MSI Thin 15.6" A15 Black

The MSI Thin A15 gets you an RTX 4050 and a 1TB SSD for around $840, which is solid for 1080p gaming. The 144Hz display is smooth, but colors are washed out and battery life is short. Buy it if you mostly game plugged in and don't mind a mediocre screen, skip it if you need a portable all-rounder.

The RTX 4050 is the star here, landing in the 79th percentile for its class. It'll handle most esports titles at high frame rates and can even manage AAA games at medium settings thanks to DLSS. The Core i5-13420H is a middle-of-the-pack performer, fine for gaming but nothing special for heavy multitasking or CPU-intensive work. The 1TB SSD is a nice surprise, sitting well above average in storage speed and capacity. But the 16GB of DDR4 RAM is a letdown, falling behind most competitors that have moved to DDR5, and the 52Wh battery paired with that 45% NTSC screen means you're not getting great color accuracy or long unplugged sessions.

Stacked against the Lenovo Legion 5i, the MSI falls behind in build quality and overall polish, though it often undercuts it on price. The ASUS ROG Flow Z13 is a completely different beast with its detachable design and better screen, but it costs way more. The HP OMEN Transcend 14 offers a superior OLED panel and sleeker design if you can stretch your budget. And compared to the Apple MacBook Pro M4 Pro, well, that's not even a fair fight, the MacBook destroys it in battery, screen, and CPU performance but costs double. The Thin A15 carves out a niche as the budget option that still gets you an RTX 4050.

At $840, the Thin A15 is a mixed bag. The RTX 4050 and 1TB SSD are genuinely good for this price point, and you'd be hard-pressed to find a new laptop with those specs for much less. But you're trading off display quality, RAM speed, and battery life to get there. If you mostly game plugged in and use an external monitor, the value proposition gets a lot stronger. If you need a laptop that can double as a work machine on the go, the weak screen and short battery life might make you regret saving the cash.

The MSI Thin A15 is a budget gaming laptop that tries to pack modern specs into a portable chassis without breaking the bank. You get an RTX 4050, a 144Hz display, and a 1TB SSD, which on paper looks like a solid deal for around $840. It's clearly aimed at gamers who want decent 1080p performance and don't mind a few compromises to keep the price down.

Skip this if you need a color-accurate display for photo or video work, the 45% NTSC panel just won't cut it. Also look elsewhere if you need all-day battery life for classes or travel, this thing will be hunting for an outlet by lunch. And if you want a laptop that feels premium and runs quiet, the plastic build and audible fans under load might drive you nuts.

The MSI Thin A15 is a budget gaming laptop that makes smart sacrifices in some areas to keep the GPU and storage competitive. It's best for someone who wants a dedicated gaming machine for their desk, often plugged in and maybe hooked up to a better external monitor. If you're a student who needs all-day battery and a vibrant screen for media, this isn't it. But for pure frames-per-dollar at 1080p, it's a reasonable pick.