Original with its sober and elegant white design, the MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR is a notebook gamer creator nomad with 7 hours autonomy under Windows 11 powerful thanks to its processor Hexa Core i5 Intel Tiger Lake-H and its 16 GB of RAM which accelerate the treatments. It is also the case of the NVIDIA Ampere GeForce RTX 3050 ray tracing graphics card able to support many games. Equipped with a 15-inch Full HD IPS anti-glare whose 144Hz frequency reinforces the fluidity in games, this versatile laptop designed to play and create benefits from a responsiveness reinforced by its fast SSD storage of 512 GB, its backlit keyboard or its connectivity with Wi-Fi ax and USB-C.
Performance, autonomy of the MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR
The MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR is a versatile 15-inch laptop that performs well in multipurpose use, with a creative and gaming focus.
Nomads will appreciate the fact that it can last about 7 hours on battery in light use. Although its weight is under control, it is not as easily transportable as an Ultrabook.
To ensure such autonomy, this creative gamer laptop relies on NVIDIA Optimus technology.
It evaluates in real time the graphic needs and according to this, switches automatically and in real time between the Intel Iris Xe solution integrated in the processor and the GeForce RTX 3050 dedicated card.
Optimus favors the Intel Iris Xe as much as possible despite its modest performance in comparison, because it is energy efficient and favors autonomy compared to the more powerful GeForce RTX 3050.
Equipped with the NVIDIA Ampere architecture, the GeForce RTX 3050 ray tracing is capable of supporting many games as long as you are willing to make some concessions under the most graphics-intensive titles to get a good gameplay. Of course, whether it’s the Intel Iris Xe or the GeForce RTX 3050, you can watch photos and videos.
The GeForce RTX 3050 will therefore be of interest to many gamers, but also to designers. It accelerates the processing of software that uses GPU computing power, such as Sony Vegas or Adobe Photoshop/Premiere.
The Iris Xe is directly housed in the Intel Tiger Lake Hexa Core i5-11400H processor, coupled with 16 GB of RAM to deliver solid overall performance to satisfy a maximum number of users.
If this core supports the GeForce RTX 3050 well in games, it should be noted that currently the contribution of the Hexa Core is variable compared to a Quad Core.
In any case, this core will be of particular interest to creators because it ensures faster processing than a Quad Core processor and 8GB DDR4, the difference being particularly noticeable in areas that require a lot of CPU and RAM resources and that take advantage of multicore, such as photo editing, video editing or 3D rendering.
On the storage side, we find an SSD that rivals the standard hard drives in terms of capacity with its 512 GB while being silent, less energy consuming, more robust and much faster.
In concrete terms, an SSD guarantees a much better fluidity and reactivity in use than a simple hard disk.
Thanks to the SSD, start/stop, multimedia processing and software/game launches are much faster, and you can get to the online game maps faster.
Of course, if 512 GB is not enough, you can rely on an external storage device such as a USB 3.0/USB-C device to enjoy fast transfers.
As for heating and noise, expect them to be present when this creative gamer oriented laptop is heavily pushed (e.g. processing, games).
If necessary to limit the temperature, you can add a ventilated stand to this computer (remember to check the dimensions!).
Features of the MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035EN
| Screen(s) | 15.6” Full HD LED IPS 144Hz with thin edges 4.9mm (1920×1080, anti-glare/matte) |
| Processor | Intel Core i5-11400H Tiger Lake-H (2.7 GHz, 6 cores) |
| Installed RAM (max) | 16 GB (2 x 8 GB) DDR4 3200 MHz (64 GB), 2 slots (occupied) |
| Graphic card | NVIDIA Turing GeForce RTX 3050 Dedicated 4GB GDDR6 (1500MHz, Dynamic Boost 60W), Processor-integrated Intel Iris Xe and Optimus |
| Storage | 512GB M.2 SSD (NVMe PCIe 3.0 x4) |
| connectors | 2 USB 3.2 (Gen1) + 1 USB 2.0 + 1 USB 3.2 Type-C (Gen1), HDMI (4K@60Hz) |
| Network | Wi-Fi ax (2×2, Intel Wi-Fi 6 AX201), Bluetooth 5.2 + Gigabit Ethernet (Realtek RTL8111HS-CG) |
| Backlit Keyboard | Yes (blue, 1.7mm stroke) |
| Numeric keypad | Yes |
| Windows Hello | – |
| Audio system | 2 speakers (2 x 2W) Nahimic 3 Audio Boost |
| Operating system | Windows 10 64 bit |
| Announced autonomy / Battery | 7 hours / Li-Ion 3 cells 53.5Whr |
| Weight / Dimensions (mm) | 2.25 Kg / 359 x 259 x 24.9 |
The MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR versus the competition
The MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR is currently on special offer at Amazon and is positioned as one of the only cheapest in its category to offer such a high amount of RAM with such a powerful processor and graphics card, all supplied with Windows in a chassis with such an original color.
If this MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR doesn’t meet all your criteria, you’ll find other configurations to play with on a similar budget in our gamer laptop guide. With the same budget, choose the model with the most powerful graphics card, as it will have the most impact on performance.
MSI Sword 15 A11UC-1035FR chassis, connectors, screen
Cooled by Cooler Boost 5 technology with 2 fans, 6 heatpipes and air outlets, it has an original design with its white angular lines typical of gamer models.
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This designer gamer laptop has good connectivity including 1 USB-C, wireless Wi-Fi ax (more recent and efficient than Wi-Fi ac) and Bluetooth 5. 2 for remote connections and communications, an HDMI video output (positioned at the back) practical to easily connect it to a TV or monitor for example, Ethernet and audio ports as well as 3 USB all compatible with both USB 2.0 and USB 3.0, USB 3.0 guaranteeing transfers up to 10 times faster than USB 2.0 if you connect USB 3.0 peripherals.
Of course, the keys of the chiclet keyboard can be backlit, which is useful for better distinguishing the keys in low ambient light.
Gamers will appreciate that the screen has a refresh rate of 144Hz because it improves the fluidity in games compared to the standard 60Hz. As it is anti-reflective, the screen is also more readable than a glossy panel in bright environments (eg: outdoor). In any case, the screen lends itself very well to the display of videos and more generally of High Definition contents thanks to its 16/9 format and its precise Full HD definition. In addition, thanks to its IPS technology, the screen has large viewing angles, both horizontal and vertical.