EVOO Gaming Laptop Review: An Overpowered Sequel?
Purchase Price: $649
buy at walmart
An OVERPOWERED Sequel?
Here at The Sypnotix, we’re on a never-ending mission to find the best tech deals that squeeze out the best performance for the least amount of moolah. We’ve seen “flagship killers” from brands like OnePlus and Xiaomi but in 2019, Walmart released a new line of products called EVOO that included a gaming laptop frequently fluctuating around the $600 range. This wasn’t Walmart’s first attempt at an in-house brand as they struck a mix chord with the OVERPOWERED brand the year before. Seeing how I missed my chance with OVERPOWERED, I was salivating for an opportunity to purchase one of these lottery ticket machines. So I actually did for $649. This is my review for the 15 inch, EVOO gaming laptop that offers a surprising amount of power for a fraction of the cost.
The EVOO gaming laptop houses a 9th Gen Intel i7-9750H processor. It follows up that strong spec sheet with 16 GB of RAM and 256 GB SSD running Windows 10 Home. For a sub-$1,000 laptop, those are already rather impressive numbers. However, what makes this even more mind-blowing is that in the $600 price range, you won’t find any other laptop supplying you with this graphics card. Most laptops in this price range have a AMD Radeon RX 570 or something in that ballpark while EVOO has leapfrogged everyone with an Nvidia GTX 1650. That’s simply edging you to push this thing to the maximum 1080p gaming experience. While the age old saying that specs on gadgets don’t mean everything is true, one can’t help but get excited looking at those numbers selling for a meager $649!
It’s important for any good gaming laptop to have a solid screen. The 15 inch display on the EVOO is the right size for most gamers and also pleases the eyes with a full 1080p IPS display utilizing a 144 Hz refresh rate. EVOO really is throwing the kitchen sink at you in terms of numbers. 144 Hz is the magic number for a lot of gamers and it’s a feature many are willing to pay a premium for. Once again, $649 and we have it packaged with all the other superb spec numbers. I did notice a few viewing angle positions that were tricky to navigate with overhead ceiling lighting while playing certain games that had darker environments. Still overall, the EVOO impressed with its display.
A Solid Build With Some Cons
Also crucial in a gaming laptop is audio. While most of us plug in headphones to play games with, I don’t competitively game so I like to let audio roll in the background casually. The speakers on the EVOO gaming laptop aren't so great. The bottom firing speakers sound distant with limited bass and are often muffled by the extremely hard working fans cooling the laptop. I’d say the fan noise to actual speaker audio emitting is 4:1 in favor of the fan noise. The sad thing is I’m only exaggerating slightly.
Performance wise, the laptop also ran solid for my gaming needs. Even when the fan kicked on and the laptop started heating up, gameplay on my Steam library remained fluid and did not throttle. I was able to run games like GTA V with high settings at 1080p 60 FPS consistently. When it comes to gaming, I was not disappointed in the actual gaming aspect of it. What takes away from the enjoyment of the experience was the obnoxious fan noise. No one is suggesting a gaming PC or laptop shouldn’t make noise. That’s just a pipe dream for a lot of us. This laptop however takes fan noise to the next level. Sometimes just running Wallpaper Engine on the background with no other application was enough to get those fans pumping at full send.
One of the other critical factors when considering a gaming laptop is the keyboard. The EVOO gaming laptop has an RGB backlit keyboard that looks top quality in appearance from a distance. When you type on it though, the keys were a bit mushy with limited travel which I wasn’t a fan of. For the price, the keyboard is serviceable and some gamers may find it less of a deterrent than I did. The overall layout is rather well laid out, but left something to be desired. The directional keys formed a pyramid between the Right Shift and the Numpad. While they aren’t the only ones to compact the key layout like this, I actually felt like Walmart could have fit it properly by shrinking the Backspace and Enter key just a tad. Regardless, that’s just a personal gripe.
Plenty of Ports
Ports are also abundant on the EVOO as there are 3x USB-A ports, 1x USB-C port, a headphone jack, a mic slot, SD card slot, HDMI port and an Ethernet port. The laptop passes the infamous one finger test, which shows me that EVOO had some sort of design language planned when designing this device. While the laptop isn’t large, it can’t compare to the slim and compact design of something like the more expensive Razer Blade. Still, this is a very attractive and minimalistic design for a gaming laptop.
The EVOO gaming laptop also has a webcam on the bottom of the display. I find the placement awkward and while the quality is not the best, it isn’t something I feel most gamers looking for a laptop like this will lose sleep over. This transitions us into battery life. Overall battery life is not that great. This laptop cannot withstand a day of usage and even on standby mode, drains battery within hours. I would conservatively estimate that you can get about 4-5 hours playing a AAA-game at 1080p high settings.
Regardless of whatever negative things I can gather using the EVOO, I’ve been impressed with this feisty gaming laptop. If you can get your hands on one for under $700, this EVOO is hard to pass on and offers a strong gaming performance for a fraction of the price you usually find competing gaming laptops for. Seeing as there was no OVERPOWERED sequel, this is a worthy successor from Walmart.
Alex
Caught in between the conundrum of his fascination with retro and the future, Alex has a very unique taste in technology. Never one to follow trends like his millennial peers yet constantly desiring to get ahead of the curve, he sees technology like he does his other love: comic books. Always looking for the best value or a hidden gem, his collector mindset reflects on some of his favorite gadgets: the Moto X (2015), HTC U11 and the Google Pixelbook. If there’s a good tech deal out there, Alex is on the hunt!