MSI Katana GF76 12UE-026 Gaming Laptop

This laptop is a beast. She does run hot on the keyboard right above the gpu but it is expected. Highly recommend getting a fan lapboard if playing high intensity games. Love this machine!

I am not an avid gamer (I will play games at times) but I purchased this laptop for performance of the chipset, the machine specs & the price point. With the upgrades of more ram & an extra ssd from Xotic, the laptop has been running great. I have been able to multitask flawlessly, while on my old ASUS laptop the performance was less than ideal. Overall, I don't have many complaints with the MSI Katana. I suppose that it would be nice to have a higher resolution webcam built in & also not putting the bumper right above the camera because it makes it difficult to place a webcam cover over the lens. One other issue I had was that the webcam deactivated itself automatically somehow. I was able to get it turned back on in the MSI center but it took awhile to figure out how to do this because it was not showing up in my computer's hardware. One last thing that I should have upgraded, was the hard drive that came with the laptop. It fills up fast. Although Windows 11 has taken a little bit of time to get used to, I haven't had any compatibility issues with software I used on Windows 10. I also like the new feature of focus sessions in Win 11. Some things that I love about the Katana: the keyboard/keys feel really nice when typing; the red backlit keys are not harsh on the eyes in a low light environment; great screen resolution; and large size. Overall, I am pretty happy with the purchase and so glad the I got it through Xotic! They have been absolutely fantastic!

The process for ordering and customizing the laptop was a breeze. This laptop was a Christmas gift to my bride (of 48+ years) to replace a 6-year-old MSI laptop that has seen better days. The key considerations when selecting this laptop were (a) the display (which is excellent) and (b) the keyboard. The keyboard is far superior to 99.99% (perhaps more) of the laptops on the market. True that it comes with Windows 11, which presented some initial challenges coming from Windows 10, but that was expected, and we got past the challenges presented by Microsoft's inane changes. XOTICPC's sales team were easy to work with when I needed to verify the display quality and the upgrade options. We upgraded from 512GB SSD to a 1TB SSD and to 32GB RAM as I wanted to future proof the laptop in the hope that it will last at least 5+ years as a fully usable laptop and not need to be upgraded/replaced as newer software is released. If this laptop proves as good as the prior laptop we purchased from XOTICPC then this will have been a great investment.

I recently purchased one of these from XoticPC and I have to say I wasn't disappointed. The laptop itself, and the hardware it's running, are fantastic and great upgrades for me from what I had been using. It's nice being able to see all of my games in full high res glory. The missing star, though, comes from a few things. I had one issue with XoticPC in the form of how long it took to get (5 weeks from click to box in hand). I had 2 issues with the machine itself, though. One of them I knew going into it, and that that 10 key pad was going to irritate me to no end. I usually use the 10 key extensively while gaming, and the one on this laptop is borderline useful at best. The other issue, which surprised me, is that I ended up with Windows 11 on my laptop. When I ordered the laptop, I specifically didn't request the upgrade to 11 because I knew nothing about it and didn't want to learn the hard way. Unfortunately, I ended up with 11, and thanks to a nifty new "feature" from Microsoft ended up needing to reinstall Windows the day I got the machine. FYI to anyone else who gets 11: DO NOT, UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, make a user profile that is attached to a Microsoft account that doesn't have a "Hello PIN" enabled. You'll be doing the nuke a pave too if you do. You have to first create one, then find the 15 steps to remove the thing after. Or live with it.