Aftershock X11 Gaming Laptop Review

Aftershock is a Singapore-based company that makes gaming laptop, so unless you are into gaming, you probably will not heard of them.

About Aftershock

Aftershock PC, based in Singapore, is a team of hardware junkies, avid gamers and IT professionals with the sole goal of providing custom gaming notebooks with the highest performance. From assembling to testing your own beast of a machine, we will be there by your side to ensure that you get the system you love.

We believe that performance matters, and we tweak, test and benchmark every system to ensure that you only get industry-leading performance with an Aftershock.

Our mission is to deliver the best custom gaming notebook solutions experience in Singapore, and eventually Southeast Asia, and to help users build systems that will exceed their every expectation in performance and quality without having to shell out a fortune for it.

After playing around with many Ultrabooks, my first impression of the Aftershock X11 was, it was thick! As their target audience are gamers, Aftershock’s laptops are not competing in the area of size and weight but rather performance. Despite being thick, it weights only 1.7kg.

When you buy an Aftershock gaming laptop. It is build-to-order. Every component can be customized to you liking including and by default, it does not include any operating system.

The review unit that I got is the Aftershock X11 with base specifications and prices start from S$1,230.

Processor: 3rd Gen Intel Core i5 3210m (2.5Ghz – 3.1Ghz)
Graphics: Nvidia GeForce GT 650M 2GB DDR3
Memory: Kingston 4GB DDR3 1333mhz
Storage: Seagate Momentus 7200.4 SATA 3gb/s 500gb 7200rpm
Display: 11.6 Inch Glossy LED display (1366×768)
Wireless: Standard 802.11 B/G/N & Bluetooth
Operating System: Not Included
Thermal Compound: Arctic Silver 5
Warranty: 1 Year Aftershock Parts Warranty, 3 Years Aftershock Service Warranty
Dimension: 11.30″ (w) x 8.15″ (d) x 0.50″~1.46″ (h)
Weight: 1.7kg

Aftershock X11 - Back View — Aftershock X11 – Back View

Ports

Aftershock X11 - Left View — Aftershock X11 – Left View

1x Gigabit LAN Port
1x VGA Port
1x HDMI Port
1x 3.5mm Audio Jack
1x 3.5mm Microphone Port
2x USB 3.0 Port

Aftershock X11 - Right View — Aftershock X11 – Right View

1x Kensington Lock
1x USB 2.0 High Powered Port
1x Power Port

Aftershock X11 - Front View — Aftershock X11 – Front View

Power Indicator
Battery Charging Indicator
SD Card Reader

Aftershock X11 - Light Indicators — Aftershock X11 – Light Indicators

Thickness

Despite being 2-3 times thicker than the MacBook Air, the Aftershock X11 only weights 1.7kg. Booting into Windows 7 took me about 45 seconds.

Keyboard

The keyboard on the Aftershock X11 is not a full-size keyboard and the keys are too small for my liking, I keep misjudging the space between the keys when I typed. Having said that, the tactile feedback of the keyboard is pretty good. If the size of the key could be like those on the MacBook Air 11″, it would be perfect!

Aftershock X11 - Mute Key — Aftershock X11 – Mute Key

One other complain of the keyboard I have is the placement of the mute key. I have no idea why is it not placed beside the volume up/down keys since they are related. Many times when I wanted to mute the volume, I end up hibernating the computer.

Trackpad

I love the Aftershock X11 trackpad, the smooth textured feeling of it gives me pretty precise control over the mouse, though of course when you play games, you might want to use a proper external USB mouse.

Sound
The Aftershock X11 comes with THX TruStudio Pro Sound System producing clear and loud some when you are playing games. Among all the laptops I played with, the Aftershock X11 produced the loudest sound.

3D Mark/PC Mark Score
The Aftershock X11 scored a total of 2,288 points in 3D Mark 11 and 2,222 points in PC Mark 7.

CS Go - In-Game Screenshot — CS Go – In-Game Screenshot

Left 4 Dead 2 - In-Game Screenshot — Left 4 Dead 2 – In-Game Screenshot

Left 4 Dead 2 - Settings — Left 4 Dead 2 – Settings

When I played Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Left 4 Dead 2, all the settings are set to the highest and there was no lag in the gameplay at all.

Battery Life
The battery life is pretty bad for the Aftershock X11 since high performance laptops always put a drain to the battery life. I got about 3 hours of battery life when playing games.

Summary
If you are looking for a portable and reasonably priced gaming laptop, Aftershock X11 is for you. There are also bigger screens Aftershock Gaming Laptop available like the Aftershock X15 and Aftershock X17. The prices are pretty competitive to Dell’s Alienware.

Pros: