Gigabyte was showing off its gaming ultrabook range at this year’s Computex and they were eye-catching to say the least. Fantastic specs combined with super long battery life make for real competitors in this area.

Our quick take

Gigabyte Aero 14 p

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Gigabyte Aero 14

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The Gigabyte Aero 14 leads these are nifty little workstations with a 3K 14-inch, QHD 2560 x 1440 IPS screen and a wide viewing angle.

It has a slimline design and while it’s not the thinnest ultrabook on the market at 19.9 mm, bear in mind that this is also a device designed for gaming. As such, its 1.9kg weight is attractive, and undercuts the Razer Blade, its obvious competitor.

The machine runs on an Intel Core i7 processor - 6700HQ - with Nvidia cards for gaming graphics, made up of a 3GB GTX 970M or 2GB GTX 965M. There is also Intel’s HD Graphics 930 on board and up to 32Gb of RAM. Two M.2 PCLe Nvme SSD storage solutions promise lightning fast read and write speeds.

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Pocket-lint

The keyboard is a backlit chiclet and there’s a Macro hub to the left for games duties. It’s a generous keyboard with excellent travel.

READ: Weird and wonderful tech of Computex 2016: Crazy gadgets and gizmos you must see

The matte finished trackpad is responsive and again well-sized. Gigabyte has popped the huge 94.24Wh battery under the wrist rest and although the models on display weren’t exactly blasting through anything hardcore, the Gigabyte rep assured us that this doesn’t lead to toasty wrists.

Gigabyte puts the battery life at up to 10 hours, which is pretty damn impressive for a machine with such power, and an important consideration when you’re looking for productivity potential too. 

You’ve got all the usual ports, including an SD card reader and USB Type-C. There are also three USB 3.0 inputs.

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Pocket-lint

The chassis is all metal and we have to say that it felt nice to the touch. There are three colours on offer – neon orange, charcoal grey and a rather odd vivid green. Perhaps they drew their inspiration from the similarly named chocolate bar? At least they are distinctive.

On a purely practical note the Aero has great specs and super portable weight and dimensions. If you’re keen to be able to enjoy a bit of gaming while you’re out and about (or pretending to be hard at work in the office) this could very well be the device for you.

The Gigabyte Aero 14 should be out around the middle of June and prices start at just over £1,000.

Keep an eye out for our full review when we get hold of one to play with later this month.