GIGABYTE launches P55W ravishing 15.6-inch gaming laptop

Gigabyte has just announced a new gaming laptop that comes packing a Broadwell CPU and a GTX 970M graphics card all wrapped in what the company describes as a “ravishing” design.

Looking quickly through the P55W’s spec list and the new Gigabyte portable gaming machine certainly looks like it will take on even some gaming desktop PCs out there. Still, I’m not 100% certain about the ‘ravishing’ statement but, hey, it’s all in the eye of the beholder right?

I am not saying that the Gigabyte P55W doesn’t look good in its black chassis and orange highlights. I prefer that to the over-the-top accents and ‘styling’ of other gaming laptops, but it’s not jaw-droppingly attractive. It kinda reminds me of my old Novatech gaming laptop which was loaded with a 8800GTX.

What does get the heart racing is what is on the inside – after all, I was brought up to believe this is what counts.

The 15.6-inch gaming laptop offers a full HD resolution display driven by a Core i7-5700HQ running at 2.7GHz with Turbo up to 3.5GHz, backed with 8GB of 1600MHz RAM. Nice.

The graphics card (GPU) is a rather tasty GeForce GTX 970M with 3GB of video RAM on-board, giving this machine plenty of power when it comes to running more demanding games on the move. I am currently running a Zotac GTX 780 AMP! Edition with 3GB in my desktop rig and have yet to have it complain so the P55W should munch through the current titles.

The full-range chiclet keyboard boasts 2.2mm of key travel, which should ensure crisp and responsive typing and in-game control.

In terms of storage, you get a 128GB SSD (option up to 512GB), along with a 1 or 2TB traditional hard drive spinning at 7200rpm. There’s a DVD writer optical drive which was an unexpected bonus as most laptops these days shun any form of optical drive. The Li-ion 6-cell 57Wh battery benefits from Gigabyte’s Battery Boost 2.0 technology for what the company describes as “extended gaming sessions” away from a power socket.

Although, given the hardware being used here, I wouldn’t expect more than the time it takes to go from one socket to another before the battery starts giving warning signs.

Connectivity-wise there’s 1 x USB 3.0, HDMI, D-sub, RJ45, Mic-in, Earphone-out, SD Card Reader, and DC-in Jack.

The full HD display also benefits from an antiglare coating so you shouldn’t get light reflections when gaming outside. There’s also Dolby Digital Plus sound to add in to the mix.

All of this portable gaming prowess can be yours for the princely sum of £1149. If your savings won’t stretch to that then there’s the P55K which drops down to a GTX 965M GPU with 2GB of RAM but also will take the asking price to below a grand.