Asus ROG Strix G16 review: A powerful laptop with cyberpunk styling

Price When Reviewed

1379.00

Best Prices Today: Asus ROG Strix G16

$1544.8

$1544.8

Asus’s ROG Strix G16 has grunt and persona in equal measures. Not solely does it profit from a robust CPU and GPU mixture, but in addition boasting an irresistible gamer-centric, cyberpunk aesthetic that hits all the correct notes. To these optimistic options, the G16 additionally provides glorious connectivity, a spacious keyboard with helpful shortcut keys, and a transportable chassis you could simply lump right into a backpack. Even the worth appears interesting up in opposition to some rivals. Let’s check out this 16-inch laptop computer’s finest options…

Looking for different choices? Check out PCWorld’s roundup of the best gaming laptops obtainable right now.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Specifications and options

The Strix G16 is out there in CPU configurations as much as Intel Core i9-13980HX with various RTX 40 Series GPUs and both a QHD+ 240Hz show or FHD 165 Hz show. Asus’s e-store is the place to go for fashions that includes Intel’s Core i9-13980HX CPU. Here, costs begin at $1,599.99 for essentially the most primary configuration that drops a GeForce RTX 4050 GPU.

Alternatively, on Amazon yow will discover a number of Asus ROG Strix G16 fashions that includes Intel’s Core i7-13650HX processor, with essentially the most inexpensive delivery for simply $1,379 with an RTX 4060 GPU. Compare that to Razer’s most inexpensive Razer Blade 16 mannequin which prices $2,699.99. The specification of our evaluation unit is as follows:

• CPU: Core i7-13650HX
• RAM: 16GB DDR5 / 4800 MHz
• GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060
• Display: 16-inch, QHD+ (2560 x 1600), 240 Hz refresh charge, IPS-level, anti-glare, 16:10 side ratio, DCI-P3 coloration, 3ms response time, G-Sync
• Storage: 1TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD
• Ports: 2 x USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, Thunderbolt 4, USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 (helps DisplayPort, energy supply and G-Sync, HDMI 2.1, RJ45 Ethernet port, 3.5mm audio jack
• Networking: Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.3
• Weight: 5.51lbs (2.50kg)
• Dimensions: 13.94 x 10.39 x 0.89 inches
• Battery: 90WHr
• Price: Starting at $1,379 at Amazon

Asus ROG Strix G16: Design and construct

Road-testing Asus’s Zephyrus M16 again in May this yr was an actual deal with, however as a gamer there’s one thing to be mentioned for taking part in on a laptop computer that’s unashamedly styled for players. With that being the case, sending the M16 again to Asus and receiving the Strix G16 felt like buying and selling a wonderfully good Mercedes Benz for a hotted-up Dodge Viper. Yes people, when two laptops are virtually as highly effective as one another and with equally attractive visuals, it might probably all come right down to styling, which the G16 has in spades.

As you may inform, that gamer-centric aesthetic bought me in hook line and sinker. What impressed me essentially the most? I actually dug the cyberpunk look, particularly the clear ASDF, QWER keys and spacebar, which weren’t solely see-through, however they had been additionally all properly illuminated by RGB.

The RGB lightbar alongside the underside entrance appears good too, because it produces a elegant underneath glow that lights up your tabletop. Then there’s the neat cutlines with ROG kind and a big unmissable Asus brand on the lid, all of which provide a depth to the laptop computer’s total aesthetic. Large ROG kind on the right-side of the keyboard supplies much more aptitude from in entrance.

The G16 is available in two coloration variations: gray and inexperienced. I often attempt to keep away from gray laptops that really feel an excessive amount of like productiveness rigs. They simply make me really feel like I ought to be sporting an outdated op-shop tweed go well with or one thing. But the gray coloration isn’t your common boring metallic gray this time. No, it even appears a tad black from afar, so it oozes sophistication.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

The laptop computer’s dimensions make it moderately moveable, too. It measures 13.94 x 10.39 x 0.89 inches, which is rather a lot smaller and simpler to hold than its large 18-inch cousin the Asus ROG Strix G18. That compares with the Razer Blade 16’s longer, however barely thinner chassis which measures 13.98 x 9.61 x 0.87 inches. I didn’t thoughts the slight additional chunkiness, particularly since I do know laptops with a bit of additional thickness are likely to have thermal advantages when issues warmth up.

Of course, the chassis is simply the correct measurement to ship you a beautiful 16-inch ROG Nebula show. Asus has achieved no imply feat in making it the primary course to be loved at the very least thrice a day. Indeed, the G16 delivers a powerful 90 p.c screen-to-body ratio, so there’s loads of it to see. This beneficiant screen-to-body ratio is achieved largely due to ultra-thin bezels, that are lower than 4 mm skinny.

Meanwhile, a 16:10 distinction ratio means the show is decadently taller than laptops with 16:9 codecs – so fairly merely, you may simply see extra motion in your video games.

Although you may’t see the G16’s inside componentry in our pictures, it deserves a shout out too. Asus claims the G16 advantages from 15 p.c cooler CPU and GPU temperatures due to an overhaul from predecessor fashions. A redesigned chassis constitutes the most important of these modifications; it’s been particularly engineered to accommodate the laptop computer’s new heatsink.

This heatsink has three sections and is constructed across the motherboard to maximise airflow and the pathing for decent air to flee. An additional fan has been added to make a Tri-Fan system, which works alongside the seven warmth pipes and Conductonaut Extreme liquid metallic that cools the CPU and the GPU within the RTX 4080 variant.

Are there any compromises within the design? You’ll have to look exhausting to see any, however I was a bit of involved at first by the bottom of the chassis, which incorporates a bit of extra plastic than some rivals.

After some time, although, I used to be satisfied that regardless of that being the case, it’s really fairly strong. There was no such doubting the lid, nevertheless, which feels exceptionally sturdy. It’s clearly made with a great dollop of metallic to forestall flex. The complete chassis additionally has a really powerful end that, for the month or so I had it, held up properly to bangs and prods with out racking up any injury.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Keyboard and trackpad

The Strix G16’s keyboard and trackpad are simply perfect for aggressive gaming. You get a full-sized keyboard with full-sized arrow keys, in addition to devoted hotkeys on the high. The hotkeys are all programmable, however of their default setting they let you management the laptop computer’s fan settings, quantity, microphone and to rapidly entry Asus’s companion software program app. which is known as the Armoury Crate.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

My evaluation unit didn’t have a numpad, which I discovered a bit of inconvenient at instances, however you will get a mannequin that illuminates a numpad within the trackpad itself, which wins Asus some factors for creativity. The keys additionally really feel fairly springy. They present a beneficiant 2 mm of journey. Programmable per-key lit backlighting makes them a delight to play on at evening.

I discovered the laptop computer’s trackpad to be massive and spacious. It additionally felt moderately fast. Although you can see faster and smoother trackpads on the market, Razer’s Precision Trackpad is one which involves thoughts. Still, with the trackpad merely a secondary thought in aggressive gaming as of late, what you get right here is completely appropriate for an occasional frantic swipe and faucet.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Display and webcam

Asus’s ROG Nebula branding conjures up imagery of deep house, but it surely merely refers back to the G16’s QHD+ show with 240 Hz refresh charge and three millisecond response time.

In my view, this decision/refresh charge/response charge mixture is without doubt one of the finest you may at present get, often producing properly detailed pictures however with out the glitching or tearing. It’s a lesser-known reality that completely clean efficiency on 4K shows can nonetheless be a bit past the {hardware} capabilities of some laptops proper now.

In any case, the G16’s show has been honed for distinctive efficiency. The backlighting supplies an honest 500 nits of peak brightness and appears very vibrant. In reality, the panel did a nice job rendering colours – I notably observed vivid reds and greens within the video games I used to be trialing.

The distinction was completely nice too, with the darkish areas of maps wanting very menacing in video games like Sniper Elite 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2. Plus, Nvidia’s G-Sync help appeared to all however get rid of display screen tearing so I may merely get pleasure from video and gaming in splendid uninterrupted movement.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

The G16’s show can be Pantone Validated for individuals who would possibly need to use it for design work. As we’ll see within the efficiency part, the laptop computer is definitely highly effective sufficient for this type of work. Although, to me, it appeared just like the Strix G16’s panel doesn’t fairly render pictures as precisely as Asus’s ROG Zephyrus Duo 16, which is a bit more fine-tuned for creators.

A 720p webcam matches into the highest bezel in a specifically designed alcove. It produces pictures sufficiently, however they’re typically of a decrease high quality than I’d have favored. I didn’t discover myself taking too many screenshots whereas in video chats. Still, one thing is best than nothing and as long as you don’t have to do any necessary Zoom calls the place video high quality is important, it can do the trick properly.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Connectivity and audio

The massive majority of the Strix G16’s connectors are situated on the left-hand aspect of the laptop computer which suggests should you’re a left hander it’s going to get mighty cluttered there and will intervene together with your mouse hand. Asus may have remedied this by putting a few of the ports alongside the again aspect, like we see within the Alienware X15 R2. But alas any such artistic port placement appears to have develop into a casualty of the air vent which includes the laptop computer’s complete posterior size.

Still, the port choice could be very beneficiant. You get a number of USB-A ports, a USB-C port and Thunderbolt 4 port for ancillary devices like your mouse, telephone and an exterior SSD. Counting the display-capable ports reveals three, so there are many choices to stream video games or movies at LAN catch ups too.

When it involves audio, the Strix G16’s two bottom-facing audio system do a satisfactory job making a wealthy and various tonal panorama whenever you’re taking part in music from an audio app or listening to music in video games.

However, in some video games I did discover that vocals within the decrease tonal vary sounded a bit of hole. That’s most definitely as a result of the acoustics from the downward dealing with audio system must bounce off my tabletop earlier than hitting my ears. Still, Dolby Atmos help is an asset to the G16’s audio providing, actually elevating the sound expertise, particularly in dramatic scenes.

Asus ROG Strix G16: CPU efficiency

My evaluation unit got here with an Intel Core i7-13650HX CPU, a part of Intel’s new Raptor Lake cellular CPU lineup. This processor, which is constructed utilizing a 10-nanometer manufacturing course of, integrates six Performance Cores (P-cores) and eight Efficiency (E-cores) and has a most of 20 threads. It advantages from a better most frequency of 4.9 GHz (that’s all-core (P-core) efficiency) and likewise has an even bigger cache in contrast with its Alder Lake equal, the Intel Core i7-12650H.

To check our laptop computer’s CPU efficiency in opposition to the silicon in different high-performance gaming laptops, I put collectively a listing of comparisons. This lineup included gamer-centric laptops just like the Alienware X15 R2 and the 2023 Razer Blade 16. The not too long ago launched Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 was additionally added to the comparisons, offering a helpful yardstick in opposition to one other 16-inch laptop computer in Asus’s 2023 lineup.

Looking first on the outcomes of the Cinebench R20 Multi-threaded benchmark and within the graph under you may see the G16 topped the sphere of seven, beating each the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 and the Razer Blade 16. This is a wonderful outcome, thereby proving this laptop computer can simply deal with CPU-intensive purposes that make the most of all of the cores of the laptop computer’s CPU like AAA video games or video enhancing.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

Moving on to the Handbrake check and the outcomes are equally spectacular. This time the G16 completed encoding a 30GB MKV file to MP4 utilizing the Android Tablet preset in simply 746 seconds.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

This is without doubt one of the quickest scores we’ve seen this yr and proves the Strix G16 is exceptionally good at maintaining its thermals in examine whereas powering by way of a CPU-intensive activity. While different laptops wanted to throttle efficiency sooner on this activity, our evaluation unit was higher capable of management and dissipate its warmth load to proceed encoding with gusto.

These outcomes bide extraordinarily nicely for players. Without me having to spice up CPU efficiency in Armoury Crate, the Strix G16 managed to outclass a discipline of gaming laptops whose CPUs are all a category act. The result’s undoubtedly meals for thought… If that’s what our mannequin with i7-13650HX CPU can do, one can solely think about what the fashions sporting Intel’s zippier Core i9-13980HX CPUs can do!

The outcomes are additionally a testomony to the efficiency capabilities of Intel’s new 13th era HX Series CPUs. Intel locations its HX CPUs above its H Series fanatic processors to supply players and creators what it claims is ‘the best possible performance currently available in laptops.’

Suffice to say, players could be assured that the Strix G16 gained’t simply run their AAA video games, certainly it can ship a few of the finest efficiency they will at present discover in a 16-inch laptop computer.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Gaming efficiency

The GeForce RTX 4060 discreet GPU in our evaluation mannequin is a step-up from the entry-level GeForce RTX 4050 in Nvidia’s cellular GPU lineup. One of its largest drawcards for players for this new video card is its 24 ray-tracing cores, which type of supercharge the rendering of sunshine and shading in video games and 3D purposes, permitting for extra realism than was ever potential earlier than.

The GeForce RTX 4060 additionally helps DirectX 12 Ultimate, which is the newest model of the DirectX API and the one that can in the end energy an entire new era of AAA video games. It’s an honest piece of {hardware} with some good future proofing help. This specific RTX 4060 GPU was tuned to a TGP of 140 watts, which is the utmost potential.

To get a common gauge of the graphics processing energy on supply, I ran the 3DMark Time Spy benchmark on our evaluation unit. Again, the outcome was very favorable. While the Razer Blade 16 with its premium RTX 4090 GPU stood head and shoulders above the pack, the Strix G16 with its extra modest RTX 4060 GPU was solely barely off the tempo of the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16, which packed a sportier RTX 4070 GPU.

Furthermore, the Strix G16 demonstrated comparable graphics efficiency to the Alienware X15 R2, whose RTX 3080 GPU was thought-about one of the vital highly effective in 2022. This is a terrific outcome contemplating the lowly placement of our laptop computer’s GPU within the hierarchy of Nvidia’s RTX 40 Series graphics playing cards.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

When I ran the Rise of the Tomb Raider benchmark, the Strix G16 averaged 155 frames per second. This outcome positioned it third amongst our group of comparisons behind the Razer Blade 16 and the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

Finally, we ran the benchmark for the sport Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Here once more, the G16 positioned third within the efficiency outcomes. Again, we will say it comfortably outpaced the Alienware X15 R2, confirming its dominance of this laptop computer in our video games benchmarks.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

What do these outcomes imply? Overall, they’re very encouraging. They present the G16 can maintain its personal in opposition to laptops with extra highly effective GPUs and likewise produce sooner body charges than laptops with older, however extra premium GPUs.

In abstract, this means not solely is the Strix G16 highly effective sufficient to easily run AAA video games, however quite players can anticipate aggressive customary efficiency even when they go for a cheaper mannequin with an RTX 4060 GPU.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Battery life

The Strix G16 impressed me in my laptop computer testing, however not so when it got here to evaluating the laptop computer’s battery life. To check the battery, I set a 4K Hollywood film to repeat, after adjusting the sound to 50 p.c and switching off the keyboard backlighting. Wi-Fi was additionally switched to airplane mode to forestall any disruption to the video.

In the graph displayed under, you may see the Strix G16 lasted simply 448 minutes earlier than it ran out of juice and shut down. That’s simply over seven hours of video playtime.

Dominic Bayley / IDG

This outcome implies that the G16 is simply a mean performer in the case of battery life and suggests it’s more likely to final solely three to 4 hours whereas gaming away from an AC outlet, which is nothing to jot down dwelling about.

Asus ROG Strix G16: Should you purchase it?

On stability the Asus ROG Strix G16 hits all the correct notes for efficiency, performance and magnificence. Not solely does it ship glorious CPU and GPU efficiency, all of the ports you want, and a slick cyberpunk angle, but it surely additionally has a beautiful show and is priced significantly decrease than at the very least one key rival.

Sure, it has some shortcomings, like the common battery life, extra plastic in its chassis than some competitor laptops, and a low-resolution webcam. But with efficiency this good, these quirks fall by the wayside.