ASUS - ROG Zephyrus G14 (2024) 14" OLED 3K 120Hz Gaming Laptop - AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS - 32GB LPDDR5X - GeForce RTX 4070 - 1TB SSD - Platinum White
- Brand
- ASUS
- SKU:
- GA403UI-G14.R94070
- UPC:
- 197105371989
- Condition:
- New
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The ROG Zephyrus G14 has been redesigned with an all-new premium aluminum chassis for increased durability and elegance. At 0.63 inches thin and weighing in at just 3.31lbs, this gaming powerhouse combines portability with cutting-edge technology. Featuring Windows 11 and an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 GPU, the Zephyrus G14 achieves unparalleled gaming performance. The AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS processor further enhances productivity with 16 TOPS in AI Performance. The Zephyrus G14 features an OLED ROG Nebula Display. Enjoy rapid 0.2ms response times, vivid 3K resolution, and a smooth 120Hz refresh rate. Elevate your audio experience with new upgraded woofers, offering a 252% volume increase, 100Hz bass frequency, and Dolby Atmos support. For intense gaming sessions, the ROG Intelligent Cooling integrates liquid metal and aerodynamic 2nd Gen Arc Flow Fans to sustain peak performance.
Dimension
Product Height : 12.26 inches
Product Width :8.66 inches
Product Depth :0.63 inches
Product Weight :3.31 pounds
Features
Make everyday use easier with the Windows 11 Operating System Game, create, and maximize your productivity—Windows 11 is the one place for it all. With a fresh new feel and tools that make it easier to be efficient, Windows 11 has everything you need for whatever comes next.
Windows Copilot AI assistant has arrived Meet Copilot in Windows – your AI-powered assistant for quick answers, creative inspiration, and focused tasks. Boost productivity with fast answers, image generation, and more. Elevate your Windows 11 experience and unleash creativity!
OLED ROG Nebula Display and NVIDIA G-SYNC Uplevel your visual experience with the Zephyrus G14's OLED Display certified with ROG Nebula Display standards. Enjoy rapid 0.2ms response times, a vivid 3K resolution, and a smooth 120Hz refresh rate. With NVIDIA G-SYNC, eliminate visual tearing, minimize stuttering, and reduce input lag.
AI-powered AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS Processor Armed with 8 cores and 16 threads, the AMD Ryzen 8945HS processor powers your laptop with ease. With 16 TOPS in AI Performance, its integrated AI Accelerators are ready to enhance your experience.
Experience lifelike graphics with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 Maximize your gaming and creativity with an NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 GPU, with a max TGP of 90W. Game-changing features like DLSS 3.5 and ray racing technology bring game graphics to life by simulating sunlight and creating a realistic environment for an immersive gaming experience.
Enjoy seamless multitasking with 32GB of LPDDR5X RAM Equipped with 32GB of LPDDR5X RAM, the Zephyrus G14 effortlessly handles multitasking demands whether you're gaming, creating, or simply browsing.
Store more and wait less with 1TB of PCIe 4.0 SSD Storage Save files rapidly and store more data and games. With massive storage, PCIe SSDs are great for major gaming applications, multiple servers, daily backups, and more.
Feel the luxury with the premium Aluminum CNC Chassis. The Zephyrus G14 sports a premium aluminum chassis meticulously crafted through CNC machining. Along with the customizable Slash lighting array, this laptop is the perfect blend of durability, elegance, and individuality.
3.31lbs light and 0.63 inches slim Embrace portability without compromising. The ROG Zephyrus G14’s ultra slim 0.63” profile and lightweight 3.31lbs 14-inch chassis redefines gaming on the go.
3 months of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate included Play Minecraft Legends and hundreds of other PC games with 3 months of Xbox Game Pass Ultimate. *Terms apply.
Stay cool with ROG Intelligent Cooling Sustain peak performance with ROG Intelligent Cooling which features liquid metal to reduce CPU temperatures by up to 13 degrees, 2nd Gen Arc Flow Fans, and Tri-Fan Technology.
NVIDIA Advanced Optimus with MUX Switch With Advanced Optimus, the switch between iGPU and dGPU becomes automatic based on the task, optimizing battery life. A MUX Switch increases laptop gaming performance by 5-10% by routing frames directly from the dGPU to the display bypassing the iGPU.
Audio excellence with 6 speakers and Dolby Atmos Pump up the volume with newly improved woofers on the Zephyrus G14 offering 252% volume increase and 100Hz bass frequency. Dolby Atmos support, AI noise cancellation and a 3D mic array further enhance your audio experience.
Advanced Connectivity Stay connected with dual USB-C ports, HDMI 2.1, USB 3.2 Gen2 Type-A ports, and a dedicated UHS-II MicroSD card reader.
What's Included
20 Reviews Hide Reviews Show Reviews
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Watch out for Scam!!
Asus is blaming best buy i dont know who did it but this laptop came with the wrong gpu so double check your gpu people! FALSE ADVERTISING! Going to try to exchange it!
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Great Gaming and General Purpose Laptop
I’m loving the Zephyrus G14. It’s almost perfect for me and does a great job both at gaming and being a general purpose thin-and-light laptop. As a gaming laptop, its wattage-limited GPU makes it a little underpowered compared to other 14 inch options, but for the portability I think the small performance hit is worth it. The build quality is great. The body is aluminum and very lightweight and thin, but also solid at the same time. The hinge is hidden away on the bottom of the laptop and feels solid with minimal wobble while typing. For ports, there are 2 USB-C, one that is 10 Gbps and one that is 40 Gbps, and 2 USB-A, both 10 Gbps. There is also a microSD slot, an HDMI out, headphone jack, and a proprietary charging port. The 40 Gbps USB-C port accepts up to 100W via a USB Power Delivery 3.0 charger, but the included proprietary charger is 180W. It’s a little disappointing Asus didn’t incorporate PD 3.1 and do away with the proprietary port, but the included charger is at least relatively compact and easy to pack away. If they were going to include an SD card slot I also wish it was a full size one instead of microSD, but it is still useful if you have something like a GoPro or a drone and need to get the files off of those cards. The screen is a 14” 16:10 120Hz OLED that supports G-Sync and it looks fantastic. The default SDR color profile out of the box is a little oversaturated, but if you set it to sRGB mode it looks great. The 2880x1800 resolution is a little bit higher-res than 1440p and sort of straddles the line between 1440p and 4K. Not every game will run the native resolution well, but upscaled games still look great. The general performance with the Ryzen 8945HS is as fast as you’d expect. Every application launches quickly and I haven’t experienced any hitches so far. The 8945HS performance should be largely the same as the previous generation 7940HS and this version just adds more AI performance. There are a couple of neat tricks with that like being able to set the camera to maintain eye-contact and better background blurring, but in general I don’t think most people using this for gaming purposes would notice much of a difference. The RTX 4070 laptop GPU is definitely not a match for its desktop equivalent and it’s limited to 90W, so it will fall behind other 4070 laptops with higher power limits. Still, the gaming performance for me has been very good and I can run most games at high settings and be at 60+ FPS. I’ve been playing Helldivers 2 a lot as an example and the ‘High’ preset with ‘Quality’ rendering is getting around 70 FPS. Having frame generation and DLSS helps a lot in the games that support them, but in general I was leaving ray tracing off. You are also limited to 8GB of VRAM with the laptop 4070, which is beginning to be an issue for some games. Overall I still think it gives good performance for the form factor. You also get a Radeon 780M with the 8945HS, which from my experience with the ROG Ally should be able to handle some lighter games, but this would likely need to be something you’d enable deliberately and I did not test any games using the integrated GPU. The battery life so far is the best I’ve seen on a gaming laptop, though to be fair most of the ones I’ve used in the past have been ‘desktop replacements’ where that kind of thing wouldn’t be prioritized. For non-gaming tasks, I’m seeing around 7-9 hours. If I was using this as my work laptop I don’t think I’d leave the charger at home for a full work day, but you could pack a smaller 100W PD charger instead if you aren’t doing any gaming (performance is limited when not using the Asus charger). In general usage, I could barely hear the laptop and the fans spin up only very occasionally in silent mode. In performance and turbo modes, the fans are definitely audible under heavy load, but not loud enough that I found them to be unbearable to listen to and with headphones on I did not hear them at all. The laptop also stays cool and never felt hot to the touch. The keyboard feels great to use and type on and the trackpad is very spacious and responsive. I did notice the single-zone RGB lighting on the keyboard isn’t quite uniform and fades a bit at the top of the keys, but I didn’t really notice this in my normal use. There’s a diagonal ‘Slash’ light strip across the back of the screen that has a few preset effects you can set in the Asus software. The amount of customization you can do with the Slash lighting is limited, but it still looks nice and ultimately I ended up setting it to ‘Sonic Match’, which mirrors the sound. Miscellaneous Notes: The 32GB of DDR5-6400 RAM is soldered to the motherboard and not upgradeable. It should be enough for most people, but if you are between this model and the 16GB version I’d consider that for longevity purposes. The bottom panel is secured by Torx screws of very lengths. Be careful not to mix those up if you open this up, but the only real upgrades you’d be able to do would be replacing the Wi-Fi card or the SSD (there is only one SSD slot). The 1TB SSD is a Western Digital SN560 PCIe Gen 4. It’s not top of the line, but performance is still decent with 5000 MB/s read and 3000 MB/s write. The speakers sound great and get quite loud and clear without any distortion. The webcam has IR sensors for Windows Hello, so that makes logging in convenient. The webcam quality is excellent and so is the microphone, so if you are planning to use this for video calls it’s a good choice. Overall I’m really happy with the 2024 G14. If you are after a purely gaming-focused machine there are better performing options, but I think this strikes the right balance of portability and power for me. There are a couple of things that keep it from being perfect for me, but overall I’d give it a 4.5/5.
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Perfect for gamers, creators and programmers!
Wow, this laptop is amazing! Build quality, screen quality, audio, performance, everything is amazing! I have used many laptops over the years, and this is as close to a perfect portable laptop that can be used for gaming and business as I have ever seen. Gamers and creatives will love it. The styling is not fully gamer specific so I would feel comfortable taking this into work or a coffee shop. Pros: -Screen quality -Audio quality -Gaming performance -Connectivity -Runs cool -Professional looks Cons: -Battery life isn’t the longest Build quality: After unboxing and setting it up, I was very impressed with the build quality of this device. The chassis is aluminum and feels very sturdy with very little flex in the keyboard. Some parts are glass such as the power button and large trackpad. All seams are flush and appear to have precise engineering. The dash lighting is neat and can do patterns or sync up to audio. The keyboard has its own lighting you can configure to your liking. Gaming: Getting to the main point of this machine, it is a gaming powerhouse! All tests and benchmarks were conducted using Turbo performance mode at maximum resolution with HDR enabled when available. VSYNC is also off in all tests. Also, default drivers are GeForce Studio drivers for creatives, but you can easily switch over to game drivers in the GeForce Experience app. The GeForce 4070 runs at 90W. Destiny 2 performs very well. At highest settings & full resolution, you can expect 60 FPS when things get intense. If you want a higher framerate with little loss of fidelity, high settings result in 80-90 FPS. Doom Eternal worked at 120 FPS on average on Ultra Nightmare settings with Ray Tracing off. If you want to use Ray Tracing, I recommend turning down the settings or resolution as at max resolution at Ultra Nightmare, frame rates went to 40 FPS with some stutter. The Horizon Zero Dawn benchmark provided an average of 91 FPS. The game looks amazing with HDR on this screen and never bogs down. Alan Wake looks beautiful, but you will likely need to play with settings you are happy with. I tested it on the Quality DLSS setting with all other settings maxed out including raytracing. At best you can expect 30 FPS, at worst, single digits. Turning off Ray Tracing and keeping everything else the same things seemed to average around 40 FPS. Keep in mind this game is very demanding. Heat management: I was very impressed with how this machine keeps up with temperatures. While on external power, the CPU hovers around 71C in performance mode. While gaming or rendering something, the most I saw was 91C for the CPU, 83C for the GPU and fans around 45 dBA. When not gaming, the fans are usually very quiet. Cooling is advertised as using liquid metal. Heat blows out under and behind the screen. On battery in silent mode (great for work and school), the CPU hangs out around 56C. I only lost about 4% while typing this review which I did take my time on while listening to music. Display: This screen is beautiful! At 2880x1800 16:10 it runs at 3K 243 PPI. No matter how close I put my face to the screen, I cannot discern any pixels at all. It supports Dolby Vision at 500 nits so your games should look amazing in HDR, just be sure to turn it on in Windows settings. The screen is great for creators and gamers alike as the refresh rate is 2ms and supports 100% DCI-P3. I do photography so this is perfect for my situation. The OLED colors pop out. The ROG Armory Crate app has some additional OLED protection settings you should check out as the screen supports DC dimming. Audio: The 6 speakers sound loud and impressive. There is plenty of base for listening to music. There is some distortion over 50% but at that volume it is already outrageously loud. I recommend setting Dolby Atmos to Dynamic in the settings. Of note, the Realtek Audio setup only supports 16 bit 44,000 hz, you might want to consider a DAC if you do any audio engineering. Connectivity: There are a plethora of high end ports here. On the left side is the power input, a USB-C 4 port which supports DP 2.0 and PD 3.0 at 40Gbps, HDMI 2.1 port, a USB-A 3.2 Gen 2 port at 10 Gbps and a headphone jack. On the right side is another USB-C port supporting DP 1.4 at 10Gbps, a Micro SD card slot supporting UHS II and a USB-A port identical to the other one. Wi-Fi connects to my WiFi6e network with no issue and Bluetooth 5.3 is supported. Battery: Battery life is fed from a 73Wh battery. It is sufficient for most people, but the Ryzen processors do not have any efficiency cores as it has 8 general purpose cores (and 16 threads). I get decent battery life for work, but if you intend to use anything with the included Radeon 780 GPU or GeForce 4070 on battery, you are better off plugging it in. For simple web browsing and typing, the battery should be fine for a day. It charges quickly with the 180W adaptor. Benchmarks: With 32 GB of DDR5X 6400 RAM and a PCIE 4.0 NVME 1TB hard drive, performance is great all around as well as the processor and GPU setup. This hard drive is fast btw. Geekbench 6 CPU - Single Core: 2267 Multi Core: 12320 Geekbench 6 OpenCL - 4070: 113271 Geekbench 6 Vulkan - 4070: 112749 GeekbenchML CPU - 3159 GeekbenchML DirectML - 4070: 12944 Lightroom export 24MP 156 photos - 2 min 31 sec Cinebench R23 multicore: 15127 CrystalDiskMark: Read: 5015 MB/s Write 3553 MB/s Repairability / upgradability: I attached a photo of the internals. Otherwise, I would give it a near perfect score with the exception of RAM as it is soldered onto the motherboard, so be sure to get the RAM setup you want as you cannot upgrade it later. The bottom lid is held on with 11 hex screws, two of which are hidden under rubber stoppers. Prying the lid off is a bit of a challenge as the fit is near perfect, but once you get a plastic tool under a corner, you can slide it in the direction of the other corner which will pop off the front making the rest easy. Inside you can upgrade the SSD and replace nearly every part aside from the RAM easily.
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Absolute Top Tier Total Package
First off, I have to say ASUS absolutely killed it this year with the new redesigned G14! For some background ive owned and used at some point every G14 ever released. Ive also had a couple other models like X16 flow, zephyrus M16 along with a plethora of other gaming laptops from other manufacturers over the past 3-4 years doing deep dives on performance, benchmarks (see some below in the CPU and GPU sections), daily use etc to the extreme trying to find the best balance of all things with the least amount of sacrifice. That being said the design this year is basically new from the ground up and absolutely perfect. When they did the last redesign in 2022 for the G14 it was really close to ideal in just about every way with only a few drawbacks to speak on. These have all been addressed and out the window with this 2024 version. Notable things I saw as a con on the last generation was the screen hinge as I never liked how it flip flopped to prop itself up higher for cooling, though it made sense it just made it awkward to use in your lap as it dug into your legs. This year that no longer exists and its flat on the bottom which is perfect. Another thing that was a bit annoying was the amount of heat that came through the keyboard previously. This was also taken care of as the new model has way way more airflow coming in from both sides of the laptop to vent at the read and when it does this it actively cools the keyboard deck and track pad to the point it barely feels warm at all when gaming which is a huge step up from years prior. The mini LED display of last years 4090 model was really really good but as mini led always does it had blooming issues to speak of around bright colored objects on a dark background making some things look strange. Im happy to say this new 4070 model here has their brand new OLED panel which of course only lights the pixels in use as needed resolving any of that type of behavior and creating an extremely immersive display for a 14” laptop with not only color depth but even brightness, refresh rate (120hz g-sync) and most of all HDR! There is not a single other 14” gaming laptop on the market right now that can even come close to touching the display on this laptop, it’s just that good. Next on the list is speakers and audio. Some how some way this years is even better and not only that the surround modes in the dolby software you can turn on actually surround your head just like a MacBook does which is normally the benchmark to beat as far as audio quality. That said this is easily the best 14” windows laptop speakers ive ever heard providing a full rich sound which is sadly extremely uncommon in this size laptop but in this case sets the G14 even more apart from the rest. Honestly I cant believe how much better they are when last years was already the best at the time. The new Ryzen processor 8945HS is an extremely solid performer for the chassis size and doesnt seem to have any compromises. It can routinely score above 1800 single core and 17k multi-core in cinnebench R23 benchmark which is very solid. Yet in silent mode can run so cool during web browsing and video watching that the fans all stay OFF which is wild for a gaming laptop at this size. The tried and true second year of the 40 series RTX GPUs in these gave ample time to get drivers completely up to perfection which these are. This model comes stock with the studio drivers rather than the gaming version which is essentially just a more stable release and what I prefer to run on them for such. As this specific laptop has the RTX4070 which is sadly the top sku this year for this chassis (4090 last year) it is still an extremely good performer. Running a benchmark such as 3dmarks time spy you’ll be looking at scores in the high 11 thousands overall with my specific testing at 12,043 GPU and 11,326 CPU which again is extremely good all things considered and at the top of the range with these chips even versus 16” models with similar specs. The chassis design itself is a CNC milled aluminum piece which is absolutely top tier in every way you can think of. This thing is not only the perfect size for daily commute and travel but also gaming on the go or at home. It has plenty of ports with HDMI 2 usb c (one is USB4) usb A audio combo jack basically anything you’d need. There is a new rectangular power plug this year which is also a great addition as I didnt much like the old barrel style plugs as they could loosen up over time. The power brick itself shrunk this year as well which is a welcome change and really lightens things up. Honestly on the go though I dont even bring the brick I use a USB c charger instead as im not gaming it does perfectly fine through my work day. One day that I forgot my charger all together it still had enough juice at half screen brightness to get through the entire 8 hours on silent mode in armoury crate which is again a feat of strength for this. The bottom and back side filled with ventilation holes for the fans to push a pull air which again need no more said about how well this design works because it just does no matter what your doing and isnt at all sketchy like it has been in the past for heat. The track pad is glass and still spring board style but the smoothest ive used of such and I have no complaints. The keyboard somehow again feels even better than last years which I didnt think was possible. Overall you really cant get any better of a gaming laptop that can also be cross used not only as a gaming power house, but work horse for daily use by day, video editing machine by night with the power to edit canon raw files from the R5 (many fail at this) but also can be used to watch your favorite shows at night while in silent mode without the worry of fans spinning up or overheating on your bed. It’s absolutely amazing in every way! Though I wish there was a 4090 model again this year I cant be mad about it because this thing is even lighter than a 14” MacBook Pro while having the power of a gaming desktop machine in a thin and light 14” form factor its just crazy. Some tips if you buy this machine make sure and go through when you first start it up and update all your drivers in windows update, armoury crate, the Nvidia graphics driver, windows store and the myasus app. That seems like a lot but most of these would update themselves over time naturally but for the best possible experience you can have its best to just get through all these right off the bat as it will restart a few times and then your good to go.
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A great update to an amazing laptop!
Asus’s G14 series of laptops is one of absolute epic heritage. The very first G14 was one of my best purchases, sporting a Ryzen 9 CPU, RTX gpu, and 1TB of storage. 4 years later, the G14’s latest iteration is nearing perfection, but keeping the winning combo from years ago. This time CPU wise instead of the 4900HS, we have a 8945HS. Pulling dedicated graphics duty is the 4070 mobile, clearly outpacing its 2060 max-q from years ago. The chassis has kept what made it special while offering further refinements. And the unusually large 1tb ssd has been replaced by a, err… well, faster 1tb drive? Well, guess you can’t have everything. That said, this piece of kit for the money is still quite a power house. While the premium for the 4070 isn’t necessarily worth it over the 4060, let’s set that aside for a moment and compare this apples to apples to competitors, which without calling out a particular brand, could be compared to the aforementioned fruit. In fact, I have a particular model that has a CPU that ends in 3 pro, and I have to say the G14 holds its own. Physically it is nearly identical in dimensions to this fruit competitor, differing in height due to the slight increase in rubber foot height in the rear. Screen real-estate and keyboard layout are very comparable, as is trackpad size, etc. The G14 GA403 is in every way an improvement over the previous gen G14’s. Gone are the odd gamer-y angles found on the first generation. Squared edges dominate, with the only strangely shaped item found is the squat hexagon power button. The awesomely cool, but only high end equipped matrix led lid display has been replaced by a series of LED’s in a slash offering a bit of flair without the expense. Gone is the only semi-reliable fingerprint reader-in-power button, which is replaced by Windows Hello IR facial recognition. The previous 1080p and 2k screens are replaced by a 2880x1800 display that comfortably runs at 1440x900 hi-dpi resolution. This screen not only has a super high resolution, but while lower than the year prior’s refresh rate of 165hz, offers 120hz of individually illuminated pixels - yes this is OLED. A beautiful dynamic contrast ratio which cannot be outdone by LCD’s is on display. Offering Dolby DisplayHDR True Black 500 certification, the display does not disappoint. I found the display more than bright enough in any indoor setting. Speakers on this laptop, of which there are 6, are excellent. This rivals any notebook (including the aforementioned fruit based one) on having the most expansive and clear sound I’ve heard from a laptop - all while being in a package that’s smaller than most. Bass hits, and clarity is top notch. Keyboard backlighting is solid, and controllable in the Armory Crate app and Windows new Dynamic Lighting control panel. Unfortunately it’s a single zone (meaning one color, not individual or multiple zones), but really I don’t find that too much of a limitation. Color is good, as even white is surprisingly white given the RGB nature. The keys themselves feel just as good as the previous keyboard, if not a bit better. The trackpad is large and oversized with decent palm rejection and good gesture support. Build wise, the laptop is quite light - weighing in at 3lbs 6oz - owing to its magnesium aluminum alloy construction. The laptop’s build quality is firm and feels just as solid if not more so than its older brethren. Considering we’re packing top tier Zen4 cores, a fully enabled AD106 GPU core, and all the things supporting those high end components, the weight and build quality are just outstanding. This laptop is a powerhouse, especially plugged in. Shifting the GPU mode to ‘Ultimate’ in Armory Crate unlocks the 90w power limit and helps the AD106 reach its peak performance. Between the CPU and GPU, this laptop is packing some of the best hardware in this price range. AMD’s cpu is both power efficient and powerful, and Nvidia’s GPU is solid, offering nearly double the frame rates of my trusty old 1st gen’s 2060 max-q. Games were fluid and smooth, and despite needing a driver update to work correctly, the mux switch helps the 4070 push the maximum amount of frames it can. If you haven’t heard of this ‘mux’ thing, it’s something that’s usually reserved for higher end gaming laptops with dedicated GPUs. It allows the GPU, on demand, to bypass the internal on-board graphics, and drive the screen directly. That allows for native things like g-sync, and better performance. The AMD 780m takes over when the Nvidia GPU isn’t required, making the battery last a bit longer than it would with the 4070 drinking it down. Performance is good on battery, if only that despite battery limited settings, the Ryzen CPU is blindingly fast. Even hampered by low clocks and process utilization limitations found in the ‘silent’ profile, it still manages ~8500 in cinebench. On performance, even on battery the CPU realizes 15k+ points. Plugged in you’ll see the full ~18k points you’d expect from the CPU. The inbuilt AMD APU is no slouch either - filling in day to day duties more than adequately. The 4070’s performance is limited on battery, but still manages to perform adequately if you’re in the mood for a mobile gaming session. I benchmarked and compared numbers for a couple games, but 3dmark Firestrike did a good job showing the GPU about 70% of its plugged-in performance numbers. Not horrible on a battery, but not quite as efficient as the CPU, which still gave about 85% of its numbers. The new rectangular power plug is fine. It can be plugged either direction, which is nice. It’s no magnetic charger, but overall it’s a sure way to deliver the 180w of power the brick can put out. While it can also charge on USB-C, but to 100w, the power hungry hardware calls for a little more juice, and we’re a bit away from that much power over USB-C. Disassembly of the chassis is fairly easy. There are 11 screws - 2 hidden under black plugs. They’re a star head, and the 4 near the front are a different length. On opening you are presented with the complex headpipe design, 3 fans, and the only 2 upgradable components: the mediatek WiFi and NVMe SSD. Hey, at least it comes with 32GB of DDR5! Some observations: The old model has a nearly identical CPU. The 7940hs and 8945hs are nearly identical in specs - sporting slight tweaks in power draw and slightly higher AI TOPS. The old model also could be optionally equipped with 4080 or 4090 cards, which may be available eventually in this chassis. The old model had a thicker lid w/ mini led screen and higher refresh rate. While some details that have changed are arguably not as good, OLED will always have deeper blacks, and the obscenely expensive high end cards are no huge loss for most buyers in this chassis size.. Overall, I think the G14 GA403 brings the G14 forward. A cleaner, more grown up design, while still keeping some gaming flair and doing what the G14 has always done: bring the biggest baddest gaming hardware in at a fairly reasonable price. The GA403 sports some of the best tech available, and a screen that’s just gorgeous to view. I have no hesitation recommending this or any G14.
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Best 14" gaming laptop of 2024
Unboxing and Setup: The Asus G14 arrived in a premium sealed box, with the charger neatly packaged separately. Setting up the laptop is a breeze, requiring only a quick connection of the power adapter and a press of the power button. Asus Armoury Crate adds convenience with customizable profiles and easy updates. Battery Life: Playing Fortnite at balanced settings, I achieved a respectable 45 minutes of gameplay at 75% brightness. Further adjustments could extend this time, showcasing the laptop's versatility. Performance: With turbo mode and the dedicated GPU engaged, I effortlessly maintained a solid 120fps in Fortnite, even on ultra settings. The OLED display brings every detail to life, from shadows to distant horizons. Keyboard and Design: This features an excellent keyboard with satisfying key travel and eye-catching RGB lighting. The light slash on the lid adds style and serves as a visual status indicator when closed. Display: The 120Hz refresh rate OLED panel offers a stunning gaming experience with calibrated profiles and G-Sync support. Bright, responsive, and visually stunning, it's a standout feature. Heat and Audio: While the laptop can warm up during intense gaming sessions, the onboard speakers deliver impressive sound quality, enhancing the gaming experience with rich, detailed audio. Ports and Build: The Asus G14 balances portability and connectivity with a selection of essential ports. The aluminum build exudes quality, though it may feel slightly heavier than expected. Pros: - Blazing-fast performance - Stunning display quality - Premium build - Reliable and fast wireless speeds - Seamless transition between gaming on battery and power Cons: - Non-standard PSU - Lack of a lip on the monitor for one-handed opening - Short gaming battery life - Heat generation during intense use - Micro SD slot instead of full-size SD slot
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New King of the hill for Gaming & Productivity
THIS… Is the ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 with a 14” 3k 120hz OLED screen, and this might be one of the most feature-packed laptops I have EVER tested or had the opportunity of owning. I am excited to see how this laptop pans out as I am looking to phase out my MacBook Pro as well as my razer into one computer to do everything on. With an OLED screen, a 4070 and 32gb of ram in the model I received, let's see how this stacks up in a growingly competitive marketplace and if this is a true multi-role gaming/productivity laptop. Obviously, we have to start with performance - No this does not come in a model that contains more than a 4070, and a few years ago I think I would have really been upset over this. That being said, today, I can say that I am perfectly fine with this choice. I have had laptops with 2080’s/3080’s and you never gain more performance that is actually realized in day to day tasks/gaming. They cost significantly more, are larger, get hotter and die way faster. We can expect 100+ frames on almost every game you can think of at near max settings given you are in turbo mode and plugged in. On battery, we can expect good performance; I could go over 100fps if I turned the settings down or killed my battery faster… so whichever way you want to tilt that balance you can certainly have a good time. I was also able to use Ableton 11 with no problems, even when I was using external monitors I never saw any noticeable lag or latency. Thanks to the 32gb DDR5 I never really ever notice … any lag ever? I am a Chrome demon and my 20/30 tabs have never been a problem, even when playing a game or opening up a creative application simultaneously. The only thing this laptop is really confined by is battery life, which for me, was about 7 to 8 hours on eco, half that in light gaming and probably 1-3 hours heavy gaming. My screen is always on max brightness too, so you could probably squeeze some more out of this G14 if you needed. The battery life was always more than enough for me to leave the charger at home worry-free. The screen is simply amazing and I was relatively unaware how good Asus has gotten at OLED screens. Yes, this is a 3k (2880 x 1800) screen…and without losing you in the details it really is almost unnoticeable between 4k and 2k… it just looks GOOD. This is a WOLED 16:10 screen with more features packed into it than my desktop monitor: 100% dci-p3/ .2ms gtg / 120hz / HDR 500 & Dolby vision HDR / g-sync / Pantone validated AND with a max brightness of 500nits. I found the brightness to be more than enough for most settings with this gloss screen. I really don’t know what beats this screen, it is truly beautiful and ticks all the boxes that you could dream of for a gaming laptop and also has HDMI 2.1 for when you want to use another screen. Build quality is great, cnc aluminum which is always my favorite feel on a laptop. There is still, however, some flex in the middle of the keyboard and around the edges. It is slight and I have to really press to actuate this flex. I can one hand the screen open as well, which is my FAVORITE feature on higher-end laptops. It has a chamfer lip on the front of the laptop that helps you open the screen and differentiate between the back and front of the laptop. The slash lighting on the back is super cool and if you hate it you can turn it off, but I have a slow pulse. Nothing on this laptop says ‘gamer’ outside of the RGB keyboard. Thanks to the profiles built into the software, I am able to quickly change profiles for the lighting and am easily able to set my keyboard to white for when I am out and about and then back to my preferred color when I am home. My favorite part about my old gaming laptop was how much it didn’t look like a gaming rig and this is a great evolution from that as well. I will endorse wholeheartedly the white design, coming from a black laptop prior I am really enjoying how elegant the G14 looks! I can certainly tell a difference between the CNC MacBook frame in the feel and heft, but at this price point, this is exceptionally well done! The keyboard is something that I was initially on edge about because I am big on productivity out of my laptop and if the keyboard sucks then the whole thing is a bust for me. Thankfully I really do enjoy the G14’s backlit keyboard. It has 1.7mm of travel and feels premium - they don’t say what the switches are or trying to be but to me it feels like a mix between MX brown and a membrane combined. The keyboard is not loud but there is still a soft click as you putter along. They also have the G14 in person at most BestBuy's to try so I would recommend that if you are worried. Cooling is something that is rather important here, but I want to affirm that I never felt the heat on the keys at all and really only in the rear of the chassis. I burnt the hair off my legs from an old old alien-themed gaming laptop and those days are gone! I was really impressed with the variation in fan speeds and the ability to run at 0db for almost every nongaming application! For turbo mode I did put it on a cooling plate, but this was more for performance rather than how it felt. Ports and charging are always some of the biggest gripes for gaming laptops, but thankfully for the G14 it is another highlight reel! That being said, the first reaction to seeing that this has a non-standard power supply I/O is to complain that it isn’t USB-C, and I am always the first to pick up the pitchfork and light the torch! This is just not the case with this, and several other high-end gaming laptops. Asus, much like Razer, Alienware or whatever flavor of gaming RGB you look at, uses a proprietary high-watt power supply to monitor the battery, prevent overcharging, modify the speed at which it charges and so on…it really is for the longevity of your battery. If you still want to charge via USB-C you can still do that as well, so really no harm done in the end. Alright, now that we can put the pitchforks away, the I/O is seriously impressive: 1x 3.5mm Combo Audio Jack 1x HDMI 2.1 FRL 2x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A 1x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C support DisplayPort™ 1x Type C USB 4 support DisplayPort™ / power delivery 1x card reader (microSD) (UHS-II) I really can’t complain about this with a full-size HDMI as well as a type-c display out, the only REAL knock I have is on the microSD card reader…I am using this as a multiuse gaming/production laptop and while my drone does use microSD, my cameras use the standard size…I would rather have a microSD adapter for a full size slot than having to get a type-c or USB adapter for my normal SD cards. Not the biggest deal, but something I kinda of scratched my head on. The ports are all fast enough that I can plug my external SSD in with no noticeable lag either which is always nice. Something I enjoyed was that there is HDMI on the left, and the display port type-c on the right so you can get display output from either side. To wrap this show up, I really don’t have much to gripe about or really any complaints at all. Armory crate, the included software to help control your performance, is on the more clunky side… but nothing that a few minutes and a Youtube video can’t solve. It is easy to swap out the m.2 for something bigger and while I wish that it had another m.2 port…this is a 14” laptop and space is tight! This is 100% going to be my new daily driver, I like to type on this and love to game even more. Thanks to the included HDMI port I can easily plug this into any tv to make any area a productivity or gaming area. This is truly a rockstar gaming laptop, and while I know that the segment is getting really packed with solid competition, I don’t really see anyone that is beating out the Zephyrus G14 as it seems to be the new King of the Hill. Between the build quality, screen, performance and honestly how good this keyboard is…its hard not to recommend this over probably any other laptop in this category and most above it as well. The best part of the whole thing is, when you buy this at best buy… you never have to worry about getting the wrong laptop, they have this model and several others from other brands in the store so I recommend you go in and test them out firsthand. Best Buy has an excellent return policy and even better customer service, so you never have to worry about buying a product that you don’t like… so why not test it out?!
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Beast Gaming Laptop in a Very Thin Form Factor
To date, this 2024 ROG Zephyrus G14 is the best gaming laptop I've had the pleasure of gaming on. While it may not feature a 4090 or come equipped with an insanely high refresh rate, as a full package, this laptop just hits that perfect sweet spot. With each new generation of Asus ROG gaming laptops, Asus is able to take an already near perfect gaming laptop and tweak it ever so slightly to make it even better. One thing I've found that Asus ROG gaming laptops do better than anybody else in the business is their touchpads. They always deliver the most satisfying and smooth tactile feeling touchpads. The massive surface area of the touchpad is also a very welcome design element. It's no different on this Asus ROG Zephyrus G14. Not only do we get the same stupendous build quality on the touchpad, but the build quality of the laptop chassis is equally as impressive. It's fully constructed of metal and machined to perfection. In hand, this aluminum chassis feels extremely premium. I'm also a huge fan of the minimalist design cues. I don't know how Asus managed to get this laptop so thin without compromising on thermal performance. This is easily the thinnest gaming laptop I've ever handled. It only weighs 3.3lbs and is 0.63 inches slim! As a result, this Zephyrus G14 is well suited for on-the-go travel. I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the "Platinum White" on this laptop is more of a light gray steel color. I love this color and I'm so glad Asus went with this over a plain white chassis. The AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS and the RTX 4070 are, of course, the stars of the show. However, the 32GB of LPRDDR5X and the 1TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD are also performance monsters in their own right; they are FAST! When gaming at higher resolutions and with textures turned up to high or fully maxed out, I'm noticing that 16GB of RAM just doesn't cut it for some titles anymore. While playing Alan Wake 2 on the display's 3K resolution with textures set to high, I noticed that the game was utilizing 17GB of RAM. Asus thoughtfully and correctly spec'ed this laptop with 32GB of RAM to perfectly complement the rest of the components that they chose. From gaming to running emulated virtual environments for engineering tasks, this laptop performed flawlessly during my testing. Multi-tasking was also a breeze. I ran multiple tabs on chrome, ran various programs, and had steaming apps open, all while having a game running and it didn't break a sweat. I've taken the liberty to highlight some of my gaming benchmark results below : ****** NOTE:Performance Results are with power adapter plugged in. I set the CPU in "Turbo Mode" and the GPU in "Ultimate Mode" in Asus's Armoury Crate Software ****** 3DMark TimeSpy: TimeSpy Score: 11,447 Graphics Score: 11,485 CPU Score: 11,241 --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Alan Wake 2 Resolution: 2560x1440 Quality Preset: Medium Average framerate : 50.2 FPS Minimum framerate : 40.8 FPS Maximum framerate : 66.9 FPS GPU Temp Average: 78C CPU Temp Average: 81C Alan Wake 2 Resolution: 2880x1800 Quality Preset: Medium Average framerate : 43.8 FPS Minimum framerate : 43.1 FPS Maximum framerate : 44.2 FPS GPU Temp Average: 76C CPU Temp Average: 78C --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Dead Island 2 Resolution: 2560x1440 Overall Quality Preset: High Average framerate : 84.1 FPS Minimum framerate : 71.8 FPS Maximum framerate : 118.3 FPS GPU Temp Average: 77C CPU Temp Average: 80C Dead Island 2 Resolution: 2880x1800 Overall Quality Preset: High Average framerate : 60.4 FPS Minimum framerate : 49.3 FPS Maximum framerate : 73.5 FPS GPU Temp Average: 77C CPU Temp Average: 80C --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Resident Evil 4 Resolution: 2560x1440 Graphics Settings(i.e. Texture Quality, Texture Filtering, Mesh Quality, Shadow Quality): High Average framerate : 123.4 FPS Minimum framerate : 83.1 FPS Maximum framerate : 173.4 FPS GPU Temp Average: 79C CPU Temp Average: 81C Resident Evil 4 Resolution: 2880x1800 Graphics Settings(i.e. Texture Quality, Texture Filtering, Mesh Quality, Shadow Quality): High Average framerate : 109.5 FPS Minimum framerate : 84.3 FPS Maximum framerate : 146.9 FPS GPU Temp Average: 79C CPU Temp Average: 80C --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Some of my other favorite highlights of this ROG Zephyrus G14 was the gorgeous 3K OLED 120Hz display, the built-in Dolby Atmos speakers, and the premium keyboard. I'm not sure why BestBuy has this display listed as 2560x1440 (i.e. 2K) resolution under the "Full Specs" section. This display is actually a whopping 2880x1800 (i.e. 3K)! I love that Asus went with this higher resolution over 2K. While one could argue that 2880x1800 resolution is absolute overkill for a screen of this size, I love the versatility of being able to run my games at 2560x1440 (to take advantage of a higher refresh rate) all while having the option to run the display at 2880x1800 when browsing the internet or doing anything on my laptop other than gaming. The higher resolution allows for some beautifully crisp and sharp text. Watching movies on streaming platforms, like Netflix, also looked stunning with the higher resolution. This display is also incredibly fast at 0.2ms for those that play a lot of twitch shooter titles. The color reproduction of this OLED Nebula display is stunning. It has very good contrast, colors are vivid and vibrant, it produces deep blacks, and has very good white uniformity. While the display does support HDR500, I do wish it supported a slightly higher HDR spec like HDR600 or HDR1000. Despite this, my games still looked gorgeous and the display was plenty bright. The Dolby Atmos speakers have to be heard in person. I was very impressed with how well tuned the soundstage is for laptop speakers. I was caught off guard byhow loud the speakers can get while still sounding crisp and defined with no distortion. Lastly, the keyboard is amongst one of the best I've used on a gaming laptop. Each individual key feels very high quality. They are firm and responsive with virtually no side to side wobble. The keys are thoughtfully laid out with convenient key shortcuts to launch things like the armoury crate software, aura lighting, CPU performance modes, and so much more. The keys are also fully RGB customizeable in the Aura software. I'm sure it's clear by now that I'm a huge fan of this ROG Zephyrus G14. I love the thoughtful design and component consideration choices that Asus made for this laptop. It all comes together really well and results in a gaming powerhouse that delivers massive performance in a very thin and compact form factor. If you're an avid gamer or PC power user looking for a portable solution and high-end performance, I can't recommend this Zephyrus G14 enough!
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Fair update to the 2024 Zephyrus lineup
ASUS and their Republic of Gamers (ROG) line of gaming PCs continue a good run, including this Zephyrus G14 2024 model. Over the last few years, I acquired a ROG Flow and the 2023 version of this model notebook and have been using them nonstop since. The Zephyrus G14 (2024) is a fairly compact white/crème laptop with a LED pattern on the top cover which flashes and provides cool visual effects. The Zephyrus is packed with hot technology including a updated AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS CPU, NVIDIA RTX 4070 GPU w/8GB of DDR6 memory (both of which are updates from last years Zephyrus model which had a 7040HS CPU & a NVIDIA 4060 GPU), this model also includes 32GB of DDR5 6400mhz RAM, a matte 14" QHD (16:10) 165Hz OLED non touchscreen. Rounding the system out with a 1TB SSD - PCIe Gen4 all with Windows 11 Home operating system. Ergonomically the Zephyrus feels good and is lighter and thinner than last year, 3.31lbs. A backlit keyboard and large trackpad are featured. Armoury Crate is ASUS’ software which provides you with deep insight and tuning abilities primarily with a CPU and GPU focus. Several preset modes are provided to keep all the performance related black magic behind the scenes. Performance profiles include Windows, Silent, Performance, Turbo (AC Powered only) and a Manual preset. Be aware some of the enhanced performance modes overclock the CPU/GPU and can really raise the temperature and get those cooling fans working. I will avoid diving too deeply into gaming performance, I only play a few games, but those I do play including ACE Combat 7 looked silky smooth with no dropped frames or glitches. As for my other passion, creating content – including moderately advanced video editing, it handles those tasks well. So everything I mentioned with the previous model of this line have been addressed. Bigger SSD, more standard memory. Pros: -