The MSI Pulse GL66 is an oddity. It has the traditional gaming notebook style of plastic and a sturdy exterior, but it is also equipped with the latest technology. However, the specifications of this model are a bit different. It is powered by a powerful 11th generation Core i7, paired with the lowest model of Nvidia's Ampere architecture. It emphasizes quietness over performance, but may seem a bit lackluster and unfocused.

I consider this a budget laptop, given its relatively low Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti. Nevertheless, the price of $1,099 (£1,099) is really at the top end of what constitutes a budget. At this price point, you're in the realm of more powerful mid-range laptops with RTX 3060s, but with slightly older CPUs and some compromises; laptops like the Acer Nitro 5 and Dell G3 15 are available for about the same price. You can find more choices in our guide to the best gaming laptops.

Returning to the MSI Pulse GL66, a quick glance at the specs gives the impression of a well-rounded laptop. For example, it comes with 16GB of RAM, but there is nothing silly about single channel. This is a true dual-channel solution, meaning the CPU has plenty of bandwidth.

Speaking of CPUs, MSI has included Intel's latest 11th generation Core processors in this machine; Alder Lake has just arrived on desktops, but not yet on laptops. Inside the chunky GL66 chassis is a surprisingly robust Core i 7 11800H. This is an 8-core, 16-thread CPU with a base clock of 2.3 GHz and boost at twice that, 4.6 GHz.

This is a serious chip and can hit serious performance when pushed. Nevertheless, the tests were mixed, with high single-core performance but nowhere near the multi-core numbers. This is undoubtedly due to the cooling system employed in the Pulse GL66, and while CPU temperatures never rose above 81°C in our tests, even when using the performance configuration, it hardly felt as if cooling was really being driven.

We applaud the general quietness this system provides, even when using the performance presets.

The other part of the performance equation is, of course, the GPU, and this is where the MSI Pulse GL66 stumbles, although not necessarily for the reasons you might first think. MSI has included an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti, along with a potentially powerful CPU on mounted. But this may not be the budget dream you want.

The problem with the RTX 3050 Ti is not its basic power, but its surprisingly high performance, as you will soon see. With only 4GB of memory on this GPU, it's at the limit of what it can run on even modest settings for the latest games.

If you buy a new gaming laptop, you are buying it for the future, not just for the games that are out now. You will want to know that the machine you buy today is capable of handling the games that will be released next year and possibly the year after. With only 4 GB of RAM, that's not going to happen, and in fact, we've had problems with our current test suite.

This is doubly frustrating because the Nvidia GeForce RTX 3050 Ti, as its name suggests, can handle ray tracing. But without the VRAM to back this up, it's a missed opportunity, and the 3DMark Port Royal performance is the worst score we've seen so far, highlighting this perfectly. The frame rates in this test are unbearable, and even a laptop with an aging RTX 2060 will lag behind.

Horizon Zero Dawn also unceremoniously crashes the entire machine if you try to run it at the highest settings. The game itself optimized the settings (basically dropping most settings to "low") to achieve an average of 63 fps and a minimum of 16 fps. Obviously not as good as the higher settings possible, but still looks good enough. Still, at least the game can actually be played.

In other respects, the performance of the RTX 3050 Ti is really not bad. Even on a loaded title like "Metro Exodus," the RTX 3050 Ti maintains 42 fps with RTX Pretty turned on. This is due to DLSS helping to mitigate the situation, which is one of the biggest selling points of this generation of GPUs, especially for budget GPUs. At least it is possible; Metro Exodus crashed several times during testing, again probably due to lack of VRAM.

This makes the MSI Pulse GL66 a difficult notebook to recommend to PC gamers. This is because once you spend $1,000 for a gaming laptop, nothing guarantees buyer's remorse more than your favorite game crashing or not running at a reasonable setting. This is not helped by the fact that it doesn't feel like a piece of high-end hardware; a plastic casing that doesn't cost $1,000 feels like a reputational hazard, especially at less than an inch thick.

There is some good news: M.2 NVMe SSDs and RAM are all standard parts. There is also room for a secondary SATA SSD if you feel that the 512GB drive in your laptop is not enough for your game collection. The upgrade requires removing the entire back of the machine, but it's not too tricky.

Overall, the MSI Pulse GL66 does not provide the necessary pieces. From a gaming perspective, it seems too expensive for what you get, especially when the benefits of the Core i7 are wasted. The rest of the specs are fine, and the easy upgrades are great, but not enough to set it apart from the rest of the pack. It's worth saving a little more money and buying an RTX 3060 laptop.