XMG Demos First Prototype AMD Phoenix Laptop, Unveils Vapor Chamber Cooling For Laptops, New Designs For 2023

Aug 10, 2023

XMG has announced its brand new laptop roadmap which confirms the upcoming AMD Phoenix designs, new vapor chamber cooling, and more.

XMG's Senior Product Developer, Tom Fichtner, visited us with two bags full of XMG's released & unreleased laptops. The main highlights were the XMG APEX series and also the XMG Pro 16 which has been outfitted with a Vapor Chamber that cools both the CPU and the GPU, delivering up to 300W of cooling performance.

The demo unit shown to us was very big and had two exhaust fans to push hot air out of the chassis.

The laptop manufacturer also presented its brand new roadmap which confirms that the AMD Phoenix APU designs are on their way. We can expect laptops with the AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS in APEX and Core flavors around Q3 2023 which will exist alongside the Ryzen 7 7735HS for the APEX series too. Talking about Dragon Range, XMG said that while they are definitely planning some form of Ryzen 7045HX series laptops in the future, users who want extra performance can get XMG's Raptor Lake-HX options right now which offer similarly great performance.

About that, we did manage to get a very early and exclusive look at an XMG APEX laptop featuring an engineering sample of the AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS Phoenix APU. This chip had a weird issue where it was detecting the Radeon 780M iGPU as the Radeon 760M. Due to unreleased drivers and the ES state of the chip, the 3DMark score wasn't up to mark but we can't blame anyone for that since this is a very early product and the final version is months away from launch.

Press Release: XMG's APEX series receives a complete makeover in time for Computex. The APEX 15 and APEX 17 not only feature completely redesigned chassis but are also XMG's first gaming laptops with AMD's current Ryzen 7 7735HS. NVIDIA laptop graphics cards up to the GeForce RTX 4060 provide upper mid-range performance. Despite good connectivity including two native monitor ports, XMG positions the APEX series as the most interesting option in its own portfolio in terms of price performance.

Ryzen 7 7735HS, GeForce RTX 4060 or 4050, & Full HD display with 144 Hz

XMG's APEX series is now the entry point to its gaming laptop portfolio after the former entry-level XMG FOCUS series recently moved significantly closer to the PRO series in terms of features and performance. This is also reflected in the pricing: there is currently no more affordable XMG laptop series than the APEX. However, "entry-level" in this case also means that the devices are more likely to be in the mid-range to upper mid-range in terms of performance.

Both the XMG APEX 15 and the APEX 17 (model generation M23) combine AMD's current Ryzen 7 7735HS with 8 cores and 16 threads with either an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4060 or an RTX 4050, each with a maximum GPU power of 140 watts (115 watts plus 25 watts Dynamic Boost). In terms of resolution, a Full HD IPS display (1920 x 1080 pixels) with 144 Hz is well suited to these graphics cards.

Freely configurable RAM and SSDs

The laptops provide two SO-DIMM sockets for a maximum of 64 GB DDR5-4800 RAM as well as two M.2 SSD slots with PCI Express 4.0 connection. As usual with XMG, the devices can be configured with RAM and drives as desired in the partner shop bestware.com. The M.2 slots are already equipped with a heat conduction pad ex works, even if the laptop is shipped with only one SSD.

The connectivity features include three USB-A (2x 3.2 Gen1, 1x 2.0) and one USB-C port (3.2 Gen2x1), an SD card reader for full-size SD cards, Gigabit Ethernet and separate audio jacks for headphones (compatible with combo plug headsets) and microphone. In addition, both laptops offer two native graphics interfaces - HDMI 2.1 and a Mini DisplayPort 1.4 - each directly connected to the NVIDIA dGPU.

A completely new chassis design makes the APEX laptops lighter

At 360.2 x 243.5 x 26.7 mm and 2.2 kg (APEX 15) and 392.9 x 260 x 24.9 mm and 2.47 kg (XMG APEX 17), the M23 model generation is significantly lighter than its predecessor. The chassis, which has been redesigned from the ground up, hosts a 62 Wh battery and is manufactured from precisely crafted plastic. The display lid of the 17.3-inch model, which is characterized by a striking gaming look (at least by otherwise rather reserved XMG standards) is forged from aluminum and provides additional stability.

An update to AMD Phoenix is already being planned

Meanwhile, a direct successor based on this chassis, which has now been presented at Computex, is already casting its shadow: Later this year, XMG plans to make the leap to a Zen 4-based processor. Along with this, the APEX series will also get a WQHD display as an additional configuration option. However, the switch to the Zen 4 platform is likely to be accompanied by a corresponding price increase.

Pricing and availability

The base specification of the XMG APEX 17 (M23), which can be freely configured on bestware.com, includes AMD's Ryzen 7 7735HS an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050, 16 (2x8) GB DDR5-4800-RAM, a 500 GB Samsung 980 SSD, and a Full HD IPS display with 144 Hz. The starting price is € 1,299 including 19% VAT.

An upgrade to the faster GeForce RTX 4060 (€ 158) is available for an additional charge. Meanwhile, the XMG APEX 15 (M23) starts at € 1,399 on bestware.com with otherwise the same equipment and a GeForce RTX 4060. All models available on bestware.com are ready for pre-order with immediate effect, shipping is expected from mid-June.