Razer announced the refresh of two Razer Blade series gaming laptops, the Razer Blade 16 and 18, which will be unveiled in full during CES 2024.
According to Razer, the Razer Blade 16 is the first 16-inch OLED display with a 240Hz refresh rate and 0.2ms response time. It is also supposed to be the world’s first VESA-certified ClearMR 11000 laptop which, combined with its 1M:1 contrast ratio and QHD+ (2560×1600) resolution, improves image clarity and sharpness.
There’s also the Razer Blade 18, which Razer claims is the world’s first 18-inch 4K 165Hz display, a pretty impressive feat considering the much higher resolution that display outputs. It also features a 3ms response time and Nvidia G-Sync support, as well as a 100% DCI-P3 color gamut. The display offers a smooth gaming experience and also works as a solid display for creatives, thanks to its high color accuracy.
At this time, Razer has not released any pricing, release date, or availability as it will likely be revealed during CES 2024 itself. We can expect the MSRP to be quite expensive, especially since these are the desktop replacement models that will likely feature with the highest possible specifications.
Razer is putting the screen first
Considering we still don’t know what Nvidia will offer in terms of graphics cards, aside from the rumored RTX Super upgrades, the focus for the new Razer Blade laptops this time is on display improvements, rather than the more obvious upgrades with raising the bar in specifications and performance.
And if that turns out to be the case, we don’t know how much more performance can be extracted from the Super versions of the RTX 4070, 4070 Ti, and 4080, or any other factors that could interfere with Razer Blade production (if integration with the Super series might have delayed the update of Blade 16 and 18, etc.). Therefore, focusing on upgrading displays to better handle more advanced GPUs is a solid way forward.
It’s also more likely to fit with upcoming Intel Ultra Core CPUs, which would benefit from the increased display. But the manufacturer hasn’t mentioned it either, which is also interesting considering that Intel announced them in December 2023.
It will be interesting to see the other Razer Blade laptops like the Razor blade 14 and 15 once they are revealed later in 2024. Also, if the 16 and 18 aren’t equipped with the Super series GPUs or Ultra Core CPUs now, will other models be released in 2024 that feature those specs?
