A behemoth of the portable device market, we take a quick look at what the MSI Titan 18 HX A14 has to offer. A powerful gaming laptop with a lot of top-end components inside along with the size to match and fit it all in. Sporting a top Intel CPU and the current lead in Nvidia graphics cards, it’s the best combination you can get.
With that, the Windows laptop comes as a possible replacement for your gaming PC and you get a lot for it. As an 18-inch laptop, there’s plenty of screen space and a great display and refresh rate alongside it. Along with memory and storage inside, there’s not much more you can even cram into it. So here’s what comes in on the grand and expensive device.
- CPU: Intel Core i9-14900HX
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop
- RAM: 128GB DDR5 (4x 32)
- Storage: (Up to) 3x 2TB NVMe SSD
- Max Refresh Rate: 120Hz
- Resolution: 3840×2400
- Screen Size: 18″
- Panel Type: MiniLED
Overall, there’s not much to complain about in the use of this laptop. The MSI Titan 18 HX A14 is a beast of a machine, with such a high spec, there’s not really anything that can challenge it. With gaming and productivity options for the machine, it also has the cooling capacity and design to control them. Especially with the MSI center control of discrete or hybrid graphics, and then with the cooling modes from performance to silent. That gives you a lot of freedom between noise and stealth.
With the sheer size of it along with the great display, it does become a bit cumbersome but there is a lot to pack into it. It also provides a great quality build and selection of hardware such as the Cherry keyboard embedded in it. Although there are some drawbacks as well. The price being one as it becomes out of reach for a lot of people, the touchpad is flashy but annoying to use, at least for a veteran mouse user.
- Top build quality and easy access to the underside for repairs/upgrades
- Great display with 4K and 120Hz Mini-LED
- Mechanical cherry keyboard with great typing experience
- Strong gaming performance with lots of control over it
- Lots of storage and memory alongside top-choice components
- Big and cumbersome make it an unwieldy portable computer
- Touchpad can be frustrating to use
- Incredibly expensive
Pricing
Now this laptop being at the top of the leaderboards, it comes with a more astronomical price tag for the pleasure, as the RTX 4090 gaming laptop has quite the equipment inside of it. You can find the MSI Titan 18 HX on Amazon or Newegg for $5,399. That comes even higher than other laptops with the same GPU and similar CPUs, but they might not quite reach the same level of features. It depends on if you need all the extra on top that’s already there including plenty of memory, storage, and display so if you see the worth in all that as an alternative it might be a consideration.
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 is a beast of a machine, with such a high spec, there’s not really anything that can challenge it
Design and experience
The MSI Titan 18 is exactly what it says in the name, a gigantic combination of hardware. The amalgamation of pieces resulted in quite a feat of engineering inside. Just taking off the base shows us a good insight into what it takes to run and cool the 4K laptop. You can see a quick look in the gallery below but it is rather quick and easy to get access with 12 screws holding it down and plenty of tabs to undo around the edge. But that gives you good access to the NVMe SSDs, battery, and fans for upgrades or cleaning.
That gives you access to the incredible three slots for storage, which ours are full of for a full 6TB of fast NVMe SSDs, although models do vary you certainly can’t run out of space, along with a 99.9 Whr battery for max capacity and travel allowance. We also see the impressive cooling solution for the hardware with most of it blocked off with heatsinks and pipes leading to the two fans and many exhausts.
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 inside, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX touchpad, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX touchpad and keyboard, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX spec stickers, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX right ports, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX open profile, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX open back, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX mouse, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX left ports, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX keyboard, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX front off, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX box contents, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX bottom, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX back top down, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX back ports, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX gaming CS2, Image by PCGuide
On the outside, there is quite a good amount of SteelSeries RGB on it, straying from the more incognito Stealth 17 we also took a look at. But it still keeps it to the logo and keyboard mostly and that itself is quite strong itself. The keyboard is in fact made with Cherry and so gives you a mechanical low-profile option that makes it pleasant and satisfying to use. But in that same line, the touchpad is quite divisive.
The embedded touchpad is smooth and all but without markings and a haptic design I didn’t enjoy using it at all. Initially, when I got to it, the LED only lit up on boot, and in Windows 11 Pro, it turned off so just trying to get around to fixing that and using it without was extremely difficult. Even then it resulted in many accidental clicks and all as the whole thing can be used for actions, which leaves me unsurprised the laptop comes with a gaming mouse anyway so you can lock it and ignore the touchpad.
Design overall on the outside is sleek, and gets rather bulky on the back with all the heating. MSI does a nice trick of breaking up the vents with the blue rubber inserts that give it a more unique and interesting look. Whilst the connectors available are also rather plentiful. with a selection of 2x Type C (one with PD3.1), 3x Type A USB 3.2Gen 2, SD card reader, HDMI 2.1, 3.5mm combo, and 1x RJ45 giving you a lot to work with.
There is a lot of included software with the laptop that can get a bit frustrating. Of course, the likes of MSI panel is expected for good control of performance and features, MSI color is there as well for changing the color of the fantastic MiniLED 4K display with 120Hz. But then there is also SteelSeries for the RGB, Nahimic for sound control, and the frustrating Norton antivirus. Some people might appreciate but it can get in the way like the alert for high CPU usage when using Furmark it can always be uninstalled to be fair but there is a bit of bloat in there.
Performance
Looking at how it does, well there’s nothing really holding it back. We didn’t put it through a whole suite of games and tasks but a good selection of them. With a top choice as a gaming laptop for Cyberpunk 2077, as well as checking its score in 3DMark, Cinebench 24, and speed in Blender. Whilst also investigating the thermal performance and power via Furmark 2 and HWInfo to check temps.
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 thermal and power stress performance, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 3DMark performance, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 Cinebench 24 performance, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 Cyberpunk 2077 performance, Image by PCGuide
MSI Titan 18 HX A14 Blender 4.1 performance, Image by PCGuide
Overall, this laptop is the best-expected performance for mobile components. Squeezing in the heft CPU and GPU does limit the capabilities, as we see they peak at 180 and 181W of power respectively. Although the processor side might be rather close, the graphics of a stand RTX 4090 are much closer to 450W, so it’s a lot less. Plus we see over time the CPU throttles down to around 80W instead as the heat builds up, but to be fair this is using Furmark stress on both at the same time, an unlikely scenario in normal use as it teeters around 95°C but the GPU manages to stay around a cooler 81°C and stays on power.
It also handles Cyberpunk with not too many issues as long as you utilize some upscaling, and being 40 series, DLSS 3 is available with frame generation for an even greater experience, and that boosts the performance quite well. Along with crushing scores and tasks put into it whilst in performance mode. Putting it into silent does keep the noise down but looking at Cinebench there is a hit to performance significantly as the CPU and GPU throttles down. So you can keep noise down but at a cost.
very compelling laptop and a replacement for your stationary desktop
Conclusion
Overall, the MSI Titan 18 HX A14 is in fact a titan in size and performance. That makes it a very compelling laptop and a replacement for your stationary desktop. But the 3.6kg weight and 18-inch size do make it a lot less portable than many other laptops. Along with the price, it puts it in a weird category sitting out of reach for many and above many gaming PCs that could be used as well.
But for those who have a need for it and require it, it certainly is a powerful machine. bringing the latest features and hardware does make it a good contender for many years to come with a lot of power behind it. Even though so things don’t make it a perfect machine it still has no competition at its level.
- CPU: Intel Core i9-14900HX
- GPU: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 Laptop
- RAM: 128GB DDR5 (4x 32)
- Storage: (Up to) 3x 2TB NVMe SSD
- Max Refresh Rate: 120Hz
- Resolution: 3840×2400
- Screen Size: 18″
- Panel Type: MiniLED
