7.5/ 10
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Maingear ML-16

Pros

• Sharp and fast 2.5K, 240Hz display
• Strong build quality but not too thick and heavy

Cons

• Faster laptops don’t cost much more
• Cheaper laptops perform just as well or better

There’s nothing wrong with being average, but the problem with the Maingear ML-16 is that it’s average at an above-average price, putting it directly in the crosshairs of gaming laptops that are significantly better. It does a decent job of providing playable frame rates at the highest quality settings on today’s graphically punishing titles, and its RTX 4070 GPU gives you access to frames-saving DLSS capabilities (in the games that support them) on the laptop’s 2,560×1,600-pixel, 240Hz IPS display. We just think you’re better off paying more for an RTX 4080- or 4090-equipped laptop or spending less for a different RTX 4070 model with equal or better performance.

As configured, our Maingear ML-16 test model costs $2,585 and finds itself in no-man’s land. We’d spend a few hundred dollars more for the category-dominating Alienware m18 R2 that delivers double the gaming performance, if not more, and better value for your gaming dollar. Or we’d veer the other way and save some cash on another RTX 4070 gaming laptop such as the Alienware m16 R2 or Acer Predator Triton 14. We also like the Asus ROG Zephyrus G16, which supplies RTX 4080 muscle for roughly the same price as the Maingear ML-16.

Maingear ML-16 specifications

As with most boutique PC builders, Maingear has a few questions you need to confirm when picking out your laptop: what kind of graphics card do you want, how much memory do you need and what kind of storage do you want to configure? The base version of the ML-16 (it labels the configurable model as the MK.II) costs $1,876 for an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 GPU, 16GB of memory and a 1TB SSD. The version of the laptop we reviewed came with a few significant but expensive upgrades: an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 GPU, a whopping 64GB of DDR5 memory and a single 4TB Western Digital SN850X SSD. This kicked the price up to $2,585. Though untested, we think somewhere in the middle is a reasonable compromise: 32GB of memory and 2TB of storage would save you an extra $300 and make the laptop’s relatively average performance easier to justify.

You can’t modify the laptop’s CPU, an Intel Core Ultra 7 155H with six performance cores, 10 efficient cores and 22 total threads. You’re also stuck with a single display: a 16-inch IPS panel supporting a maximum refresh rate of 240Hz and a native resolution of 2,560×1,600 pixels. 

The laptop comes with ample, diverse connections, including support for a Thunderbolt 4 port and an HDMI 2.1 out. The Gigabit Ethernet port is a nice-to-have, but 2.5Gbps would have been more impressive (and future-proofed). Built-in support for Wi-Fi 6E gives you plenty of potential speed at home.

Maingear ML-16 performance

Across our benchmarks, our Maingear ML-16 test system coughed up scores and frame rates that trailed the competition. It performed adequately on our synthetic benchmarks, but we had higher hopes for its 3D performance. It finished dead last among a group of similarly priced gaming laptops on most of our 3D tests, including other RTX 4070 models and even a Dell model with an RTX 4060 that costs $1,000 less. 

On the synthetic benchmark 3DMark Fire Strike Ultra, it managed to top only the RTX-4060 Dell Inspiron 16 Plus  7640, though its score was near those of the Acer Predator Triton 14 and Lenovo Legion Pro 5, two other RTX 4070 rigs. Still, the Maingear ML-16 was 11% slower on the test than the RTX 4070-based Alienware m16 R2.

Turning to actual games, its result of 99 fps on the Guardians of the Galaxy benchmark and 100 fps on Shadow of the Tomb Raider are certainly playable frame rates but well off the pace of the competing models.

If you’re spending thousands of dollars on a gaming laptop, I’d argue it’s worth spending more for the Alienware m18 R2 that delivers double the performance (and a larger display) or saving some money and going for a less expensive model such as the Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 Alienware’s m16 R2 that still serve up better 3D frame rates.

Decent design with so-so speakers

The Maingear ML-16 weighed less than I expected for a gaming laptop. At 4.6 pounds and with a roomy, 16-inch display, it’s not a laptop that you’ll want to stuff in a backpack when you’re on the go, but it’s not one that will break your back during a daily commute. It’s also not a typical beast of a gaming laptop whose weight makes it more of an around-the-house PC.

Numpads on gaming laptops are generally unnecessary, and I hate that the ML-16’s numpad has its bottom-left keys practically overlapping the laptop’s arrow keys to accommodate one. That said, the keyboard itself is spacious, featuring keys with a short, crisp travel, and it’s silent and pleasant to hammer away on when you’re about to die during your World of Warcraft raid night. 

There is RGB lighting for the keyboard, but it’s single-zone, and the Control Center software to manage it is spartan at best. There are no fun effects to choose from (so much for a “breathing” laptop). Getting per-key RGB lighting isn’t an unreasonable expectation at the Maingear Ml-16’s price.

A 4.8-by-3.3-inch touchpad sits below the keyboard’s primary keys, slightly offset from its center (as well as the laptop’s “true” center). Although it looks awkward, your left-hand gets an extra bit of necessary space that makes it comfortable, not cramped, to rest your palm on the lower-left corner of the keyboard tray. The touchpad itself is as responsive as we’d expect, which is to say that the top inch or so is much more difficult to click than the lower half. That’s typical of most laptops with mechanical-click touchpads, as much as we dislike it.

The laptop’s speakers sounded worse than I expected. Located in the corners of the laptop underneath the bottom of its keyboard tray, they partially down-fire toward your lap or desk, muffling the sound. Bass feels almost non-existent even when the laptop sits on a desk. Worse, they’re imbalanced: On my test system, the right speaker sounds louder than the left by default. You can fix this by hopping into Windows’ sound settings and turning up the left speaker’s volume a little bit, but it’s temporary. If you lower the laptop’s volume to zero, the next time you raise it, Windows will have reset the balance to its original values. You’ll be right back to hearing way more sound out of the laptop’s right than its left, which gets annoying.

Also, while the laptop’s fans aren’t the loudest we’ve heard on a gaming laptop during heavy gaming, they’re absolutely noticeable. You’ll want to keep your headphones handy or you’ll struggle to hear dialogue and effects above the fan noise when gaming unless you crank the volume past an uncomfortable level.

On the whole, the ML-16’s build quality is good. The laptop feels solid and sturdy. Its 16-inch screen is slightly wobblier when you adjust it than with other gaming laptops I’ve tested, but nothing I’d consider problematic. As is typical, the included webcam at the top of the display isn’t amazing, but at least it’s 1080p. It’ll pass for your Discord streams, but that’s about it.

Speed is the display’s strength

I was pleased to see a fast, 240Hz display on the Maingear ML-16. A 4K resolution would have been better for extra sharpness and clarity, but your frame rates would likely suffer as a result, thus invalidating the point of a 240Hz screen — unless you are willing to crank down the resolution or your games’ quality settings. 

The screen is a typical IPS display and not the OLED that you get with the Asus ROG Zephyrus G16. The display supports only the sRGB color space, which is another bummer if you prefer that saturated, vibrant look for games and images. Its brightness maxed out at a measured 432 nits, which was enough to not lose details in dark scenes. The display’s overall range is pretty good, but the minimum measured brightness of 64 nits (on an all-white screen) is high. While it’s doubtful that you’d run the laptop that low in anything but a pitch-black room, I prefer to see displays under 50 nits for the extra comfort it provides.

I didn’t have any issues using the laptop for gaming or work. Spreadsheet text was perfectly readable, and I wasn’t hampered by the laptop’s resolution in any obvious way. I did find myself ticking the screen’s brightness up slightly from my typical standard of 120 nits for a little extra readability and perceived image quality, but that’s the only outlier I encountered. The display’s 16:10 ratio gives you a little extra vertical space to work with, but it also means you’ll get letterboxing when watching 16:9 content (4K movies, 1080p YouTube videos full-screen, etc.). 

The Maingear ML-16 isn’t a bad laptop by any stretch, but there’s not much to get excited about. It lacks the wow factor you might expect from a boutique builder at a boutique price, whether that’s incredible gaming performance, a gorgeous OLED display or even per-key RGB lighting. Competing models from Acer, Asus and Dell offer better performance at better prices.