The Razer Blade gaming laptop has been refreshed with the new advanced model, which now features
Nvidia’s latest RTX graphics, but just how well does it perform in games? In this video
I’ve benchmarked 20 different games at all setting levels to show you how well it runs.
Just quickly before we jump into the benchmark results I’ll cover off the specs in my unit.
I’ve got the highest specced version here, which has Intel i7-8750H CPU, 90 watt Nvidia
RTX 2080 Max-Q graphics with 16gb of memory running in dual channel with a 144Hz 1080p
15 inch screen. The blade is also available with RTX 2060 or 2070 max-q graphics, so expect
different results with those, and you can find up to date prices linked in the description.
I was running Windows 10 with the latest Nvidia drivers available, and just a reminder we’re
only looking at gaming performance here, if you’re new to the channel get subscribed
for the upcoming full review. We’ll start off with the results from all 20 games at
all setting levels, then compare with some other laptops afterwards to see how it stacks
up.
Battlefield 5 was tested in campaign mode and not in multiplayer mode, as it’s easier
to consistently reproduce the test run. The purple bars show the results with ray tracing
disabled, while the green bars show RTX on. The RTX results were actually fairly decent,
it was playable even at ultra settings, the 1% lows weren’t too far below the averages
so the frame rate was somewhat consistent. For a first person shooter though most people
just want more frames, so leaving RTX off will give you almost 100 FPS at ultra.
Battlefield 1 was also tested in campaign mode, and was performing very nicely, with
the high frame rates even at ultra settings allowing us to take advantage of the 144Hz
panel in the Blade.
Apex Legends was tested with either all settings at maximum, or all settings on the lowest
possible values, as it doesn’t have predefined setting presets. It played well even with
max settings, still perfectly smooth with 100 FPS averages, with 30% higher average
FPS possible at minimum settings.
Far Cry New Dawn was tested with the built in benchmark. While the results look pretty
good in isolation, in most instances the ASUS Scar II with RTX 2060 was actually ahead in
this test, but I’ll investigate performance and clockspeeds in a future video.
Far Cry 5 was also tested with the built in benchmark, and the results were ahead of the
newer Far Cry New Dawn just covered.
Fortnite was tested with the replay feature, and due to a recent game update the replay
I’ve used is a fair bit different compared to my previous tests, so these results can’t
really be compared with my past results. Regardless even with max settings over 100 FPS was easily
possible in this well optimized game.
Overwatch is another well optimized game and was tested in the practice range, as other
players, bots and even different maps in actual gameplay affect the frame rate and this allows
for consistent testing. Even ultra was giving us 1% lows around the refresh rate of the
panel, so it’s running extremely well.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider was tested with the built in benchmark, the results were quite
good for this test, in line with other 2080 Max-Q laptops I’ve tested, but we’ll compare
these results to other laptops soon.
Metro Exodus was tested using the built in benchmark, which performs worse than actual
game play, making this more of a synthetic test rather than indicative of actual game
performance, but does allow you to perform the same test run to compare.
CS:GO was tested using the Ulletical FPS benchmark, and like always high frame rates were coming
out of this test, with 200 just possible with all settings at minimum and not much of a
drop with everything at medium. The average frame rates were again similar to the 2060
in the Scar II for the most part, however the 1% lows are boosted a fair bit here comparatively.
Rainbow Six Siege was tested with the built in benchmark, and is a game I’ve found to
benefit from Nvidia’s new turing architecture. This is the first time I’ve started using
a 100% render scale, my previous results used 50% as that’s the default the presets of
the game set, so these results are a bit lower when compared to other laptops with the same
specs due to this.
PUBG was tested using the replay feature, and we were only just below 100 FPS at ultra
settings in my standard test, with above 60 FPS 1% lows still possible, so should run
quite well, though I still always end up playing with very low settings because how else can
you go pro?
Assassin’s Creed Odyssey was tested with the built in benchmark, and I was getting
60 FPS with very high settings, the results at max settings were on par with the other
90 watt 2080 Max-Q laptops I’ve previously covered.
Dota 2 was tested playing in the middle lane with an average amount of action going on,
and it was running very smoothly without any problems at all, I won my game anyway, no
doubt thanks to the high FPS.
Watch Dogs 2 is a resource intensive game, but despite this even ultra settings was able
to average around 60 FPS, which is plenty given this is a game that I think runs perfectly
well with a solid 30 FPS.
Ghost Recon is another demanding game and was tested using the built in benchmark. Lower
frame rates are expected with all but the most powerful laptops at ultra settings in
this test, and with the 2080 Max-Q we’re only just below a 60 FPS average, with improvements
possible at lower settings.
The Witcher 3 was also running well with hairworks disabled, and seems to be a game that loves
higher end graphics, able to achieve above 100 FPS even with ultra, while high settings
let us better utilize the 144Hz screen, not that this game really needs to be super smooth
to play, but it does look great though.
DOOM was tested using Vulkan, and usually this game runs very well on basically anything,
however that was not the case here. The averages are lower than what I’d expect, and the
game felt stuttery, as shown by the poor 1% low performance, I’m not really sure what
the problem was, the other games were fine but the issue persisted after a system reboot.
Strange Brigade was another game that was tested with Vulkan, though this one seemed
to be running great, with even the 1% low at ultra above 100 FPS, however as a newer
game I only recently added I don’t have too much data to compare with yet.
Shadow of War was tested with the built in benchmark, and is another game that I’ve
found to benefit from Nvidia’s new Turing architecture. The results were decent, with
over 100 FPS averages possible at very high settings while still looking good.
Let’s also take a look at how this config of the Razer Blade compares with other laptops
to see how it stacks up, use these results as a rough guide only as they were tested
at different times with different versions of Nvidia drivers.
In Battlefield 5 I’ve got the Blade up the top in red, and we can see that it’s ahead
of the Alienware m17 despite having the specs, likely due to the thermal throttling I noted
in the m17. The blade is scoring second highest out of these laptops, however is still behind
the larger ASUS Zephyrus GX701.
Here are the results from Far Cry 5 with ultra settings in the built in benchmark, this time
the Blade was behind the m17, though only just by a few frames, but only slightly ahead
of the 1070 in the MSI GE75 or 2070 Max-Q in the Apex 15X which uses the popular Tongfang
chassis.
These are the results from Shadow of the Tomb raider with the built in benchmark at highest
settings, and in this one the Blade is back in second place and ahead of the larger m17,
but still can’t catch up to the GX701 as it’s got G-Sync and therefore no overhead
from the Intel graphics.
Overall I thought the gaming performance from the Razer Blade was great, and so it should
be considering it’s the highest specced model available. With that said, I did notice
many times at lower settings even the ASUS Scar II with RTX 2060 was ahead of it, likely
due to better CPU performance which is possible from a thicker body, or maybe the Scar II
is just incredible. I’ll be testing thermals and clockspeeds of the Razer Blade 15 in an
upcoming video, so get subscribed for that one. In any case, all games tested here played
well even with max settings, with the exception of DOOM for reasons unknown.
So how do you guys think the new advanced model of the Razer Blade gaming laptop did
in these games? Let me know your thoughts down in the comments, and get subscribed so
you don’t miss the upcoming full review.