MSI Prestige 14: Workhorse power in a thin-and-light shell

All laptops are a compromise in design and MSI’s Prestige 14 is no different. Even so, there’s a lot to love about what is likely the most powerful laptop in its class.

We’re not exaggerating. The Prestige 14 packs a 6-core Comet Lake Core i7-10710U along with a GeForce GTX 1650 Max-Q discrete GPU, all while weighing 2.8 pounds That’s basically the same weight as a Dell XPS 13 7390 or HP Spectre x360 13, which don’t have discrete GPUs.

MSI does all this while also including a 4K screen and a reasonably sized 52-watt-hour battery.

THE COMPROMISE

But as we said, there is compromise to all laptops, and in with Prestige 14, it’s the cooling. While competitors might use two fans or beefier heat pipes to keep all of that hardware cool, MSI tasks a single fan and a single heat pipe. That results in loud fan noise when pushed and yes, performance throttling at times.

For many people, the performance and weight of the Prestige 14 will be a godsend. For others, the compromise may be too much. Keep reading to learn more about the pros and cons of the Prestige 14.

SPECS

It’s truly impressive that MSI was able to fit so many high-end parts into such a small and slender chassis. Here are the main features:

CPU: Our review model came with a Comet Lake U 6-core Core i7-10710U. Budget-minded folks can opt for the quad-core Core i5-10210U.

RAM: 16GB LPDDR3

Storage: Our unit had the 1TB NVMe SSD, and a 512GB SD is available in the lower-cost model.

14-inch 4K UHD (3840x2160) “IPS-level” LCD with 100-percent Adobe RGB