As impressive and high-priced as the Asus ROG Strix G16 is, we will thus use this machine from edge to edge and beyond thus the numbers. It shall be thoroughly told what this laptop offers, and we would also like to ultimate answer the question: Is it worth the hard-earned cash?
We do have some semi-fancy packaging. There’s a little bit of graphics on the box, though the biggest change by far here is the fact that the box now opens vertically instead of horizontally. Once you open it up behind some protective packaging, here it is—the beast itself. But we’ll talk about this guy in just a minute. We also get a larger-than-life 330W charging brick, which makes total sense given the hardware we have, and then of course, you have a barrel-pin type charger.
Design and Exterior Features
Consistent with the design of ROG Strix, Asus has been doing it for many years now. It’s not a terrible thing in my opinion. For me, it seems quite cool. The front half, for example, is more traditional and conservative with linear design elements. However, you do have a very fancy RGB light bar at the front, which is fully customizable through software.
The design gets more aggressive towards the rear. For example, the vents have more protruding edges, and at the very rear side, you have a very aggressive-looking vent design, which are all real heat exhaust vents.
The top lid has a metallic exterior, but the rest of the body is plastic, which is a little bit of a letdown at this price point. There are weight implications, though. At its current configuration, this laptop weighs 5.12 lbs. An all-metallic build would inevitably increase that number.
Ports and Connectivity
On the sides, you have the DC charging port, an RJ45 port, an HDMI 2.1 port, two Type-C ports (one with Thunderbolt 4, the other with DisplayPort and Power Delivery), and a good old headphone jack. On the other side, there are two USB-A SuperSpeed ports.
The bottom side has a plastic finish and is one giant party of air intake vents. Given you have a tri-fan setup, this is all expected. You also have a bottom-firing speaker setup with speaker grills on either corner.
Keyboard, Trackpad, and Hinge
As soon as you unfold this laptop, you are provided with a generous amount of palm rest space, which is expected with a 16-inch device. Though I’m still not the biggest fan of the plastic surface finish, I suppose we can be more forgiving since it’s ultimately a gaming device with other priorities.
At the center, you do have a high-quality glass surface finish for your trackpad, and my goodness, it’s smooth and tactile. It feels really nice and crisp. The keyboard is definitely geared for a nice gaming experience with large keycaps. The font is translucent, which makes it a little harder to read with RGB lighting on, but since it has a full RGB palette, it’s not a huge concern.
Display
The display on this laptop is no joke. Asus did not hold back. You’ve got a high-quality 16-inch IPS panel with an impressive 2.5k resolution, a 16:10 aspect ratio, a fast 240Hz refresh rate, and a vendor-rated 3ms response rate. You also have built-in G-Sync certification, an anti-glare coating, and a peak brightness of up to 500 nits, giving you HDR certification. In the color department, things are equally impressive with a 100% DCI-P3 color rating and a 100% sRGB rating, making this laptop appropriate for creative activities like video or photo editing.
Performance
So let’s have a quick rundown of specifications: the default equipment of this laptop is Intel’s Core i9-9400 HX series processor, 32GB of DDR5 memory (with options for 16 or 8 GB), and an RTX 480 with a 12GB VRAM (optional upgrade to RTX 4070 with 8GB VRAM).
General performance is an absolute breeze while browsing the Internet, engaging in 4K streaming, and doing extremely high-end productivity tasks such as programming. If you’re into 3D modeling, the RTX 480 provides plenty of horsepower for complex tasks. For the most demanding activities like multi-layer 4K video editing, it performs exceptionally well, with little to no frame drops. The export times are ridiculously fast, making this laptop a powerhouse for high-end productivity.
Gaming Performance
Obviously, you’re buying this laptop for gaming, and the specs here are very beastly. Even the most demanding and unoptimized games run buttery smooth at the native resolution with DLSS on. We consistently saw well over 60 frames per second, without having to cut back on resolution.
For optimized games, like Doom Eternal, this laptop consistently runs north of 150 frames per second, nearly maxing out settings. More mainstream games like Fortnite can be fully maxed out, consistently achieving over 150 frames per second. For competitive games like CS:GO, you can easily utilize the 240Hz refresh rate, reaching over 300 frames per second, even at the 2.5k resolution.
Thermals and Noise
Intel processors aren’t typically associated with good thermals, but this laptop defies that notion. Under peak load, this laptop barely hits temperatures of around 42°C, cooler than many productivity laptops with lower-end Intel chips. During sustained load, it maintains around 38°C, which is quite impressive for a gaming laptop.
Fan noise isn’t too bad, either. Under peak load, it hits around 64-65 dB, but that number can rise a bit higher at times. Still, it’s manageable and impressive given the power this laptop delivers.
Upgradability
As for self-upgradability, this laptop offers two built-in DDR5 slots that can be upgraded to a maximum of 64 GB. It also has two M.2 PCIe Gen 4 SSD slots that support a 2280 drive. Additionally, the Wi-Fi system is modular, and you can upgrade to Wi-Fi 7 down the road.
Battery Life
The Asus ROG Strix G16 comes with a 90Wh battery, but given the demanding hardware, the general productivity runtime is about 5.5 hours. If you’re gaming without the charger, expect less than an hour of battery life, which is entirely fair considering the hardware involved. Who games without a charging adapter plugged in, anyway?
Audio
The speaker system is pretty underwhelming. You’ve got two speakers, but there’s not much oomph compared to other gaming laptops. Here’s a quick sound test for reference:
Conclusion
The price of this laptop will be typically around $3,300, which is definitely not cheap, yet a high-performance gaming laptop lives up to its promise- the ROG Strix G16. It takes the axiom of performance seriously, offering hardware potent enough to deliver good frame rates even in other resource-hungry titles while boasting a beautiful 2.5k display with a refresh rate of up to 240Hz.You also get impressive thermals and a wide range of ports with a design that screams gaming.
The biggest letdown would be the plastic finish on the bottom half, but overall, this is a great laptop that achieves its goals. If you’re looking for a high-performance gaming laptop with a substantial budget, I can wholeheartedly recommend the Asus ROG Strix G16. These machines last a long time, given proper care. Follow for more updates on Tech Education.
