Customer Ratings & Reviews

Oh my, I used to have an Intel G16 2024 version, but this AMD refresh version does make a difference. The one point surprise me most is how cool and efficient this laptop is, unlike Intel version, it's fan often kick in for even light task such as Internet browsing. The battery seems to get a bit better but not very significant given how efficient the new horible naming AMD chip is. I could have given this review 5 start but my model have interet and Ethernet adapter failure, I have no chance to restore my wifi drivers so I ended up returning it. Not to even mention the pricing compared to how often Intel version get on sale.

Build Quality and screen is amazing and the laptop feels very snapy and is battery efficient. But i had some issues while launching and playing games the laptop freezes or hangs completely. Otherwise it would have been a 5 star

Great Amazing screen in the 2.5K sweet spot Great typing experience Great speakers Light for the size Very thin for the performance Aluminum chassis feels premium and strong No screen wobble unlike first generation Windows Hello via camera Full sized SD card slot Includes MUX switch Ports are further back than older generations Large, smooth trackpad Upgradable SSD and Wi-Fi card Truly silent in silent mode Surprisingly quiet even on Turbo Keyboard stays cool Not So Great Warranty service still controversial Diving board style trackpad rattles Keyboard backlight color and brightness uniformity issues Still uses heat pipe instead of vapor chamber Single zone RGB keyboard RAM not upgradable MediaTek Wi-Fi performance inconsistent No ethernet port Out of the box, the ROG Zephyrus G16 looks and feels premium even compared to previous laptops from Asus. What strikes you first is how thin and light it is for gaming laptop while feeling sturdy. Chassis and Ports 9.5/10 The aluminum has a matt finish which resists fingerprints. The edges also have a slight chamfer so they don’t dig into your arms when you are typing. The new slash lighting is more subtle than the previous AniMatrix. Charging is via a slim power adapter which is double sided and looks like an oversized rectangular USB-C plug. While it does support USB-C charging, Asus said they added this plug because pushing that much current via USB-C would require a much larger power brick and far worse power efficiency. While not ideal, the compromise is appreciated as the 200-Watt power brick is very light and compact. A nice change from older models is the IO is pushed to the back of the chassis away from where you might have your mouse. Both sides have one USB-C and USB-A allowing more flexibility of connections. The Wi-Fi and SSD are both upgradeable. Unfortunately, the current Ryzen AI 9 series is limited to soldered RAM by AMD. Thankfully the included 32GB should be food for many years. Screen 9.8/10 While other screens might be better on paper, this screen is the whole package. You get the best of both worlds with variable refresh rate and OLED and difference is immediately noticeable. On startup you just see the ROG logo on an inky black background instead of dark gray. Even better is colors look accurate regardless of if you are watching HDR content or playing a game. The 2.5K screen is also in the sweet spot of resolution allowing sharp text and visuals without overtaxing the GPU. Another bonus is the pixel arrangement of this OLED means text stays sharp without any odd fringing noticeable on some other gaming OLEDs which means the screen performs well doubling as a productivity monitor for school or work. The screen appears to be north of 500 nits with a mild anti-glare coating that maintains contrast. This translates to a screen that performs well in a dark room or well-lit room. Keyboard 9/10 The keyboard is single zone RGB. It also exhibits some backlight uniformity issues with certain keys being dimmer as well as some keys having a rainbow or off-white appearance when set to white. It isn’t horrible but it does degrade the premium feeling slightly. Thankfully this is only a minor downside as the rest keyboard is great. Keys have a good amount of travel and don’t exhibit any noticeable ghost with a fast response. I have more problems with poor activation in typing than gaming with laptop keyboards missing presses. This is the first keyboard that allows me to type comfortably without missing anything. I also type heavy and appreciate good dampening. While not at the level of a custom mechanical keyboard, it has very good landing with a soft thump at the bottom. The feeling is like a silent tactile key switch with a distinct activation point. This means the keyboard is well suited to both gaming and productivity work. Trackpad 7/10 The trackpad is a bit more of a mixed bag. The trackpad is probably the largest on the market on a laptop now. It’s comically large but it does mean you have plenty of space to set the tracking speed slower can still reach anywhere on the screen without lifting your finger. Reports coming from Asus were saying it would be a haptic touchpad which would have been great. Unfortunately, it is a traditional diving board trackpad. This works perfectly fine when using tap to click but if you need to drag and drop you will find the bottom of the keyboard had to reach and press. Palm rejection also can be inconsistent from time to time degrading the typing experience. Thankfully it works the vast majority of the time but every once in the while when typing you will find your cursor jumps to a random spot in the middle of typing. Speakers 9.5 While it is easier to get good sound out of a larger chassis, the sound from these speakers is still surprising. The two large speaker grills to the sides of the keyboard certainly help but the overall tuning of the speakers is one of the best if not the best. Others might have slightly more bass, but the overall result is well balanced and plenty loud. In fact, if you set Dolby in Dynamic mode people two rooms over will know exactly which game you are playing. Out of the box the tuning is good but can tuned to your liking via the Dolby software. This G16 is only the second laptop I have owned where listening to music without headphones felt like a viable option. Battery 9/10 The 90Wh battery is a good compromise between weight and battery life. Of course, if the system is set on Performance using the dGPU you are probably going to be looking for an outlet in about 2 hours but for casual use or gaming using the iGPU you should be able to manage at least 4 hours. Regular productivity work on silent eco mode I have not been able to get a good estimate of because the longest single stretch of usage was over 5 hours. Based on usage so far in this mode it wouldn’t be a surprise if the battery could last for 7-8 hours at minimum. Performance 9/10 I know some might wish Asus offered the G16 with an 4080 or 4090 but the overall compromise feels worthwhile to keep the chassis thin and light at the expense of a few FPS. The one area where the 4070 falls short isn’t really an issue with Asus but Nvidia and their decision to hamstring it with only 8GB of VRAM. There have been games where it felt like the card had more headroom but was running into the VRAM limit. Halo Infinite is an example. Plugged in on Turbo with the dGPU in Ultimate mode the system easily returned 76.2FPS Avg, 107.6 Max, 29.8 Min, 52.1 1% Low, and 1.7 for 0.1% lows. The game ran smoothly until it had to grab from system memory causing a sharp dip. The effect was harder to see in Forza as pushing the limits with all setting maxed out, native resolution, and DLSS off it could still achieve 61FPS overall in the benchmark but did have a stutter count of 27 and GPU limited percentage of 99.1% showing the CPU isn’t a bottleneck to performance. Trying Doom Eternal on Ultra Nightmare returned 105FPS Avg, 130.8 Max, 86.6 Min, 77.5 1% Low, and 24.2 0.1% Lows. Overall, in most cases the VRAM was the limiting factor before the CPU, GPU, or memory. The included screenshots also performance if you use the iGPU for extended gameplay on battery. While performance using the Ryzen 890M iGPU is only about ¼ that of the RTX4070 it has the benefit of using up to 16GB of system memory as VRAM. It has the opposite limitation in that you will hit the performance ceiling of the iGPU long before running out of VRAM. Just remember to change the VRAM allocation from the tiny amount AMD allocates by default. Cooling 9.9/10 Just like the Intel version of the G16 with the RTX4070, this version uses a heat pipe instead of a vapor chamber. Thankfully, it seems like Asus has done some reworking to this solution as the reports of the Intel version being loud and having a strange pitch from the 3rd fan don’t seem present in this version. In fact, in all the gaming laptops I have owned including several ROG laptops the cooling is by far the quietest. Even on Turbo mode with everything max out the fans are easily drowned out by the very capable speakers. Of course, the hot spot on the system in this mode would be uncomfortable on the skin the placement of the fans means you won’t feel it during gaming. The two main cooling fans are directly below where your hands rest on the keyboard, and you can feel air being pulled in from these areas actually giving a slight cooling effect. The major of the heat is shifted to the back center of the chassis just in front of the monitor and the center back. Both well away from your hands. Coming from older systems that tried to cook your hands this is a welcomed refinement. Wi-Fi 3/10 This was left for last so as not to ruin the rest of this laptop. Unfortunately, Asus keeps choosing MediaTek for the Wi-Fi solution and issues persist. First, sitting right near a Wi-Fi 6E access point it would choose the 5GHz band and not even full speed at that. Making matters worse it randomly disappears from Windows. Turning off all power management of the driver in Device Manager helps some this but overall, the card is main black mark against this system. Thankfully, it is replaceable and better options are relatively inexpensive. It would be the one upgrade purchase you should plan for if you get this system. Final Thoughts Asus did a great job of striking a balance between performance, versatility, and portability with the ROG Zephyrus G16 and it feels like a major upgrade from previous generations. Now if they could sort out the warranty controversy things would be perfect. If the ROG Zephyrus G16 is in your budget it is worth serious consideration.

KEY SPECS AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 CPU (12C / 24T) 32GB 7500Mhz DDR5 RAM 2TB NVMe SSD NVidia RTX 4070 GPU with 8GB RAM AMD Radeon 890M with 16 CU’s OLED 2560 x 1600 Panel with HDR and 100% Color Reproduction NVidia G-Sync and Dolby Vision Compatible PORTS 1x SD Card Reader 2 x USB3.2 Gen 2 Type A 1 x USB3.2 Gen 2 Type C with DP 1.4 and Power Delivery (NVidia GPU) Full-Size HDMI 2.1 Port 1 x USB4 USB-C with DP 1.4 and Power Delivery (AMD Radeon Graphics) 3.5mm Headphone / Mic Port INTRODUCTION Occasionally, a manufacturer will release a product in the same lineage as its ancestors but is so different that it can be considered revolutionary. The new ROG Zephyrus falls into this category. I have a ROG Zephyrus from only a couple of years ago and this ROG feels nothing like its predecessor. It is truly a new and revolutionary design. If you couldn’t see the logo or branding, you would never know the 2 were siblings. DISPLAY The G16 sports Asus’ new Nebula display. Quite simply, it is stunning. It has a native resolution of 2560 x 1600 and supports 100% of the DCI color spectrum. Something that is extremely important for content creators and photographers. The Nebula display is rated for 500 nits in HDR and supports Dolby Vision. It is Pantone certified and add to that amazing accuracy a 240Hz refresh rate and a .2ms response time and you have a display that looks and performs AMAZING regardless of your task. GAMING PERFORMANCE I’ve played several games on the G16 as of late. My two favorites for some time now are Call of Duty MW 3 and Forza Horizon 5. For those who have not experienced the ray-tracing goodness of the new Nvidia 4000’s cards, you really need to. Combine ray-tracing with this new OLED display and visuals are stunning. Especially, when you enable the Auto HDR feature. The oversaturated world and graphics just pop! My second go-to game is often MW3. Regardless of what people think of the game, it offers a good opportunity to test a panel’s ability to reproduce details in the darkest of scenes. Being an OLED, the G16 had zero issues. That is one of the best parts of an OLED display. They offer perfect black levels. Levels unparalleled by any other display technology. Having the power of a 4070 to play on changed the game for me. Even after playing the full campaign less than a year ago, the visual enhancements offered by the 4070 made the game feel new. The OLED panel produced shadow details I’ve never experienced before and with ray tracing combined with the performance of the 4070 produced details and intricacies I’ve never experienced before in the game. It made MW3 far more enjoyable. But how much power is really on tap for gamers? I used a USB-C to DP adapter to make sure I was getting accurate readings. There are 2 USB-C ports on the G16. One is linked to the 890M integrated graphics and the other directly to the RTX 4070 discreet GPU. I ran each test using my new LG Ultra Gear 49” 120Hz OLED gaming monitor. These are the results I obtained using both the integrated and discreet graphics using both FSR for AMD and DLSS for NVidia: Graphics Results AMD @ 2560 x 1600 AMD 4k 4070 @ 2560 x 1600 4070 @ 4k Forza 60 60 95 92 COD 48 17 108 59 F1 2023 58* 112* *F1 2023 was not tested at 4k as neither graphics chip could render playable speeds at 4k. Even at 2560 x 1600 I had to turn off all ray-tracing effects and lower the preset to High in order to make F1 playable on the RTX 4070. I was surprised at how well the integrated graphics performed. Forza was smooth despite locked at 60Hz and MW3 would have been passible should I have lowered resolution to 1920 x 1080. Forza numbers were obtained using the Ultra preset for both graphics’ chips. MW3 numbers were obtained using Max settings for the RTX 4070, but only balanced for the integrated 890M, as the extra graphical details paid a heavy price in the game. I have zero complaints about either graphics processor. Even the 890M plays well and is a decent option to the much more power-hungry 4070. The first laptop I’ve used that you can enjoy a game with integrated graphics instead of it ruining the entire experience. CPU The new Ryzen 9 is built on AMD’s new Zen 5 architecture. It is a low-power high performing processor containing what “the other” brand would call 4P cores and 8E cores. Just how well does the new 4nm Zen 5 hold up against the competition? For testing, I turned to Handbrake (my go-to for testing CPU’s). I took a 30 minute video recorded in 1080p and compressed it to 480p/30 using Handbrake’s HQ480p setting. Encoding times utilizing only the CPU for x.264 are: Zephyrus G16: 5:10 @ 174fps average Desktop i5-13400: 6:38 @ 141fps average ROG Zephyrus i7-14700KF: 3:32 @ 255fps average The little low-power AMD keeps pace and even pulls ahead of comparable desktop competitors. While I knew it would be no match for the woefully more powerful i7 in my desktop Zephyrus, it is an impressive feat for such a low power chip. Especially one that was able to maintain 100% CPU utilization throughout the test without thermal throttling. It did spike to 98C during testing but was able to maintain no more than 97C after. COOLING After reviewing several gaming laptops over the years, the one thing that winds up either killing the mood or shutting down the gaming experience all together is heat / noise. There are a lot of heat producing components shoved into a tiny space. I swear I’ve heard F-15's spinning up for takeoff that are quieter than gaming laptops. Often so loud, even noise cancelling headphones can’t keep out the whine. The new G16 is one of the quietest gaming laptops I’ve used to date. Yes, it still has fans (3 of them), but Asus has switched to liquid metal for heat transfer and has built the chassis into the cooling system. Yes, the G16’s CNC machined aluminum construction becomes part of the cooling solution. This is especially noticeable after a good, long gaming session taxing the RTX 4070. Those fps benchmarks from above? That 4070 was working VERY hard during all of my COD gaming at 4k. I went to pick up the laptop and almost dropped it. I was not expecting it to be that hot. The whole body was hot. That’s a unique solution to help thermals. I’m sure if I put the G16 on a good laptop cooler with fans blowing against the aluminum underside would help with thermals even more. Either way, the computer never lost its cool or thermal throttled during testing, but it was close, REAL CLOSE (some testing saw thermals hit 97C on the GPU). AUDIO Normally, I wouldn’t comment on audio in a laptop. They all stink. However, this is the best sounding laptop I’ve used to date. Markedly better than any other laptop from any other vendor I’ve tried. Audio reproduction is impressive for such a small package. Not only is there a sense of some bass (Asus claims a frequency response to 100Hz) the inclusion of Dolby Atmos tech gives a convincing, semi-realistic sense of surround sound. NEGATIVES Asus claims it doesn’t exist, but there is panel wobble. I don’t think it’s as bad as others around the interwebs have made it out to be. There is some wobble, but I haven’t found distracting, at least not yet. That may change. The MediaTek Wi-Fi chip. I’m not sure why Asus would choose to partner with MediaTek. This new Wi-Fi 7 chip is supposed to be great, but it isn’t. I’ve experienced spotty connections and even the chip reporting drivers not being installed after having been working perfectly for 3 hours. For this being a Wi-Fi 7 chip, I haven’t noticed any improvements in speed or performance, even using it in an MLO configuration, that I get from a Wi-Fi 6 chipset from MediaTek’s primary competitor. If there is one thing that makes this laptop feel cheap or half-baked, it’s the Wi-Fi card. Upgradability. I’m going to say that 2024 may very well mark the year of the end of upgradeable laptops. This G16 is one of the first. The only upgradeable parts are the SSD and Wi-Fi card (thankfully). The writing is on the wall. Shortly, users will no longer be able to swap or increase RAM. So much for saving a few bucks and upgrading RAM later at a far cheaper price than you can usually buy it for from the manufacturer. It’s going to be an all or nothing game. FINAL THOUGHT I’ve heaped tons of praise on Asus’ new shining star. It is well deserved. This is a revolutionary change for Asus, and they should be commended for their efforts. It’s got computing power to spare, excellent graphics power, long battery life, and runs much quieter than any other gaming laptop I’ve used to date. EVERYTHING (except the Wi-Fi) feels premium. From its all-aluminum construction, to its stunningly beautiful display, to its tasteful lighting. This is a great piece of gear and if you need a gaming laptop or the power of a gaming laptop, without the size and weight penalties you would normally get with a machine like this, The Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 should be on your very short list of options. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED

Lots of text, should answer most questions on product and next generation CPU/NPU. Shortened language to keep as short as possible. TLDR: 9.5/10 laptop with very little compromise. AMD RYZEN AI HX 370 CPU: - Hard to monitor exact temps, too new. Was getting less than 80C in all tasks including gaming. Usually less than 70C. Neat thing in Asus Armory where you can place Aura lighting on keyboard to Green/Yellow/Red depending on customized values of temps. Mine Green (less than 80C), Yellow (80 – 90C), Red (More 90C). Almost never saw red except for brief periods during loading. Never felt heat on trackpad or keyboard where hands sit. But top of laptop very hot as it vents through the back. - Performance is same plugged in vs battery. Beats Surface and M3 in single/multicore. However, loses to Intel 13900HX. But has significantly better battery life and retains performance when on battery over getting cut in half. I get about 2.5 hours max on my Acer Predator Helios 16 (13900HX, 32 GB DDR5 RAM, 4080). - 890M performance is better than Intel Iris Xe. Also, about 10% better than 880M based on other benchmarks I’ve looked at. - 50 TOP NPU: AI is still too early bird. Hard to test potential. Built in features outside of Co-Pilot is mostly gimmicky. Will have to see how this develops over time. As good potential in increasing power/performance in future. But not there yet. Not a reason to buy currently, should focus more on performance/efficiency. - CONCLUSION: Not the full win I wanted. As battery life not as good as competition. But performance on/off battery is great. A significant step in the right direction. As if this is the worst it is (as it is brand new, not fully released yet, and new architecture) firmware should improve in time. However, you never buy something with promises of what it will be only what it currently is. Cinebench R23 (Single/Multi) AMD AI 370: - Balanced Power: 1,901 / 17,964 (balanced in windows power + Armoury Crate Windows) - Balanced Battery: 1,911 / 19,397 (Balanced + Silent) - Performance Power: 1,949 / 21,532 (Best Performance + Turbo) - Performance Battery: 2,002 / 21,016 (Best Performance + Performance – Turbo N/A) - MacBook Plugged/Battery: 1,881 / 9,223 Acer Helios Predator: - Balanced Powered: 1,999 / 24,892 - Balanced Battery: 1,743 / 9,623 - Turbo Powered: 1,918 / 29,929 - Turbo Battery: 1,646 / 10,219 Cinebench 2024: - Surface 7 Snapdragon X Elite: - Balanced Powered: 102 / 845 - Balanced Battery: 104 / 755 - Max Performance Powered: 123 / 915 - Max Performance Battery: 122 / 926 4070 MOBILE GPU: - Mentioned Acer Predator Helios 16 (I9-13900HX, 4080, 32 GB RAM, 2023) because it is a normal size gaming laptop in similar price range that I own. 4080 at 2.5K is much better netting around 20 – 70 frames more with average of 37, which is significant. So, if looking for best gaming machine, should not go with a thin and light like this. As this doesn’t come with a 4080 option. However, from a holistic perspective this will beat most gaming laptops. - Nice thing about 4070, more frames per watt meaning better battery life, and less power usage when plugged in. - Disgusted with Nvidia as 8GB VRAM is not enough. Minimum should be 12 GB. Run into issues often with modern games at 2560x1600 (2.5K) (resolution of the display) leading to lower settings when shouldn’t with a premium GPU. Recommend dropping resolution to 1920x1200 in game settings as better for VRAM, lower temps, and about 10 – 30 frames more with almost no impact to visual fidelity (on a screen of this size). Also, that resolution is sweet spot for 4070. 2.5K is asking a bit much. - Ultra Settings at 2560x1600 resolution average is around 60 fps. Ideally, want to use High, 60 – 120 fps (average 80 fps). In Triple A games mostly 50 – 60 fps. Where with multiplayer usually getting 100 or more. My opinion 60 should be minimum for good time, ideally 80 – 100 fps or more. As nice buffer making it feel smoother with frame rate fluctuations. As OLED screen has such low latency you feel when you dip below 50 fps compared to other screens. - Max watts I saw was 112. Without boost 4070 is 105 watts so seems fully powered. - To note.10 – 20 FPS increase when I was plugged into an external monitor vs built in display. As getting 10 – 20 more watts to the GPU allowing for more fps. This wasn’t always the case, mostly with very demanding games such as Triple A Single Player Titles. - Average temps during gaming were 75 – 87 C. Recommend cooling pad as vents in bottom helps noticeably. But that was without and just tilting it allowing good natural airflow. When using cooling pad average 70 - 75 C and was getting more watts which sometimes translated to increased fps. BUILD QUALITY: - Stellar. 0.59” aluminum chassis has no flex, very smooth, looks/feels incredible. One of the best, if not the best built laptop I’ve tried. No screen wobble with typing. Only weighs 4.08 lbs. Is well balanced. Incredible at this size and power. Excellent cooling despite being so thin. Satisfying click when closing lid. Lip to open lid with single finger. Torx screws to open. RAM soldered. Additional full size M.2 SSD slot for a total of 2. SCREEN: - 2.5K (2560x1600, WQXGA), 16:10 Aspect Ratio, DCI-P3 100%, Pantone Validated, Supports Dolby Vision HDR. 500 – 600 nits brightness. Gets my mouth salivating just thinking about it. - Color accuracy, punch, blacks, whites, everything is excellent across the board here. Second best display in my house. Losing to Apple iPad Pro M4. - Dolby Vision works. All media, especially, well shot media looks incredible and a delightful treat. Especially, with the lights off. No black crushing. - Max brightness is great. Lower than 50% brightness you get flickering. But not above that. 16-inch screen feels just right. - Gaming is incredible. 0.2 millisecond response time. I didn’t know how much better gaming on an OLED was, but the difference compared to even top of the line IPS is staggering - Screen goes to about 140 degrees full tilt. Hinge stays in place where you put it. - Does not have variable refresh rate (outside of G-Sync). Only 60 or 240 in windows setting. But Gsync works by giving 960 frames to panel so brightness is consistent with lower frames. Super smooth and buttery. Love Gsync. BATTERY LIFE: - Disappointed, perhaps my expectations were too high. I wanted a thin-light gaming laptop that lasted all day. However, with normal use (YouTube videos, web surfing, writing documents, emails, etc.) I got about 4 – 5.5 hours. That was with low power mode, no dedicated GPU, 60 GHz, Bluetooth off, no fans, 30% screen brightness (but caused flickering making me wonder if higher brightness would be better to prevent flickering which may use less power). - Recharge time is quick with included charger, 90% in 1 hour. Full charge in 1.5 hours. Can use USB-C charger on both USB-C’s. However, get warning not providing full power. - I like the proprietary charger. Reversible. Plugs in nicely. Small and compact. Charging brick is small. 200 Watts. - Hoping to see improvement as time goes on. As so new. Snapdragon and M3 destroy this with no regard to settings getting 8 – 12 hours. - Lost 6% in 24 hours on standby (closing lid and leaving unplugged). I lose like 1 – 2% with M3/Snapdragon. TRACK PAD: - Huge. Made of glass. Very responsive, accurate, feels great, smooth, nice to use. However, with it being so big when gaming/typing I hit it a lot which can cause my cursor and screen to go crazy. Can turn off touchpad with shortcut keyboard key for gaming. Turning down sensitivity helped resolve cursor jumping. - Click force varies dramatically on position. No matter what moderate to severe. Slightly disappointed here. - Would’ve been perfect if haptic touchpad. KEYBOARD: - Good travel for a laptop. Making not as good for typing, but great for gaming. Not as crisp/tactile as I would like, slightly mushy but still feel a tactile bump. Still feels good/great to type on. Getting normal WPM at 130 – 160. Didn’t have to acclimate. Quiet to type/game on. Most standard keys are full size. No wobble. - Single zone RGB lighting. Colors accurate. However, not equal lighting (shine through) on some keys. Three levels of brightness. Gets very bright. - Power key not near delete key leading to no accidental hit. Like this. - Four macros on top. Love. No dedicated play/pause. Sadness. Can remap with specific options. Cannot remap other keys. - Can turn on/off FN lock. Love this. FN key shortcuts in general are great choices. WEBCAM: - Supports Windows Hello. Love. Works well. - Picture quality is average. Nothing to write home about. AI features do not appear to be working at this time. Which could help dramatically. - No shutter for privacy. - Microphone quality is great. Above average for laptop. CONS: - Would like more tactile keyboard. But still very good. - Trackpad maybe too big? As hard not to hit with palm. Causing cursor to jump and mistakes to be made. - Battery is not all day. 4 – 5.5 hours. - Expensive. - 4070 is a disappointing graphics card generation comparatively. Nvidia’s fault. Best for 1080p over 2.5K. - Mediatek WiFi card sometimes stops working so I have to restart PC. Also, doesn’t perform consistently. Sometimes slow to connect. They should drop them and go with a better one. - Soldered RAM. - Webcam picture quality is average. No built-in shutter to close. - Wish normal windows setting had variable refresh rate (1 - 240 Hz)

Asus has always had a special place in my heart. Not always for the right reasons (a CPU socket that broke off the board), but for the past 20 years or so, the company has been producing some of the best computer components, systems and accessories on the market. By sourcing in-house, Asus has been able to fully take control of what goes into their hardware. So it shouldn't come as a surprise that the Zephyrus G16 is packed full with Asus tech and know-how. Let's dig in and see what this bad boy can do. Hardware The specifications of this variant of the Zephyrus are quite impressive: OLED screen, Ryzen AI CPU and a solid RTX 4070, along with 32 gigs of DDR5 RAM and a 2 TB SSD all jammed into a gorgeous package. It's hard to believe that Asus has been able to pull this off and still keep the thickness of the Zephyrus to about 1 inch when closed. The laptop is nothing less than stunning, with a decent amount of ports and connections and a pixel display on the back of the screen. The keyboard is of course ARGB and is very responsive and I do like the idea of the main speakers flanking the keys on each side, even though it meant cutting out the keypad. The airflow seems to work well, even when gaming on the highest performance settings and it *can* get loud, but it seems Asus found a working solution to keep the CPU and GPU cool without causing too much noise. It's also worth mentioning that the track pad is huge and very comfortable to use, even if it won't replace a mouse when gaming. The CPU is a brand-new model from AMD. It is actually the first time I got my hands on a Ryzen AI CPU from the 9 HX300 series. It packs a total of 24 cores and comes with a built-in graphics solution (RX 800M series) as well as a dedicated chip to handle AI tasks. I ran a good number of tests and it outperformed my Core i9 Ultra more than once, especially in games that required a hefty CPU (Starfield, Ark, Fallout 4 just to name a few) to keep up with loot drops and other CPU intensive tasks. All in all, I believe it was a clever choice as it will be more than enough to run your games or software at the highest speeds for the next 2 years to come (if not longer). The integrated graphics can be used when running on battery, which cuts the power draw from the dedicated GPU. The GPU is a NVidia RTX 4070, but not the desktop model. It does share a lot of specifications with its desktop counterpart, but it has a lower TDP and 8 gigs of VRAM. It's a bit on the lower end as most demanding AAA games now require at least 8 gigs of VRAM, 12 being better and 16 gigs pretty much gearing towards being the new standard. It still can deliver excellent performance, but it can be constricted by the lower amount of VRAM, which causes sudden stutter if there are many textures to load/unload. It does run everything at very high or ultra between 70 and 120 FPS in most cases. Modern Warfare runs at native resolution with ray-tracing on normal at about 170 FPS. So, it's not a potato as it supports all of NVidia's AI frame generation technologies and other performance enhancing techs such as DLSS, DLAA, and more. But if it was equipped with more VRAM, it would be able to give gamers a bit more breathing room for the next few years to come. This Zephyrus comes with 32 gigs of DDR5 RAM. The memory chips clock speeds are in the mid-range but it's more than enough to run everything from games to content creation software, not to mention Windows 11 itself which is at its best on 32 gigs and up. In terms of storage, you get 2 TB (and you can add more if necessary) on a SSD. It's worth mentioning that this is pretty much the least amount you need to be able to store games and content alike. Seeing as most major game releases require anything between 100 and 200 gigs (sometimes more), you might have to consider adding more storage later on. I do salute Asus for not cheaping out and leaving us to drown with less storage space as other manufacturers do to save a buck. 1 TB is simply not enough anymore for a gaming laptop. Now, my favorite part is the gorgeous 16" OLED screen which rocks a 240Hz max refresh frequency. I have to admit that no other laptop I own sports such a great screen. It is G-Sync compatible which allows the GPU to deliver frames at a brutal pace. Everything is smooth and crystal clear. Deep darks contrast with brilliant and vivid images. Nothing compares to an OLED screen in terms of visual quality at this point in time. There are new types of screens coming out soon, but there is no real way to tell if the difference will be that big or how much it will drive the prices up. I think Asus chose wisely. The only real issue might be the glare that can be a bit of a nuisance as the screen surface is glossy. Finally, getting to the end of the hardware check, we have the power supply which is surprisingly small for such a powerful laptop. It fits easily in every bag or sleeve. Software Asus knows that gamers like to tune games to their likings and their needs. Windows 11 is pre-installed and the Zephyrus manages to boot to the login screen in less than 5 seconds or so. It might get a bit longer to load once you've installed some other software, but it still is very fast. As with all other Asus gaming laptops and devices, Armor Crate is the nerve center of your device. It allows to monitor, adjust and modify almost every aspect of the Zephyrus G16 with a superb interface. I was already acquainted with Armor Crate through my ROG Ally, so it didn't take me long to get around. I do encourage everyone to use it. One thing that stood out to me was the NVidia driver setting when I started running the laptop: It used the Studio version of the driver - which is aimed at content creation - by default. It's not a deal breaker as it's rather simple to switch to the regular, gaming oriented driver package. An odd choice, but it did allow me to test video and image editing software (the latter using AI) and the speed at which it performed the demanding tasks was excellent. Verdict This Asus gaming laptop comes with a rather high price tag, but it's very much justified. Be it the slick design, the low noise, the magnificent screen or the hardware powering this beast, the Zephyrus G16 is a solid and fast gaming laptop which doubles as a content creation platform. Even if the battery life can be rather short when gaming with the dedicated RTX GPU, it can run longer by switching to the less powerful but still very capable AMD iGPU. The slim format makes it easy to carry around and isn't as heavy as most other solutions from other manufacturers. I can only recommend this iteration of the Zephyrus, as it's one of the best gaming laptops in its class. Excellent work, Asus!

The Asus G16 does what very few laptops have ever come close to doing and that is being something that everyone from a normal user to an enthusiast to a professional can use daily without looking like an enthusiast or a professional. Enthusiast: • Performance: The G16 is excellent when it comes to raw power needed to run games or coding or using intensive programs. The new AMD CPU is leaps and bounds above anything else in the x86 market in terms of power and power efficiency. There was nothing that I threw at this laptop that it could not manage (exporting video projects/ 30 tabs in browser/using DJ software). I was able to play all games without any hiccups and since it’s running everything natively, I did not need to worry about programs not working. The 32 GB of DDR5 memory is perfect for most people today for the most extreme task and makes the G16 future proof, my configuration had 2 TB storage which is more than enough for my needs. Asus did a great job with the cooling, the thermals were great and the laptop wasn’t hot to the touch nor did I hear the fans kick on at all (unless doing extensive task). Now once I picked the laptop up and put it next to my ear I could hear the fans were going but there was barley any noise at all. I think the biggest performance upgrade comes to the APU, I was able to play most games above 30 FPS without any issue (getting 47 FPS while playing Like a Dragon: Ishin while running on battery). • Looks: The G16 has a premium look so you can take it anywhere and at the same time you can add some flare for the gamers out there. The RGB keyboard is great for those that prefer it and the light strip in the back not only lights up in different patterns but can be adjusted to match your unique style. Professional: • Battery life: The G16 has excellent battery life, I was getting 10% battery lose an hour while watching videos at 60% brightness. This helped me get 9 hours and 20 mins of battery use which is excellent, most battery test are done with brightness at 20% to get 12 to 15 hours of use. Now I did turn the brightness down to see if there was any changes but sadly I got less of a run time of 9 hours and 15 mins. There is a software bug that Asus needs to address with an update and once that’s done I’m sure the G16 will easily be able to get over 14 hours of battery life if not more. The G16 preforms very well on battery, I noticed anywhere from 8-13% performance loss on batter as opposed to plugged in depending on the task/program. • Connectivity: The G16 has all the ports you will need so there is no need to carry a dongle. There is USB A/C/ USB 4/ HDMI 2.1/headphone jack/SD reader and a proprietary charging port which should be enough for 99.9% of people. Speaking of connectivity the Wi-Fi card is great, for context I have the G14 from 2 years ago and I had to change out the card for multiple reasons. The new Wi-Fi card works great, and it was always connect by the time laptop screen was opened. I have had no issues with dropped signal or not connecting and there is no slow down in the Wi-Fi speeds when connected to a Bluetooth devices as there was with previous MediaTek Wi-Fi card. I didn’t get a chance to use Wi-Fi 7 as my routers support Wi-Fi 6E, the speeds for Wi-Fi 6E were solid hovering around 800 down with my 1GB service. • Fit/Feel: The G16 feels premium in every way with its soft corners and magnetic closing lid. There are no sharp corners anywhere, you can’t even feel the speaker holes if you run your fingers across them. The Platinum white color does not have many fingerprints on it so you’re not having to clean it to get rid of smudges. While it is a 16-inch laptop it doesn’t feel like it, the weight distribution is perfect, so it feels more like the G14 that I have. Normal user: • Screen: For your everyday user one of the biggest things is the screen and the G16 has the best screen of any laptop on the market. It’s an OLED so you get stunning colors and the inkiest of blacks. The brightness of the screen is great as it can reach over 500 nits’ in HDR and over 400 for SDR. The screen also has an antiglare coating, so it reduces the reflections from surrounding lights. Not only is the screen stunning to look at its perfect for gaming with high refresh rate and low latency. The color accuracy is also perfect for editing photos and videos. • Sound: Another thing that most everyday users will love are the speakers, Asus has fitted the G16 with a total of six speakers which includes 2 dual woofers. The highs/mids and lows sound exceptional, I was not expecting such sound quality with the laptop being so thin. Asus also has Dolby Atmos support which just adds to the viewing experience and makes watching content a pleasure. Issues: • One of biggest issues with the G16 is the trackpad, don’t get me wrong it registers clicks perfectly fine and all the gestures work along with it being big enough and placed in a great location, my only issue is that it just doesn’t feel as good as a haptic trackpad. • The keyboard on my G14 had the best keys of any laptop out there, it had the perfect amount of bounce back when pressing the keys and the G16 has taken a step back from that. The keys have much less bounce back and that took some getting used to. • The waking from sleep still does not work correctly. At times the laptop will stay asleep for 5 hours and wake once I open the lid and at other times, I had to push the power button to wake it. • The laptop does get hot when charging near the screen area, so you’re not really feeling the temp while typing. • The mux switch changing from one GPU to another always causes a little bit of a screen flicker. Overall, the G16 is one of the best laptops in the market that blends power with style and is future proofed ready for AI capabilities (if/when they arrive). There are very few shortcomings and most of these will be fixed with software updates (as is my experience with my G14). I would recommend this to anyone in the market above any other laptop out there.

If you are looking for a lite weight gaming laptop that can also handle any work/video/everyday processing needs this is worth a look. The design is sleek at .56 height x 9.69 width x 14 inches deep weighing in at just over 4 lbs. This is almost .5 lbs lighter than my current 16-inch gaming laptop. The OLED screen with 2560 x 1600 and 240Hz response is fantastic and has little to no reflection. A very thin bezel with connections on the side contributes to the laptops thinness. The keyboard is “interesting” I really like the feel of the soft touch keys but the keyboard itself is about 25% smaller than my other 16-inch gaming laptop. This is due to the very large touchpad as well as having the speakers on each side of the keyboard. The large touchpad (centered on laptop) while very tactile did make it a little difficult to use the keyboard, for me. Also, I had trouble seeing the white keys functions when backlit – may just be my old eyes but preferred the lighting off. AMD Ryzan AI 9 HX 370 with 12 cores, 24 threads @ 2GHz processor and Radeon 890M onboard graphics. 2TB SSD looks to be Micron 2230 mtfdkba2t0qfm-1bd1aabgb PCIe 4x4. Crystal Disk score was acceptable at 5055 MB/s read and 3953 MB/s write speeds. 32GB LPDDR5X at 7500 MHz is fast. But it looks like it is soldered in. #@GB should be more than sufficient any processing needs but if there is an issue with memory – you can’t replace it Power in on left side 1 HDMI 2.1 connection on left side 1 USB-C 4 Gen connection – 40Gbps with power delivery on left side. 1 USB-A 3.2 Gen connection – 10Gbps on left side. 1 Headphone/Mic jack on left side USB-C 3.2 Gen Display Port/Power delivery on right side. USB-A 3.2 Gen 10Gbps on right side. SD card slot on right side. Why not micro-sd so card does not stick out? Wireless is 802.11be (wi-fi 7). I have wi-fi 7 mesh and connected using 802.11be with no issues. No issues running Minercraft (grandsons love it I don’t play), Assetto Corsa and Automobilista 2 (which I do play). There was no stuttering, etc. In PCMark10 GPU testing this units NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40708 (with GB GDDR6?) I was surprised at the somewhat low 18 fps. This was a tad better than my current gaming laptop with Radeon RX 6800S but very far behind my Asus Gaming desktop 197+ fps with Nvidia Geforce RTX4070 Super (which is to be expected). However, its Cinebench score of 11261 was very high as current gaming laptop scored 4600. The area between the top ff the keyboard keys and the top edge got very warm during my GPU tests but was much less during my gaming. I personally don’t use ray tracing but GPU is certified. It does support HDR. I always test running 2021 Adobe Photoshop and Premier (video) Elements editing - which was very fast as is moving files, doing word processing, excel, etc. as well as multi-tasking. Has NPU so has built in Copilot button. Comes with Asus specific software Armory Crate, Aura, etc. to allow for tuning and setting up colors, etc. to your liking. Speakers – Not sure of wattage but 2 x 2W is standard for laptops. Having them firing up on either side of the keyboard does give good separation, if not an immersive experience. Power cord over 6 feet with reasonably sized inline block. I have a USB-C 100W charger and was able to charge using that as well. So, you can leave the brick behind… No Thunderbolt port as it seems Thunderbolt is licensed by Intel. No ethernet connection. 1-year warranty. While not user upgradeable/fixable it is sleek and has enough connections/power for pretty much any use. The keyboard, while small, feels great using. I am not sold on how the white will wear/look over time, but it stands out now from the black/grey crowd. I am also concerned about the machine getting so hot during my tests – but in playing my games it was considerably cooler. Also, mine arrived with a little nick in the top edge of the keyboard (hardly noticeable but wanted to mention). Overall, a nice package I rate at 4.5 and I would recommend giving it a look.

I do everything on my PC’s from gaming to relaxing and unwinding, video editing, emailing all the time, voice-over work, photo editing, VR…I mean everything. I need the power and performance plain and simple and I don’t want to (nor should you have to these days) spend 5k on a pc. The ASUS - ROG Zephyrus G16 16" OLED brings the muscle and fits the bill perfectly. Whenever I get a new PC I like to run it through the benchmarks. Nothing crazy, but just a nice benchmark like “UserBenchmark”. ROG Zephyrus G16” was off the charts. But the real test is getting up and running and seeing how it handles the job. Steam was my first download! I also absolutely love the Amoury Crate app! Talk about useful and very functional. You can trick out lighting and keyboard and set up performance profiles. So cool. I went with a cool white on my KBD to match the white athestics of the unit. Speaking of aesthetics… ROG Zephyrus G16 16” is one of the most sleek and striking pc I’ve owned. Really a smooth looking machine. I started with VR, I have played Half-Life Alyx many times but it’s like my benchmark for VR. The ROG Zephyrus chewed through it like a hot knife in butter. Moved on to another one of the power-hungry VR experiences, Google Earth. This builds the world digitally in front of you. I love how quickly the ROG Zephyrus rendered and I was flying all over the globe effortlessly. For VR…This unit is an absolute winner. Went through my Steam library and hit my favorites, Cypherpunk, PUBG: Battlegrounds, and Rust. They all looked amazing and ran smoothly. They should, the AMD Ryzen AI 300 Series, 32 GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070, 2Tb ssd HD, and a gorgeous monitor…AMAZING! One thing that really surprised me was just how lightweight this beast is considering the hardware on board….just a few years ago these gaming laptops were boat anchors and sounded like jet’s taking off….not so with the ROG Zephyrus 16”…. It is quiet. Now the fan can kick on but look at the bottom of it and you can see how they keep it cool. Plenty of ventilation. That’s another thing… it runs pretty cool. The on-Board sound is really quite impressive as well…although a good pair of headphones are the way to go for sure. But if you don’t want to have them on your head…you will not be disappointed with the audio. As a gaming machine, this one is a gonna be hard to beat…unless you have stacks of cash just lying around with nothing to spend it on. In my experience, If a PC can high-end game…there is nothing it can’t do and same with this amazing computer…. Adobe CC and especially Adobe Premier Pro rendered files like lightning. Another thing that was kind of cool was the Copilot feature in the new windows. Really quite handy with schoolwork… This AI stuff is really going to change the world and you get it at your fingertips with this amazing unit. Beautiful screen, incredible hardware, AI, great onboard sound, nice big mouse pad, lightweight, low heat, low sound….the win column stacks up for just an absolutely gorgeous beast of a PC!!! The only slight “Karen” complaint I have …is you will need to keep the power chord with you. It is a super powerful PC and it needs to be fed! But I would rather have the light weight plus on a gaming laptop it is always better to have it plugged in for max power settings.

This new model variant of the ASUS ROG Zephyrus G16 is a high-performance gaming laptop that strikes a perfect balance between power and portability. This machine offers impressive specs for both gaming and content creation. While it faces competition from other premium gaming laptops like the Razer Blade 16 and Alienware M16 R2, the Zephyrus G16 stands out for its sleek design, excellent display, and overall value proposition in its price range. The ASUS ROG Zephyrus G16 is not just a powerhouse, it's a sleek and portable one. Crafted with a platinum-white aluminum chassis, this gaming laptop combines durability with portability. Weighing just 4.3 pounds and measuring a slim 0.59 inches in height, it's a stylish companion for your professional and gaming needs. Its premium build quality and understated aesthetic set it apart from more garish gaming laptops, adding a touch of style to your gaming setup. The display of the ASUS ROG Zephyrus G16 is not just a screen, it's a window to stunning visuals. Boasting a 16-inch OLED panel with a resolution of 2560 x 1600 and a 240Hz refresh rate, it delivers visuals with vibrant colors, deep blacks, and excellent contrast ratios. The screen supports Dolby Vision HDR, enhancing the visual experience for gaming and multimedia tasks. Powered by an AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor and 32GB of LPDDR5X memory, this laptop delivers exceptional performance for both gaming and multitasking. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 GPU with 8GB GDDR6 memory ensures smooth gameplay and supports advanced features like ray tracing. Storage is ample with a 2TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD, providing fast boot times and quick access to data. While not the most powerful in its class, the Zephyrus G16 offers a balanced performance profile catering to gamers and content creators. Compared to rivals like the Razer Blade 16 and Alienware M16 R2, the Zephyrus G16 offers a compelling balance of features and value. While the Razer Blade 16 boasts higher performance with its Core i9 14900HX processor and increased GPU TDPs, it comes at a significantly higher price point, costing $900-$1,000 more. The Alienware M16 R2 provides higher GPU power but uses an IPS panel instead of OLED, which is also pricier. At around $2,300, the Zephyrus G16 stands out for its excellent OLED display, balanced performance, and sleek design, making it an attractive option for those seeking a premium gaming experience without breaking the bank. Overall, the ASUS ROG Zephyrus G16 is a versatile gaming laptop that balances performance, portability, and premium features. Its standout OLED display delivers stunning visuals with vibrant colors and deep blacks, enhancing gaming and content creation experiences. The sleek aluminum chassis and understated design make it suitable for professional environments while offering gaming prowess. While it may not top the charts in raw performance compared to some bulkier competitors, the G16 provides solid gaming capabilities with framerates consistently above 100fps in 1080p for most titles. The laptop's excellent speakers, comfortable keyboard, and large touchpad further contribute to its appeal as an all-round entertainment and productivity device. I highly recommend this gaming laptop if you are looking for premium quality hardware with solid performance at around half the cost of the competition.

TL:DR - The sound, the display, the form factor, the build quality, the styling, the battery life, basically everything except the performance is TOP NOTCH. I ABSOLUTELY LOVE this laptop!!! It’s so good! I can’t recommend it enough! —- Now when I say “everything but the performance” I don’t mean it’s bad, it’s just I wish it was more than what it is. To elaborate, it’s only (and I’ll throw only in quotes “only”) 105 Watts and when I game, it steems to hit 90-95 consistently. I’ve seen it go to 100 but it rarely stays there.This is even with a laptop stand providing additional clearance from the table top surface. What does that mean for performance, well I’d get around 60 FPS at 1600p in Star Wars: Jedi Survivor on custom graphic settings with ray tracing off. If I wanted to use High preset, I’d get 50s, and if I used medium, I’d get above 60. But lowering shadow details to medium and a couple others, 60 without issue. I could have used Frame Generation, but with that game in particular, it had hitches that bothered me, but I was in the 80s-90s with that setting on. All that means for me is I can’t just simply throw it on Ultra graphic settings and move on. I kind of have to think about it for some games and tweak the graphics settings. For the most part though, I can just throw it to High (instead of Ultra) and be good. Star Field with it’s weird resolution scaling when set to Ultra, works fine! I didn’t have to tweak that at all. XDefiant and any real eSports style game also had no issues with Ultra. Long story short in performance, it does play games and a lot of them at High and Ultra, but some games you may have to drop the resolution like RTS or some city builders if you have a lot going on on the screen. Speaking of dropping the resolution… no obvious degradation. I think this may be because it’s OLED, but it could be also related to the resolution being 16:10. Not sure there, but other laptops going outside native resolution, there’s like an increased level of softness that I didn’t notice here. I want to talk about the display some more! It’s so beautiful! I left the screen on for like three hours without realizing it, and it didn’t sleep because Steam kept it on. I immediately panicked and thought I burned in the screen! I looked it over on various full screen colors; from red, gray, green and yellow. No burn in, in sight! So to me that means it has some sort image retention mitigation going. Which is nice for a laptop. The colors, the speed and refresh rate, the brightness are all top notch. I do have an issue where the image gets really grainy at lower brightness levels, but my wife couldn’t see it. So maybe that’s just me. I also want to gush about the sound and the speakers. Most laptop speakers are just bad in my opinion, minus a very small few of them. Asus I think may rival or beat all of them especially with Dolby Atmos enabled. Seriously in XDefiant, I got some spatial awareness with it on. It wasn’t mind blowing like some sound bars, but it was good! I didn’t feel like I was at a disadvantage using them. Sure headsets would be better, but no not bad at all! I also loved music and shows coming out of this device. When watching shows, the fans are darn near silent and the sound really shines. During gaming the fans are there, but I don’t think they’re out of control loud! The build quality is fantastic, the styling is what I like the most! I don’t feel weird bringing this to work, coffee shops, or busting it out on the train when I don’t want to drive to work. It belongs to a mature gamer! The slash lighting is a bit out of control out of the box. I threw mine on static and left it there. It turns off on battery, and that’s all I need. I do wish the slash lighting indicated the battery life some times. Not sure if I missed that setting somewhere, but feels like a missed opportunity. Some other additions were the new CoPilot button on the keyboard, it didn’t do much for me other than open CoPilot. I did toy around with paint a bit and edited some photos in MS photos, but I didn’t think the inclusion of “AI” in the Ryzen processor did much as of right now. Paint added me to a waitlist, photos seems like it did everything a non-AI processor would do, and there was a quick button to throw it online for additional editing which doesn’t do anything for a local NPU/AI processor. And I seriously considered removing a star from my review because it DOESN’T HAVE A PRINT SCREEN BUTTON!!!!!!!! Seriously why? I get it has a screen capture button, but for those that use Snagit, or any other screen capture software that isn’t Microsoft, is gonna be let down here. I jest of course, but that annoyed me! I just changed my bindings to Cntl + Shift + C. Overall, good sound, decent performance, amazing screen, amazing battery, etc. It really is the whole package for Windows laptops, let alone gaming laptop! I’m super happy with it, and I imagine you will be too!

I have been using ASUS products for years and I have always had good luck with them. My daughter has an older ROG laptop that she never gives a moment to rest, and it has been very reliable, but she couldn't use it to play some newer games... it was time for a replacement. After using this new ROG laptop for a week, I am not sure I want to give it to her... it is the best laptop I have ever used. The light weight, quiet fans, awesome screen, large storage space, and performance are a perfect combo. The AMD Ryzen 9 processor and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 GPU is a powerful combination and can easily play most games on higher quality settings with ray tracing (RTX) enabled, although a few tweaks might need to be made to get the frame rate wear you want it. My daughter loves all the Five Nights at Freddy's games, and we recently got a Meta Quest 3 to play the VR versions, but only my liquid cooled tower could play them reliably until now... the ROG G16 maintained over 70fps for hours of playing Five Nights at Freddy's Help Wanted 1 & 2 on the Quest 3. Some other games I have tried (using Turbo performance mode): Metro Exodus Enhanced (~100fps - RTX ON, high quality), Mech Warrior 5 (~70fps - RTX ON, high quality... w/RTX ON the frame rate sometimes drop to ~45fps; RTX off fps ~200fps on ultra), Fortnite (80fps, RTX ON, high quality preset... playable on epic, but fps are low at ~30-45fps), FNAF Security Breach (~70fps, RTX Medium, ultra quality, 1080p), Quake II RTX Demo (70fps, RTX, max quality), Doom Eternal (I know it is old...max quality, ~200fps). Pros 1. Future proof specs and plenty of RAM. 2. Sharp, bright high-resolution screen with excellent color production, contrast (HDR), and deep blacks. 3. Minimal cooling fan noise. There are a few performance modes, each one stepping up the cooling fan speed, but even on Turbo (best gaming performance) fan noise is significantly reduced from my old gaming PC (games are still playable without headphones) and in silent mode there is no noise at all (not for gaming though). 4. Well-built and light weight (especially for a gaming setup this powerful). I also like the design; it has some nice features (like the led slash on the top cover and RGB lighting for the keyboard), but no crazy vents or large labels. The "Platinum White" is almost silver in some lights but is a nice complement to my Meta Quest headset. 5. Large multi-finger touchpad allows you to scroll and pinch to zoom. 6. Great hard drive space with minimal preloaded software; giving you a usable storage space around 1.77GB (I have 10 games from my Steam library and Fortnight installed (so far) with around 70% still available). 7. ASUS Armoury Crate software makes it easy to change performance modes, switch between the integrated GPU and the RTX 4070, change RGB keyboard and slash lighting effects, and monitor system parameters (fan speed, frequency, RAM utilization, temperatures). It has a logging feature that can be helpful in monitoring temperatures and resource utilization during game play. 8. Full sized SD card slot makes it easy to load videos or pictures for my GoPro for editing/sharing (I realize a lot of devices use micro-cards now, but it is easy to use an adapter to go smaller). Things to Consider 1. The speakers are good not great... on par with most quality laptops. They are clear and loud enough to overcome any fan noise, with no distortion at max volume, but they are a bit flat. The Dolby Atmos settings are extremely limited but do help to fill in the sound a bit. Get a good pair of headphones. 2. Bring the charger (warning it is big) - even with some smart battery saving features this laptop will not make it through a full day of casual use. I got just at 6hrs making a few short video calls, web browsing, and watching videos with the iGPU on to save power (no gaming). With the main GPU enabled, battery life dropped to less than 2hrs. 3. Certain parts of this laptop get pretty warm. Consider buying a cooling pad or make sure you have enough space to allow the cooling system to work. The space between the base of the screen and top of the keyboard gets very warm (~120°F) and do not place anything that can be damaged by heat near the back vents (~130°F).

Gaming laptops have had a specific style for many years, being big, loud, and brash. Usually loaded with bright colors, RGB, and simply screaming “Look at me, I’m a GAMER!”. When I first saw this new Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 it was exactly the opposite in nearly every way, and to me, that is a good thing. Other than the RGB backlight in the keyboard and the fact that it has Republic of Gamers inscribed in the casing, you might never guess this was a gaming laptop. It is a gaming laptop for someone who wishes to be more discreet, or simply someone who feels like the more conventional take is perhaps juvenile. In my opinion, it is gorgeous, with machined aluminum casing, the 240hz OLED HDR screen, hidden hinge, and full ventilation underneath the chassis. It expels a great deal of heat from those vents making using it in the lap very uncomfortable, but that is how you know it is working right, by getting that heat out and staying at an appropriate temperature. As a result, when gaming the CPU and GPU never exceed 74C in my experience so far which is very reasonable. Battery life is abysmal if you attempt to game on it without being plugged in 30 min to an hour at best, and closer to 5-6 hours when doing other less demanding tasks. In general, you’re going to want to keep that charger close by. The OLED screen is beautiful, with flawless colors and perfect blacks. The keyboard and touchpad are high quality, with just the right amount of travel and sensitivity to feel somewhere between a desktop keyboard and a typical laptop one. There is no touch screen or fingerprint scanner, but the touch pad is extremely responsive, and it supports facial recognition via Windows Hello. Sound quality from the built-in speakers is surprisingly excellent, giving my high-end computer speakers a run for their money. The sound is crisp and clean, and with Dolby Atmos support as well. There are plenty of ports, two USB-C, two USB-A 3.2, an HDMI 2.1, and an SD card reader. One of the USB-C ports is dedicated to the 4070 chipset along with the HDMI, and the other runs off the Radeon chipset built into the NPU. As a result, I can run multiple external monitors and depending on which ports I use I can engage the discreet and dedicated graphics simultaneously. The Ryzen AI NPU is very quick, and the Copilot features add a few new usability functions to the table. I have a Wi-Fi 7 mesh network, and this is my first device that supports it fully and the difference in Wi-Fi speeds is extremely noticeable. I spend most of my time PC gaming on strategy or city builders, and the performance is excellent for those types of games. My current favorite, Cities: Skylines II runs flawlessly at max settings without a lost frame in sight and is super smooth. Others like Age of Empires Remastered or StarCraft II also run amazingly. I have even tried much more intense games like Starfield and had good results with it. I had to dial it back a little to get it smooth, but it still looked great. Both on the internal screen and by plugging into my 4K monitor the games I play are almost identical either way. The 2TB SSD goes a long way for storing lots of software and has exceptional loading times as well. Gaming is the primary purpose for it and it excels in what I have tried. Asus Laptops have come a long way since the last time I owned one years ago. This machine is incredibly impressive in every way. I love that it looks discreet and handsome while also being a powerful and capable gaming rig. It is lightweight and easy to transport, but I can’t go far without the charger handy. Everything altogether make it the total package and I can’t recommend it enough.

I’ve been using ASUS ROG gaming gear for a long time. This is the 5th ROG laptop I’ve had in the past few years. Every year, it seems like they make some slight changes, and increase the gaming performance, but this year they have leapt ahead. *Performance* Performance is what you would expect from a ROG laptop specced out the way this is. 32GB of LPDDR5X memory, an NVIDIA RTX 4070, 2TB PCIe 4 SSD, and brought together with AMDs new Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 and the gorgeous 16” 2560 x 1600 OLED panel running at 240Hz. You will find numerous posts, videos, and reviews that will show you FPS at various resolutions. Suffice to say that this machine will be able to handle just about any AAA titles at great video fidelity without sacrificing performance. I played my usual line up, Diablo IV, WoW, COD, Cyberpunk 2077, Elden Ring, and Baulder’s Gate 3. They all ran very well without noticeable frame drops or having to sacrifice visual quality. One thing that is usually an irritant is fan noise. I have always wanted a gaming laptop that I could use while lying in bed, but normally that is not possible. With other laptops, as soon as you load up a game the fans start spinning up and are very loud. Even running less intensive games like Balatro, Vampire Survivors, Dave the Diver, etc. The fan noise is usually a big problem since my wife is generally watching TV next to me, so it becomes an issue. Not with this laptop. I can easily run most of those games with the AMD integrated video card without even having to turn to the RTX 4070. This allows the system to run cooler and keeps the fans relatively quiet. Now, if I decide to run some AAA titles the fans do spin up, but even then, they aren’t nearly as loud as some other gaming laptops I have used. If my wife is watching a semi-loud movie, I can still play some of those AAA games without fan noise being an issue. Since we are on the topic of cooling, another thing to note is since AMD’s new Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 chip is supposed to be far more power efficient it generally runs cooler. I can easily use this laptop for long periods of time while it sits on my lap without feeling like it’s cooking my thighs. The same power efficiency has also been nice since I don’t get the normal battery life anxiety I would get from other gaming laptops. I can comfortably work for hours with the laptop laying on my lap and not worry about needing to plug it in. It’s not at MacBook levels or anything, but it’s far longer battery life than I would have expected from such a powerful gaming laptop. So, you have all this power, an amazing processor with great thermals and power efficiency, and 2TB of storage to hold all your games and work. That might be enough to seal the deal, and have you click that buy button, but we haven’t even arrived at my favorite part. The amazing screen! The OLED panel is so crispy. Yes, it is amazing to run games on here since you get G-Sync, a 240Hz refresh rate, 0.2ms response time, and a beautiful 2.5k resolution, but just watching movies and videos is also a treat. The display also has 100% coverage of the DCI-P3 color space, a delta E color accuracy of less than 1, and VESA HDR True Black 500 certification. Put all this amazing display technology together and the Nebula display makes blacks super inky, and colors scream off the screen. It is a joy to do just about anything on the screen. I am going to need to upgrade my external monitor to try to keep up. Another thing that I loved, that was truly unexpected, was the audio. I have no idea what changed this year, the ASUS site shows this monster has 6 speakers with dual woofers. Whatever changes they made, this laptop is the best sounding laptop I have ever used. By far better than any other Windows rig I have used, and even slightly ahead of my M3 Pro MacBook Pro. Again, any media, music, movies, games, videos just sound great. **Design** Overall design is also great. Even though this is a 16” laptop, it feels far lighter, and slimmer than other similar devices I have used. It feels lighter than the 4.08lb that is listed. I love that it’s so slim, only 0.59” inches thick. The aluminum alloy chassis feels very premium. The keys have always been great on ROG devices and this one follows that tradition. The trackpad is enormous, and smooth. One minor negative thing I noticed about the trackpad is that the topmost part near the spacebar doesn’t click. If you are like me and you normally just run tap to click this isn’t an issue. It’s just something you should be aware of. I’ve made this comparison already, but the feel and build of this ROG G16 is on par with my MacBook, and that is saying something. This is a beautiful piece of tech. ***Wrap-up*** This is quite possibly the best laptop of the year. I love everything about this, even considering that you can’t upgrade the 32GB of RAM. I know that ASUS has received flack for continuing to use the MediaTek Wi-Fi cards, but I have had a good experience with them, especially the Wi-Fi 7 card here. If you really hate it, you can swap the Wi-Fi card for something else. It would also be nice if this was already rated as a Copilot+ device. AMD’s new AI chip is capable of 50 TOPs so should qualify to get that Copilot+ designation. I think I read that it might come later in an update, if so, I am looking forward to trying that out as well. If you made it this far that you already know; the screen is a piece of art, as is the entire hardware. The audio is amazing, the performance is stellar, battery life is great, and cooling is efficient. If you had someone create their ideal portable gaming laptop this would be it. My favorite piece of technology by far. A very enthusiastic recommendation for anyone looking for a premium, lightweight, gaming laptop.

ASUS has released their new ROG Zephyrus G16 OLED 240Hz gaming laptop. It's got some of the latest-and-greatest tech inside, and definitely a must-see and a must-play. The box includes the laptop, AC adapter, and some paperwork. The laptop comes with a manufacturer's 1-year warranty. PROS: ----------- * Stealth. You'd never know it was a gaming laptop by the looks of it. It doesn't have the common gaming emblems and lighting all over it. It's basic-looking but packs a punch inside. * 32GB of stock RAM is not common, so I'm happy I start out with 32GB instead of 16GB. Same for the 2TB of SSD storage (connected to PCIe 4.0). It's not super common to get this much as a base. * Connection ports are adequate, having an HDMI, SD card, 2 USB-C, and 2 USB along with a headphone/mic combo jack. * The PC overall has a good feel and build to it. It does not feel cheap. Parts are solid, and the keys feel of high quality, and do not "clack" when typing or playing games. * The mouse pad is oversized and works perfect. The back side of the pad (closest to the user) can actually be depressed for clicking when touch motions aren't used. * The full-length rubber feet keep the laptop in place. It simply will not move without a lot of force. * Armoury Crate gives the user a TON of features to play with... colors, patterns, hardware configurations, stats, status... it's insanely populated with information and options the user can change where needed. * MyASUS app is similar to Armoury Crate, but to a much lesser degree. This also allows the user to upgrade SW to ASUS-proprietary items if needed. Games are also available along with points the user can obtain to get perks from ASUS. * Gaming is mad-fast at 240Hz refresh rate. CoD4:MW is as real as it gets and is super smooth. Wearing headphones is the way to go with these war games, but pair that with the picture on this laptop, and you will be hard-pressed to go back to a 120Hz monitor. I have 5Gig fiber at home, so internet speed is not an issue... the way this PC displays the gameplay is as good as I have seen. The AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 paired with the GeForce RTX 4070 are a combo not many other laptops can really compete again. ASUS made sure this laptop had the best of everything. * ASUS states this laptop has 6 speakers with Dolby Atmos. Though it does sound phenomenal, I still go with headphones. * The light streak on the back of the display is a nice touch though I wish the options on how the lights operate weren't quite so 80's. CONS: ----------- * Being a "gaming laptop", I'm surprised that it doesn't have an ethernet port built-in. If you want ethernet, you'll have to attach an ethernet adapter in some form (by itself or on a docking station or hub). * I'm not a fan of the ASUS proprietary charger with the rectangular end. I'm wondering if this is due to USB-C power limitations or the possibility of USB-C breaking more easily when plugged in. I'm unsure, but not many people I speak with are fans of proprietary charger connections. Many people like to have one at work/home while they keep another one for on-the-go use. * All of the vents are on the bottom of the unit (see picture). Though very ventilated, it would be good to have some side vents available. With this laptop, you absolutely need to use a bean bag laptop desk if you use it in your lap. Under regular use on a desk or tabletop, ventilation should be ok. OTHER OBSERVATIONS: ----------- * The screen does not open to a full (flat) 180-degrees. It looks more like 140 degrees, give or take. (see picture) * The laptop comes in a nice slim/sleek box that can actually be used for storage and travel. There is no room in it for the power adapter though. CONCLUSION: ===================== Overall, this is likely the best gaming laptop I have ever played on, performancewise. The 240Hz refresh rate along with the 2TB SSD available, not to mention out-of-the-box 32GB of LPDDR5X RAM make this laptop one of the best I have ever played on. I do question the lack of physical ethernet port, but I think I can overlook it given all of the other perks of this machine. Do I like it? Yes. Do I love it? Yes. Would I buy again? In a heartbeat. Great job ASUS!

Overall I think this is a really great laptop, with a sleek design and great performance. There are a few minor annoyances that pop up every now and then, but don't impact the experience enough to drop a star imo. Performance-wise it works great - on multiple recent AAA games I'm able to get consistent 60+ FPS at 1440p, sometimes 80-90+ with DLSS/FG. The RTX 4070 and Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 are a great combo. Frankly I don't have much to say about them - they work, and they work great. I've limited the CPU to 20W in my own "power saving" profile, and it still can do quite a lot of work even limited to that level - I may take it even further to see how much I can get out of the battery. Speaking of battery, I think it's good enough. I haven't had much chance to really get a feel for it yet, but I haven't had any battery anxiety the few times I have unplugged it - though I am usually mindful to keep the dGPU off and I generally avoid gaming on battery. It runs quite quiet even on a "turbo" preset, compared to a 2022 G14 (which I believe has a higher power draw!) it performs significantly better while also being significantly quieter. I might even go so far as to say this machine runs quieter on "turbo" than the G14 did on "silent". As for silent mode on this machine, if you're just doing basic web browsing it barely needs to turn them on, and I personally don't even notice the fans being on, unless I'm in a perfectly quiet environment - think no A/C or similar background noise. The OLED screen looks absolutely gorgeous, HDR videos feel as though you're actually there. 240HZ is a great bonus, although I haven't really hit numbers that high quite yet - I don't often play games I can reach that high of FPS with this hardware. One odd thing I've noticed is there's an odd static-like pattern at very low brightness in greys. It reminds me of the appearance of darker colors on plasma displays. It's only apparent to me when within a foot of the screen and at very low brightness (in a dark area as well - it gets quite dim). The build quality is great - the aluminum chassis means it's quite solid, not a lot of flex. It feels and looks premium. The keyboard is quite nice to type on as well. The touchpad is quite large and very nice to use as well. I've had a few quirks with the machine so far, software bugs that I don't really have an explanation for - although they're most likely to do with the MUX switch going between iGPU and dGPU. Some really odd scaling issues that crop up once in awhile, that are fixed by a quick restart. Overall I'm very happy with this laptop, I only wish Asus had gone the extra mile to use vapor chambers in these lower-end models instead of being exclusive to the 4080/90 G16 models - to keep temps lower, or to possibly eke out a bit more performance.

I've had my fair share of gaming laptops, and the sleekness of these newer generation laptops while still having the performance chops of gaming machines is something I'm really enjoying. This laptop takes that whole situation to the next level. Packaging: I will say that the packaging for such a high end machine was a bit of a letdown, just your usual run-of-the-mill carboard box with another smaller cardboard box inside. I've seen some pretty impressive and elaborate boxes for high end gaming laptops in the past, and while I would agree that I would prefer the money be spent on the laptop and not the packaging, to me there's a certain level of wow factor that is missing when something like this doesn't have an equally sleek presentation. Build: The laptop is all aluminum, it's gorgeous to behold, there's no flex or creak to it as you open it or use it, the use of plastic is limited to the keys and there's a faint almost glow to it (not really) just in how the light hits the aluminum . The trackpad is large, the keyboard is responsive, the hinge is stiff but not too much so. Really the only thing I dont love about it is the strange bar across the lid with the lighting effects, it almost feels like it's not working right even though I know it is. I'll likely turn it off or change how it functions. Performance: Where do I begin, I powered it up, immediately installed 3DMark and ran TimeSpy. While I know there are newer benchmarks and have newer ones available, TimeSpy has become somewhat of a defacto standard in gaming benchmarks for quite some time. Out of the box it gave a respectable score of 10939, but when compared to other machines with the same AMD AI 9 HX 370 and RTX 4070 it was showing near the bottom of the list. I figured I'd massage things a bit to see if it had more performance under the covers. I upgraded the drivers then set ASUS Armoury Crate to Performance for both CPU and GPU (this has to be done in two places, set the GPU to Ultimate on the summary screen, and create a profile to set the operating mode to performance. Out of the box both are on middle settings). In addition I upgraded the BIOS from the Asus site. I was rewarded for my efforts, my score improving almost 10% to 12061 after that, so it is definitely worth it, if you are plugged into the wall most of the time, to turn up those performance features. On top of that I've played a number of more recent games and the laptop chews through them all at an amazing rate, COD Black Ops III, Palworld and some favorites like Apex Legends. It does not disappoint. With this being a wholly new processor, I wonder if we'll see more performance come from it as firmware and games are better optimized. That said this laptop easily gets the highest numbers from this CPU/GPU combo. The one place where it falls short in my opinion is the SSD. They chose a very middle-of-the-road PCIE4x4 SSD, and while I get that it doesn't mean everything, it feels like they could have gone with something better and faster to utilize the capabilities of the laptop more. Overall: It's a great machine, has a wonderful high-quality build and great performance. I would easily recommend this to anyone.

The Asus ROG Zephyrus G16 is a beast. Not only does this laptop pack a powerful performance, but it looks amazing while doing it. The laptop has a look and feel that screams, premium. The case is made of light silver aluminum case, with front LED custom effects on the lid, and a customizable backlit keyboard. The keyboard is extremely comfortable to type on, and the extra-large multi touch pad works great. The screen is a 16” 240hz OLED display that looks absolutely gorgeous. It offers vibrant and rich colors, deep blacks, and gets incredibly bright. The speakers have amazing quality surround sound, with deep bass and solid ambiance. The ROG G16 has an impressive amount of storage and ram. The laptop comes with 2TB of SSD storage, which is a generous amount for holding a decent size library of games. It has a staggering 32GB of DDR5 ram, which is more than enough for most demanding games. There is also a dedicated Nvidia GeForce RTX Studio 8GB DDR6 graphics card. Needless to say, this laptop can handle any game currently on the market without skipping a beat. The G16 has the new AMD Ryzen AI 9HX processor. With the new processor, you are now able to use all the new AI features that Windows has to offer, including the new Copilot. As far as the performance of the new processor is concerned, everything runs super-fast. Multitasking has been flawless, switching between apps has been a breeze and I never had an issue of it slowing down or stuttering. When it comes to gaming, this laptop is a true beast! I tested out an assortment of games from my Steam library, all with ultra settings and I was blown away. Playing MW3 with this level of detail was such a great experience, especially playing with a 240hz OLED display. I loaded up Returnal next and that looked and played incredible. Overall, I am extremely happy with the ROG Zephyrus G16, this is now my main go to computer for both gaming and everything else. The 16” OLED display looks gorgeous and gets incredibly bright. With the 32gb or ram and the GeForce RTX 4070, gaming is incredible. The new Ryzen AI 9HX processor is very impressive and works great. This is an amazing laptop, and I would highly recommend this to anyone looking for a premium gaming laptop.

This is quite possibly, no! This is my favolrite laptop that I've ever had the honor of testing and reviewing. The ASUS Zephyrus G16 has way too much power for something so slim a sexy. There's no way that this pc should be able to survive the hours of playtime that thingg offers. The 90watt hour battery gives my five to hours of solid gaming on the default settings. and a graphic intenceive wallpaper running. that's a reallyy good amount of gaming for me. With the wallpaper off and no gaming, I believe it can get upwards of 8 and a half to 9 hours of power. I love that. Remember, this thing is roughly the size of a Macbook. It's super slim. I would've thought that the keys would get really hot while gaming with a graphically intense game( A Plagues Tale) for a couple hours. But no. I'm very pleased with the temps. The ports a just what you need. It spoils you. a USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type C port, 1 Type-C USB 4 support Displayport that can power the PC, if and when you don't have the power source. 1 HDMI 2.1port, 2 USB 3.3 Genn 2 Type a ports, and a SD Exxpress 7.0SD Card reader. Upward firing Dolby Atmosspeakers that flank the backlit RGB keyboard( No Num Pad). And finally, a 1080P FHD IR Camera foe Windows Hello. No fingerprint scanner.

Phenomenal Windows laptop. This is my first AMD CPU based laptop having been an Intel Del, HP, Razer user for decades, and a Macbook Pro user. I can say this model with the Ryzen AI9 HX370 & NVIDEA 4070 graphics has been awesome. Unlike my Razer 15, this ASUS remains cool to the touch, no annoying fan noise, and the OLED screen is vibrantly beutifiul. It does rival my Mackook Pro 16 (M3 MAX) far closer than the Razer Blade or any other Windows laptop I have used. The speakers are fantastic. Despite some reports, I have not had any WiFi issues at all. Maybe that's because this is the latest version of the ASUS Zephrus G16 - IDK. But I have experienced no issues whatsoever. The white color is cool. I had hoped it would come with black as an option, but it's ok. It is a tad hard to see the keyboard key letters, but not too bad. The RGB backlighting makes it much easier to see. I am glad I got the 2T model with the 32G RAM. Might as well max it out from the get go. RAM is soldiered on so cannot be upgraded, so think carefully. 16G in my mind is too small. A 64G model would be better if only it was offered. 32G should be fine for my needs. I do highly recommend the ASUS G16 with the AMD AI9 chip.