Pros
- 15.6-inch Full HD display with a 144 Hz refresh rate
- Intel Core i7 10th generation CPU
- NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Graphics Card (6GB)
- Connectivity HDMI 2.1 + USB-C + Thunderbolt 3
Cons
- There is no SD card slot
- It's a fingerprint magnet
Designed by professionals for gaming professionals, the new Razer Blade
15 and 17-inch laptops pack enough power to make you stand out on the
battlefield, with the mobility you need to take gaming with you wherever
you go.
And in this Razer Blade 15 RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1 review, we will dive deep within the 15-inch model, which has managed to become
a standout gaming laptop garnering massive positive reviews despite being
a base model. On that note we'll tackle the Razer Blade 15 speakers,
battery life, performance on games such as league of legends and much much
more.
Index
- Technical specifications
- Who's it for?
- Design
- Panel
- Performance
- Graphics
- Ports and Connectivity
- Battery Life
- Verdict
Razer Blade 15 RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1 Specs
| Make model | Razer Blade 15 (RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1) |
| Dimensions |
13.98 '' x 9.25 '' x 0.78 inches |
| Weight | 4.6 pounds |
| Panel | Anti-glare | 15.6 inches | 144 Hz |
| Resolution | Full HD (1920 x 1080 píxeles) |
| Processor | Intel Core i7-10750H | 6 cores | Up to 5.00 GHz |
| RAM | 16GB (DDR4) |
| Graphic Controller | NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 (6 GB) |
| Storage | 512 GB (SSD) |
| Drums | 65 Whr | Li-Po | Up to 6 hours |
| Operating system | Windows 10 Home |
| Connectivity |
Wi-Fi 6 Bluetooth 5.1 RJ-45 USB-A 3.2 (x3) USB-C 3.2 | Thunderbolt 3 HDMI 2.1 (Up to 8K @ 60Hz) Audio combo jack HD webcam Digital microphone |
Who's it for?
This high-performance laptop is designed to meet the needs of those gamers
who usually play demanding AAA titles, also being extended to those who need
to work with intensive applications with absolute fluency.
The above is perfectly possible thanks to the Razer Blade 15's commitment to the Hexa-core
Intel Core i7 microprocessor, a new generation NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 graphics card, and a massive SSD unit, responsible for minimizing those typical
loading times between each task.
Alternatively, if you're looking for a laptop that goes one step further and brings in double the storage and an even better battery life (going from 65W to 90W) you might want to consider the ASUS TUF506IV-AS76, sure enough, it's slightly more expensive - at least at the time of publishing this post - but it packs a series of very interesting specs that should not be overlooked for the serious gamer.
Razer Blade 15 (RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1) Review
Design
Manufactured in a CNC aluminum unibody body, the Blade 15 boasts a not only an elegant design - with a matte black finish - but
also, a very compact one, since its profile is kept at about 0.78-inches and its weight at 4.60 lbs.
Although its internal cooling system can be noisy as soon as you start
playing, the truth is that the pair of integrated fans do an excellent job of dissipating the heat generated by its components.
Keyboard and Trackpad
Implemented with anti-ghosting technology, to enable the introduction of
multiple key commands when playing games, the QWERTY keyboard of this laptops has a pleasant and firm touch, which you will also appreciate when
writing emails and editing documents.
In addition, its customizable backlight technology, Razer Chroma RGB, allows you to enjoy a pleasant gaming experience, thanks to
the animated lighting effects compatible with such popular titles as Fortnite and Apex
Legends. It also has a high-precision touchpad, in which you can enter the most used touch gestures in
Windows.
Precisely, it's the trackpad and the keyboard one of the most praised features of this laptop by its buyers and it's also easily one of the items that manufacturers most often overlook when designing gaming laptops as a good input experience is absolutely critical to a fluent gaming experience.
Having said that, the Razer Blade 15 is also a fingerprint magnet so if you like your laptop to look nice and neat all the time then be prepared with a microfiber cloth to do some daily scrubbing.
Panel
Meeting the needs of professional gamers, the RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1 implements a glare-free screen, whose 15.6-inch diagonal ultra thin frame reproduces sharp images in Full HD resolution. Sure enough, we would've loved to see a Razer Blade 15 4K Gaming laptop here but alas, these models are few and far between with much heftier price tags so we're left with your standard 1080p gaming laptop.
Having said that, the Blade 15 does implement a 144Hz refresh rate within its 1080p display, meaning you can play fast action games such as first-person shooters or the likes without worrying about tearing or ghosting on the display.
Finally, the excellent colorimetry of this screen, equivalent to 100% coverage of the sRGB standard, makes it ideal for the reproduction and retouching of photos,
videos and other multimedia content that you usually enjoy.
Backed by Intel, this computer packs a
6-core processor, Core i7-10750H, which works at frequencies of 2.60 GHz to a maximum of 5.00 GHz,
through a single-core, thanks to the thermal technology velocity
Boost.
The minimum consumption of this chipset is kept at a reasonable 35W
(TDP), and to speed up the management of multiple heavy tasks, it is accompanied by a 12 MB cache, 12 extra virtual cores, and a low consuming 16 GB DDR4 RAM.
Overall, this basically means that it's packing a beast of a processor and enough RAM capable of managing just about anything you throw at it.
More over, if there's one thing that users of the Blade 15 have agreed on time and time again is on the fluid performance on this device with which you can
carry out tasks that lower-end gaming laptops such as the Acer Nitro 5 AN515-55-59KS would not be able to handle.
Specifically, we're talking about complex calculations, virtualization, advanced programming, front-end development, architectural
design and editing of photos and 4K videos at a professional grade.
Finally, to boost your productivity under these demanding scenarios, you have a solid-state drive ( SSD ), equipped with 512 GB, enough space to store documents, games, and applications. But, can you upgrade the storage capacity on the Razer Blade 15? Yes, you can. We'll talk more about that in a minute.
Thanks to Ray Tracing technology, responsible for simulating the actual behavior of light in your games - much like Philips has done with its Ambilight TVs -, and a dedicated GeForce RTX 3060 GPU with 6 GB of SDRAM you can enjoy realistic gaming, and even go as far as to play VR games.
Ultimately we're talking about one of the best GPU's in the market so you can expect top-level performance capable of moving with ease releases
of the caliber of: Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War (Full HD at 59.4 fps), Cyberpunk 2077 (Full HD at 63.2 fps), Hitman 3 (2K at 79.1 fps) and FIFA 21 (4K at 114 fps) and of course League of Legends.
Ports and Connectivity
In this section, you've got Bluetooth 5.1 and Wi-Fi 6 connections, so you can connect the gaming peripherals you need and in turn
enjoy an internet connection up to 3 times faster, especially when playing
online.
Additionally, you have a conventional network connector (RJ-45), 3 USB-A
3.2 type inputs and a reversible USB-C port, the latter being compatible with the Thunderbolt 3 protocol so that you can transfer data quickly with speeds of up to 40
Gbps.
The set is completed by an HDMI 2.1 output, through which you can connect 8K (60 Hz) or 4K (120 Hz) monitors, an
audio jack for headphones/microphone, an HD webcam for your streaming sessions, and a pair of decent Razer Blade 15 Speakers.
On that front, we should point out that the Razer Blade 15 sound is far from good, being only "decent" when you consider this to be a gaming laptop. The issue is so relevant there's even a Reddit thread about the speakers of this lineup. Having said that, this is nothing that can't be easily remedied through the use of a nice set of gaming headphones or an external soundbar.
Battery life
With a performance very similar to that of other gaming laptops,
the Razer Blade 15 RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1 has a 65 Whr lithium polymer battery, which ensures a duration of up to 6 hours of strictly office use. In truth gaming laptops rarely surpass this mark so we're not going to hold it against them, it's hard to produce a compact gaming laptop with a good battery.
Can the RAM / Storage of the Razer Blade 15 RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1 be increased?
Yes. Giving the Razer Blade 15 a RAM upgrade is possible and quite straightforward, allowing you to go up to 32 GB on each of its two available RAM slots, totaling up to 64 GB of RAM. Personally, I believe that's a bit of an overkill and you'd be hard-pressed to ever use that much RAM in most cases but upgrading to 32 GB seems like a good option down the line if you're a hardcore multitasker.
Storage-wise, apart from the integrated SSD unit, you have an additional M.2 type slot, to install another disk of equal or greater capacity, and in this way have more space for your games and applications. Again, 512 GB seems about right for me but that's more of a personal thing.
Conclusion: Is the Razer Blade 15 RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1 worth buying?
Thanks to its indisputable performance and features aimed at professional gamers - hello ray tracing tech!-, the Blade 15 lineup has managed to become a legend amongst the gaming community and the RZ09-0369AE22-R3U1, in particular, is no exception to this.
As soon as you open the lid, you will be able to enjoy the
spectacular nature of its 144 Hz Full HD screen when it comes to playing
titles of the most diverse genres, with a fluency that's simply impossible to achieve
by a more mainstream laptop.
Its comfortable backlit keyboard guarantees the firmness you need when
pressing each key, while its connectivity allows you to enjoy the
benefits of cutting-edge technologies such as Wi-Fi 6, HDMI 2.1 and
Thunderbolt 3 standards, essential to deliver a powerful gaming experience wherever you are.