Customer Ratings & Reviews

Awesome laptop with great battery life and screen!

TL;DR - So many quality issues and they keep repairing and sending back to BBY to resell but they come back with different issues!!! Let me start out by saying I've purchased Open-Box Satisfactory before with NO issues and lasted a very long time (Alienware laptop for 6 yrs). So it has been a while and I wanted to to upgrade to this beauty (ROG Zephyrus 16") but not spend full price on it. It was on sale and being Open-Box Satisfactory I was able to get it for $1300 . Well they would not boot up the laptop for me until I bought it. So when i brought it home, first thing I did was test it out. It wouldn't boot!! I checked BIOS and not hard drive was detected at all. I contacted ASUS support and they said I would have to send it in and might get charged. I said, NOPE! and returned it the next day. So I returned it at a different best buy. They took it back no problem (after having it for only 1 day) and told me they have a Open-Box Excellent available. I decided to give it a try for $1442, they even convinced me to get total tech which was fine. I took that home and it booted right up (whew). Well guess what, I bought an extra SSD since it comes with 2xM.2 slots and was about to install it when i go to the bios and it was locked!!! What the heck? I called ASUS support and they said I would have to ship it to them at a cost.... Forget that! I took it back to bby and they scanned it and told me it was sent to ASUS to get motherboard replaced and when it came back the techs forgot to reset the BIOS pw and would need to be sent back. The tech also explained ASUS laptops get returned a lot and advises not to get any open box ASUS laptops because they all have issues. He also said its a crapshoot on the new laptops as well. So now I'm still looking for a laptop.

Fast, cheaper, enough for all my duties all the time

Works just fine and I got a good deal on it.......

Took it back. I got it because of what I thought was pretty state of the art for $2K. Intel Core i9, Nvidia 3070, 165 hz., 1 TB SSD. For all intents and purposes this should have faired pretty well; however, it falls way short. I turned it on and when I jumped on the internet just to see how she felt and just a simple search and scrolling down I started to get screen tear. So I tried playing a game on Steam and it was terrible. Everywhere the cursor went on screen, all the graphics around it digitized. So I synced the graphics with Intel’s app to no avail. Still terrible graphics. Also, the fan ran the whole time, and always on turbo, even if I manually changed it. The laptop got really hot and the vent air blew right on the screen, with no protection. For a gaming laptop it seems like it has to work awful hard. I don’t know how much it matters but I couldn’t find anything about the processor speed prior to buying. I made the mistake of thinking Best But actually sells a laptop without sacrificing quality somewhere. It is nowhere online, and the laptop wasn’t on display at the store. But when I finally got to the system information, I discovered that it’s only 2.5 gHz. My wife just got a laptop for $400 cheaper and has Ryzen 9, Radeon graphics and 3.3 gHz processor speed. But it’s only 120 hrs refresh rate. But her laptop is better than this garbage for $400 less. Very disappointing for 2,000 dollars.

Good product would be happy to buy again and again

Excellent Laptop. Very fast and Windows 11 works fine.

It's a workhorse, and for the class of laptop you are looking at, here it ticks all the boxes. Remarkable light for a gaming laptop, even with the included charger and good build quality.

Great laptop and very portable for its size. Will stick with asus.

Phenomenal...blazingly! Don't look elsewhere. DON'T! ;-)

Great laptop was able to get on sale. Runs a lot of high end games( as long as battery is plugged in of course). Beautiful screen and refresh rates of up to 165. Hitting about 101 FPS on warzone.

It was a great machine to be sure, but ultimately we realized it was too expensive for our purposes. Very solidly built and high quality.

Bluetooth audio. It just does the opposite you would want it to do in every opportunity it gets. Volume control from laptop is 0% or 100% when BT. Connection will timeout even if source is just paused. Speaker will then shut off. Once connection is manually established. Sound device must be changed manually and unmuted. Go get something from the kitchen or answer the door. You will be reinstalling your speaker. Not the peripheral problem, Tested with visio soundbar, bose speaker, and Samsung headphones. Why would anyone want this? My guess is this is a combo between two conflicting problems. Every discreet NVIDIA build I have used is dysfunctional. Why will default output settings never be: play sound on BT device automatically. FPS or other benchmarks don't matter if NVIDIA GPU doesn't work. The laptop drops BT audio connection if no sound process is going on When sound source starts up again, connections are not reestablished. It doesn't even fall back to internal speakers! The source just plays to HDMI with no speaker or nothing. Why is thing so stupid? This one problem makes this laptop so aggravating, if fixed, five stars. I cannot recommend without a fix or GPU replace with comparable AMD GPU. Is the BT radio connection drop due to a California prop energy restriction? Well thats a pretty crappy thing to do.

It is a good laptop in general, fixed a lot of misses from 2021. The biggest issue I have is the model number per ASUS website is supposed to have 32gb of ram. This laptop comes with 8gb soldered to the board, therefore I would not be able to ever get to 32gb. will be returning as 32gb of ram was mandatory for me.

Graphics on this computer are ridiculously good. It can run multiple instances of touch designer no problem. The additional storage is easy to install

The Asus Zephyrus M16 (GU603ZW) is a continuation of GU603 chassis, but with updated components. Boasting a 12th gen Intel Core i9 12900H, with 6 performance cores and 8 efficiency cores, and a 3070ti, this is a powerful laptop. Asus, while reusing the chassis from previous models, this is certainly far from boring. Asus has really hit its stride in the ROG Zephyrus series. While the previous G series had its highlights (most notably the popular G14) the M16 brings a lot of the same design cues, but a larger screen. While the previous Tiger Lake 8 core CPU found in M16’s was potent, the Alder Lake i9 wipes the floor with it. In real world scenarios I found the 12th gen to be 15-40% faster in CPU intensive workloads. This mobile CPU outclasses anything skylake based by a significant margin in almost all tests. Asus’s chassis continues to cool well, with its multiple head-pipe design. And by extraordinarily well, I mean the focus on cooling means this CPU performs beyond what it does in lesser chassis. With 6 heat pipes and Thermal Grizzly Conductonaut liquid metal TIM, this laptop attempts to keep the high power draw of the 12900H under control. Unfortunately, there is a lot of thermal throttling, as this chip can be pretty power hungry. I was able to to hit 7001 points in Cinebench R20, but only the first run. Given 3 or 4 more runs it would settle into scores closer to 6000. Honestly, the H series chips have been plagued with chassis unable to handle their ferocious heat output. The GU603 is a great chassis, but while it was able to handle an 11900H, the 12900H proved too much - having the chip hit 95C+. For reference, the GU603 came up on my scale at 4lbs 10oz. The CPU is a great upgrade, but how is the GPU performance? Well the RTX 3070ti is definitely faster than the previous 3060. Based on the GA104, it possesses 5888 cores (8 TMU’s short of a full GA104). This is an upgrade of over 2000 cores. However, performance translates into a much smaller uplift than you would expect when moving to a higher set of cores and clocks. 10%-40% uplift in performance is seen, and that certainly is nothing to sneeze at. The 3070ti can game pretty much anything off the shelf - mostly at the native resolution of the screen. Speaking of, the screen is a familiar piece of kit. It boasts a 2560x1600 resolution, and a 16:10 aspect ratio that harkens back to more a productivity focused resolution than the 16:9 screens most laptops boast. The panel is 165Hz, and lives up to that speed. The IPS panel has solid color reproduction, fast response, and a resolution that befits the 16” panel. You can use the screen at 100% scaling relatively comfortably, but the default 150% is a pretty good setting. Unlike the previous M16 I had, there is almost no backlight bleed, just a bit of IPS glow. Overall this screen is excellent. The display also features almost no bezels. One welcome new addition to this laptop is Windows Hello camera support, meaning you can login with your face. This is surprisingly amazing, and if you’ve ever had a Surface device you’ll know how awesome it is. Previous M16’s had a fingerprint scanner on the power button, but this is a much better experience. So how is it as a laptop for day to day usage? Between the svelte formfactor, excellent RGB keyboard, and large trackpad - this is a great machine. The beauty of the M16 is that it isn’t caught up in gaming style - and just like the G14 before it, can function in a professional environment. The black color adds to the professional acetic. The RGB keyboard can be set to a static color via the Asus Armoury Crate software (however there is only one zone - not per key backlit). Performance can be adjusted here as well, allowing for quieter operation in the office, or full workstation performance if desired. The fans can get loud on the M16 when pushing sustained performance. Thermal throttle is always the name of the game when dealing with Intel, but how far and fast it throttles are the differentiators. The M16 does a great job of keeping clocks high in those circumstances, and the firmware is tuned very carefully to keep clocks as high as possible which explains the performance consistency in this machine. The camera, wireless, and trackpad are all good, but maybe not best in class. The camera is 30fps at 720p, not great, but not horrible. The trackpad is large and has been tweaked over the previous overly sensitive settings on the 2021 M16. The wireless has been changed to an Intel AX211 unit. The port selection is excellent - offering USB A, C, and Thunderbolt. HDMI and RJ45 basically mean you never need a dongle with you. There even is a microsd slot hiding on the left edge. The 1TB SSD performs on par with top tier gen 3, while being a gen 4 SSD. it boasts speeds of linear reads/writes of 3500 MB/s. This isn’t top tier, but it certainly isn’t a slouch and should be fast enough for all but the most demanding users. There is a second PCIe/SATA m.2 slot waiting to be populated inside. Also inside is a RAM slot that allows you to upgrade from the included 8GB (DDR5) chip to 32GB (total 40GB). The built in 8GB DDR5 is soldered in. The WiFi card is also accessible and upgradable. You can enter the back panel by removing 13 screws (1 is captive in the bottom corner, and 3 are hidden below small rubber sticky grommets). It easily clips off at that point. The casing does feel like all plastic (save the lid) compared to the previous generation M16. Part of the casing has a rubberized coating that shows grease pretty readily. The design is solid, and the lid is amazing. There is a metallic flex of color in the small holes that grace the lid, and make a subtle statement. Dedicated volume keys above the center mounted non-number pad keyboard. I continue to applaud the center keyboard, as number pads just aren’t very useful in my opinion on a gaming laptop. The GU603zw is a great gaming laptop. The chassis cools the powerful hardware (with limitations) without making you stand out. This design still is one of my favorites from Asus in blending gaming and a professional flair. A top notch screen, and more than adequate keyboard, trackpad, and complete port selection make this equally a great workstation.

Great device with an amazing display. The CPU is amazing and it is able to sustain being at full load. The 3070ti does a good job of taking full advantage of the 1440p display.

This latop was good enough to do what was needed unil we realized build quality isnt great. Ended up having to replace it in under a year.

Overall, I think the laptop does what it’s suppose to do. I have had it for two weeks and this is what I’ve noticed, keep in mind this is my first gaming laptop, my previous laptop was an XPS 15 9560: - Idling temperatures are high 50-60s - My laptop (maybe not others) get super hot when it’s on sleep, to the touch it’s almost scorching, the fans blow super loud every now and then when it’s on sleep mode. To help from this occurring I have set it to go into hibernate mode instead of sleep. - When It’s on sleep mode it does this “heart beat” type of keyboard lighting, this can be turned on in the Armoury Crate. - Gaming (plugged in / high settings): 300+ fps in Valorant 1440p, 150fps in GTA V story mode, 300-400fps Minecraft - in silent mode the fans will never be audible/noticeable, but fps will adjust accordingly, i.e. 60-100fps in Valorant same settings as before. Temperatures are high, 70-90s - performance mode has audible fans that adjust according to the temperatures, keeps the laptop at a more managing surface temperature. Temps 70-80s - turbo mode has very loud fans that seem to always be on, I usually don’t see that big of an increase in performance fps whenever I turn it on, just keeps the laptop A LOT cooler, 60-80s - Battery life: if you don’t turn off the gpu in Armour crate battery life is 2 hour max on low browsing or idling. If you want to maximize battery life, then on the gpu optimization in Armour crate, turn laptop hz to 60, moderately low brightness (even at low brightness it’s really bright) and turn on battery saver, you’ll get 6-9hours of battery with low browsing or idling. I think those are all the things I would’ve liked to know before I would’ve boughten it, and hope I helped someone.

bought this laptop for a top tier gaming & CAD setup. This laptop performs well when browsing the internet. Other than that, youd better have some pants on because its going to burn your legs. It not only gets hot but it stinks. not in the figurative way but it literally smells like burning plastic, this begins under light load. I was also disappointed this laptop did not offer a number pad. In addition to the major heat flaw, & the smell, the number pad, the body itself is a weak design. If you hold this laptop from the corner the weight of the computer itself will bend the chassis. when you place the laptop back down it will rock because it bent. seriously consider these quirks before spending the money of this bad boy. If the laptop is going to sit in one spot, and has proper cooling, maybe its a good buy. but for these issues I was forced to give a fair rating on this machine. I considered the smaller version, but after visiting a nearby BestBuy I quickly realized the heat issue was not addressed. Asus battery limiter feature is a massive plus. Battery life and charging time are great. I wish asus put the same quality from the zenbook into their performance lines. This computer would have been my daily driver.