Gigabyte P55K V4 review

A gaming laptop with plenty of grunt

Gigabyte P55K V4
Gigabyte P55K V4

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Measuring up at 380 x 269 x 34mm (W x D x H) – that's 14.96 x 10.59 x 1.34-inches – actually makes the P55K V4 one of the narrower 15-inch laptops available, but the aforementioned large bezels around the screen make it deeper than most.

The overall footprint comes in slightly smaller and lighter than the all-conquering Origin EON15-X and compares favourably to the similarly priced Digital Storm Triton, which weighs an identical 2.5kg.

Gigabyte P55K V4 ports

There's plenty in the way of connectivity here

Spec sheet

There are slight variations of the P55K V4 on offer, but here are the specifications of the unit made available to TechRadar:

  • Processor: Intel Core i7-5700HQ (quad-core, 2.7GHZ, 3.5GHz with Turbo Boost)
  • GPU: Nvidia Geforce GTX 965M (2GB GDDR5); Intel HD Graphics 5600
  • RAM: 8GB DDR3L
  • Screen: 15.6-inch full HD 1,920 x 1,080 LCD
  • Storage: 128GB SSD, 1TB HDD (7,200 rpm)
  • Optical drive: Super Multi DVD-RW
  • Ports: 4 x USB 3.0, HDMI, VGA, RJ45, microphone-in, analogue/optical headphone-out, SD card reader
  • Connectivity: 802.11ac Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 4.0
  • Camera: HD webcam
  • Audio: 2 x 2 watt speakers, microphone, Dolby Digital Plus Home Theatre certified
  • Battery: Li-ion 6-cell 5400mAh (63Wh)
  • Weight: 2.5kg (5.51 pounds)

The specs you see above can be had for £1,049 (around $1,650, or AU$ 2,230) but there are other variations of the P55K available with a minimum of 4GB of RAM, hard drives ranging from 500GB to 2TB, and as we already mentioned, a Blu-ray Rewritable Drive on offer instead of the standard Super Multi DVD-RW drive. The rest of the specification including the CPU and GPU options are a standard affair that can't be tweaked.

Gigabyte P55K V4 angle

An Intel Core i7 processor is running the show

For the same price as the new 12-inch Apple MacBook you're getting a super-speedy Intel Core i7 processor with clock speeds of up to 3.6GHz, and one of the latest (if not the absolute fastest) mobile GPUs from Nvidia, which is perfectly capable of full HD gaming.

The SSD and HDD combo, plus 8GB of RAM, are enough to fly through any application and can easily cope with any of the current crop of top-end games. The 128GB solid state drive could be a little roomier, but it's enough for Windows and your most-played games, with the 1TB hard drive on hand for everything else.