razer Blade 18. The Alienware M18 is also in this market segment, also without the cooling abilities, but keeps the nice 5k asking price.

Use one of those other 4090 laptops, and game on it. Your ears will bleed from the fan noise, and a headset is almost required, unless you like having your neighbors hear your gaming laptop that you have to crank the volume on to hear against the fan noise.


The NEO 17, at load, with the OASIS attached, barely spins up the fans. Other laptops without the aid of watercooling possible, just simply lose when gaming, or under any load. This is something that as a laptop user, I feel is really valuable. You know, since becoming a full-time laptop user, I wouldn't go back to a desktop. It's just not worth it. Do also keep in mind that you'll have to watercool said desktop to provide the same break from fan noise that you get with the NEO 17, and simply put, that's a pain in the you-know-what, but it IS worth paying for. That's a big part of why watercooling exists... it greatly reduces fan noise.

Watercooling on a desktop really isnt that hard. AIOs are cheap and easy to install, and a pair of 240mm rads will get you that silent treatment.

 

[Harthad]

Great review.
Even though I appreciate the fact that you took the time to mess with the dram timings and provide us with the results, you clearly didn't take my recommendation from last year seriously when I pointed out that you didn't actually talk about the display very much. Perhaps it took you more than a year to gather or build the tools to do so.

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The display is one of the thing you care the most about because guess what, we look at it 99% of the time.

 

[Selaya]

[ ... ]
Do also keep in mind that you'll have to watercool said desktop to provide the same break from fan noise that you get with the NEO 17, and simply put, that's a pain in the you-know-what, but it IS worth paying for. That's a big part of why watercooling exists... it greatly reduces fan noise.

i'd disagree w/ this; desktops have plenty of space to work w/ to make a nigh-silent aircooled build.
obviously you'll have to agree to some tradeoffs (450w 4090 is likely a no-go; nor is a 13900k), but it'd certainly be more powerful than a 13900hx-4090m laptop still.

 

[cadaveca]

but it'd certainly be more powerful than a 13900hx-4090m laptop still.

4090m is basically a 4080 desktop card with less core speed. It's actually really good for what it is, within that 175W limit (2400 MHz). I kind of wish the desktop cards were as efficient. The HX CPU loves to reside at 4.0 ghz on the P cores and 3.4 ghz on the E cores.

 

[Selaya]

i know what a 4090m is; the point still stands that you could build a desktop and run either a 4090 or 4080 at like, 200w or somesuch and it'd be both whisper-quiet on air, more performant than a 4090m and also cheaper (than this model, anyways - possibly cheaper than any 4090m laptop but honestly idk)

 

[gQx]

On review at bios section you said "Part of the available options are hidden at first boot, but a few clicks once in your OS can open them right up for you, and enable memory speed and timing changes. I'm not exactly sure why its this way, but it is what it is."
What exactly am I supposed to click?