Asus’s ROG Strix G16 has actually grunt and personality in equal steps. Not only does it gain from an effective CPU and GPU mix, but also boasting an irresistible gamer-centric, cyberpunk aesthetic that strikes all the ideal notes. To those positive features, the G16 also includes outstanding connectivity, a large keyboard with beneficial faster way secrets, and a portable chassis that you can quickly swelling into a backpack. Even the rate looks appealing up versus some rivals. Let’s take a look at this 16-inch laptop computer’s finest features …
Looking for other choices? Check out PCWorld’s roundup of the very best gaming laptops readily available today.
The Strix G16 is available in CPU setups up to Intel Core i9-13980HX with differing RTX 40 Series GPUs and either a QHD+ 240Hz display screen or FHD 165 Hz display. Asus’s e-store is where to go for designs featuring Intel’s Core i9-13980HX CPU.
Alternatively, on Amazon you can discover a selection of Asus ROG Strix G16 designs including Intel’s Core i7-13650HX processor, with the most budget friendly shipping for just $1,379 with an RTX 4060 GPU. Compare that to Razer’s many budget friendly Razer Blade 16 model which costs $2,699.99. The requirements of our evaluation system is as follows:
CPU: Core i7-13650HX
RAM: 16GB DDR5/ 4800 MHz
GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060
Show: 16-inch, QHD+ (2560 x 1600), 240 Hz refresh rate, IPS-level, anti-glare, 16:10 aspect ratio, DCI-P3 color, 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 (supports DisplayPort, power delivery and G-Sync, HDMI 2.1, RJ45 Ethernet port, 3.5 mm audio jack
Networking: Wi-Fi 6E (802.11 ax), Bluetooth 5.3
Weight: 5.51 pounds (2.50 kg).
Dimensions: 13.94 x 10.39 x 0.89 inches.
Battery: 90WHr.
Rate: Starting at $1,379 at Amazon.
Asus ROG Strix G16: Design and construct.
Road-testing Asus’s Zephyrus M16 back in May this year was a real reward, but as a gamer there’s something to be stated for using a laptop computer that’s unashamedly styled for gamers. With that holding true, sending the M16 back to Asus and getting the Strix G16 seemed like trading a perfectly good Mercedes Benz for a hotted-up Dodge Viper. Yes folks, when two laptops are practically as effective as each other and with likewise stunning visuals, it can all come down to styling, which the G16 has in spades.
As you can inform, that gamer-centric visual got me in hook line and sinker. What amazed me the most? I actually dug the cyberpunk look, specifically the transparent ASDF, QWER keys and spacebar, which were not only see-through, but they were likewise all perfectly illuminated by RGB.
The RGB lightbar along the bottom front looks dazzling too, as it produces a sublime under glow that lights up your tabletop. Then there’s the cool cutlines with ROG type and a big unmissable Asus logo on the lid, all of which use a depth to the laptop computer’s general visual. Big ROG type on the right-side of the keyboard provides even more flair from in front.
The G16 comes in 2 color variations: grey and green. I normally attempt to avoid grey laptops that feel too much like productivity rigs.
The laptop computer’s dimensions make it fairly portable, too. I didn’t mind the slight extra chunkiness, particularly because I understand laptops with a bit of extra thickness tend to have thermal benefits when things warm up.
Naturally, the chassis is just the best size to provide you a stunning 16-inch ROG Nebula screen. Asus has accomplished no mean task in making it the main dish to be taken pleasure in at least 3 times a day. The G16 provides a remarkable 90 percent screen-to-body ratio, so there’s plenty of it to see. This generous screen-to-body ratio is attained mostly thanks to ultra-thin bezels, which are less than 4 mm thin.
A 16:10 contrast ratio indicates the display is decadently taller than laptops with 16:9 formats– so rather just, you can simply see more action in your video games.
” The result is absolutely something to chew on … If that’s what our model with i7-13650HX CPU can do, one can just envision what the models sporting Intel’s zippier i9-13980HX CPUs can do.
You can’t see the G16’s internal componentry in our images, it should have a shout out too. Asus claims the G16 take advantage of 15 percent cooler CPU and GPU temperatures thanks to an overhaul from predecessor models. An upgraded chassis constitutes the biggest of those modifications; it’s been especially crafted to accommodate the laptop computer’s brand-new heatsink.
This heatsink has 3 sections and is developed around the motherboard to make the most of air flow and the pathing for hot air to escape. An additional fan has actually been added to make a Tri-Fan system, which works alongside the 7 heat pipelines and Conductonaut Extreme liquid metal that cools the CPU and the GPU in the RTX 4080 version.
Are there any compromises in the style? You’ll require to look difficult to see any, but I was a little concerned initially by the base of the chassis, which consists of a bit more plastic than some competitors.
After a while, though, I was encouraged that despite that being the case, it’s actually rather strong. There was no such questioning the cover, however, which feels remarkably strong. It’s certainly made with an excellent dollop of metal to avoid flex. The whole chassis also has an extremely difficult finish that, for the month or so I had it, held up nicely to bangs and prods without racking up any damage.
Asus ROG Strix G16: Keyboard and trackpad.
The Strix G16’s keyboard and trackpad are simply perfect for competitive gaming. You get a full-sized keyboard with full-sized arrow secrets, along with devoted hotkeys at the top. The hotkeys are all programmable, however in their default setting they allow you to manage the laptop computer’s fan settings, volume, microphone and to quickly access Asus’s companion software application app. which is called the Armoury Crate.
My evaluation unit didn’t have a numpad, which I found a little inconvenient at times, however you can get a model that illuminates a numpad in the trackpad itself, which wins Asus some points for imagination. The secrets likewise feel quite springy. They offer a generous 2 mm of travel. Programmable per-key lit backlighting makes them a delight to use at night.
I discovered the laptop computer’s trackpad to be big and spacious. It likewise felt reasonably quick. You will find quicker and smoother trackpads out there, Razer’s Precision Trackpad is one that comes to mind. Still, with the trackpad merely a secondary idea in competitive video gaming nowadays, what you get here is perfectly appropriate for an occasional frantic swipe and tap.
Asus ROG Strix G16: Display and cam.
Asus’s ROG Nebula branding summons imagery of deep area, however it simply refers to the G16’s QHD+ screen with 240 Hz refresh rate and 3 millisecond action time.
In my view, this resolution/refresh rate/response rate combination is among the very best you can presently get, normally producing well in-depth images but without the glitching or tearing. It’s a lesser-known fact that perfectly smooth performance on 4K display screens can still be a bit beyond the hardware abilities of some laptops right now.
In any case, the G16’s display has actually been developed for extraordinary performance. The backlighting supplies a good 500 nits of peak brightness and looks really brilliant. In fact, the panel did a great task rendering colors– I particularly saw vibrant reds and greens in the video games I was trialing.
The contrast was completely fine too, with the dark locations of maps looking really menacing in games like Sniper Elite 5 and Red Dead Redemption 2. Plus, Nvidia’s G-Sync assistance appeared to all however remove screen tearing so I might simply delight in video and gaming in magnificent continuous movement.
The G16’s display is also Pantone Validated for those who might wish to utilize it for design work. As we’ll see in the performance area, the laptop is definitely powerful enough for this sort of work. To me, it appeared like the Strix G16’s panel doesn’t rather render images as precisely as Asus’s ROG Zephyrus Duo 16, which is a little more fine-tuned for creators.
A 720p webcam fits into the leading bezel in a specially designed alcove. It produces images adequately, however they’re usually of a lower quality than I would have liked. I didn’t find myself taking a lot of screenshots while in video chats. Still, something is much better than absolutely nothing and so long as you do not require to do any important Zoom calls where video quality is critical, it will suffice perfectly.
Asus ROG Strix G16: Connectivity and audio.
The big bulk of the Strix G16’s connectors are located on the left-hand side of the laptop which suggests if you’re a left hander it’s going to get mighty chaotic there and may interfere with your mouse hand. Alas any such innovative port placement seems to have ended up being a casualty of the air vent which consists of the laptop computer’s entire posterior length.Still, the port choice is really generous.
When it concerns audio, the Strix G16’s two bottom-facing speakers do a satisfactory job developing a rich and varied tonal landscape when you’re playing music from an audio app or listening to music in video games.
Nevertheless, in some video games I did observe that vocals in the lower tonal variety sounded a little hollow. That’s more than likely because the acoustics from the downward facing speakers have to bounce off my tabletop prior to hitting my ears. Still, Dolby Atmos assistance is an asset to the G16’s audio offering, actually raising the sound experience, particularly in remarkable scenes.
Asus ROG Strix G16: CPU efficiency.
My evaluation unit featured an Intel Core i7-13650HX CPU, part of Intel’s new Raptor Lake mobile CPU lineup. This processor, which is developed utilizing a 10-nanometer manufacturing procedure, incorporates six Performance Cores (P-cores) and 8 Efficiency (E-cores) and has a maximum of 20 threads. It gains from a greater maximum frequency of 4.9 GHz (that’s all-core (P-core) performance) and also has a bigger cache compared to its Alder Lake equivalent, the Intel Core i7-12650H.
To test our laptop computer’s CPU performance against the silicon in other high-performance gaming laptops, I put together a list of comparisons. This lineup included gamer-centric laptops like the Alienware X15 R2 and the 2023 Razer Blade 16. The recently launched Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 was likewise contributed to the contrasts, providing an useful yardstick against another 16-inch laptop computer in Asus’s 2023 lineup.
Looking first at the results of the Cinebench R20 Multi-threaded criteria and in the chart below you can see the G16 topped the field of seven, beating both the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16 and the Razer Blade 16. This is an excellent outcome, therefore proving this laptop computer can easily deal with CPU-intensive applications that make use of all the cores of the laptop’s CPU like AAA video games or video editing.
Proceeding to the Handbrake test and the results are similarly excellent. This time the G16 ended up encoding a 30GB MKV file to MP4 utilizing the Android Tablet preset in just 746 seconds.
This is one of the quickest scores we’ve seen this year and shows the Strix G16 is extremely proficient at keeping its thermals in check while powering through a CPU-intensive task. While other laptop computers needed to throttle performance faster in this task, our review unit was much better able to manage and dissipate its heat load to continue encoding with gusto.
These results bide very well for gamers. Without me needing to boost CPU performance in Armoury Crate, the Strix G16 managed to beat a field of gaming laptops whose CPUs are all a class act. The result is absolutely food for thought … If that’s what our model with i7-13650HX CPU can do, one can only imagine what the models sporting Intel’s zippier Core i9-13980HX CPUs can do!
The outcomes are likewise a testament to the performance abilities of Intel’s brand-new 13th generation HX Series CPUs. Intel positions its HX CPUs above its H Series enthusiast processors to use gamers and creators what it claims is ‘the best possible performance presently offered in laptop computers.’.
Suffice to state, gamers can be confident that the Strix G16 will not just run their AAA video games, certainly it will deliver some of the best performance they can currently discover in a 16-inch laptop.
Asus ROG Strix G16: Gaming performance.
The GeForce RTX 4060 discreet GPU in our evaluation design is a step-up from the entry-level GeForce RTX 4050 in Nvidia’s mobile GPU lineup. Among its greatest drawcards for players for this new video card is its 24 ray-tracing cores, which kind of supercharge the rendering of light and shading in video games and 3D applications, enabling more realism than was ever possible prior to.
The GeForce RTX 4060 likewise supports DirectX 12 Ultimate, which is the current variation of the DirectX API and the one that will ultimately power an entire brand-new generation of AAA games. It’s a decent piece of hardware with some good future proofing assistance. This particular RTX 4060 GPU was tuned to a TGP of 140 watts, which is the maximum possible.
To get a general gauge of the graphics processing power on offer, I ran the 3DMark Time Spy benchmark on our review unit. Once 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 more modest RTX 4060 GPU was just somewhat off the speed of the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16, which loaded a sportier RTX 4070 GPU.
Moreover, the Strix G16 demonstrated similar graphics performance to the Alienware X15 R2, whose RTX 3080 GPU was considered one of the most powerful in 2022. This is a great result considering the lowly positioning of our laptop’s GPU in the hierarchy of Nvidia’s RTX 40 Series graphics cards.
When I ran the Rise of the Tomb Raider standard, the Strix G16 balanced 155 frames per second. This outcome placed it third among our group of contrasts behind the Razer Blade 16 and the Asus ROG Zephyrus M16.
Finally, we ran the standard for the game Shadow of the Tomb Raider. Here once again, the G16 positioned third in the efficiency results. Once again, we can say it easily outpaced the Alienware X15 R2, verifying its dominance of this laptop computer in our video games benchmarks.
What do these outcomes imply? In general, they’re extremely motivating. They reveal the G16 can hold its own against laptops with more powerful GPUs and likewise produce quicker frame rates than laptops with older, however more premium GPUs.
In summary, this suggests not just is the Strix G16 powerful adequate to merely run AAA games, but rather players can anticipate competitive standard efficiency even if they choose a less costly model with an RTX 4060 GPU.
Asus ROG Strix G16: Battery life.
The Strix G16 impressed me in my laptop testing, but not so when it concerned assessing the laptop computer’s battery life. To check the battery, I set a 4K Hollywood motion picture to repeat, after adjusting the sound to 50 percent and switching off the keyboard backlighting. Wi-Fi was likewise changed to plane mode to avoid any disruption to the video.
In the chart displayed below, you can see the Strix G16 lasted just 448 minutes prior to it lacked juice and shut down. That’s simply over 7 hours of video playtime.
