Gigabyte P56XT Review - ComputerShopper.com
Introduction, Design & Features
Taiwan-based Gigabyte has an intensive lineup of 15.6-inch gaming notebooks, starting from entry-level to one of the best. The least-expensive type is the Sabre 15, which options the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti GPU. Just above that type is the GTX 1060-packing Gigabyte SabrePro 15. For extra portability, you'll be able to get the similar functionality as that type within the thin-and-light Gigabyte Aero 15, a pocket book that is actually nearer in length to a 14-incher because of its without borderlines show. And for those who improve to the Gigabyte P35X, the GPU will get upped to a GTX 1070. Last however now not least, you may have the type we’re reviewing right here, the P56XT. This is arguably probably the most feature-rich 15.6-incher that Gigabyte provides.
The P56XT is a real desktop alternative. Inside, it homes an Intel Core i7-7700HQ quad-core processor and a GeForce GTX 1070 8GB GPU, probably the most potent processor and graphics-card mixtures to be had in a 15.6-inch shape issue. This pocket book is able for digital fact (VR) out of the field.
The P56XT has some headlining options, probably the most notable of them being its per-key RGB backlit keyboard. Each key can also be custom designed in 16.7 million other colours. Gigabyte is likely one of the few firms to provide a keyboard like this on a pocket book, because the era continues to be somewhat new. Another wonder with the P56XT is its integrated optical power, which can also be swapped out for the incorporated 2.5-inch storage-drive caddy. That's a function you do not see all that steadily anymore.
All of that rings as much as $2,099 for the P56XTv7-KL4K3 SKU we won for trying out. Another $1,899 type, the P56Xv7-KL3, type has the similar general specs, however substitutes in a lower-resolution 1080p show instead of the 4K panel that used to be on our assessment unit. The P56XT's different specs come with 16GB of dual-channel RAM and a 256GB solid-state power (SSD)/1TB exhausting power garage combo. An Alienware 15 R3 with the similar general specs as our tester got here out to $1,954 as we have been tapping out this assessment, however that wasn’t allowing for the two-year guaranty this is same old at the P56X. Add that to the Alienware, and also you’re having a look at $2,203. The Alienware has some benefits of its personal, together with a complete external LED illumination machine, however it does not have the per-key RGB keyboard that is at the P56XT, nor does it have the garage growth capacity. Either approach, it is secure to mention Gigabyte has priced the P56XT to be aggressive for the extent of functionality it provides.
It's time to peer simply how nicely it stacks up in all places else.
Design
The Gigabyte P56XT has an competitive and muscular glance. This pocket book is not just an oblong slab, as its corners are rounded off, and there is a pointed protrusion on the most sensible of the lid.
The rear-mounted sculpting extending clear of the chassis offers the design some intensity. The out of doors edges of the hinges have brilliant orange accents, as do the strips working alongside each and every aspect of the chassis. The energy button is orange, too.
Made predominantly of plastic, we predict the P56XT feels stable sufficient. However, the fee level of this pocket book makes us want for some steel within the building, a minimum of the lid. Strength-wise, the chassis has extra lateral flex than we might like to peer, however the true surfaces have subsequent to no give in them.
This pocket book is not any featherweight at 5.7 kilos, in an instant obtrusive for those who check out to pick out it up. Its 15.1x10.6-inch dimensions are moderate for a pocket book housing a 15.6-inch show, despite the fact that. Varying in top between 1.1 and 1.2 inches, the P56XT may not be profitable a thinnest-notebook contest anytime quickly.
We like that the show can also be opened one-handed, and extra that the hinges are stiff sufficient to stay the show from wobbling an excessive amount of. The hinges permit the lid to tilt again 45 levels from vertical, an anticipated vary of flex. The most and minimal angles of the show are not all that vital, because the P56XT is offered most effective with wide-viewing-angle presentations.
The keyboard is likely one of the P56XT’s key promoting issues. This keyboard options per-key RGB backlighting, that means that each and every key can also be in my view set to any one of the vital 16.7 million colours within the RGB spectrum. The backlighting regarded brilliant and sharp via the important thing tops. Something we applaud in this keyboard is that the secondary symbols at the keys, such because the quantity signal (#) at the 3 key, also are backlit.
The pre-installed Gigabyte Fusion device lets in for keep watch over over the keyboard backlighting. Fusion provides a large number of preset lighting fixtures patterns, similar to an RGB wave and raindrops, or you'll be able to create and retailer as much as 5 profiles of your individual design. You're restricted to converting the colours of the keys; there have been no choices for developing layered results. You can, alternatively, adjust the brightness of the keys in very fantastic increments. The Fusion device additionally features a macro editor, however you'll be able to be buying and selling an present keyboard key to make one; the P56XT lacks the devoted gaming macro keys that you'll be able to in finding on Gigabyte's pricier Aorus-brand gaming notebooks. Still, the strategy to remap keys is a great factor.
The keyboard has a stiff really feel. We suppose the actuation force—this is, the quantity of drive required to press a key—is at the excessive aspect. In addition, the keys have a somewhat brief shuttle distance, proscribing the tactile comments. The plastic sound they make when pressed is not confidence-inspiring, both. But we will be able to't deny that we have been in a position to very easily sort at the P56XT's keyboard for a longer time frame. It has no flex in anyway and a realistic structure.
The exception to the latter is the arrow keys being compelled into the principle keyboard space, which truncated the dimensions of the quantity pad 'zero' and the appropriate Shift keys. The remainder of the number-pad keys are full-size, despite the fact that.
The contact pad is aligned with the keyboard. It has a nice anti-glare floor and is sensibly sized for the P56XT's 15.6-inch diagonal show. Pressing down at the floor produces bodily clicks; there are not any devoted buttons. The clicks take simply the correct quantity of effort with out making plenty of noise. When the P56XT is grew to become off, you'll be able to take a look at the battery rate point by means of urgent the decrease appropriate nook of the contact pad. Up to 5 of the standing lighting fixtures alongside the entrance fringe of the chassis will light up.
Features
The P56XT is obtainable with two alternatives of show decision. The base SKU has a 1080p (1,920x1,080) panel, whilst our assessment unit had the finer 4K (3,840x2,160-pixel) panel with 4 occasions the pixels. Both presentations have an anti-glare floor and IPS panel era for extensive viewing angles. The 4K panel on our tester had well-balanced colour, superb brightness, and deep distinction.
A 4K panel has possible productiveness advantages over a 1080p panel. Windows textual content scaling used to be set to 200 p.c out of the field on our assessment unit, making textual content glance about the similar length because it does on a 1080p panel at 100 p.c (i.e., no scaling). However, for those who decrease the scaling a little, you'll be able to have compatibility considerably extra strains of textual content onto the display than you can be capable to do on a 1080p panel. Stacking two and even 3 home windows side-by-side in this 4K panel will have to be no downside.
The panel’s 60Hz refresh fee lets in it to show as much as 60 frames consistent with 2d in a sport with out tearing. Although the GeForce GTX 1070 within the P56XT is likely one of the maximum potent cell playing cards you'll be able to get, it's going to fight with these days's AAA titles at a 4K decision until you very much decrease the element settings. We discovered ourselves working maximum video games at 1080p, a decision that usually scales nicely on a 4K panel because of the even 4:1 ratio of pixels. At 1080p, the GTX 1070 is greater than in a position to pushing previous 60fps. We'd actually like to peer a 1440p (2,560x1,440) panel presented in this pocket book as a just right compromise between 4K and 1080p, a minimum of for gaming functions.
The P56XT features a 720p/30fps Webcam above its show. The image high quality regarded fantastic to us for informal utilization. It’s now not an IR digicam, despite the fact that; this pocket book lacks integrated biometric options.
If you might be making plans to plug one thing into the P56XT, you might be in success, as this pocket book has lots of the ports you'll look forward to finding on a contemporary PC, after which some.
Along its left edge is the Ethernet jack, a couple of conventional Type-A USB 3.zero ports, separate headphone and microphone jacks, and the full-size SD media card reader...
The remainder of the ports are alongside the appropriate edge...
They get started with the mini-DisplayPort video-out connector, a Type-A USB 3.zero port, a Thunderbolt 3 (Type-C USB) port, an HDMI video-out, legacy VGA video-out, and the AC energy jack. The VGA port is one thing we aren't used to seeing on a contemporary pocket book, however its inclusion is welcome. You may well be the one individual within the room that may nonetheless connect with that older projector or observe if in case you have the P56XT.
The optical power bay sits alongside the entrance fringe of the chassis, as we illustrated a couple of pictures above. Yes, the P56XT is likely one of the uncommon notebooks in the marketplace that also has one. But you do not need to stay the incorporated DVD burner in there, as that is in truth a swappable bay.
Gigabyte features a separate caddy with house for a 2.5-inch garage power with this pocket book, which you'll be able to switch instead of the DVD. We take into account this sort of hot-swap capability on business-class notebooks from a few years in the past, however that is the primary time we’ve observed it in a while. It's an effective way to beef up the versatility of this pocket book.
Traditional standing lighting fixtures are simply above the optical power bay. These are just right to peer as nicely; it’s great to grasp what is going on within the pc with no need to make use of a device device. Also alongside the entrance fringe of the P56XT are its dual audio system, one on both sides. They have moderate sound high quality and quantity. We had no bother enjoying video games with them, however we did want the sound used to be fuller for track and flicks.
Wireless connectivity within the P56XT is courtesy of the Intel 8265AC 802.11ac card and integrated Bluetooth 4.2. The P56XT picked up a lot of wi-fi networks in our trying out, together with the ones a long way away.
Components
Aside from a collection of a 1080p or 4K show decision, the configurations of the P56XT that we discovered on the market as of this writing shared the similar core parts. The processor and graphics card have been the Intel Core i7-7700HQ and the Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 8GB, respectively. Some competing notebooks (such because the Alienware 15 R3) be offering a mildly quicker Core i7-7820HK processor, however the graphics card is the bottleneck in maximum video games. The GTX 1070 is as rapid of a card as you'll be able to in finding on the $2,099 payment level of our P56XTv7-KL4K3 SKU. The base SKU, the P56Xv7-KL3 type with the 1080p show (versus the 4K panel on our tester) used to be $1,899 as of this writing, making it a fair higher worth from a price-to-performance viewpoint.
Although 2d most effective to the GTX 1080 and GTX 1080 Max-Q in processing energy, the GTX 1070 does not have the muscle for these days's AAA video games when performed at a 4K decision—a minimum of now not with out considerably decreasing the in-game element settings. This card is preferably suited to high-fps 1080p gaming, or 1440p or 1600p gaming someplace between 30fps and 60fps. We indisputably are not complaining concerning the functionality of this GPU, however we do wish to illustrate that anticipating to wade through these days's video games at a 4K decision with out compromising on element settings is not practical.
The P56XT helps as much as 32GB of DDR4-2400 reminiscence by way of two slots. Our take a look at unit had a two-8GB DIMM configuration for a complete of 16GB of RAM working in dual-channel mode. That's masses for contemporary gaming. For solid-state garage, the P56XT has two M.2 slots. One of them used to be occupied in our unit by means of a fast 256GB Lite-On-brand power with NVMe beef up. In addition, there is a unmarried 2.5-inch inside bay for normal garage drives, which had a 1TB exhausting power in our type. You can use the swappable bay to suit a 2d 2.5-inch power. In general, the P56XT can accommodate as much as 4 garage drives. We do not recall any other present 15.6-inch pocket book that provides extra garage chances than this one.
The garage and reminiscence can also be accessed by means of casting off the ground duvet of the pocket book. Getting the duvet off used to be hair-raising, as we needed to necessarily pry it away after casting off the screws maintaining it down. Note that the screws that cross alongside the out of doors edges of the chassis are other than those against the middle, so you'll want to separate them as you’re taking them out. Another tip: When hanging the panel again in position, get started on the rear towards the vents, after which lay it down towards the entrance.
Under the panel you'll be able to see the dual M.2 slots for SSD garage at the left, one in every of which is occupied. In the center-right are the 2 occupied DIMM slots for reminiscence, and on the decrease appropriate, the 2.5-inch bay.
Thermals
In our picture above, you'll be able to see the P56XT’s cooling resolution is positioned on the rear of the pocket book. The two heatpipes are shared between the processor’s heatsink, positioned simply above the reminiscence modules, and the bigger GPU heatsink to the left of the modules. The lovers ship air out the again fringe of the pocket book. Most of the warmth travels up the show’s floor, with only a small quantity escaping beneath the lid.
The lovers have been somewhat loud in our trying out. They ran at a just about imperceptible velocity whilst idling or simply browsing the Internet, however whilst gaming, lets simply listen them throughout a medium-size room. There’s little in the way in which of fan whine, however the quantity point is very important. We suspect probably the most sound is amplified off the show lid, because the lovers are geared toward it. If you’re seeking to sport at the P56XT in a room the place individuals are seeking to watch a film, it's possible you'll get a couple of glances all through the quieter scenes.
The P56XT’s inside element temperatures weren’t the most efficient. During a 30-minute stint in Rise of the Tomb Raider, the Core i7-7700HQ CPU reached 96 levels C, or only some levels shy of Intel’s most ranking for the chip. That’s too scorching for our liking. In addition, the GeForce GTX 1070 crowned 86 levels C, additionally only some levels beneath the place it might start to throttle.
Fortunately, the GPU didn’t throttle beneath its minimal clocks all through our gaming consultation. We used GPU-Z to gather temperature and frequency information.
The GPU temperatures, indicated by means of the pink line, leveled off a couple of 3rd of the way in which in the course of the consultation. Note how the GPU core clock (blue line) had an inverse courting with the GPU temperatures as indicated by means of the craze strains imposed on each information units. The moderate GPU clock used to be a good 1,595MHz; the bottom clock for the GTX 1070 on this pocket book is 1,443MHz, and the utmost spice up clock is rated for 1,645MHz. That way the P56XT, regardless of its somewhat excessive GPU temperatures, used to be in a position to nearly utterly make the most of its spice up clock.
Here’s a have a look at the out of doors of the P56XT in the course of the infrared eyes of our FLIR One Pro, a thermal imaging attachment for iOS and Android units. This easy-to-use device supplies a easy and intuitive method to seize thermal information about virtually the rest.
This is the P56XT on the finish of our gaming consultation whilst the sport used to be nonetheless working. The warmth is unsurprisingly concentrated across the processor and graphics silicon within the center-rear of the chassis. Note the streaks working up the show from the new exhaust air.
The cool blue spots at the keyboard on this picture are the 2 lovers. The hotspots are differently moderately obtrusive. The most temperature we recorded used to be 114 levels F within the middle of the keyboard. The spaces close to the cooling lovers have been appropriate about 110 levels F. Those readings are scorching by means of our requirements; we’d like to peer the surfaces stay nearer to the 100 stage F mark at maximum.
The underside of the pocket book had the most up to date surfaces; our IR thermometer measured 136 levels F within the center-rear and left rear nook. That’s too scorching to the touch with naked pores and skin for extraordinarily lengthy. You’ll undoubtedly wish to be certain this pocket book is on a stable floor whilst gaming. (As in, don’t put it on your lap.)
We’re general much less inspired with the P56XT’s cooling than we concept we might be. Its gaming functionality used to be constant regardless of its warmth output, and we assume that’s crucial factor. However, we’d desire to peer cooler temperatures in and out.
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