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Origin EON17-X v2: Two-minute review

(Image credit: Future / James Holland)

Gaming laptops typically come in two different flavors: the lighter variant that requires some performance compromises, and the desktop variant that is about as mobile as a large turtle. The Origin EON17-X v2 is the latter.

For many, these desktop replacements are the best gaming laptops for them. While heavy, they’re still much easier to fold up and transport than an actual desktop. You just wouldn’t want to carry it around on your back all day. Yet, they still have the bona fide internals to allow playing AAA games on higher settings with ray tracing and all that jazz. Unfortunately, it shares some of the drawbacks of these types of computers with its loud fans and issues with thermal efficiency, not to mention it blows hot air out its sides around where one would most likely have their hand when using an external mouse.

On the bright side, it comes with a large, sharp, and vibrant screen like the best 17-inch laptops. And like some of those bigger models, the Origin EON17-X v2 gets up there in price. Depending on what you’re looking for – especially if you’re looking for a powerful gaming laptop with an HD UV printed lid – the Origin EON17-X v2 might be the gaming laptop for you.

Origin EON17-X v2: Price and availability

(Image credit: Future / James Holland)

•  How much does it cost? Starting at $3,400.00 (about £2,610.00 / AU$5,120.00)
•  When is it available? Available now 
•  Where can you get it? Available in the US 

Though the basic configuration listed on the Origin site for the EON17-X v2 is discounted down to $2,480 at the time of writing, it generally starts at $3,400.00 (about £2,610.00 / AU$5,120.00). Even if that’s one of those deals where it’s constantly discounted so most are never paying that price, this is still an expensive computer. That said, $2,400 is a much more accessible price and an easier one to swallow.

Even that basic configuration is plenty powerful as well. It comes with an Intel Core i9 CPU, Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 GPU, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD, and a 1440p screen with a 240Hz refresh rate.

If you want to max out the configuration, which has that same i9 CPU, an RTX 4090 GPU, 64GB RAM, 8TB SSD with an additional 8TB SSD and a 4K screen with a 144Hz refresh rate along with one of the preconfigured UV printed lids, the price is going to be $5,681 (about £4,360 / AU$8,550). Now, those massive SSDs both add on a lot price-wise, specifically $824 for the main 8GB SSD and an additional $930 for the additional 8TB SSD.

The review configuration here is a happy medium as it keeps the Intel Core i9, RTX 4090, and 4K screen, and pairs that all with a more modest but still very robust 32GB RAM as well as a 2TB SSD and an additional 2TB SSD. That will set you back $3,913 (about £3,000 / AU$5,890) give or take (there are multiple options for the same configuration of hard drives at slightly different price points). Of course, it’s discounted at the time of writing to $3,098.

Origin is not the only game in town for these sorts of desktop replacement laptops that are more than likely to be very powerful, very loud, and very stationary. The MSI Titan 18 HX is another such computer. It starts at an even pricier $4,999.99 / £4,379.98 / AU$6,999 and comes with an Intel Core i9, RTX 4080, 64GB RAM, and 2TB SSD, along with an 18-inch screen with a 2400p resolution and 120Hz refresh rate. The one thing it does have over the Origin is that that screen has HDR1000 on hand. Still, it starts at an even higher price point for a similar package.

If you’re willing to compromise, particularly on screen resolution, the Acer Predator Helios 18 starts at a much more palatable $1,699.99 (about £1,339 / AU$2,576). Of course, the specs are more modest as you get an Intel Core i7, 4060 GPU, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD, and an 18-inch 1200p screen with a 165Hz refresh rate. 

• Value: 4 / 5

Origin EON17-X v2: Specs

All models come with an Intel Core i9-14900HX CPU, but you do have a few ways to customize (and a whole bunch when it comes to the SSDs). The GPU and screen are tied together, so if you get the cheaper Nvidia GeForce RTX 4080 GPU, the PC will come with the 17.3-inch 1440p screen with the faster 240Hz refresh rate. If you get the 4090 GPU, it will come with a 17.3-inch 4K screen with a still blazing fast 144Hz refresh rate.

As far as RAM goes, you can select from 16, 32, or 64GB. When it comes to SSDs, the options are too numerous to mention here. I’ll only say that you have options ranging from 1 to 8TB for both the main and the additional hard drive. For some sizes, there are multiple options.

Besides the two different screens, there’s one other way to customize the Origin EON17-X v2 externally, and that’s with the HD UV printed lid. For a small upcharge, you can choose from 19 different prints. Or, for a bigger upcharge, you can upload your own design to be printed on the lid. 

Origin EON17-X v2: Design

(Image credit: Future / James Holland)

•  Massive in every way, including weight
•  Port selection is great
•  HD UV printed lid is unique

The Origin EON17-X v2 is massive. Yes, that’s to be expected of any computer with a 17-inch display not named LG Gram, but this PC is 16 pounds (despite the fact that a lot of the verbiage online says 7.25 pounds). It’s clearly not meant to be routinely lugged around. It just happens to be more portable than an actual desktop setup. That said – as I’ll get into below – the battery life is good enough that, if you’re actually comfortable carrying around an extra 16 pounds, you can use this on the go.

The upside of the EON17-X v2 being so big is that it comes with a large 17.3-inch display with either a super sharp resolution (4K at 144Hz) or blazing fast refresh rate (1440p at 240Hz). The only thing really missing with the display is any kind of HDR.

(Image credit: Future / James Holland)

It also has a full-sized keyboard layout thanks to its larger size, which can be customized with Macros and per-key RGB lighting. The touchpad is likewise sizable. Both work well, though the keyboard has enough stiffness that I prefer typing on my MacBook or using an external keyboard. 

The touchpad, however, is very responsive and accurate. Almost enough to use during gaming, though it’s held back by the fact that if you’re pressing down to simulate a right click, you won’t be able to left click. This is a combination of actions needed in games where you would aim before shooting. Otherwise, I was very impressed by the touchpad.

Image 1 of 3

Backside port selection on the Origin EON17-X v2 (Image credit: Future / James Holland)Image 2 of 3

EON17-X v2 left side ports (Image credit: Future / James Holland)Image 3 of 3

Origin EON17-X v2 right side ports (Image credit: Future / James Holland)

The port selection on here is pretty great. Though I don’t like having ports on the back, there are so many that it makes sense. Anything outside of a SD card reader is here. It even has an optical style audio jack to go along with a regular 3.5mm one. And, of course, two thunderbolt 4 ports are on hand as well.

Taking a step back and looking at the whole package, the Origin EON17-X v2 is mostly matte black with an aluminum chassis, and, when open, only really looks like a gaming laptop thanks to its size and the RGB lighting on the keyboard. However, the lid with its HD UV printed design is going to give it away. Regardless of the design, it’s not a look I would personally go for (you can choose a standard black lid), but it’s certainly unique and something that someone would appreciate.

• Design: 4.5 / 5

Origin EON17-X v2: Performance

(Image credit: Future / James Holland)

• Powerful performance
• Loud fan
• Gets hot under stress

It’s no surprise that Origin bills the EON17-X v2 as “[its] most powerful laptop ever designed.” Its specs are impressive. It has a top-of-the-line CPU in its Intel Core i9 as well as the most powerful consumer-grade GPU with the Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 (even if you get the 4080, it’s incredibly powerful).

It’s a testament to how ambitious Origin got that you can still run games like Cyberpunk 2077, Red Dead Redemption 2 and Hellblade 2:Senua’s Saga and really push the laptop, ending up with 20-30 fps. But, that’s with maxed settings and ray tracing on full blast. Singling out Cyberpunk 2077 for a second, I get 20 fps with everything maxed out at 4K including ray tracing. With ray tracing off, it’s 29 fps. At 1080p with ray tracing off but all the other settings still maxed out, I get 89 fps.

That’s actually pretty impressive. And, with a lot of AAA games, you can get up to 150 - 160 fps in 1080p but still with the settings all the way up.

Also remember that the Origin EON17-X v2 is powering a 4K display (or 1440p one if you go the cheaper-ish route) with a high refresh rate even if you’re not fully utilizing it. And it’s a wonderful display. Its Delta E > 0.25 is incredibly accurate and the color coverage is very wide, specifically insofar that it has an sRGB of 153.5% and DCI-P3 of 108.7%. With those numbers and the powerful internals, I could imagine doing quite a bit of video editing on this machine.

Origin EON17-X v2: Benchmarks

3DMark: Fire Strike: 31284; Time Spy: 17838; Port Royal: 11950

GeekBench 6.3 2979 (single-core); 17014 (multi-core)

25GB File Copy: 11.43

Handbrake 1.8.1: 3:52

CrossMark: Overall: 2217 Productivity: 2085 Creativity: 2407 Responsiveness: 2084

Assassin’s Creed Mirage: (1080p) 131 fps, (4K) 75 fps

Dirt 5: (1080p) 167.5 fps, (4K) 87.83 fps

Web Surfing (Battery Informant): 7:17:36 

Where the Origin EON17-X v2 is not quite amazing is in the fact that its fans are very loud, though you can adjust that in Origin’s Control Center app. I literally could barely hear the maxed out audio of games over it. Strangely, the laptop still got very hot under duress, measuring 122 degrees Fahrenheit (50 degrees Celsius) right above the F10 / webcam key in the middle of the keyboard. 

More distressingly is the fact that while there’s venting on the back and the sides of the computer, a lot of the hot air is getting blown out the sides. Unless you’re using an external keyboard, you probably will have your mouse and therefore your hand right next to one of the side vents.

On the bright side, if you choose to use the speakers instead of external headphones, the audio sounds decent. Not a lot of low-end, but it’s full enough. More importantly for a gaming computer, it actually has a decent soundstage so you can hear what’s supposed to be on the left or the right.

• Performance: 4 / 5

Origin EON17-X v2: Battery life

• Solid battery life for a gaming laptop
• No fast charging

I always say this when I review gaming laptops, but it’s worth repeating. They’re notorious for having, at best, mediocre battery life. So, to test a 17-inch model with very robust specs and have it last a little more than seven and a quarter hours in our web surfing battery informant test is very impressive. Typically, I expect to see two to three hours of battery life in these kinds of machines.

Also worth noting is that the Origin EON17-X v2 does not have fast charging on hand. However, that’s more the purview of Ultrabooks. On the bright side, you do have some customization over how the laptop charges in the Control Center app so you can set it to charge when it’s under 70% and stop at 80. You can also select your own personal parameters. That’s a nice feature if you care about the longevity of the physical battery.

•  Battery life: 4.5 / 5

Should I buy the Origin EON17-X v2?  Buy it if…

You want an incredibly powerful gaming laptop

The only way to get something more powerful is to go the actual desktop route. Otherwise, the Origin EON17-X v2 is about as performance-heavy as you’ll find in laptop form.

You want to customize your PC

With the ability to choose from an assortment of HD UV printed lids or upload your own design, this laptop can be customized beyond the competition. And, that’s before considering the different options available with the different internal components.

You want good battery life in a large gaming laptop

If you want good battery life in a 17-inch gaming laptop, this machine has the goods. It might not compare to an Ultrabook or even smaller gaming laptops like an Asus ROG Zephyrus, but you’ll be hard pressed to get seven hours out of most mid- to large-sized gaming portables.

Don't buy it if...

You’re on a budget of any kind

Unless you can spend $2,500 on a laptop (and that’s when it’s on sale), you’re better off finding some other pre-built laptop with slightly less robust internal components.

You care about a laptop getting too hot

The heat this thing produces is a pain to deal with, especially when it’s blowing right on your mouse hand. If this is a dealbreaker, there are gaming laptops that handle thermals a little better or at least don’t blow the hot air out the side vents.

Also Consider

If our Origin EON17-X v2 review has you looking for other options, here are two laptops to consider...  

MSI Titan 18 HX

The MSI Titan 18 HX does a lot of what the Origin EON17-X v2 does and adds in HDR1000. It’s powerful with a great display and plenty of ports. It’s, however, even more expensive and you can’t add your own design on the lid.

Read our full MSI Titan 18 HX review 

Acer Predator Helios 18

The Acer Predator Helios 18 proves that, if you’re willing to compromise on some settings, you can get some great gaming done for a much cheaper price. It’s much cheaper while still offering up a very large display. While that display as at a lower resolution, it’s still blazing fast.

Read our full Acer Predator Helios 18 review 

How I tested the Origin EON17-X v2

•  Tested for two weeks
•  Used it for work, gaming, and streaming 
•  Pushed it as hard as possible with demanding games

I used the Origin EON17-X v2 for two weeks, gaming on it primarily, but also typing up most of this review and watching / listening to streaming. I pushed it as hard as possible, running AAA games at various settings including at their max to see how it would respond.

The Origin EON17-X v2 is an interesting machine as it’s for a very select group of people who want as much performance as possible, but still want a single laptop instead of all the individual parts of a desktop setup.

I’ve spent the last few years reviewing tech gear for gaming and otherwise, where I’ve gotten a feel for what to look for and how to put a piece of kit through its paces to see whether it’s worth the recommendation.

•  First reviewed September 2024

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The launch of iOS 18 has been mostly well-received by iPhone fans, but the most controversial change has been Apple's redesign of the Photos app.

Across the TechRadar office and multiple Reddit threads, many fans have been fuming about the many changes – with the most disliked one being Apple's decision to ditch the tabbed navigation bar that used to live at the base of the app's screen.

Instead, Apple has embraced a scrolling design that, for many, makes the app feel slower and more laborious to use. Fortunately, it has also hidden two handy customizations that can help you restore the app to something similar to the previous tab experience.

The first is the ability to change the order of the app's long list of photo collections. To do that, scroll to the bottom of the app and tap 'Customize & Reorder'. This lets you move your preferred collections, such as 'Albums' and 'Recent Days, ' further up the page.

To reorder or remove collections in the iOS 18 Photos app, scroll to the bottom to find the 'Customize & Reorder' button (left) and choose your preferred order – with 'Pinned Collections' (right) being a key one for an old nav bar experience. (Image credit: Future / Apple)

If you want something closer to the old navigation bar, the key one to move to the top (so it sits just below your Photos feed when you open the app) is 'Pinned Collections.' 

As the name suggests, this is a bar of shortcuts to your preferred photo sets. To change the order of these, tap 'Modify,' and you can move some of the old nav bar favorites, like 'Albums,' into one-tap territory again without needing to scroll.

Put 'Pinned Collections' at the top of your list and it'll sit below your Photo Feed like an old nav bar – tap 'Modify' to change the order of your 'Pinned Collections'   (Image credit: Future / Apple)

If your photo feed is overrun with screenshots, you can also remove them and restrict them to a Screenshots folder in Pinned Collections. To do this, scroll upwards on the Photos app's home screen until the menu bar appears at the bottom of the screen. Now tap the up-down arrows button, hit 'View Options,' and then uncheck Screenshots.

While you may still need to relearn some muscle memory, these tweaks should at least make the Photos app less confusing and overwhelming than it first appears. 

RIP nav bar

The old Photos app (above) had a nav bar that let you quickly jump between collections and search – but you can achieve something similar with some customizations in iOS 18 (Image credit: Future / Apple)

It's fair to say that the new Photos app has traded some old-school simplicity for a more modern look, and that's divided opinion. However, the undoubted plus side is that this approach comes with greater customization.

These options are somewhat buried or hidden in the UI – so while many have been dismayed and aghast upon opening the new Photos app, there are, fortunately, ways to restore a more familiar experience.

That's not to say there aren't legitimate grievances with Apple's new app. One is that video playback appears to have taken a step backwards, with the scrub bar losing its thumbnail previews and requiring a tap to play videos full screen. Another is that the app feels slightly cluttered, with so many automated collections competing for your attention – although you can again remove the ones you don't want using the 'Customize and Reorder' menu.

While some iPhone owners are holding off from updating to iOS 18 in order to keep their comfortably familiar Photos app, they may soon be tempted to take the plunge when Apple Intelligence features finally start rolling out – which Apple confirmed today will happen next month in the US, and in December for the UK and Australia. 

You might also like...

• iOS 18 lets you ditch Apple’s Camera app for a much better one – here’s how
• iOS 18 is available right now – how to get it and 5 reasons why you should
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Keeping track of what was said in even the briefest workplace chats and meetings could soon get a lot easier thanks to a new update from Slack.

The online collaboration platform has revealed its "huddles" - quick-starting meetings designed for spontaneous chats and catch-ups - will now be able to use its Slack AI platform to generate notes for users.

Slack AI will use real-time audio along with the messages sent in the huddle to create a transcript, letting attendees keep track of exactly what was said, and by whom.

Slack AI Agents

Once the huddle is complete, the transcript and notes will be shared into a Slack canvas, including citations and action items. The notes will be visible to anyone in the channel or direct message that hosted the huddle, meaning even those members unable to attend can keep track of what went on.

(Image credit: Slack)

Elsewhere, Slack also revealed several other AI-powered upgrades, including full integration with Agentforce, a major new release from its parent company Salesforce.

Designed to help enable "the third wave of AI", Agentforce will allow companies to communicate with their data like never before, connecting unstructured data in a way that gives customers access to new insights and a greater experience for all.

It's not just AI agents from Salesforce getting in on the action, as the company announced a number of third-party AI agents will also be coming to Slack, including the likes of Adobe, Anthropic, Cohere, and Perplexity.

The move is another step along Slack's AI journey, which has been ramping up in recent months.

The company claims customers have summarized more than 600 million messages, saving a collective 1.1 million hours across users, since it unveiled Slack AI in September 2023.

"We’ve moved beyond collaboration; every day, millions of teams are leveraging purpose-built AI, with customer data, automation, and now agents seamlessly integrated into the flow of work," noted Denise Dresser, CEO, Slack.

"This isn’t just about getting work done. It’s about unlocking new productivity levels to drive results and move business forward for every team and department. In today’s increasingly complex work environment, true productivity requires a work operating system built for the future of work — and that is Slack."

More from TechRadar Pro

• Check out the best productivity tools around right now
• Slack: Why AI could actually make your work not just more productive — but actually more enjoyable too
• Salesforce CEO: Get ready for agents - the third wave of AI

Right now, you can get the LG CineBeam PU700R 4K smart home movie projector for more than half off.

Prosecutors revealed last week that Weinstein had been indicted on additional sex crime charges that weren’t part of the case that led to his now-overturned 2020 conviction.

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Despite our protestations, Microsoft is determined to make AI tools in the workplace accessible and appealing with a raft of new improvements across its Microsoft 365 (M365) suite of productivity tools.

In an announcement on the M365 blog, the tech giant announced ‘wave 2’, rolling out (mostly) in September 2024, which includes Copilot Pages, “a dynamic, persistent canvas” for AI-powered collaboration. It also announced that Copilot would be seeing increased functionality in a number of key applications, such as data analysis in Excel and inbox management in Outlook.

While the company is stressing the importance of its AI tool for small to medium businesses who may have a need to manage costs, it is also keen to highlight that Business Chat (or ‘BizChat’, as it insists on calling it), the content-sensitive portion of Copilot, requires a subscription. The standard Copilot chat is free, but only searches the internet.

(Image credit: Microsoft) The net positives of “wave 2”

It seems like the integration of company content into content that’s AI-generated has been around for a while now, but Microsoft is claiming wave 2 will bring with it ‘reasoning’ for Copilot Business Chat - helping it make more contextual decisions and answer more contextual questions. For example, with Microsoft Teams, “you can ask Copilot if there were any questions that you missed in a meeting, and it will quickly scan across what was said, and what was typed in the chat, to see if anything was left unanswered.”

So, Copilot Business Chat is better now, in nebulous small ways. It can draw more on company-specific data, while Word specifically now supports quick reviews of all of it in-app, alongside additional writing prompts from the blank page.

Microsoft also says that “dynamic storytelling” is now available in PowerPoint, helping users build out a structure for their presentations. It will also pull in company branding to keep business presentations stylish and on brand. It also claims that Copilot will “soon” be able to draw from “approved” images in Sharepoint libraries.

Copilot is making the scourge of customer service, AI chatbots, easier to create, and able to be tailored towards specific “business processes” to “work with or for humans”. An agent builder in Business Chat will be in general availability “over the coming weeks” to facilitate this, according to the company.

Microsoft Excel gets possibly the most interesting development, albeit only in public preview for now, as its natural language prompts are being equipped with programming language Python to make advanced data analysis as easy as ever, with Microsoft promising to enable advanced data analysis, “[with] no coding required.”

(Image credit: Microsoft) Copilot Business Chat, marketing speak, and you

There are BizChat deniers in the Microsoft cell, however, resisting the very notion that it even exists. User HalSclater on Microsoft’s Small and Medium business blog writes: “BizChat?? Suddenly this is everywhere and yet it isn’t a product. Please stop!”

Microsoft should hire him to write their copy, because “BizChat” isn’t the only bit of strenuous marketing coming from Microsoft on this. The concrete thing here seems to be Copilot Pages, which puts “ephemeral AI-generated content” into a collaborative edit space.

Please ignore that insisting on calling this concept “multiplayer” and “a completely new work pattern” is somewhat egregious given what Google are up to in implementing its Gemini AI into Google Workspace. And it’s not just “a dynamic persistent canvas”, but one “designed for multiplayer AI collaboration”, going so far as to say that “it’s the first new digital artifact for the AI age”. The harried copywriter over there who’s just brazenly free associating words and expecting them to mean things has my undying respect, but at the same time, “please stop!”

More from TechRadar Pro

• We’ve also listed the best collaboration platform for teams right now
• AI hype is at an all time high, but only a few of us actually use it daily
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The International Brotherhood of Teamsters, a union of 1.3 million workers, will not endorse Vice President Harris or former President Donald Trump for president, after decades of backing Democrats.

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