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Razer didn't surprise anyone when they released the new Razer Blade with better

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hardware and identical build quality to its predecessor it was the massive price

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drop that got me and a lot of others excited about it but apparently Gigabyte

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doesn't think they went low enough Gigabyte figures they can do the same

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thing for $600 cheaper for a 512 gig model wow and

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this is it the arrow 14 or as I'm calling it The Poor Man's

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blade Mast drop is currently featuring their exclusive k7xx red headphones

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built by AKG learn more and buy one today at the link in the video

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description let's start with specs it would be easy to put a core i5 with

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onboard Graphics in this thing and say Hey look it's cheaper so you can't call

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something a blade competitor unless it's similarly equipped so like the blade 14

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my config of the Aro 14 more on that later rocks a core i7 6700 HQ 16 gigs of

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ddr4 memory an m.2 SSD and a

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gtx970m graphics card though it has 3

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gigs versus 6 gigs of vram which leads

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us pretty well into the differences because while raw system performance

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should be pretty darn close in some ways

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in others the experience will be pretty different for starters the SSD in my

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config is SATA instead of NVMe in spite

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of the product pages PCIe messaging

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right at the top onto the power brick in

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spite of its slightly lower rated output it's a touch bigger But it includes a

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2.1 amp USB port which is a super convenient feature for regular Travelers

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next is IO where it's hard to declare a true winner the arow 14 rocks three USB

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3 5 GB typ a ports just like the blade

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adds a USB 3.1 10 gbit port on its

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type-c Port but it sacrifices

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Thunderbolt on that same type-c connector and then it gets more

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complicated they both have HDMI but the Aro 14 has HDMI 2.0 for 60 HZ 4K output

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and a mini DisplayPort for easy conversion to anything including VGA

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making up for some of the functionality lost by that Thunderbolt Port that's

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missing and then finally and if this isn't a home run it's a ground rule

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double for sure the AR 14 has an SD card

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reader woohoo moving on to the display

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the A14 has what Gigabyte very optimistically refers to as a free K

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14in IPS display with an actual resolution of 2560 x440 which I've

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usually heard referred to as 1440p or 2

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1 12K which is only about

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64% the number of pixels as the blade

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14's 3K plus display but deceptive

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product marketing aside I think this is a great move at this size it doesn't

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appreciably affect the sharpness of text or other onscreen elements and it

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contributes directly to better battery life and longer battery life when gaming

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at the panel's native resolution it's not as bright as Razor's display and the

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huge chin bar bar reminds me of notebooks from years past but it's got

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DC backlight modulation that's why it's not flickering in RB roll and a matte

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finish with strong contrast performance that makes it look really good in person

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I did miss the touchcreen quite a few times and gsync or higher refresh rates

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would be on the wish list for an arrow two but these features would add cost

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and device thickness so overall I'm not complaining here on the subject of

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thickness whatever Gigabyte might think about this the blade 14 continues to be

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the obvious competitor here and while

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you could convince me that the AR 14 is the same size if it had been a couple of

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weeks since I'd seen Cena blade side by side the difference is noticeable the A1

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14 is about 15% larger by volume most of

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which is due to its increased thickness but once again this is a matter of

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tradeoffs rather than an opportunity for me to declare a clear winner for your

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extra thickness you get socketed memory slots two of them allowing the arrow 14

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to be upgraded to 32 gigs of off-the-shelf RAM this apacer stuff that

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I had lying around from an ad spot a while ago worked great making it a

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shockingly well equipped workstation competitor you get a second m.2 slot for

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an additional storage drive with raid support by the way and you get a

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whopping 90 plus wat hour battery that translated into a huge realworld battery

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life Advantage at the same screen and keyboard backlight brightness speaking

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of the keyboard Gigabyte also makes a point of mentioning the super Long Key

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travel in their marketing materials but frankly I don't think it contributed

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anything here I mean the good news is that it didn't hurt the experience

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either the force required to type is a little bit heavy for my tastes but I did

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get used to it in a few days and at this point I feel like the keyboard uh with

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the well positioned macro Keys contributing significantly here is a

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strong point for this device in spite of its monochromatic backlighting and

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missing right function key that makes one-handed volume adjustments a bit more

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of a chore as for the touchpad it's not

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the best I've ever used but I've been using this thing daily for over two

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weeks now and it's yet to make me upset so very good marks for both of these on

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to overall build quality the one finger 180 plus degree hinge is really nice the

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speakers are very loud and very clear but sound like they're coming from

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somewhere else due to their position on the bottom of the device the built-in

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webcam isn't anything special and and there's more chassis Flex than premium

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products like Dell's xps15 Apple's MacBook line and yes that comparison

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again the blade 14 but nowhere near the

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Gigabyte notebooks of old that I refused to review because I could bend them into

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a boomerang shape with minimal effort and you are saving a few bucks here so I

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don't mind making some concessions when it comes to overall

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robustness but what about performance then lonus well as long as it doesn't

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thermal throttle this Hardware combo shouldn't shock us so the only real

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difference here comes into play if you insist on playing at Native resolution

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so make of that then what you will on the subject of thermals it's trade-off

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time again the arow 14 manages to be

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quieter than the blade 14 underload and I'm thinking this is in no small part

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due to its much less restrictive exhaust vent under the screen but It suffers

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from noticeably higher keyboard and touchpad temperatures at idle then while

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gaming its touchpad is actually 4° cooler but its keyboard which you're

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more likely to be touching while you're gaming because you'll probably be using

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an outside Mouse is 4° hotter add to

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that though that the components inside the blade 14 generally run hotter and it

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becomes a question of personal preference at least if you have enough

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to afford either one which leads us then into the conclusion I don't like some of

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Gigabyte's sketchy claims 3K display all

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those call outs for m.2 NVMe raid when

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my config the only one available in the states at the moment has a single 512

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gig m.2 SATA drive and I don't

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understand why they felt the need to behave this way because there's no need

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to stretch the truth for the Aro 14 to be a fantastic machine it does that on

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its own it gives up some build quality

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it gives up a touchcreen and an RGB back click keyboard and Thunderbolt and it is

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a little bit bigger than the blade 14 but it offers up significantly better

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battery life HDMI 2.0 an SD card reader

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more flexible configurations so I talked about my config I'd expect to see more

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in the future thanks to two slotted memory and m.2 Bay a 2-year Global

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Warranty and a much lower price and it

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does all that while including a USB to Ethernet dongle for folks who prefer

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wires to killer networking wasn't that fun you know what else is

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fun saving money on your phone bill do you ever find yourself going gee why is

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it that I when I go to the restaurant I have to order you know six cheeseburgers

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for the week and then if I don't use four of those cheeseburgers I just have

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to throw them in the garbage I only ate two of them why can't I just buy two

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well that is how mobile phone bills work

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you have to say in advance like oh I'm probably going to talk to you know

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people for 200 27 minutes this month but

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then if you only use 226 you paid for something you didn't use well not with

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Ting with Ting you pay for only what you use and the average Ting bill is only 24

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bucks a month per device just head over to lin. ting.com we've got it linked in

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the video description and try out their savings calculator you enter your last

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couple of bills and then it spits out hey here's how much you would be saving

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on Ting and boom you can see if you'd be a happy person and by the way data is

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now just 10 bucks per gig beyond the first

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Gigabyte pretty freaking cool so sign up

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and you'll get 25 bucks in service credit or towards a new device

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wow so thanks for watching guys if this video sucked you know what to do but if

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it was awesome get subscribed hit the like button or check out the link to where to buy this laptop which we will

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have in the video description usually it's at Amazon also linked in the video

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description is our merch store which has cool shirts like this one and our

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community Forum which you should totally join so you can talk talk shop with

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other Tech Geeks now that you're done doing all that stuff you're probably

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wondering what to watch next so click that little button in the top right to

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check out our latest video over on Channel Super Fun barkl and Dennis go

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for a joy ride in my car for some reason who does that kind of thing