Origin's latest slim EVO16-S gaming laptop falls between the heavy hitters in the same price range: slightly more expensive than laptops like the Acer Predator Helios 300 (opens in new tab) and Lenovo Legion 5 Pro (opens in new tab) and are not significantly more powerful than them. But the difference is marginal, and as a 1080p laptop with an AMD Radeon RX 6650M XT, the EVO16-S offers a sweet spot if your gaming habits do not require higher resolutions and refresh rates.

The 6650M XT and Ryzen 7 6800H continue to feed the EVO16-S when it comes to gaming performance, but its 1080p 144Hz screen has no tremendous appetite. If this laptop had a 1440p panel or touted a 165Hz or 240Hz refresh rate, the graph below would tell a different story; the EVO16-S is not reckless or overkill, but it's not quite what you're looking for. It's a gaming laptop for people who don't know what they want.

My EVO16-S review unit costs about $1,920. Instead of the basic 16GB of RAM, mine is 32GB and has a 1TB SSD. That's expensive for an AMD-based laptop like the other alternatives with Intel's Core i7 12700H and Nvidia's RTX 3060; cutting the RAM and SSD in half would bring the price down to about $1,500. To me, this is the only price where this laptop makes sense as an alternative.

I don't see the need for more than 1080p and 144Hz on a mid-size laptop unless you play the kind of games that specifically demand it. I play "Overwatch 2" (open in new tab) on a desktop setup with a 4K 144Hz monitor to my shame, and going back to 1080p at the same refresh rate on the EVO16-S was not as big a downgrade as I expected. Not only did the game run fine on medium and high settings, but the smaller screen size made the transition easier. I had more trouble getting used to it than the experience of seeing a membrane keyboard on a laptop.

The EVO16-S has lowered its high specs to get more out of its modest setup; the RX 6650M XT ran Hitman 3, F1 2020, Overwatch 2, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 (in a new tab) The 6650M XT was capable of approaching 144 fps in many of the games I tested, including "Hitman 3", "F1 2020", "Overwatch 2" and "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2" (open in new tab). With slightly lower graphics settings, you could easily play a variety of games like this; AMD's FreeSync Premium smoothes out fps variations as well.

When it comes to ray tracing, the RX 6650M XT falls far short of the power of the superior Nvidia RTX 3060. In my Metro Exodus RTX tests, it could not approach 60 fps and averaged 48 fps. It is inferior to cheaper laptops with better screens, but I don't think anyone is looking for impressive ray tracing performance on a laptop at this price, and EVO16-S owners have chosen a lifestyle of turning off ray tracing and turning on FSR, which is a good thing, because the EVO16-S is a very good laptop. If they want more than that, they will have to spend more.

The Ryzen 7 6800H on the EVO16-S also stumbles when compared to the Intel Core i7 12700H. In the Hitman 3 Dartmoor test, the EVO16-S had a slightly lower average frame rate; Cinebench R20 scores show similar differences. The Ryzen CPUs were not able to keep up at all, perhaps with a noticeable impact in processor-intensive open world and strategy games. However, given that the EVO16-S excels in everything else, we don't think this is a deal-breaker.

My machine's 32GB of DDR5 memory also kept pace with the competition; in the SiSoft Sandra test, it was 42GB/s. The EVO16-S is nothing short when it comes to multitasking, but still, you could drop down to 16GB to save money I think.

The 1TB Gen4 Samsung NVMe SSD in the EVO16-S is also comparable to similar laptops. Benchmark results for Final Fantasy 14: Endwalker put it at about 11 seconds. I didn't encounter terribly long load times in my testing either, and as with the RAM situation, I don't think reducing it to 512GB would hurt much.

Like most Origin gaming laptops and desktop PCs, the EVO16-S has a clean look; Origin allows you to customize the exterior in a variety of patterns for an additional fee, but I don't care. I prefer the stock black style for laptops. Other, more technological and futuristic color schemes just don't work for me. I'll leave that to the full-size RGB backlit keyboard and the RGB strips on the front edge that highlight it. My only minor complaint about the keyboard is that the right Shift key is squashed.

As an everyday laptop, the EVO16-S is easy to use. In all the tests I performed, the fan never went into overdrive. In the worst case, the CPU recorded 93°C (the GPU stabilized around 80°C). Unlike the previous Origin laptop I reviewed (opens in new tab), the EVO16-S was very quiet throughout my use. Battery life was no problem either, with PCMark 10 testing registering nearly an hour and a half on an 80W battery. With this kind of power, it would almost be expected. I played a few games of "Overwatch 2," paused for a break, and played a few more games without getting yelled at for not having enough battery power.

The EVO16-S's dual USB 3.2 Type-A and USB 3.2 Type-C ports, adequate speaker quality, and light weight (about 5 pounds) make the EVO16-S a well-equipped and versatile gaming laptop. However, my $1,900 build is hard to recommend. At this price, it is not as good as less expensive, more powerful laptops. But if you can sacrifice storage and RAM and are not trying to achieve a high refresh rate on a 1440p screen for professional gaming, it is a wise choice.

The EVO16-S is not a desktop replacement, but a laptop if you actually want to treat it like a laptop; the EVO16-S is suitable for playing a variety of games at reasonable settings and beyond if you have a power outlet nearby; the EVO16 The EVO16-S is an impressive laptop that takes full advantage of its 1080p screen if you can configure it for $1,500 (opens in new tab) If you're not spoiled by 4K or dreaming at 240Hz, this laptop will serve you well.