Laptop FASTER than your Gaming PC? - ASUS Zephyrus GM501 Review
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2018-05-06
·
1,452 words · ~7 min read
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when NVIDIA released their max-q line of low-power gaming gpus notebook
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manufacturers fighting to make their devices as thin and powerful as possible
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made headlines with some let's call them unconventional designs
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i'm sorry you put the trackpad where oh
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i don't know if that's any better now they were cool to play with but the
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usability sacrifices made them very
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hard to recommend so ASUS
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backtracked on some of their more edgy design choices in this the second
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generation zephyrus
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the zephyrus gm 501 is a sexy machine
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and opening it up at the local coffee shop is bound to draw attention the guy
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watching summit 1g on twitch will notice the keyboard area lifting up creating a
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gap for the internals to breathe and then everyone else will probably turn
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their heads when you boot it up
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really guys that's the idea you rip off from acer
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and you guys will hear just a moment the uh
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start engine noise that comes with this notebook it's pretty cool anyway
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the vent flap itself is a little flimsy feeling when it's
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lifted but the feel of the entire machine including the keyboard is
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nothing short of premium noticeably better than last gen
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and the flap closes when you pack up making it a total non-concern if you
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want to throw the zephyrus into your bag and then get to class
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if the first thing you do when you get home is fire up netflix or a game stream
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the speakers are potent enough that you won't need to grab a pair of headphones
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but if you want to be the one doing the streaming you are definitely going to
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need some accessories in spite of the fairly complete io including Thunderbolt
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3. first and foremost you're going to want a type c to DisplayPort adapter for
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your external display then you're going gonna want a gigabit
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Ethernet adapter and finally you are definitely going to want a
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different webcam because the one that's included is well i think the best way to
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put it is not very exceptional
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even if you are considerably better looking than me
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it's definitely got enough power though not only will its full fat gtx 1070 push
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a high enough frame rate in modern aaa titles but its six core CPU means that
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finally we've got a portable device that
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covers you for both your game and your streaming coding the experience
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is shockingly similar to what you'd get from a very decent desktop machine
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but the same is not true of acoustics and
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thermals with a full blown synthetic load there
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is some overheating at first despite the
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spoiler but the good news is that the frequency on the CPU doesn't drop too
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much to get the temps reasonable again so in productivity tasks the new
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zephyrus is faster than every 7th gen
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laptop we tested and the only laptop it loses to in cinebench is the g702 zc
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that one with eight ryzen cores with an actual desktop chip in it so needless to
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say this one is about 44 thinner than that
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one so this is great news for video editors or other on-the-go content
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creators as for gaming well you've actually got a
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couple of tuning options in shadow of war in silent mode we got 77 frames per
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second which is respectable but it clearly wasn't designed to be used like
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that so we toggled overboost cranking up
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the fans now this is not a quiet experience
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but if you play games with sound especially if you wear headphones it's
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definitely worth it 104 FPS
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dang like that is an insane improvement so with the fans on bust the zephyrus
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beats out even its much thicker 7th gen siblings and that is in spite of a touch
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of thermal throttling on the CPU
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probably the coolest thing happening in laptops right now alongside incredible
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performance is high refresh rate displays and this 1080p ips one is
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fantastic now the colors aren't quite what i would
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describe as pro grade but
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they are heaps better than any high refresh rate laptop display from a year
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or two ago and at 144 hertz with g-sync you will finally
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be getting the most out of your op mobile graphics card
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so there are no huge surprises so far
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a gaming laptop that games
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but it's actually more than just a one trick pony the RGB lighting on the keyboard
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might not be for everyone but this typing experience
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probably will be most gaming laptops have low actuation
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force keys that are awesome for quick split second actions but fall flat once
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you try and type but with a long 1.7 millimeter travel
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the zephyrus offers a surprisingly tactile feel like i could easily sit and
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write scripts or long letters to people who are mad about my recent you know
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insert controversial topic here video on it
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below the keyboard is a trackpad
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it's a little on the small side but thanks to its somewhat sensible
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positioning thank you ASUS it's perfectly suitable for casual on-the-go
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use that is if you want to carry around
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the 1.8 pound power adapter with you
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on the go
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on the subject of which we were actually expecting much better battery life than
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other gaming laptops ASUS has given you
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the option to turn off g-sync and then
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with a restart enable NVIDIA optimus
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which lets the laptop use the Intel integrated graphics for tasks like web
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browsing and microsoft word but in practice we were still only
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getting around two and a half hours in our work battery test
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and opening it up reveals why the 55 watt hour battery doesn't stand a
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chance against a six core CPU now i
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think the solution is ditching the two and a half inch drive bay for more
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battery capacity here but the upgraders out there might like
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it better this way maybe let us know in the comments
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so is the zephyrus for you then
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well at 2200 us dollars for the gtx 1070
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model with some better battery it would be a
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lot easier to recommend but that doesn't mean we're recommending against it
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either because the zephyrus has one of the best mobile gaming experiences
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available on the market it's got an awesome keyboard great screen and heaps
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of sex appeal so if you can afford the not entirely
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ludicrous premium the zephyrus gm 501
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asks for the fewest compromises we've seen out of a gaming thin and light so
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so thanks for watching guys if this video sucked you know what to do but if
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it was awesome hit the like button get subscribed or consider checking out the
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link to where to buy the stuff we featured in the video description also
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link down there is our merch store which has cool shirts like this one and our
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community forum which you should totally join the guy watching the summit 1g stream on
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twitch will probably notice the keyboard area lifting up
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as you'll