XMG Neo 16 (A25) Owner's Thread

[ÊtaPegasus]

• Release date : May 2025
• 9th gen AMD HX Fire Range CPU (Ryzen 9 9955HX and Ryzen 9 9955HX-3D) - 16cores/32threads
• Nividia Blackwell GPU (RTX 5070Ti, RTX 5080 and RTX 5090)
• Up to 96GB DDR5 5600MTs non-ECC memory
• 2 NVMe slots (1x PCIe4 + 1xPCIe5)
• Full driver support for Win 11
• 16-inch display (IPS or Mini-LED) - 2560x1600 - 16:10 ratio - 300Hz
• All-metal (aluminium) chassis

 

Product page : XMG NEO 16 (A25)

Useful information : XMG PRO & NEO 16 (2025): Deep dive and on-going updates

Driver and Bios download portal (including Bios tuning guide and control center): XMG Downloads

 

This laptop is also compatible with the latest portable watercooler Oasis Mk2 to reduce working temps and fan noise while increasing power limits.

Power limits table for various configuration and performance profiles in Control Center :

A complete and thorough written review from notebookchek : Review

A shorter version in video : Video review

 

I'll try to post a review from the version i purchased (see sig) with some benchmarks later.

[ÊtaPegasus]

My system specs :

• Ryzen 9 9955HX
• 32GB DDR5-5600 Kingston Fury 
• Geforce RTX 5070Ti
• 2560x1600 - 300Hz - 500Nits IPS display
• 2x2TB Samsung 970 Evo Plus
• 330W power adapter

 

Impressions :

Positive

• Excellent build quality. Coming from a daily user of Dell Precision laptop (7550 at home and 7680 at work), the chassis feels very sturdy and even more "premium" than these workstation : All aluminium chassis, no flex on keyboard deck, no flex on the screen. Even compared to some recent gaming laptop i test (Lenovo Legion 7i for example) i find the XMG more polished (no pun intended).
• The display (eventhough i chose the IPS version) is miles away from the one i'm used to on the Dell lineup (FHD IPS) or even my desktop one (AOC 27 G2 - FHD IPS 144Hz). The brightness is way better, the color accuracy is excellent with pre-install color profiles, and i did not expect a high refresh (300Hz in dGPU only mode, 240Hz in optimus mode) rate panel to be this good even when not gaming.
• The performance uplift from my previous Dell Precision 7550 is, as expected, huge with almost double the performance. 
• The most striking thing to me is the cooling solution and associated thermal performance. While playing Metro exodus, in optimus mode, at native resolution, all settings in ultra, i can pull 140W on the GPU and up to 90W on the CPU and yet, the remperature stays below 80°C with the fan at around 60%. Comparing this to my Dell Precision 7550 in wich i had to cripple my CPU when gaming to obtain the same thermal (i7-10850h limited to 2,7GHz still at 75°C) i am genuinely impressed.
• 3x USB type A, 2 on the right side, one on the left side. This allow me to connect my wireless mouse, my cooling pad and my external drive for backup. That's a huge plus from my previous laptop.
• The keyboard layout is great with a better typing experience than on my Dell Precisions and no useless copilot key.
• The 330W power brick is smaller and ligher than the 240W one used in the Dell Precision and older Alienware system.
• The control center is so far stable and responsive, while allowing me to modify anything i deem necessary (fan table, power limits, ligthing, battery mode, etc...)
• The bios allow for CPU undervolting via PBO curve optimizer, ram tweaking with frequency and timing control. This reminds the good old day of the Alienware M17x R4!
• Sound quality is good and better than expected.
• Fan noise is really less annoying than on my Dell Precision. I did a test and force full blast fan on the XMG and the Dell Precision 7680 side by side, and the XMG fan noise does not have the same high pitch annoying sound.

Negative 

• The motherboard modular design gave me some trouble when intalling my SSDs. The daughterboard where mounted a bit close to the motherbaord and i had to unscrew all the left daughterboard to regain the millimeter needed to install my SSD.
• Issues with my bluetooth earbuds (JBL Wave Flex). Some time i have lags in the sound and it take few seconds to come back. I tried multiple drivers and couldn't resolve the issue. More annoying than really a problem since i can also plug my headphone in the 3.5mm jack.

Here is a TimeSpy benchmark (stock CPU, +350MHz GPU core, +350MHz GPU memory, optimus mode on, Overboost mode) : Timespy