It’s not every day you see a yellow gaming laptop!
This is MSI’s Crosshair 15, and I’m going to cover everything that you need to know
about it in this review.
My configuration has Intel’s 14 Core i7-12700H processor, Nvidia RTX 3070 graphics, 32 gigs
of memory, a 1TB SSD and a 165Hz 1440p screen, but there are both lower and higher spec options
too.
Prices change, so you can refer to updates with those links below the video.
I’ve got the Rainbow Six Extraction edition here which is a design collaboration with
Ubisoft.
At its core, the laptop is the same as the regular Crosshair 15, but the Rainbow Six
version I’ve got is themed around the new game, so it looks a little different.
The back half of the keyboard area seems to be painted on while the front section looks
like a sticker.
It also has the game’s logo on the lid and different key backlighting, as well as appropriately
themed mouse and mouse pad.
The plastic chassis has some flex if you go looking for it, but it’s sturdy enough during
normal use.
There’s an average amount of lid flex, and that seems to have a metal finish which is
an absolute fingerprint magnet.
The laptop alone weighs 2.3kg or 5.1lb, then under 3.1kg or 6.8lb total with the included
240 watt power brick and cables.
The 15.6” screen is available with 1080p 144Hz or 1440p 165Hz like I’ve got here.
Unfortunately there’s no MUX switch, so we can’t disable optimus to get a speed
boost in games, but we can attach an external screen to achieve this.
The 1440p screen had great color gamut, something I’m not used to saying when it comes to
a more mid range gaming laptop chassis, though contrast was below average compared to others.
At least it’s able to get above 300 nits at full brightness, even far more expensive
models like MSI’s GE76 can’t achieve this on the 1080p panel for some reason.
The MSI Center software, the control panel for the laptop, let’s us enable or disable
panel overdrive, which normally affects screen response time, however I wasn’t seeing a
difference with it on or off, so the setting doesn’t actually seem to matter.
There wasn’t any overshoot or undershoot, so if I had to make an educated guess, overdrive
isn’t on at all.
If that’s the case, it’s not too bad when compared to other laptop screens that I’ve
tested.
Not quite the 6.06ms needed for all transitions to occur within the refresh window, but I’ve
had worse 165Hz screens.
The total system latency was a middle of the pack result.
This is the total amount of time between a mouse click and when a gunshot fire happens
on the screen in CS:GO, so more relevant to eSports players.
I had some very minor backlight bleed, but not enough that I ever noticed it during normal
use, but this will vary between panels.
There’s a 720p camera above the screen in the middle, but no IR for Windows Hello face
unlock.
This is what the camera and microphone look and sound like, and this is what it sounds
like while I’m typing on the keyboard, and you can see that there is some wobble to the
screen while I’m typing.
So yeah just for brief demonstration like right now it’s wobbling a bit just as I’m
moving my hands on the table and if I actually go out of my way to hit the screen it will
wobble for quite a while.
So it’s still going, still going, still going and stopped.
So it does wobble if you type on the keyboard normally which I did find a bit distracting
and annoying but yeah it wasn’t quite as bad as the HP Victus.
Key presses felt fine with 1.7mm of key travel, though light touches did flex the keyboard
deck a little.
The keyboard has 3 levels of brightness which can be adjusted with the F8 shortcut key,
and all keys and secondary functions get lit up.
MSI is calling this the spectrum backlight keyboard.
The top two rows are colored yellow, the middle two are blue, and the bottom two are green,
and the colors cannot be changed.
This is part of the Rainbow Six theming, so I'm guessing shouldn’t be present in the
standard Crosshair 15.
The touchpad was straight up garbage.
I’m sorry MSI, but it was just so annoying to press.
Maybe mine’s not working properly or something, but the left side needs to be pushed harder
and it just makes a big awkward clunk sound - maybe that’s why it comes with a mouse.
The left has the power input right at the back, an air exhaust vent, and two USB Type-A
ports.
The blue one is USB 3.2 Gen1 while the black one is the older and slower USB 2.0.
The right has a 3.5mm audio combo jack, a second USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-A port, a USB 3.2
Gen1 Type-C port, HDMI 2.0 capable of 4K 60Hz maximum, and a gigabit ethernet port facing
the preferred way so you don’t have to lift up the machine to unplug.
The HDMI port connects directly to the Nvidia graphics, bypassing optimus to give you a
speed boost in games, but unfortunately there’s no variable refresh rate support.
The Type-C port did not offer any DisplayPort output and it also cannot be used to charge
the laptop.
The back just has a couple of air exhaust vents towards the corners and a visible yellow
plastic trim, while the front has a little groove to help you get your finger in to open
the lid, which opens back the full 180 degrees.
Getting inside was very easy to do using the tools linked in the description.
Just remove 13 Phillips head screws and pry the panel off.
2 of the screws were far shorter than the rest, so keep track of them.
We’ve also got quite a few holes for air ventilation underneath directly above the
intake fans.
Inside we’ve got the battery down the front, two M.2 slots for storage just above, two
memory slots towards the center just under the heat pipes, and the Wi-Fi 6 card to the
left of that.
Intel 12th gen offers two PCIe Gen 4 M.2 slots for storage, each with 4 lanes.
The installed 1TB SSD was performing well for both read and write speeds, but I would
expect much faster from a better PCIe 4 SSD.
The Wi-Fi performance was quite good relative to most other laptops as we’ve got an Intel
Wi-Fi 6 card installed.
Basically we’re looking pretty good as long as we’re not dealing with MediaTek or RealTek.
This is the first Intel 12th gen gaming laptop I’ve had that uses DDR4-3200 memory.
Alder Lake can support DDR5, however it’s up to the laptop maker to decide.
MSI seems to be using DDR4 in their low to mid range models including this one, but at
least it’s dual rank x8, so decent stuff.
The upgradeability score ends up being quite good as it’s easy to open and as we’ve
seen there’s quite a lot of components that can be changed.
The speakers are underneath towards the front on the left and right.
They sound below average and aren’t very clear, I didn’t notice any bass.
The latencymon results weren’t looking great here.
This is now the 3rd Intel 12th gen with Windows 11 machine where this has been the case, so
not sure if it’s the OS change or hardware difference.
The Crosshair 15 is powered by a 4-Cell 90Wh battery, which sounds great on paper, but
in practice it consistently gave one of the lowest results, lasting for a little over
4 hours in my YouTube playback test.
I thought this must be wrong so I tested it twice, but I got close results each time in
the super battery mode.
Let’s check out thermals next.
There are some shared heat pipes between the CPU and GPU and two fans towards the corners,
though only the larger fan exhausts air out of the side.
The MSI Center software let’s us change between different performance modes, which
from lowest to highest are silent, balanced and extreme performance.
Extreme performance mode claims to overclock the graphics by 100MHz, however MSI Afterburner
didn’t actually show this as being applied so not sure if it’s actually working.
Otherwise you’ve got the option of enabling cooler boost which sets the fan to full speed
or customizing each fan individually through advanced mode.
You can also hold the function key and press the up arrow key to enable cooler boost at
any time to max the fan out, regardless of the performance mode in use.
The temperatures were warmer than most other laptops when just sitting there idle, I mean
the CPU was actually cooler with the stress tests running in silent mode.
Otherwise the laptop wasn’t getting too hot, not even 90 degrees Celsius on the processor
in the worst case.
The cooling pad I test with, linked in the description below, was able to further lower
the temperatures a little more.
These are the clock speeds for the same tests just shown, and I’ve split the processor’s
P and E cores up as they reach different speeds.
Silent mode was giving super low GPU performance, so probably not too usable for many GPU bound
games, while the clock speed differences in balanced and extreme mode weren’t as different.
We’re not seeing a performance difference with the cooling pad as thermals weren’t
the limitation, power limits are.
We can see this when looking at the power levels being reached.
Silent mode only lets the RTX 3070 run at 35 watts, basically nothing.
The GPU was able to run close to 120 watts in balanced mode as the CPU was running under
40 watts, but then extreme mode seems to boost the CPU up to about 50 watts but at the expense
of taking some of the GPU power away.
Up to 140 watts is possible with dynamic boost, but 115 is the max with the CPU fully loaded
at the same time.
Here’s how an actual game performs with the different modes in use.
Sure enough silent mode was running poorly due to the lower power limits, though less
demanding games would probably be fine.
Otherwise balanced mode was doing well enough, with extreme mode giving the best result.
Here’s how CPU performance differs in a CPU only workload with the different modes,
so a bit more of a progressive difference going from lower to higher modes compared
to the game test.
The Crosshair 15 is actually one of the better results that I’ve ever recorded in terms
of multi core performance, and that’s purely because the 12th gen i7 is a 14 core 20 thread
part and I haven't tested a whole lot of those just yet.
The single threaded score is the lowest 12th gen score I’ve got out of the three shown
here, but it’s still a fair bit ahead of all last gen models.
The performance dips significantly compared to the same selection of laptops if we unplug
it from wall power.
The single core score is still competitive with the best of last gen, but the multi core
performance is now being beaten by last gen 8 core 16 threaded laptops.
The keyboard was a little warmer than the usual 30 degree Celsius point that I typically
see with most other gaming laptops at idle.
It doesn’t really change a whole lot with the stress tests running, as silent mode offers
relatively low power limits, so less heat.
Balanced mode was in the low 40s in the middle of the keyboard, so warm but not hot.
Extreme mode was also peaking around the low 40s, so again never actually hot to the touch,
but how’s the fan noise?
The fans were still audible when it was just sitting there doing nothing in the lowest
silent mode, so despite the warmer internals it’s not even completely quiet like others.
I mean it was about the same with the stress tests going.
The next mode up, balanced mode, was the same as running the fans manually maxed out in
cooler boost, there’s no in between by default, though as mentioned you have user fan control
so you can at least customize it.
I just wanted to see better defaults.
Now let’s find out how MSI’s Crosshair 15 gaming laptop actually performs in games
and compares against other laptops.
We’re going to compare both 1080p and 1440p resolutions because it came with a 1440p screen,
but there are also 1080p options too which is why we’ve done both.
Cyberpunk 2077 was tested the same on all laptops, and the Crosshair 15 is highlighted
in red.
It’s one of the better RTX 3070 results that I’ve got data for, likely helped along
by the newer 12th gen processor, especially at this lower resolution, and of course we
could enable DLSS or FSR to further boost performance.
I’ve got a different selection of laptops for 1440p as we only test machines that actually
stand a chance of running it.
Interestingly the ASUS Zephyrus M16 is just ahead of it despite having a lower wattage
3070, and that 2021 M16 doesn’t have a MUX switch either, so not sure why it’s doing
so well comparatively.
There were quite a few higher RTX 3070 laptops when testing Control.
This is a fairly GPU heavy game, and those other 3070 machines all have higher power
limit ranges so I suspect that’s why.
Not to mention the top 3 also have a MUX switch which would help out.
The 1440p result is one of the lower ones, again right next to the lower wattage and
thinner Zephyrus M16.
Although the Crosshair 15 has a 140 watt maximum GPU power limit with dynamic boost, with the
CPU also loaded up 115 watts was more typical, as we saw earlier during the stress tests.
Red Dead Redemption 2 was tested with the game’s benchmark, and the 3070 was one of
the lowest here, only slightly ahead of the lower wattage 3070 in the HP Omen 15 which
was about 1 FPS behind, though there was still a fair gap between it and the 3060 machines.
Again 1440p was one of the lower results, sure definitely still playable with these
frame rates at high settings and we do have the option of using DLSS to boost performance
here, but yeah it’s still behind a number of other 3070 laptops with last gen processors
that I’ve tested.
Here are the 3DMark results for those that find them useful, now for some content creator
tests.
Adobe Premiere was tested with the Puget Systems benchmark, and the Crosshair 15 is highlighted
in red.
While it is one of the higher results, it’s one spot behind the last gen Helios 300 which
has an older i7 processor and lower wattage 3070 graphics.
Adobe Photoshop typically depends on processor performance, so it’s not too surprising
that this 12th gen based machine had a higher score.
It’s only being beaten by other larger, more expensive 17” machines with i9 CPUs.
DaVinci Resolve is more GPU heavy, though the 12th gen processor is definitely helping
too, otherwise I wouldn’t expect the 3070 to be beating higher wattage 3080 options.
I’ve also tested SPECviewperf which tests out various professional 3D workloads.
MSI’s advanced BIOS can be unlocked by entering this epic cheat code.
Just like previous MSI laptops, you get a seriously crazy level of options to control
through here, so definitely make sure you know what you’re doing and don’t brick
the machine with random changes.
There’s an option that makes it sound like you can disable optimus and only use the discrete
graphics, but don’t try it, it’s a trap, you’ll just get a black screen and an unusable
laptop that boot loops.
I had to clear CMOS and smash F3 during boot to fix it.
Linux support was tested by booting an Ubuntu 21 live CD.
By default the keyboard, touchpad, ethernet, and camera worked, plus you can still use
the up arrow key to max out the fans and keyboard lighting adjustment works too.
Screen brightness adjustment, audio and Wi-Fi did not work out of the box though, it probably
just needs some additional drivers.
Let’s discuss pricing and availability next.
This will of course change over time so refer to those links below the video for updates.
At the time of recording, the configuration that I’ve tested goes for $2000 USD, but
you can instead get the higher tier 3070 Ti for the same price, though that one isn’t
available until April and it comes with a 1080p screen instead of 1440p - probably not
an amazing trade off unless you’re using an external screen and need the GPU power.
Alright, let's summarize all of the good and bad parts of MSI’s Crosshair 15 gaming laptop
to help you decide if it’s one you should consider.
Considering the unique Rainbow Six theme, you’re probably only going to be interested
if you like the yellow design.
Personally I didn’t mind it, but I guess I get sick of testing the same black rectangle
every other week.
Overall build quality was alright for a primarily plastic machine, just be aware of that screen
wobble as mentioned and the weird touchpad problem where mine kind of has this big clunky
noise on the left.
I did watch some other reviews just quickly before this one and it doesn’t seem like
anyone else had this problem, so I suspect it might just be my unit.
The 1440p screen was quite good in terms of color gamut and brightness was acceptable.
Response time was alright, but the overdrive mode didn’t seem to do anything.
Gaming performance was great, I mean yeah sure, not quite as good as some other 3070
laptops with a MUX switch or higher GPU power limits, but regardless you’ll be running
modern games at 1440p decent settings no problem on this hardware.
Battery life was surprisingly poor considering the 90Wh size of the battery, but at least
they’re shipping it with decent RAM.
Something I can’t say for a lot of other companies!
Now I wouldn’t say the laptop was running hot, but I think the fans could use some tuning.
I’m not sure if it’s getting picked up on the microphone right now, but even just
sitting here idle it’s more audible compared to a lot of others.
But what I found most annoying is they’re either too loud or too quiet.
So with the stress test running in silent mode it was about the same as it just sitting
there idle.
But then with any of the higher performance modes the fans were the same as manually maxing
them out, there’s no middle ground.
It’s either one extreme or the other, but at least you do have some customization to
change this, I just would have liked to have seen better defaults.
The ports weren’t amazing, USB 2.0 in 2022 feels a bit rough and MSI normally puts all
the I/O on the left so cables don’t get in the way of your mouse hand, but that doesn’t
seem to have been a consideration here.
All things considered I think the Crosshair 15 is a fairly average gaming laptop, it’s
just a bit too pricey right now.
I’ve seen other 3070 gaming laptops with more features for less money.
So I suppose it depends on how much you want to pay for this unique yellow design or if
the price ends up dropping a bit more once it’s more widely available.
Check out this video next if you want to see what I thought were the best and worst gaming
laptops of the year, and get subscribed for future gaming laptop reviews like this one
- there are a lot more on the way, there are plenty of new models this year!