MSI has achieved something a little bit special here and it's hard to find too many negatives for a laptop that is one of the early adopters of NPU technology. The CPU and GPU are some of the latest and most impressive available. The chassis is slimline and the display is ultra high definition plus. The only thing I couldn't stomach about this laptop was the price.
For
Next-level hardware
AI capabilities
Slimline build
Against
Early NPU technology
Battery life could be better
Why you can trust Creative Bloq
Our expert reviewers spend hours testing and comparing products and services so you can choose the best for you. Find out more about how we test.
Recent years has seen an explosion in laptops designed for creative professionals who have a penchant for gaming in their spare time. What would have previously required two laptops is now mostly being merged into one super powerful and great-looking machine.
These laptops are also increasingly boasting new AI and NPU technology which means we now have a best AI laptops guide here at Creative Bloq. The hardware required for gaming also makes them some of the best laptops for graphic design and photo-editing.
MSI has been right at the forefront of this growth, designing and manufacturing more laptops than you can throw a stick at. Not all of them are hitting the mark but boy are they hitting the jackpot with some of them.
The latest one we have got our hands on is the MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio A1V. It's powerful, good-looking, and will stand the test of time thanks to its build quality. Let's dive in and see more of where this laptop shines and whether it's missing any tricks.
MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio A1V: Key specifications
Swipe to scroll horizontally
Specs as tested
CPU
Intel® Core™ Ultra 9 processor 185H
Graphics
NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 4090 Laptop GPU
Memory
16GB*2, DDR5-5600
Screen size
16-inch
Resolution
4K (3840x2400 px)
Refresh rate
120Hz
Storage
2TB*1 NVMe SSD
Connectivity
4x Type-C, 1x Type-A, HDMI, microSD Card, 3.5mm audio jack
Dimensions
355.8 x 259.7 x 19.95 mm
Weight
1.99 kg
Design & Build
(Image credit: Future)
When I think of gaming laptops, I think of bulky blocks that contain great hardware but at the cost of portable design. The MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio A1V is different. At 1.99kg it's surprisingly light and with a 19.95mm ultra-slim body, you'll have no problems picking this thing up with one hand.
The chassis itself is made of a magnesium and aluminium alloy, which feels very much like plastic. It's okay but not as robust as I would have liked from a laptop that I knew I'd be moving around a lot. I could physically push in parts of the case and bend the display without any trouble at all. This is a laptop you'll want to take very good care of.
The problems with the chassis don't end there, unfortunately. Maybe it was just the one I had but it was incredibly 'creaky'. This noise continued to the hinge such that every time I opened or closed the screen I was affronted with the annoying noise.
(Image credit: Future)
Moving onto more positive matters. The design is classic MSI with the familiar font across the keyboard a gaming style back-lit keys that make you feel like you might be tripping. They've included a dedicated numpad and avoided my bugbear with laptops, they've put the trackpad in the centre of the whole keyboard. Thank you, MSI!
Almost 100% of the trackpad is responsive to touch and it's small enough to not require an unnecessary amount of finger or hand movement. There are also grippers underneath to make sure the laptop doesn't budge during use.
Continuing on a positive note, the Stealth 16 has an abundance of ports with everything you need for connecting accessories, and monitors. It even has an ethernet port. There are an abundance of grills on almost all sides of the laptop, ensuring a good level of airflow. I had no problems with excessive fan noise or overheating. That's impressive for such a high-performing laptop.
Features & Performance
(Image credit: Future)
I recently had my hands on the MSI Titan 18 HX, which was one of the best-performing laptops I've tested all year. The MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio isn't quite the same powerhouse but still performed incredibly well across all of our tests.
Considering many readers of Creative Bloq are creative professionals who need good rendering capabilities, we always put our laptops through Cinebench and Blender benchmark tests.
The former breaks the results down into CPU single-core, CPU multi-core, and GPU. The scores for these came in at 108, 684, and 17,255 respectively. These impressive results were backed up by Blender with the laptop scoring 86 for Monster, 59 for Junkshop, and 41 for Classroom.
These results demonstrate the Stealth's ability to deliver what's required for 3D artists. You can expect complex scenes to render quickly and efficiently no matter whether you're using CPU or GPU rendering. This laptop will also enable you to efficiently switch between the two rather than needing a dedicated laptop for each.
General CPU and GPU capabilities were tested using Geekbench. Single-core scored 2,447 whereas the same test but multi-core came in at 11,504. The GPU test showed how good the NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 4090 Laptop GPU really is. All types of creatives will be glad about that including graphic designers, illustrators, and photographers.
(Image credit: Future)
Swipe to scroll horizontally
MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio A1V: Benchmark scoring
Geekbench 6:
CPU single-core: 2447
CPU multi-core: 11504
Row 1 - Cell 0
GPU OpenCL: 160998
Row 1 - Cell 2
Cinebench 2024:
CPU single-core: 108
CPU multi-core: 684
Handbrake:
4m 18s
Row 3 - Cell 2
Blender:
Monster: 86.12Junkshop: 59.83Classroom: 41.96
Row 4 - Cell 2
Moving onto video editors. We were able to transcode a 10-minute, 34-second 4K video to 1080p in only 4 minutes and 18 seconds, which is an identical time to the Asus Zenbook S 16. Interestingly, that would be a great alternative to the MSI Stealth as they both deliver a similar level of performance.
A time of just over 4 minutes for the transcoding is very impressive indeed and guarantees that you won't be waiting around long for your videos to render. Thankfully I didn't have any problems with fan-noise and was grateful to be able to focus on my work.
In terms of battery life, the MSI Stealth follows a very similar path to most other laptops designed for creatives. Due to the heavy workload and demanding tasks it is put though, a laptop like this will need to be plugged in almost all the time, especially once the new-battery shine has worn off.
The MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio has all the hardware required to keep most modern day creatives happy. If you can stomach the price of the laptop then you won't be disappointed.
Price
(Image credit: Future)
The MSI Stealth is available in both the US and the UK. Take a sit down and make sure you're not eating anything before I run you through the prices. The US cost is $4,099.99 and the UK cost is £3,684.97. The laptop is not available in Australia.
You might wonder why it costs this much and who would want to fork out so much money for a laptop. These are great questions and when laptops cost this amount of money, it is our responsibility, as consumers, to do our research.
The MSI Stealth is a high specced laptop and for the price you are getting some of the best hardware available at the moment, especially when it comes to both the central and graphics processing units. Alongside the power centre there's also a lot of RAM, an UHD+ display resolution, and a refresh rate that gamers would die for.
If you have some savings set aside, and you want a future-proofed laptop then the MSI Stealth is a fantastic consideration.
Who is it for?
The MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio A1V is unashamedly a laptop designed for the person who needs a high-performing laptop during the day and a super nippy and responsive gaming machine at night.
This suits creative professionals right down to the ground, many of whom love to game as their main hobby. The laptop also boasts a nice compact and relatively lightweight chassis which makes it perfect for hybrid workers who need to be able to easily throw it into a bag.
More serious gamers will probably want to build their own dedicated machine but the Stealth 16 will certainly cater for a big middle ground of users.
This is for the all-out gamers who want better battery life than in previous-gen gaming laptops. Mind you, it works real nice for creative pursuits too.
A bulky gaming-first laptop with an unbelievably high specification. But remember, with great power comes great fan noise.
The Verdict
8.5
out of 10
MSI Stealth 16 AI Studio A1V
MSI has achieved something a little bit special here and it's hard to find too many negatives for a laptop that is one of the early adopters of NPU technology. The CPU and GPU are some of the latest and most impressive available. The chassis is slimline and the display is ultra high definition plus. The only thing I couldn't stomach about this laptop was the price.
Paul is a digital expert. In the 20 years since he graduated with a first-class honours degree in Computer Science, Paul has been actively involved in a variety of different tech and creative industries that make him the go-to guy for reviews, opinion pieces, and featured articles. With a particular love of all things visual, including photography, videography, and 3D visualisation Paul is never far from a camera or other piece of tech that gets his creative juices going. You'll also find his writing in other places, including Creative Bloq, Digital Camera World, and 3D World Magazine.
