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Leaked MSI laptop with GTX 1650 and Core i7 makes for a killer gaming combo

Image used with permission by copyright holder

The next generation of midrange gaming laptops is just over the horizon and we may have our first glimpse of what they will be like with some leaked slides for the upcoming MSI GL63. It combines a ninth-generation Intel Core i7-9750H CPU with the still unannounced Nvidia GTX 1650 graphics core for some impressive performance numbers.

Gaming laptops might seem like an oxymoron to desktop diehards, but there are a number of great examples of portable gaming systems and some of them even have reasonable battery life, too. If the specifications and alleged performance numbers from the leaked MSI slides are anything to go by, we should have at least one more laptop to add to that list of great gaming notebooks.

The MSI GL63 is said to have 16GB of memory, 512GB of NVMe PCIExpress storage, and a 15-inch 1080p IPS display. These details come from slides leaked by Twitter user @momomo_US, who as Toms Hardware points out, has a strong pedigree of accurate leaks. It’s the other specifications for the MSI laptop that have us most excited, though.

Allegedly there will be two options for prospective buyers, one with an Intel Core i5-9300H CPU and the other with a Core i7-9750H CPU. Another slide suggests that the more capable of those two chips is twice as fast as the Core i7-7700HQ from two years prior, and nearly 30% faster than the Core i7-8750H it replaces.

Alone that would represent a sizable performance improvement for anyone looking to upgrade from a gaming laptop that was even one year old. However, there are enhancements in the graphics department, too, with the unannounced Nvidia GTX 1650 offering a sizable improvement over its predecessor as well. According to the leaked slides, the 1650 comes with 4GB of VRAM and is capable of outputting more than playable frame rates in a number of popular games, including more than 65 FPS in PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, and almost 100 FPS in Fortnite.

In 3DMark 11, we’re told that the GTX 1650 can achieve a score of almost 11,300 points. That’s a near 25% improvement over a GTX 1050 Ti and a more than 40% improvement over the GTX 1050.

While we can’t guarantee the veracity of these numbers, nor even the existence of this laptop, the materials seem polished enough that we’re inclined to believe them. We’ll await third-party benchmarks before making a final judgment on the capabilities of this laptop if and when it appears, but if such confirmation arrives, the combination of a GTX 1650 and Core i7 CPU could be a winning one for this generation of gaming laptops.

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Jon Martindale
Jon Martindale is the Evergreen Coordinator for Computing, overseeing a team of writers addressing all the latest how to…
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