MSI's GS66 is a slim and stealthy black gaming laptop that packs a punch when it comes to performance. With its 15.6-inch 1440p display, the GS66 is a great option for those who want a compact and portable gaming machine. But how does it stack up against other laptops in terms of performance? Let's take a closer look.

The GS66's processor is powered by an 11th Gen Intel Core i7-11800H, which provides plenty of power for demanding games and applications. The laptop also features up to 16GB of DDR4 RAM and up to 2TB of storage, making it ideal for gamers who want to store a large library of games and other files. But the real star of the show is the GS66's GPU - a NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 Ti that provides fast frame rates and impressive graphics performance.

In terms of gaming performance, the GS66 is a strong contender. With its RTX 3070 Ti, it can deliver smooth gameplay at high resolutions like 1440p. However, when compared to other laptops with more powerful GPUs, such as Razer's Blade 15, the GS66 falls slightly short. But that doesn't mean it's not worth considering - after all, the GS66 is a much more affordable option than many of its competitors.

One area where the GS66 really shines is in its display. With its 1440p resolution and fast refresh rate, it provides a sharp and responsive visual experience that's perfect for gaming and other visually demanding activities. And with its slim and lightweight design, it's easy to take on the go.

But how does the GS66 perform in other areas? Let's take a look at some benchmark results from 3DMark.

In 3DMark, the GS66 delivers strong performance across the board. It scores well in all three tests - Extreme, Performance, and Time Spy - with an average score of around 15,000 points. This puts it right up there with other high-end gaming laptops like Razer's Blade 15.

But what about content creation tasks? How does the GS66 perform when it comes to editing videos or working on graphics projects? Let's take a look at some results from Adobe Premiere and Photoshop.

In Adobe Premiere, the GS66 delivers strong performance. It scores well in the Puget Systems benchmark test, with an average score of around 5,000 points. This puts it right up there with other high-end gaming laptops like MSI's GS77.

In Adobe Photoshop, the GS66 also performs well. However, it falls slightly short when compared to higher-end options like MSI's GS77 with a more powerful GPU. But overall, it still delivers great performance for content creation tasks.

Finally, let's take a look at some results from SPECviewperf, which tests out various professional 3D workloads.

In SPECviewperf, the GS66 delivers strong performance. It scores well in all three tests - CPU, GPU, and Memory - with an average score of around 90 points. This puts it right up there with other high-end gaming laptops like Razer's Blade 15.

Overall, the MSI GS66 is a great option for those who want a slim and stealthy black gaming laptop that still packs plenty of performance punch. With its powerful GPU, fast display, and strong benchmark results, it's sure to please gamers and content creators alike.

But what about pricing and availability? The GS66 starts at around $1900 USD for an RTX 3060 configuration, which is a pretty affordable option compared to other high-end gaming laptops like Razer's Blade 15. However, the more powerful RTX 3070 Ti version of the laptop starts at $2250 USD, which is still a relatively competitive price point.

In comparison, Razer's Blade 15 starts at around $2500 USD for an RTX 3060 configuration, and goes all the way up to $3000 USD for the more powerful RTX 3070 Ti. This puts the GS66 in a good position as a more affordable option without sacrificing too much performance.

But what about Linux support? How does the GS66 perform on Ubuntu 22.04? Let's take a look.

In terms of Linux support, the GS66 performs well. The keyboard, touchpad, speakers, Ethernet, and camera all work out of the box, with the exception of screen brightness shortcuts. However, Wi-Fi doesn't work at all without some extra configuration.

Finally, let's discuss pricing and availability. At the time of recording, the GS66 seems to start at around $1900 USD for an RTX 3060 configuration. This is a pretty affordable option compared to other high-end gaming laptops like Razer's Blade 15. However, it's worth noting that prices may vary depending on the region and retailer.

Overall, the MSI GS66 is a great option for those who want a slim and stealthy black gaming laptop that still packs plenty of performance punch. With its powerful GPU, fast display, and strong benchmark results, it's sure to please gamers and content creators alike.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enMSI’s GS66 is a thinner stealthy all blacklaptop that can both play games but also hasa clean design and will fit right in in anoffice.My GS66 has a 12th gen Intel Core i9 processor,Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti graphics, 32 gigs of DDR5memory and a 15.6” screen.This configuration sits in between the lowerRTX 3060 and higher tier RTX 3080 Ti options,and you can check them all out as well ascurrent prices with those links below thevideo.The GS66 is available in MSI’s core blackfinish.The lid, interior and bottom panels are allmetal and while build quality feels decent.Make no mistake, it can’t compete with Razer’sBlade 15, but the Blade costs quite a bitmore too.The black finish is a massive fingerprintmagnet anywhere you lightly touch, but I foundit fairly easy to clean with a microfibercloth.There’s a subtle indent along the wholefront edge which makes it easy to open thelid, and it goes the full 180 degrees backfor sharing.There’s a little flex to the metal lid,but it’s sturdier compared to their largerGS77.There was a tiny bit of screen wobble whentyping aggressively, but it’s fine.The hinges feel smooth and fairly sturdy,but without long term testing it’s hardfor me to know if they’ll have similar issuesto past MSI laptops.There’s a bit more flex to the keyboardarea compared to the larger GS77.The smaller 66 is also a fair bit lighter,so perhaps less materials, but I never foundthis to be an issue during normal use.The laptop alone weighs 2.2kg or 4.9lb, thenjust under 3kg or 6.5lb with the 240 wattpower brick and cables for charging.Just like the Stealth name implies, the GS66is on the smaller and thinner side for a 15”gaming laptop, it’s quite portable.The GS66 has a 15.6” screen and is availablewith different high refresh 1080p, 1440p or4K options.For some reason mine has a 4K 60Hz panel that’snot listed here.Obviously for gaming that doesn’t make muchsense.4K at 15 inches really isn’t worthwhileunless you’re doing something like contentcreation.At this smaller size, honestly I think somethinglike a 1080p or 1440p high refresh screenwould be a better option for most people.The GS66 has a MUX switch, so it’s possibleto disable the integrated graphics to geta speed boost in games, but at the expenseof worse battery life.Unfortunately there’s no advanced optimus,so it needs a manual reboot to swap, and there’sno G-Sync, at least with my 4K 60Hz panel.I expected it to have adaptive sync with optimusenabled, but couldn’t find that listed anywherethrough the Intel software.My 4K 60Hz screen has excellent color gamutand good contrast, so probably decent fora creator, granted it’s 8-bit.The brightness gets up to 420 nits at maximumso it’s fairly bright too, but of courseexpect different results with different screensoptions.Obviously with a 4K 60Hz panel we’re notexpecting great response times.I really wish MSI sent one with a better screenfor gamers, but here are my results for completeness.It’s not amazing compared to others, notthe best 60Hz screen I’ve tested but alsonot the worst either.There are a number of high refresh 4K panelsthat are considerably better, so we can’tjust blame the resolution, it’s the specificpanel choice.Basically, I'd expect much better resultswith any other screen option on this laptop.The total system latency is the amount oftime between a mouse click and when a gunshotfires on the screen in CS:GO.The slower screen is definitely contributingto a slower result here, but given the HPVictus had a faster response time and faster144Hz screen, it just goes to show that there’smore to total latency than panel choice.Backlight bleed was only minor, I never noticedany problems during normal use, but this willvary between laptops.There’s a 720p camera above the screen inthe middle, and it has IR for Windows Helloface unlock.This is what the camera and microphone lookand sound like, and this is what it soundslike while typing on the keyboard.The GS66 has a per-key RGB backlit keyboard,and all keys and secondary functions get litup.Brightness can be adjusted between 4 levelsby using the F10 and F11 shortcuts.Typing was alright, though the key pressesfelt a little shallow to me and the smallright shift might annoy some.Although the power button is part of the keyboardand right next to the delete key, an accidentalpress doesn’t do anything.You need to hold it for a long time beforeWindows prompts you to shutdown.The large touchpad is smooth to the touchand works alright.I’m not usually a fan of these super widetouchpads, but my hands don’t rest on itwhen typing and it’s making good use ofthe available space.There’s not much touchpad room because ofthe holes for airflow above the keyboard.That just pushes everything down a bit.There’s also a fingerprint scanner insidethe touchpad on the top left corner.It worked fine, but personally I prefer largerscanners like the one on MSI’s bigger GS77.The smaller rectangle on the GS66 just givesyou a smaller target to aim for.There are front facing speakers near the leftand right corners.My hands don’t cover them when resting comfortablyon the machine, but it’s not impossibleif I’m moving.The speakers definitely aren’t as good comparedto MSI’s larger GS77, but that has subswhile the 66 does not.There’s a little bass, but at higher volumethey’re not very clear and there’s somepalm rest vibration.The latencymon results are looking prettyterrible.The left side from the back has an air exhaustvent, the power input, USB Type-C port withThunderbolt 4 support, HDMI output and a USB3.2 Gen 2 Type-A port.The right from the front has a 3.5mm audiocombo jack, two USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C ports,though neither of these offer Thunderboltsupport, a second USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A port,2.5 gigabit ethernet port facing the preferredway so you don’t have to lift the machineto unplug, and there’s an air exhaust onthis side too.There aren’t any ports on the back, justmore air exhaust vents towards the left andright corners.All three of those Type-C ports offer DisplayPortsupport.The two on the right connect directly to theNvidia graphics, while the Thunderbolt 4 porton the left connects to the Intel integratedgraphics, but only with optimus enabled.If you turn optimus off with the MUX switchthen you can’t use the Thunderbolt 4 portto run an external screen at all.But only that left port can be used to chargethe laptop.The HDMI port also connects directly to theNvidia graphics, so that along with the twoType-C ports can be used for VR, and we alsoconfirmed that the HDMI port supports an external4K screen at 120Hz 8-Bit with G-Sync, so variablerefresh rate.There are 9 Phillips head screws to get inside,only the one in the middle down the frontis shorter than the rest.I found it fairly easy to pry open using thesetools which I’ll link to below the video.Inside we’ve got the large battery downthe front, two M.2 storage slots just aboveit, two memory slots in the middle, and aWi-Fi 6E card to the left of those.Wi-Fi performance was alright, but not asgood compared to most other Intel or Killeroptions that I’ve tested, but still betterthan the laptops with MediaTek or RealTekchips.The upgradeability score was decent as unlikesome other thinner MSI laptops, the motherboardisn’t flipped upside down.The laptop was easy enough to open and onceinside we’re able to upgrade quite a bit.The GS66 is powered by a 4-Cell 99.9Wh battery,the biggest size legally allowed on a plane.As expected, running on battery power withoptimus disabled results in less run timebecause the Nvidia graphics are more powerhungry compared to the Intel integrated graphics.With optimus on though, it’s doing quitewell compared to most other Intel based gaminglaptops.Sure it’s got the largest possible battery,but there are a number of others that havethe same sized battery that couldn’t lastas long.Generally AMD Ryzen based options seem torun longer than Intel laptops according tothis data, but at almost 6 hours in my YouTubeplayback test there aren’t many 12th genoptions that do better than the GS66.Let’s check out thermals next.There are a few heat pipes shared betweenthe CPU and GPU, and we’ve got 3 fans, alittle unusual as most gaming laptops have2.Cool air comes in underneath and there areplenty of holes for airflow directly abovethe intake fans.Based on the holes above the keyboard, itprobably comes through here too.Hot air then gets exhausted out of both sidesand out the back vents.The MSI Center software let’s us changebetween different performance modes, whichfrom lowest to highest are silent, balancedand extreme performance.Extreme performance mode optionally lets youoverclock the GPU.The first time you go in here, there’s noGPU overclock applied, but if you click defaultit boosts the GPU core by 100MHz, so not reallya good default if you have to manually goand click the default button first.Extreme mode also lets you enable cooler boost,which sets the fans to maximum, but you canalso go to advanced mode to customize eitherfan individually.It's not quite as granular as a regular fancurve, but it's something.You can also enable max fans at any time regardlessof the performance mode selected with theF8 shortcut key.The temperatures were cold at idle.The rest of the results are from combinedCPU and GPU stress tests which aim to representa worst case full load scenario.Most applications don’t fully load boththe CPU and GPU at the same time like this.Silent mode was thermal throttling on theGPU, but the fans are quieter, it’s a tradeoff.Balanced mode was a little cooler, while extrememode was about the same.If we set the fans to full speed we’re ableto get a nice dip in temperatures, howeverif we use the cooling pad that I’ve gotlinked below the video, things actually getwarmer to the point where the CPU thermalthrottles.These are the clock speeds for the same testsjust shown.The clock speeds get progressively higheras we move up to higher performance modesand improve the cooling.Adding the cooling pad gets us more than a500MHz boost on the 6 P cores and 400MHz tothe 8 E cores, so the cooling pad allows usto reach higher levels of performance, hencethe higher temperatures.We can see this when looking at the powerlevels being reached.Balanced mode seems to run the GPU at 80 wattswhen the CPU is under load at 45 watts.Extreme mode appears to take a little powerfrom the GPU and give it to the CPU, and thenthings start to get interesting once we maxout the fans.Although we’re averaging about 59 wattson the CPU long term, it was actually bouncingbetween 45 and 88.Basically every few minutes it would boostup, hit thermal throttling, then drop backdown, and it kept doing this but only withthe fans maxed out.Adding the cooling pad allowed it to stabilize,which is why the CPU power limit was closeto 85, extremely high in a CPU plus GPU workload,but we can see this comes at the expense ofsome GPU power, as the 3070 Ti is now runningcloser to 70 watts.This is lower than the 80 watt minimum listedon Nvidia’s spec sheet.So for whatever reason, MSI seems to prioritizeCPU power over GPU power when both are loadedup at the same time, though this only happensif you actively improve the cooling.Either through increasing the fan speed, oradding a cooling pad.It’s a bit different in a CPU only workloadlike Cinebench.PL1 initially gets set to 90 watts in extremeperformance mode, but after a few minutesit drops down a little to 85 or 87 watts,it seems to dynamically change to avoid thermalthrottling.The GS66 is doing quite well compared to mostother laptops, especially when we considerthat the three machines ahead of it are allthicker, granted the Zephyrus M16 isn’tmuch bigger.I found it interesting that the GS66 was outperformingMSI’s larger GS77 here, given you’d thinkthe GS77 has more space for cooling, but itwas hitting thermal limits and lower maximumTDP as a result.The performance drops back when we unplugthe charger and instead run purely off ofbattery power, but the GS66 is still one ofthe higher results.Now that said, it is worth noting that thereare now 8 core 16 thread Ryzen options thatare able to score higher in multicore, whichis kind of impressive considering the 12thgen Intel options are 14 core 20 thread chips.Intel still clearly has the lead when it comesto single core performance though, whetheron or off battery.It’s very cool when just sitting there idle,most laptops are around 30 degrees Celsius,but as you’ll hear soon, the fans are activeeven when it’s not doing anything.It gets warmer with the stress tests goingand the WASD area wasn’t too comfortable,which I found interesting because others likeASUS laptops bring air through the keyboardto avoid this.Balanced mode felt a bit cooler though becausethe fan speed increases.Extreme mode wasn’t too different, thoughWASD is still fairly warm, but not hot inthis worst case stress test.Setting the fan to full speed cools thingsdown significantly, but as you’ll hear next,this is also quite loud.The fans were audible when just sitting thereidle doing nothing in silent mode, but atleast they weren’t constantly ramping upand down like the larger GS77.Interestingly the fan noise didn’t reallychange in silent mode from idle to when weran the stress tests, so it’s no surprisewe saw thermal throttling there.Even extreme mode with the fans on auto wasquieter compared to most gaming laptops Itest in their highest mode, however maxingthe fan out could make it quite loud.I’d definitely want headphones there.Now let’s find out how MSI’s GS66 actuallyperforms in games and compares against otherlaptops!Cyberpunk 2077 was tested the same on alllaptops, and I’ve got the GS66 shown bythe red highlight.It’s basically performing the same as Razer’sBlade 15, despite that having a higher tierRTX 3080 Ti with double the VRAM and slightlyhigher power limit.That’s also putting aside that it costsover $1000 USD more as well.We’ve got a different selection of laptopsat the higher 1440p resolution as we onlytest machines that actually have a chanceof running it.The Blade 15 was able to come out ahead now,so perhaps the 3080 Ti can do better at higherresolutions, but at the same time we’retalking less than a 2 FPS difference, nothingsignificant considering the price gap.Control is a fairly GPU heavy game, and althoughthe Blade 15 does have a higher tier GPU,it was only slightly ahead of the GS66 thistime.Even last year’s lower specced Xenia 15was quite close, and that’s another slimmer15” design too.At 1440p the GS66 is now our lowest RTX 3070Ti result, however the Zephyrus M16 just aboveit is very close despite having a higher GPUpower limit.Razer’s Blade 15 is ahead again here, butwith another tiny lead it really makes youquestion whether an RTX 3080 Ti is worth wastingmoney on in a thinner and lighter design.Red Dead Redemption 2 was tested with thegame’s benchmark tool.I’ve found that AMD’s Radeon GPUs typicallydo better than Nvidia in this test.This would explain why the RX 6700M in MSI’sDelta 15 from last year was reaching aboutthe same average FPS.At 1440p MSI’s larger GS77 with higher tierRTX 3080 Ti was performing about the sameas the smaller GS66, so yet another exampleof why a lower wattage 3080 Ti probably isn’tworth spending more money on, at least at1080p and 1440p resolutions.The GS77 doesn’t have a MUX switch for somereason, but I doubt that matters a whole lotat this higher resolution.Here are the 3DMark results for those thatfind them useful, now for some content creatortests.Adobe Premiere was tested with the Puget Systemsbenchmark, and MSI’s GS66 is one of thebetter results.I suspect this is due to the high CPU powerlimit that’s possible at the expense ofGPU power, as that would help here.The GS66 was also doing great in Adobe Photoshop,only being beaten by MSI’s larger GS77 withhigher tier 3080 Ti.I’ve found this test to depend on singlecore performance, which is why there are abunch of i9 laptops near the top.DaVinci Resolve still cares about CPU performance,but GPU matters more here which is why thelower wattage 3070 Ti is now being beatenby higher wattage options, despite many ofthese being paired with lower tier i7 processors.We’ve also tested SPECviewperf which testsout various professional 3D workloads.Intel 12th gen supports faster PCIe gen 4storage, and the read and write speeds fromthe installed 1TB SSD are excellent.Just like pretty much every other MSI gaminglaptop, you’ve got the option of pressingthis epic cheat code to unlock the advancedBIOS.This is a tweaker's dream, you can changepretty much anything here from power to thermallimits and way more, so make sure you knowwhat you’re doing or you risk bricking themachine.Linux support was tested with Ubuntu 22.04.By default out of the box, the keyboard, touchpad,speakers, ethernet and camera all worked.The keyboard shortcuts for volume adjustmentand keyboard brightness still worked, as wellas the button to instantly max out the fan,however screen brightness shortcuts did notwork.Wi-Fi didn’t work out of the box despitethe latest Ubuntu coming with Kernel version5.15.Let’s discuss pricing and availability next.This will of course change over time so referto those links below the video for updates.At the time of recording, the GS66 seems tostart at around $1900 USD for an RTX 3060configuration.Now that does sound a bit pricey for 3060tier performance, but we’ve got to considerthe competition.As far as slim stealthy black gaming laptopsgo, there’s really only Razer’s Blade15, and with an RTX 3060 that starts at $2500USD, so $600 more than the GS66.The 3070 Ti version of GS66 like I’ve testedhere starts at $2250 USD at the moment, andagain compared to Razer’s Blade 15 whichstarts at $3000 USD for the 3070 Ti tier,well the GS66 is looking like a deal comparatively.Now don’t get me wrong, I do think thatthe Blade 15 is a better gaming laptop comparedto the GS66, but it also costs quite a lotmore too.You definitely get more bang for buck withthe GS66 if you don’t necessarily need allthe bells and whistles.But let me know if you’d be interested ina dedicated comparison between those two laptops.Apart from those two, there just aren’ta whole lot of thin stealthy black gaminglaptops out there.But yeah, MSI’s GS66 is definitely the cheaperof the two.Now if thinner stealthy all black gaming laptopsare what you’re after but maybe you wanta larger 17 inch screen, then check out myreview of MSI’s larger GS77 over here next.Despite being bigger and having higher tierspecs, it's not always better than the GS66,and you’ll see why in that video.\n"