Introduction
Usually, I will recommend any gamers looking out for a new computer system to opt for a desktop computer instead of a laptop. A desktop computer promises customizability, upgradeability, and is generally cheaper than a gaming laptop that provides similar kinds of performance. However, not everyone is as technologically knowledgeable as a techie like you and me, and a gaming laptop on the other hand could provide a complete and out of the box experience for casual gamers. Moreover, as laptops are made to be portable, they are great machines for gamers who attend LAN parties (if LAN parties still exists in today’s context?).
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| Red LED lit keyboard |
Today, we will be exploring the renown ROG gaming laptops from ASUS. Back in the past when we talk about gaming laptops, the usual names like Alienware and probably Sager pop into mind. With harsh branding and continuous innovation in gaming technology, ASUS ROG gaming laptops are far ahead in the competition these days. We have the ASUS ROG G752 gaming laptop for review today, to find out what exactly does it takes for a gaming laptop to be called a “gaming desktop replacement”.
Disclaimer : The ASUS ROG G752 model we have is of a previous version, installed with a NVIDIA GTX980M. This model has been refreshed to the newer GTX 1080 graphics card which promises almost 2x in gaming performance. We took a look at the laptop back during NVIDIA’s APAC Editor’s Day, where the GTX 10 Series laptop graphics cards were launched. You can read that article here.
Hardware and Specifications
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| Shiny metallic rear |
When we talk about a gaming laptop, the discussion should be surrounded by it’s performance. Of course, a gaming laptop shall not be known as a ‘gaming laptop’ if it performs poorly in games. While we put the weight, design, and the general usability aside for now, let’s see if this machine performs well in what it is supposed to do – games.
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| 17inch Full HD Non-Glossy Display |
ASUS has decided to start off the G752 with a 1080p resolution display, rather than a higher definition 3K or 4K display. We thought that this was a good design decision, as most graphics card technology can play within this resolution without much hiccups. Furthermore, a higher display resolution may not directly mean better gaming experience. We were satisfied with the Full HD display to much of an extend in terms of a proper gaming experience. The 17 inch display was able to give us a good immersive experience in our games.
The ASUS ROG G752 we have is armed with a popular Intel Core i7-6700HQ that runs up to 3.5GHz. There should be no worries about CPU performance on this machine, as the Intel Core i7s are great, or if not possibly, an overkill for most games. This machine is also backed with the new DDR4 greatness that new Skylake architecture brings to the table. With 8GB of DDR4, this machine should work well in whichever memory heavy games are out in the market. Most importantly, it is backed with a out of the world NVIDIA GTX 980M graphics card that surpassed gaming performance on gaming machines back before the GTX 10 series were launched. Despite newer graphics card available, the GTX 980M still remains to be one of the best mobile based gaming graphics card in the market.
We had only one issue with the ASUS ROG G752 that was available for review. Instead of a SSD that should be somewhat a default configuration for all gaming laptops of today, our unit only had a 1TB hard drive, which slowed down generally every single process that had to run on the computer. Games were able to run very smoothly on the machine, but the loading times of these games were a big turn off. Luckily, the ASUS ROG G752 does have different SKUs that has SSDs built in.
Gaming Performance
We ran the ASUS ROG G752 through a few games to determine its gaming performance. We are looking for anything that is above 60FPS to be considered a decent gaming computer. For a FPS game like Resident Evil 5, the machine was able to reach an average of 109FPS. This was done with all game features maxed out.
We then placed the ASUS ROG G752 to the test with a more demanding Direct X 11 game, Lost Planet 2. It still managed to score frames above 60FPS. On average, this gaming monster managed to reach 69.3 FPS with graphics setting maxed out too.
On a more recent Final Fantasy XIV Heavensward benchmark, it managed to achieve a score of 9232 with all game graphics features maxed out. This was not bad and playable, but of course, desktop alternatives would have given a much better performance.
Gaming features
With years of innovation in gaming since the introduction of the Republic of Gamers brand, ASUS has brought the best of the best gaming technologies in the ASUS ROG G752. These come in the form of software to allow gamers to customize their laptops for an overall better gaming experience on different genre of games.
ASUS Gaming Center is a one stop software for all the software gaming features on the ASUS ROG G752. From here, users can customize different kinds of hardware profiles for different kinds of games. Gamers can also access other kinds of gaming related software from here. They can also customize the brightness of the red LED of the keyboard, or set different macros for their games at the gaming center. XSplit Gamecaster can also be accessed from here. This is a software that allows in-game recording and casting to different online live platforms.
An example of a gaming software included with the ASUS ROG G752 is the Sonic Studio II. This software allows the customization of audio output coming from the speakers. Users can choose to use features like Bass Boost or Smart EQ to change the audio profile of the sounds coming out of the speakers to their preferences. This software can also allow the gamer’s voice to be clearer when using in-game voice chatting systems. There are simply a lot of different options available on this software that enhances audio recording and output for a great gaming experience.
Another software that is worth noting is the GameFirst software. GameFirst is a technology developed and promoted by ASUS. This software allows the prioritization of network packets coming in and going out from this gaming laptop. It ensures that network based games will receive priority in terms of the getting data from the home network, thus reducing latency and improving gaming experience. This is done by monitoring different kinds of applications and prioritizing each application on the network.
Great Cooling Capabilities
The cooling capabilities of the ASUS ROG G752 blew our minds away. We were surprised at how cool the laptop performed when playing games, or when running any computationally demanding programs. From what we understood, ASUS had put in a lot of effort in designing the chassis of the ASUS ROG G752, to make sure that users will not feel the heat from the hardware. This is done by having a great heat sink design and fans that bring heat directly out from the chassis. This also explains the extra bulk at the rear of the gaming laptop. Even though it does bring an additional space to the laptop, we thought that a better cooling design can also mean better reliability and greater user experience, and we appreciated the additional work on providing an advanced cooling mechanism on this laptop.
Final words and Conclusion
The ASUS ROG G752 is a powerful gaming laptop that is able to play any games out in the market smoothly. With the new NVIDIA GTX 10 series graphics card that are already available on this model, gaming performance and experience on this machine will be supercharged. We thought that we had nothing much to say in terms of performance as there is nothing much else that we expected from this machine with such specifications. However, we thought that the lack of a SSD on the machine limited this beast from what it is really capable of. We would definitely recommend anyone to purchase the ASUS ROG G752 that has a built in SSD rather than just a HDD. Also, we thought that the Optical Drive is quite pointless. Who still uses optical drives these days? The space would have been used to accommodate another hard drive slot or something even more useful.
The ASUS ROG G752’s gaming oriented features differentiate the gaming laptop from other competing products in the market. Its great cooling capabilities also meant that gamers will be able to focus on their games, rather than get distracted by the heat that is generated by such monstrous hardware. We would really recommend this gaming machine for any games who seeks performance with usability.
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