A behemoth of a laptop, it’s sure to raid your wallet but brings plenty of performance with it
Updated: Apr 15, 2024 3:12 pm
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Unveiled in 2024’s CES showcase, the MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG comes with the top-end hardware in the current generation. In laptop form, it might not be equivalent to the desktop counterparts but it still is an 18-inch behemoth that sits in between the top gaming PC and a more compact portable laptop. So can it reach the levels of the best gaming laptop available?
Pros
- Excellent general performance in gaming and production tasks
- Wonderful display with a 4K resolution and fast refresh rate
- Massive cooling solution keeps temps down and keeps it comfortable to use
- 18-inch 16:10 screen provides a top immersive experience
Cons
- Finicky power connector has to be plugged in straight as to function properly and without warnings
- Quite heavy and cumbersome as a choice for moving around
- Massive fingerprint magnet making the black finish slightly less appealing
Pricing
The MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG is nothing if not expensive, with a retail price of £4,699.99 (~$5,868.24 with 20% VAT) in the UK as of writing. It soars even above the rest of the best 4090 laptops in the market. It doesn’t quite reach the heights of the top MSI laptop in the Titan but still on a high level, except maybe the Razer Blade seen at a similar price point.
Design
MSI gives a great overall build quality and design, the Raider 18HX comes with a robust design. The metal chassis is rigid and opposes flexing quite well. Although you might find the keyboard to bend under greater force, under normal utilization it’s not affected greatly at all. Plus with such a large size, the keyboard is easy to use and doesn’t compromise on much at all providing a top writing experience.
MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG alongisde its box and contents of the package including power cable and leaflets
A MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG gaming laptop with a glowing green logo on its lid, displayed on a desk with colorful blurred background of boxes.
Close-up of an MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG gaming laptop’s side showing USB ports and ventilation grills with a colorful blurred background.
View of the bottom panel of an MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG gaming laptop with ventilation grilles and red accents.
Side view of an MSI Raider 18HX gaming laptop showing USB-C, A, and audio ports with blurry colorful lights in the background.
Close-up of a laptop keyboard with backlit keys in blue and green colors, emphasizing a modern, high-tech look.
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MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG, source: BGFG
In general, the look of the laptop is a lot more sleek, providing a more incognito gaming device. That’s not to say it doesn’t stand out from any basic devices considering the red highlights around the vents and the RGB around the outside. Although with the size of the thing, it’s down to draw some eyes on you if you’re out somewhere.
The weight of the model also makes it a bit harder to move around and get to places without a workout. Although it’s not surprising considering that it fits both the i9-14900HX and an RTX 4090 laptop GPU inside of it. Plus all the cooling is capable of taming the 250W so it’s unsurprising that h the thickness is a lot higher than most, as you can clearly see all the heatsinks adorning the inside and spitting out the heat of the parts.
MSI doesn’t skimp on the connectors either, with so much real estate you can enjoy a whole slew of connectivity. This includes two USB-Type C connectors with Thunderbolt 4, one of which even grants PD3.1 charging. But there are also three USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 choices, one SD card reader, an RJ 45, HDMI 2.1, and a combo 3.5mm audio jack.
The ethernet and video port are on the back of the laptop making them less in the way of your mouse or other accessories. The power connector is also on the rear, but that comes with its own problems, as it utilizes a custom plug for it. This also comes up with MSI center errors if it’s not properly inserted, which is good for safety but does mean playing around with it so it is properly charging.
As unfortunate as the non-standard connector is, it might be simpler as it does deliver 330W through it and even Thunderbolt 4 is limited to 100W. At least you get it for peripherals and some power delivery.
A person using the MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG with colorful backlit keyboard, displaying a high-resolution desert landscape game scene.
Person playing a video game featuring a motorcycle chase scene on an MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG laptop, in a room with purple ambient lighting.
A person’s hand typing on a backlit gaming keyboard of the MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG, with a focus on the colorful keys and a blurred computer screen in the background.
Close-up of MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG gaming laptop highlighting the keyboard and the edge of the screen with neon light accents.
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MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG, source: BGFG
Performance
Looking at what the laptop can do in terms of gaming and performance we put it through just a couple of tests. With a look at gaming capabilities in Cyberpunk 2077 as well as the performance capabilities in production with the use of 3DMark and Cinbench 2024.
We also found how much the MUX Switch can change the performance. Although MSI utilizes an AI performance option for changing it out you can set it to use the GPU, the CPU, or a hybrid of the two for graphics. As we find out it seems best discrete graphics are used.
MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG 3DMark benchmark graph
MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG Cinebench 2024 benchmark graph
MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG Cyberpunk 2077 benchmark graph
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MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG benchmarks, source: BGFG
We see the laptop be able to be a strong choice as a gaming laptop for Cyberpunk 2077. Running at native 4k makes it prettier and nicer to use on the display, but does limit its performance. As we pure rasterization drop it down under 60 FPS for both discrete and hybrid modes. That falls even more when using ray tracing but it also puts a bigger gap and shows off discrete mode giving you plenty more power.
But being an RTX 40 series card, you can also turn on DLSS 3 and benefit from improved performance and the utilization of upscaling to get more out of the game. That also comes with frame generation and improving the look of the game while using the technology.
Cinebench also shows the prowess of the machine as it soars in the GPU benchmark, this time though the hybrid combination boosts its capabilities and shows it has its benefits in certain scenarios. Although 3DMark is not one as again discrete soars to higher levels, especially ray tracing as seen in Port Royal.
Final words
Overall, the MSI Raider 18HX A14VIG is an exceptional piece of hardware. It brings with it plenty of power and performance from utilizing the top line of hardware available in the mobile sector. Which is unfortunately limited to what it can achieve and can be confusing considering the 4090 in this is nowhere near the RTX 4090 GPU as we saw in our review of the card.
However, the laptop comes with some drawbacks, mainly the cost and weight. The over £4,000 price tag is certainly not for everyone and is quite the desktop replacement for some. But also with a 3.6kg weight, it’s not as mobile as most other laptops, but with the cooling and power inside of it, we wouldn’t expect any less. But for the right person, it will be the right fit.
