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SabrePro15 walks the line between performance and price

Gigabyte's budget range isn't exactly affordable, but it makes up for it with an impressive offering.

Luke Lancaster Associate Editor / Australia
Luke Lancaster is an Associate Editor with CNET, based out of Australia. He spends his time with games (both board and video) and comics (both reading and writing).
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Luke Lancaster
2 min read

"Affordable" isn't usually the go-to descriptor for gaming laptops , but Gigabyte's Sabre range aims to strike a balance between the performance required for modern PC gaming and keeping costs low enough that it won't send would-be customers screaming for the hills. Not that you'll find any cheap gaming laptops in the hills. But at least you can play with the squirrels and bears and whatnot.

The SabrePro, on show at Computex 2017, has about as much power as you can expect from a budget gaming laptop -- especially one with the "Pro" tag.

Key specs

  • Intel i7 Core
  • Nvidia GeForce GTX 1060
  • 15.6-inch full HD (1,920x1080-resolution) panel
  • RGB per-key backlit keyboard
  • 390x268x25mm
  • 2.5 kg
  • 8 or 16GB RAM (up to 32GB max)

Based on a quick hands-on, it certainly feels like the business. Personally I can take or leave the RGB backlit keys, but the per-key functionality is nice. The screen held up under glare and it ran smooth. Obviously the real test is in those marathon gaming sessions and how well the cooling holds up, but stay tuned for more extensive testing.

gigabyte-saberpro-15-004.jpg

The RGB backlit keyboard is all bling.

 Aloysius Low/CNET

It still has gaming laptop DNA, from the angular design to the RGB backlit keyboard, and those trappings don't come cheap. It's even stepped things up from previous entries in the Sabre range with a silken texture on the palmrest and a brushed metal case. That brings the price up to $1,499 in some configurations (around £1,170 or AU$2,000 converted).

While it's still cheaper than the rest of Gigabyte's gaming range, the truth is that it's still erring on the side of "gaming" rather than "budget". That might be the wrong side of the line, especially with rival brands such as Dell announcing aggressively priced competitors on the lower end of the gaming laptop space.

Check out more of CNET's Computex 2017 coverage here.

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