Just when you think you’ve seen it all, MSI drops the mother of all gaming notebooks right on your lap. Now, nothing feels quite the same.
Anyone who knows me will attest to the fact that I love gaming notebooks. They are the best tools for doing anything digital; they are portable, and you can game from virtually anywhere without much hassle. Best of all, you can get an entry-level gaming notebook for under R20,000 these days. Great. But what if you are looking for something on the other end of the scale, where money is no object, or you have a really big IT budget at your disposal?
The MSI Titan range has always pushed the boundaries of notebook computing power, but this latest model is something else.
Firstly, the CPU. The MSI Titan features the high-end Intel Core i9-14900HX processor capable of speeds up to 5.80GHz. Of course, at this end of the scale, there is only one number to choose when it comes to RAM. Yup, this one features 128GB of DDR5 RAM and will ensure no application or game ever gets bottlenecked, even when you leave all your Adobe apps open while you game. True story.
For storage, there is a 4TB NVME drive, which you can upgrade to 8TB if you have an extra R20,000 (or the value of one entry-level gaming notebook) lying around.
This gaming behemoth also sports a beautiful (and super bright) 18-inch UHD panel with 4K resolution (3840×2400 pixels) at 120Hz and there’s a 1080p FHD webcam which is great for content creators.
Last, and certainly not least, is the reason why this notebook can decimate anything that came before it. The MSI Titan 18 HX a14V features the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 graphics card with 16GB GDDR6 RAM under the hood. It’s a marvel they managed to cram all of this into such a relatively small form factor.
As you can imagine, with that 18-inch screen, this is a big notebook, but the body is not as thick as you’d expect. In fact, this beast is not much thicker than my 2-year-old MSI Raider GE76, at a mere 24mm when open.
Indeed, one of the things that impressed me most about the MSI Titan 18 HX a14V is how thin it feels compared to other high-end gaming notebooks. It’s also not particularly loud under load either.
MSI also did some impressive engineering with the large seamless touchpad on this gaming notebook. It sits flush with the Titan’s body and features RGB lighting supported by MSI’s Mystic Light. As a haptic touchpad, you will feel the feedback of clicks even though there is no mechanical mechanism that you are pushing—it’s rather impressive. As you’d expect, the SteelSeries keyboard with Cherry Mechanical keys and per-key RGB lighting is also something special and feels great to type and game on.
I’m sure you are swooning by now, and if you are not, check your pulse. The MSI Titan 18 HX a14V is, by all accounts, the best gaming notebook I’ve ever gamed on. It has everything you’d want from a high-end device, including impressive thermal capabilities, which means that this one runs a steady 70 to 80 degrees under load, a whopping 10 degrees less than my mid-range gaming notebook.
Another big design feature is where the MSI Titan 18 HX a14V vents the hot air. I’ve played with far too many gaming notebooks that blow hot air out of either side of the notebook. This means that your mouse hand usually get the air fryer treatments if you move it too close. The MSI Titan vents air out of the back of the notebook and away from any extremities. It may seem like a small thing, but a big deal for me.
With such a VIP specification list, it’s really not necessary to prove its worth with benchmarks, but I’ll indulge you nonetheless. The MSI Titan 18 HX a14V will run any game you throw at it and hit 100fps with ease, even on the most demanding titles like Cyberpunk 2077.
Geekbench 6 produced a multi-core score of 16,887 and a single-core score of 3,015. Cinebench
Futuremark’s 3Dmark Steel Nomad produced a massive score of 5,160.
Battery life, as to be expected, is not going to break any records here; desktop replacement notebooks such as the MSI Titan 18 HX a14V will give you an hour or two, depending on your usage, but don’t expect much game time on battery. These computers work best plugged in as the power draw of the components under load is upwards of 300w
Whether you are a gamer or use your computer for animation or video work, the MSI Titan 18 HX a14V will slice through those pixels with little effort. This gaming notebook can compete with the best gaming desktop computers out there, and even though all of this portability comes at a cost, this is a purpose-built computer for gamers, animators and engineers who need raw computing power on the move.
The MSI Titan 18 HX a14V impressed us so much that we awarded it the Gamimg Notebook of the year at our Annual Awards 2024. Check out the NAG Magazine Annual Edition 2024 for more details. You can grab your copy at the NAG Shop.