Maingear Ultima 18 assessment: Over-the-top energy, old-school design

Greatest Costs In the present day: Maingear Ultima 18

Fifteen years in the past, I had a gaming laptop computer that was a giant heavy brick. I beloved it! That’s what gaming laptops have been again then. The 18-inch Maingear Ultima 18 seems like a contemporary religious successor to big-and-heavy gaming laptops. That’s superior, nevertheless it additionally reveals the place these designs stumble.

To create the Ultima 18, Maingear packed a giant Clevo laptop computer chassis stuffed with high-end parts. It goes overboard in some attention-grabbing methods with hard-to-find specs. However for $3,599, it’s competing with fashionable high-end gaming laptops that ship a extra polished expertise. These polished machines — with their software program tweaks and cutting-edge cooling techniques — usually edge out the Ultima 18 on efficiency, they usually’re obtainable at an identical value.

It’s a very good machine. I’m simply undecided whether or not it’s your best choice round this value level, except you’re passionate about the distinctive options it provides. And also you is perhaps!

Maingear Ultima 18: Specs

The Maingear Ultima 18 combines a blazing-fast 24-core Intel Core Extremely 9 275HX processor with different high-end parts. Our assessment mannequin had an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 processor, however you can too get this with a top-of-the-line RTX 5090 GPU.

Whereas our $3,599 assessment unit had 32 GB of DDR5 RAM and a 2 TB SSD, you may get this machine with as much as 192 GB of RAM. This machine has two 2.5 Gbps Ethernet ports for wired networking — I haven’t seen a twin Ethernet setup like that on one other fashionable gaming laptop computer. Plus, there’s room inside this monster of a laptop computer for 4 M.2 SSDs. And the Ultima 18 has an 18-inch 4K show, too — with a quick 200Hz refresh price. Maingear isn’t enjoying round.

Options like the 2 Ethernet ports and 4 M.2 drive bays are approach above and past. Some individuals will certainly search out this particular laptop computer only for these options.

• Mannequin quantity: Maingear Ultima 18 RTX 5080
• CPU: Intel Core Extremely 9 275HX
• Reminiscence: 32 GB DDR5 RAM
• Graphics/GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080
• NPU: Intel AI Increase (13 TOPS)
• Show: 18-inch 3840×2400 IPS show with 200Hz refresh price
• Storage: 2 TB PCIe Gen4 SSD
• Webcam: 1080p webcam
• Connectivity: 2x Thunderbolt 5 (USB Kind-C), 2x USB Kind-A, 2x 2.5Gb Ethernet, 1x combo audio jack, 1x HDMI 2.1 out, 1x microSD reader, 1x Kensington lock slot, 1x DC energy in
• Networking: Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 5.4, Ethernet
• Biometrics: IR digicam for facial recognition
• Battery capability: 98 Watt-hours
• Dimensions: 16.14 x 12.56 x 1.42 inches
• Weight: 8.8 kilos
• MSRP: $3,599 as examined

Maingear Ultima 18: Design and construct high quality

IDG / Chris Hoffman

The Maingear Ultima 18 takes me again. This 18-inch laptop computer weighs 8.8 kilos and is 1.42 inches thick at its thickest level — it’s a brick. It’s based mostly on a Clevo chassis. (Clevo produces laptop computer designs that system builders like Maingear use to create and launch their very own laptops.)

In the event you’re searching for a brick of a gaming laptop computer, nevertheless, it’s designed nicely. With a metallic lid and palm relaxation, it doesn’t really feel plasticky. However it additionally doesn’t really feel like a single piece of metallic, like another high-end gaming laptops. The hinge is straightforward to open with one hand. It feels strong for an 8.8 pound 18-inch gaming laptop computer, however that is the form of machine you’ll have to be cautious with — I wouldn’t decide it up from the nook with one hand.

The design options quite a lot of black, damaged up by the “Maingear” title under the show and the emblem on the lid. With animated RGB lightbars on the rear of the machine and RGB lighting on the keyboard, that’s the place the “gamer” aesthetic comes from — however, in fact, it’s customizable.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

Considerably unusually for a contemporary gaming laptop computer, this laptop computer has small LEDs on the entrance edge, to the suitable of the touchpad. In regular use, the left one shall be lit when your laptop computer is on, the center one shall be lit when your laptop computer is plugged in, and the suitable one will blink as your laptop computer makes use of its storage. These was once rather more frequent, however they’re the form of factor most producers omit lately.

The design is conventional in one other approach: The laptop computer blows sizzling air out of each side of the laptop computer in addition to the again. I favor fashionable designs that don’t blow sizzling air towards my mouse hand. Nevertheless, a lot of the sizzling air does come out the again, so it’s not too unhealthy. The cooling additionally retains the WASD space of the keyboard pretty cool. The followers get loud beneath load, although — that is nearer to the standard “jet engine” fan profile on a brick laptop computer, whereas many fashionable laptops have discovered methods to make them quieter.

Maingear proudly proclaims that this can be a “zero-bloatware Home windows 11 set up,” and that’s glorious to see. You get a couple of utilities to your {hardware} — from Maingear, Nvidia, and Inventive — and that’s about it. There aren’t any nags to pay for antivirus software program right here. Our assessment mannequin additionally got here with Home windows 11 Professional, which is sweet.

Maingear Ultima 18: Keyboard and trackpad

IDG / Chris Hoffman

The Maingear Ultima 18 has a full-size chiclet membrane keyboard full with a quantity pad. It has per-key RGB backlighting for max customization.

With 1.5mm of key journey, the keyboard feels good to sport on. It doesn’t fairly really feel as premium as the remainder of the machine, although: It’s no mechanical keyboard, such as you’ll discover on some variations of the Alienware 16 Space-51, and it doesn’t have the stronger actuation pressure you’ll discover on machines just like the Razer Blade. I favor a clickier expertise.

The trackpad is giant and makes good use of the obtainable palm-rest area. It’s good and easy — Maingear says it has a “low friction end.” Whereas it’s not fairly as easy because the swankiest glass touchpads I’ve used, it will get a lot of the approach there. The clicking-down motion feels crisp.

Maingear Ultima 18: Show and audio system

IDG / Chris Hoffman

The Maingear Ultima 18 has an 18-inch 4K IPS show (3840×2400 decision). That’s spectacular when different laptops on this class usually ship WXGA (2560×1600) shows as a substitute. The show has a 200Hz refresh price and help for Nvidia G-Sync, too. Brightness may very well be higher: 400 nits is okay, however many laptop computer shows go brighter. At that brightness, you not getting HDR.

The show is strictly what it feels like on paper — a giant 18-inch 4K show with a excessive refresh price. It’s good. However decision isn’t all the pieces, and gaming laptops with lower-resolution shows usually ship extra brightness and extra-vivid colours with bonus options like HDR in video games — particularly if they’ve OLED shows. (And, as you may anticipate, this isn’t a contact display screen.)

This machine features a subwoofer in addition to two important audio system and two tweeters. It’s additionally powered by Sound Blaster Studio Professional 2. The bass is fairly good for a laptop computer, which isn’t any shock — most laptops don’t have subwoofers!

I check each laptop computer I assessment with Steely Dan’s Aja and Daft Punk’s Get Fortunate. There’s greater than sufficient quantity right here, and there’s sufficient bass to make the sound really feel “full” in songs like Get Fortunate. You aren’t getting audiophile-grade element right here, although — the instrument separation in Aja isn’t as crisp as it might be on a high-end pair of audio system, with the sounds blurring collectively a bit as a substitute of separating.

The audio system offered good sound in Doom: The Darkish Ages — with a chunky sound to the shotgun blast, for instance. However the lack of unpolluted separation of sounds on the high-end — plus these loud followers — would push me to make use of a very good pair of headphones. (That’s regular for any laptop computer, although.)

Maingear Ultima 18: Webcam, microphone, biometrics

The Maingear Ultima 18’s 1080p webcam appears to be like first rate. It’s a tad grainy, and I’ve seen enterprise laptops with higher-end webcams. For a gaming laptop computer, that is good — however not mind-blowing. It additionally has a bodily privateness cowl, which is all the time nice to see.

This 18-inch laptop computer has a microphone that works and positively picks up sufficient quantity. It is a fairly customary gaming laptop computer mic, however the noise cancellation wasn’t nice — it picked up the whirring of followers within the background. The microphone isn’t as much as the audio high quality I see on many enterprise laptops, that are optimized for on-line conferences — you’ll need an exterior microphone to speak whereas gaming.

This machine has presence-sensing {hardware}, too. If you’d like, you may have Home windows mechanically wake your PC once you sit down in entrance of it or put it to sleep once you step away.

The Maingear Ultima 18 has an IR digicam for Home windows Whats up sign-in help. You’ll be able to log into your PC along with your face, and it really works nicely. This machine doesn’t have a fingerprint reader.

Maingear Ultima 18: Connectivity

IDG / Chris Hoffman

The Maingear Ultima 18 provides quite a lot of connectivity choices. On the left aspect, this machine has a combo audio jack and two USB Kind-A ports — each are 10Gbps, and one has Energy Supply.

On the suitable aspect, you’ll discover two Thunderbolt 5 (USB Kind-C) ports in addition to a microSD card slot. This being a high-end gaming laptop computer, it’s nice to see future-proof Thunderbolt 5 — regardless that few peripherals are benefiting from it but.

On the again, you’ll discover the ability adapter connection, a Kensington lock slot, HDMI 2.1 out, and two Ethernet jacks (each 2.5Gbps.) That two Ethernet jack setup is totally excessive — most individuals shopping for this laptop computer received’t make the most of it — nevertheless it’s spectacular and strange.

This machine has Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 5.4 help, too, so it helps the most recent requirements. I had no issues with the Wi-Fi.

Maingear Ultima 18: Efficiency

The Maingear Ultima 18 delivered strong gaming efficiency — as soon as I configured it. Out of the field, benchmark outcomes have been on the sluggish aspect in comparison with different comparable laptops. As soon as I went into the Maingear Management Middle and set it to “Efficiency” mode — after which went into Home windows 11’s Settings and set it to Greatest Efficiency whereas plugged in — the efficiency ended up the place I anticipated to see it. The benchmarks under have been carried out with these settings modified.

On many gaming laptops, that is now automated: The manufacturer-provided software program mechanically switches your gaming laptop computer into higher-performance modes once you launch video games. On this machine, you’ll be doing it your self.

Nevertheless, that is robust {hardware}, and it carried out nicely in real-world gaming. The outcomes have been impacted by a couple of issues, although. In Metro: Exodus, for instance, I solely noticed aggressive efficiency as soon as I disabled the built-in GPU within the Maingear management heart.  And I do really feel like machines just like the Alienware 16 Space-51 have a extra environment friendly cooling setup that appears to result in greater top-end efficiency.

As all the time, although we ran the Maingear Ultima 18 by way of our customary benchmarks to see the way it performs.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

First, we run PCMark 10 to get an concept of general system efficiency. It’s designed to be a holistic benchmark, however the CPU is a significant factor on this check. With an general PCMark 10 rating of 8,700, this machine delivered spectacular efficiency on par with different Intel Core Extremely 9 275HX-powered machines just like the Alienware 16 Space-51.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

Subsequent, we run Cinebench R20. It is a closely multithreaded benchmark that focuses on general CPU efficiency. It’s a fast benchmark, so cooling beneath prolonged workloads isn’t an element. However, because it’s closely multithreaded, CPUs with extra cores have an enormous benefit.

The Maingear Ultima 18 produced a multi-threaded Cinebench R20 rating of 14,502, proper according to different laptops with the identical CPU.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

We additionally run an encode with Handbrake. That is one other closely multithreaded benchmark, nevertheless it runs over an prolonged time period. This calls for the laptop computer’s cooling kick in, and lots of laptops will throttle and decelerate beneath load.

The Ultima 18 accomplished the encode course of in a median of 458 seconds, which is simply over seven and a half minutes. That’s about what we’d anticipate to see with this CPU, though it lags a little bit behind laptops just like the Alienware 16 Space-51 and HP Omen Max 16, which suggests these machines could have higher cooling setups to keep away from throttling attributable to warmth.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

Subsequent, we run a graphical benchmark. First, we run 3Dmark Time Spy, a graphical benchmark that focuses on GPU efficiency. With a 3Dmark Time Spy rating of 19,168, this machine is available in about 10 p.c behind different comparable laptops on graphics efficiency.

(Efficiency on this specific benchmark went up by 5 p.c after disabling the built-in GPU within the Maingear management heart. With a rating of about 19,902, it was extra according to comparable laptops.)

IDG / Chris Hoffman

Then, we benchmark some video games. We begin with Shadow of the Tomb Raider, an older sport — however an effective way to check efficiency throughout {hardware}. With a median FPS of 190 in our customary benchmark right here, this machine is according to different comparable laptops with RTX 5080 and even RTX 5090 GPUs.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

Lastly, we benchmark a demanding sport. We run the Excessive benchmark in Metro Exodus. For this benchmark, the laptop computer was persistently coming in far behind with a median of 73 FPS. After I went into the Maingear management panel and disabled the built-in Intel GPU — setting it to the discrete Nvidia GPU solely — and rebooted, efficiency went up. After that change was made, the Maingear Ultima 18 delivered a aggressive 87 frames per second on this benchmark.

Whereas that’s aggressive, it nonetheless is available in a couple of frames behind laptops just like the Alienware 16 Space-51, probably because of their higher cooling designs. And people machines didn’t want any further tweaking.

General, the efficiency is aggressive, nevertheless it wants tweaking — and the cooling setup simply isn’t as spectacular as it’s on many different gaming laptops. That results in a discount in efficiency.

Maingear Ultima 18: Battery life

The Maingear Ultima 18 has an enormous 98 Watt-hour battery. That’s as huge because it will get — any bigger and the U.S. Transportation Safety Administration wouldn’t permit it on an airplane! An 18-inch brick of a gaming laptop computer like this one isn’t designed for lengthy battery life, nevertheless.

IDG / Chris Hoffman

To benchmark the battery life, we play a 4K copy of Tears of Metal on repeat on Home windows 11 with airplane mode enabled till the laptop computer suspends itself. We set the display screen to 250 nits of brightness for our battery benchmarks. It is a best-case state of affairs for any laptop computer since native video playback is so environment friendly, and actual battery life in day-to-day use is all the time going to be lower than this.

The Maingear Ultima 18 lasted a median of 288 minutes throughout our benchmark — that’s slightly below 5 hours. You’ll be capable to get a couple of hours of labor out of it, if it is advisable to, however you’ll must plug in for max gaming efficiency, anyway.

Maingear Ultima 18: Conclusion

The Maingear Ultima 18 impressed me once I unboxed it. The design is someplace between an old-school gaming laptop computer brick and a contemporary gaming laptop computer, and options like 4 drive bays, two Ethernet jacks, two Thunderbolt 5 ports, and a 4K 200Hz show really feel properly excessive. Whereas it feels huge and heavy, the {hardware} justifies it.

However the spectacular specs turn out to be a bit lower than the sum of their elements. In comparison with this machine, many fashionable gaming laptops are lighter, have a extra spectacular metallic design, a extra superior cooling system, don’t want this a lot tweaking to carry out nicely, and produce other high-end touches like a mechanical keyboard and extra rigorously tuned speaker setup.

Don’t get me mistaken — this can be a good laptop computer! I’d be comfortable to make use of it. However it’s additionally $3,599. And it has quite a lot of competitors at that value vary.

Nonetheless, the {hardware} alone shines. The Alienware 18 Space-51 gaming laptop computer has comparable {hardware}, however taking it to an RTX 5080 will carry you to a $3,800 retail value — and also you’re not getting a 4K show. The Razer Blade 18 with an RTX 5080 and a higher-resolution show will price you $4,100 at retail value. (It’s value noting that each the Alienware and Razer laptops are on sale on their respective on-line shops for lower than their retail costs on the time I wrapped up this assessment, however these are marked as limited-time reductions.)

The specs listed below are good. For the value, although, I simply want it got here collectively higher. Different high-end gaming laptops could price a little bit bit further, however the software program integration, lighter weight, and higher-end metallic designs shine.