Gaming and Overall Functioning

Every bit a gaming PC, this is the almost crucial section. Of course, whether or not the X700 is for y'all depends entirely upon your needs, wants and wallet. Anecdotally, our X700 with a unmarried GTX 660 handled most recent games well @ 1080p with loftier to ultra settings and most features enabled sans MSAA, usually. "Reasonably well" is defined as staying above 30 FPS and maintaining a median FPS of 40 and above. If you're thinking long term though, the side by side circular of cutting-edge games volition definitely modify that so savor it while it lasts (or add a second GTX 660).

Far Cry 3: Claret Dragon, Hitman Absolution, Bioshock Infinity, Saints Row Iv, Sleeping Dogs, Deus Ex: Human Revolution and a few others were very playable with their highest settings at 1920x1080, provided MSAA was disabled. From this, we tin can deduce that many gamers will be pleased with the base configuration.

At less than $200, the 192-bit GTX 660 represents one of the sweetest spots in affordable, low-compromise gaming. I've nevertheless to see marks on Lenovo'south Radeon HD 8950 option (available from OEMs just), but 28 compute-units and 240GB/south of memory bandwidth should put it more in line with a GTX 770. With a Crossfire setup, that divergence volition only abound but so does the toll -- the model boasting dual Radeon HD 8950 cards retails for $3,000. That kind price tag puts Lenovo's Erazer squarely in the premium boutique territory, an area where it seems ill-equipped to compete.

Of course, nosotros can't ignore the elephant in the room: the GTX 660 is a good value, but not a loftier-end graphics carte du jour. Discerning gameophiles -- the kind who are looking for 60 FPS minimum in full visual celebrity -- require better. Maintaining a minimum of lx FPS is doable though in modern AAA titles, but will require pregnant quality trade-offs (e.m. certain visual quality options @ depression/medium, no MSAA, 1600x900 instead of 1920x1080 etc..). Where gaming is concerned, the X700 is only as good equally its graphics card, and so exacting gamers will demand to consider SLI/Crossfire… or a different system.

For WQHD (2560x1440) gaming, the X700's base configuration is insufficient. While modernistic large-budget titles (e.k. Bioshock Infinity, Far Weep 3 and Battleground iv) are destined to asphyxiate though, wait aging favorites (e.g. Torchlight two, Diablo 3, Team Fortress two) to operate silky smoothen. Far Cry three: Blood Dragon, Bioshock Infinity and Deus Ex: Homo Revolution are just a few games where 2560x1440 proved to be a less-than-perfect experience. Squeezing out good frame rates at this resolution isn't possible without significantly scaling down visual quality.

While our config struggles with demanding titles at WQHD, calculation your own GTX 660 (a $200 proposition) in SLI tin can catapult the X700 comfortably beyond 1080p. For every bit long as Lenovo offers the SSD-less X700 for $1290, $1490 can purchase a very capable gaming auto.

Alternatively, the height-cease Erazer X700 with dual Radeon HD 8950s should perform admirably, only again, it also retails for $3,000. That's a hefty price disparity, but don't forget that extra cash besides scores you more storage, 32GB RAM and a high-end Intel Core i7 farthermost. At that place's likewise a single Radeon Hard disk drive 8950 model for $1910 which I suspect can also handle WQHD. The Erazer X700's Intel Core i7-3820 (a roughly $300 part) can easily power current games. Interestingly though, Lenovo chose a Sandy Bridge-E part over Ivy Span (Haswell was likely never a choice because Lenovo had its eyes on the X79). Yet, this CPU offers lots of power relative to its graphics subsystem.

For testing purposes, our Erazer X700 was loaded with Nvidia'south 331.65 driver. Default presets for graphics quality were favored for the sake of consistency and Fraps was used to tape FPS on titles without an average frame charge per unit feature.

Far Weep 3: Blood Dragon

At 1920x1080, "Ultra" with no MSAA performed satisfactorily. Similar many newer games, Claret Dragon utilizes FXAA which provides some anti-aliasing benefits simply without the huge operation penalty of MSAA. At higher resolutions (1920x1080, for instance), FXAA is probably all you need.

For fun, I'd similar to mention that 2560x1440 + Ultra + MSAA x8 turned the options menu into an unusable slideshow. After exiting the menu, the game itself also ran poorly but not every bit badly as the options screen. Overclocking the arrangement to 4.3GHz yielded very little difference (0-2 FPS), much like it did in most games. At 1080p, the graphics card is the bottleneck.

Bioshock Infinite

In real-world game play, Bioshock Infinite ran flossy smooth at 1920x1080 with "Very High" settings and acceptably with MSAA x2 enabled. "Ultra" was also very playable throughout, but disabling MSAA is paramount. With this game, MSSA is either on or off with no in-between adjustments.

Saints Row IV

Choosing "Ultra" graphics settings automatically enables MSAA x8: a rather sadistic motility on Saints Row IV's part. Fifty-fifty so, Ultra at 1920x1080 with MSAA x8 remained a very playable experience. Although SR4 was easier to run than most titles tested, 2560x1440 and Ultra remains a combo best left for faster graphics cards. Overclocking wasn't necessary, but did better average frame rates by ane-3 FPS.

Hitman Absolution

Hitman includes a built-in benchmark tool. The reported max FPS would sometimes inexplicably leap at the concluding moment -- and sometimes would scales inconsistently -- but the average FPS scores didn't stray far from actual gameplay. Once more, 1920x1080 was playable with Ultra enabled, just you'll definitely want to disable MSAA. And actually, knocking a couple settings down to the realm of Loftier instead of Ultra helped smooth a few remaining rough spots. Overclocking made no observable difference for ultra at 1080p.

Constructed and Other Awarding Tests

Results from Futuremark's 3DMark 2022 peg our Erazer X700 somewhere between "gaming laptop" and "high end gaming PC". Based on my experiences, this seems similar an accurate (if vague) assessment. As the benchmarks become more demanding (i.e. performance and extreme settings), the performance gap between stock and overclocked lessens. It's clear the GPU is holding dorsum the X700 here, negating most of the advantage from a 700MHz overclock.

3DMark11 Score: P6643

PCMark 7 Score: 5652 PCMarks

PCMark 7 is actually a suite of benchmarks aimed at simulating overall "real-world" system operation. Our Erazer X700 scored 5652 PCMarks at stock speeds (3.6GHz) and 6012 PCMarks when overclocked (4.1GHz). A gain of 360 PCMarks represents a roughly half-dozen-per centum increase in overall performance. The numbers don't hateful much on their own, but offer an like shooting fish in a barrel method of comparison against other systems.

Storage Functioning

The X700 is equipped with a 128GB Samsung SSD (MZ7TD128HAFV) and a 1TB Seagate HDD (ST1000DM003). A bigger SSD option would be overnice, but even the highest-end Erazer ($three,000 retail) only ships with a 128GB SSD. The included SSD is an OEM function manufactured by Samsung; however, Samsung'due south Magician utility failed to discover information technology. Interestingly, benchmarks pegged the SSD's IOPS performance effectually 80k reads and 30k writes. This puts the MZ7TD on par with the Samsung 830 -- a rebadged or slightly modified 830, perhaps? Non unexpectedly, Crystal Disk reveals a solid SSD and a mostly unremarkable 1TB HDD.

Boot performance

The X700's boot times were sluggish for a Windows viii system equipped an SSD. Times ranged from 38 to 41 seconds between pressing the power button and arriving at the logon screen. It took roughly nine seconds to reach Mail service, after which Lenovo'southward UEFI BIOS would spend some fourth dimension handing off the boot process to Windows viii.

Kick times are irrelevant to many people; however, if y'all're the type who will be hitting the overclock push button a lot, irksome boots could lead to frayed nerves.