MSI GT75 Titan review

You just need to look at the GT75 once to be able to figure out that this thing is a beast of a performer. No matter what you’re trying to do with this laptop, it’s likely to complete the task without breaking a sweat. 

As you can see in our benchmarks to the right, the MSI GT75 Titan absolutely smoked all of our tests. Not only did the Core i9 CPU destroy Cinebench with a CPU score of 1,020 but it especially shines when it comes to gaming benchmarks.

In 3DMark, this laptop absolutely shines, scoring a whopping 6,509 in Time Spy – which would be an impressive score for a desktop. This score was reflected across our suite of 3DMark tests, too – it scored 16,750 in Fire Strike and 36,309 in Sky Diver. It’s kind of insane that performance like this is even possible in a laptop, thick as it may be. 

But, what about actual games? Well, it shouldn’t be surprising that the GT75 kills it there too. We ran our benchmarks at 4K on this thing, and we were able to get 32 fps in Shadow of the Tomb Raider with everything maxed out, again, on a laptop. 

That was just the benchmark, too. We played a bit of Shadow of the Tomb Raider on here (maybe a little too much), and by turning down a couple of settings we were able to get a solid 45-50 fps and, because of G-Sync, that 45-50 fps felt smooth as butter. 

Of course, the GT75 is blisteringly fast in non-gaming applications as well. One of the coolest things about gaming laptops, and even gaming PCs, is that they make for stellar workstations, due to the amount of horsepower packed inside. In the intense PCMark 8 Home test, the MSI GT75 Titan scored 4,789 points, meaning that it can absolutely get work done. 

However, we have to mention that this thing does get hot under load, and you’re definitely going to notice the fans pop on whenever you’re doing anything. After playing Shadow of the Tomb Raider for a couple of hours, we will tab over to MSI Dragon Center to see that the temps are reading at 88 degrees Celsius. That’s not quite high enough to thermal throttle, but it’s definitely hot enough to notice if you’re using a gaming mouse next to one of the vents. 

Still, if you want a gaming laptop that you’re going to be able to play games and edit some sick gaming montages afterwards on, you can’t go wrong here.

Battery life

The biggest downside to the GT75 Titan, as with most gaming laptops like it, is the battery life. It’s practically non-existent. In our TechRadar movie test, where we loop Guardians of the Galaxy over and over again until the device dies, we weren’t even able to finish the film. That’s right, the GT75 Titan lasted just an hour and 45 minutes on battery power. 

The PCMark8 battery test was equally harsh on this laptop – scoring just an hour and 39 minutes. You won’t be able to do much of anything on this laptop on battery power, so you’re going to spend most of your time plugged into the wall. 

And, you should be prepared to take up an entire wall outlet – the MSI GT75 Titan needs two large power bricks to charge. Be careful when you’re plugging it in, too. When we were initially setting the laptop up, we plugged it in and saw a couple of sparks – there’s a lot of voltage being sent through the charger.

Final verdict

The MSI GT75 Titan has one purpose, one target audience and it absolutely succeeds where it counts. If you’re looking for a no-compromises desktop replacement, you want the MSI GT75 Titan. This gaming laptop is less garish than other devices in its category, and it has the raw power you want from a laptop that can cost nearly five grand. 

This is a laptop that isn’t much of a laptop – you’re going to need to have the GT75 plugged in at almost all times, so moving around is just not a very convenient option. Still, this isn’t that surprising in a desktop replacement such as this, just something that you should be aware of if you’re planning to pick this up.

It’s easy to recommend the MSI GT75 Titan to anyone that wants to play all the latest settings without compromise, as long as they have the budget to back it up. For everyone else though, it might be better to just build a desktop – you’re not saving that much space with this laptop over a mini-ITX PC. But, hey, sometimes you have to go all out and treat yourself, and we’re not here to judge.