Eurocom Monster 1.0 11.6" Gaming Notebook Review

Performance Summary: Although the Monster will offer up excellent gaming performance with some older games, it's GeForce GT 650M struggled a bit in newer DX11 titles. In certain tests isolating CPU, memory and storage performance, it’s clear that Eurocom did a good job of selecting strong components (Core i7, 8GB of DDR3-1866 memory, Intel 520 Series SSD) to give the whole system a boost, and all around, benchmark scores were really goo, though not always impressive. Battery performance and portability, however, are two areas in which the Monster shines.


Eurocom is going for something here--a balance of performance, portability, and price--and although we like where this is going, the company just missed hitting the sweet spot yet. For starters, the $1605 price tag isn’t bad, but it doesn’t stop buyers in their tracks; they’ll likely shop around for potentially better deals on other systems. (For what it’s worth, Monster configurations start much lower, at $783, and Eurocom also offers a 10% off education deal for students.)

Further, although the CPU, memory, and SSD provide superb all-around performance, the GeForce GT 650M GPU held the system back somewhat in a few tests. For a small notebook on which users will sometimes play games, that’s no problem, but this is billed as a gaming notebook, and as we’ve seen, there will be some compromises when playing certain titles.

The design of the laptop itself could also use some excitement; it’s a simple black box with no lighting scheme or anything particularly attractive save for the two Eurocom logos, and the display didn't stand out. Although the multitouch touchpad is responsive, it's bumpy and rather uncomfortable, not to mention it gets hot when the system is running under a heavy load. That said, the finish does do an uncanny job of resisting fingerprints, and the build overall is solid yet light.

What the Monster really has going for it is true mobility in a gaming notebook. Most gaming rigs are obscenely large and heavy, making them “laptops” in name only. Only a few of the most hardcore gamers would bother to haul one of those things around on any regular basis. The Monster, by contrast, is light at under 4 pounds and is surprisingly small; instead of being terribly unportable, it begs to be taken along for the ride. Other shortcomings aside, Eurocom nailed that aspect of the Monster 1.0, and they’ll no doubt continue to improve upon the design and features in future generations.