Taiwanese tech giant, Gigabyte, announced this week their latest slimline gaming notebook, the 14-inch P34G v2. It's a thin 'n' light laptop that's supposedly "perfect for any corporate worker who needs a reliable laptop by day and then wants to play demanding games after work."
The GTX 860M inside should handle demanding games well. My feelings on the choice of graphics card are a bit mixed—on one hand the 860M is rocking the same GK104 GPU as the impressive GTX 775M of the last generation, but on the other it isn't the version of the 860M that comes with the new Maxwell GPU.
The GK104 Kepler chip should deliver impressive gaming performance at the 1080p native res of the 14-inch screen, but will kick out a lot of heat in return. When I checked out Gigabyte's GTX 765M-powered P35K it made a lot of noise when gaming because of the svelte chassis and the heat it needed to disperse.
The GM107 Maxwell GPU that appear in some versions of the 860M is relatively lower-powered, but will still give a pretty decent level of gaming performance. It's not in the same league as the Kepler version, but will have significantly less impact on battery and your ears. The Kepler GPU is only likely to give you 90 minutes of gaming on battery, at best.
The new P34G v2 has got three modes of fan speed, so maybe we'll at least be able to tone down the VTOL-esque roar that it might otherwise create. That 14-inch 1080p screen looks pretty interesting too—it's an AHVA screen rather than the dreaded TN or IPS and that means it'll have excellent viewing angles and blacks inkier than a scared squid.
My review sample is on order as I type and it'll be available later this month for around $1,400 / £990.
