ASUS ROG GL702Z Ryzen Gaming Laptop Review

ASUS ROG GL702Z Intel this, Nvidia that, it's all you hear in the laptop market these days, or at least, it was. Today is a super exciting day as ASUS have sent us their AMD Ryzen 7 1700 equipped gaming laptop for review. Of course, it's got more AMD goodies too, as it comes with the AMD RX 580 4GB graphics card too, so sit should make light work of any game at 1080p resolutions. What's going to be interesting to test is how well this CPU compared to the Intel i5 and i7's we've been testing recently. Even more so, with eight cores at its disposal, the Ryzen 7 1700 has a clear advantage for rendering tasks, at least on paper. The RX 580 may be an older GPU, but it's proven competitive against the similarly priced Nvidia offerings in the desktop market. Of course, AMD has a big advantage in DirectX 12 too. Features AMD Ryzen 7 1700 / 3 GHz Max Turbo Speed 3.7 GHz 8-Core Processor 16GB RAM, 1TB HDD+256GB SSD 17.3" Full HD Display (1920 x 1080) Resolution AMD Radeon RX 580 4GB Dedicated Graphics Windows 10 Home What ASUS Had to Say "ROG Strix GL702ZC is the world's first gaming laptop featuring the AMD Ryzen™ 7 processor. Combining the sheer power of AMD's revolutionary Ryzen platform with ROG's gaming design legacy, ROG Strix GL702ZC is designed to deliver amazing performance to satisfy the needs of hard-core gamers and users with demanding, multimedia-heavy workloads. With a 17-inch, wide-view panel for incredible visuals, an anti-ghosting backlit keyboard for fast, accurate control, and ROG Gaming Center with a wealth of gamer-oriented features, ROG Strix GL702ZC is a finely tuned weapon backed by eight-core power for gaming a competitive edge." - ASUS Freesync and Beyond It wouldn't be AMD if they didn't throw in some cool Freesync support too. And with a 1920 x 1080 17.3" display, the GL702ZC should look great while gaming. Add to that a high-quality keyboard, powerful cooling, noise cancelling microphone tech to filter fan noise, and much more. FILTER OUT ALL AMBIENT NOISE "ROG Strix GL702ZC The comes with array microphones are designed to filter out ambient noise so your voice will come through loud and clear, which means that even if you're at a LAN party or in another loud environment, your voice will come through loud and clear." Specifications For in-depth specifications, please visit the official ASUS product page here. For updated pricing information, check out the ASUS store here. A Closer Look The Gl702Z does have a large display, so obviously it's a pretty huge laptop in general. If you're looking for something slim, light and easy to travel with, this isn't it. However, if you keep your laptop bag in the boot of your car, it's hardly going to be a burden to you anytime soon. If you want a big screen, you have to learn to carry it around. Connectivity Down the right side, you'll find an SD card reader, two USB ports, and a Kensington lock. Nothing too fancy, but all welcome additions. On the left, you'll find the power socket, GbE Ethernet, MiniDP, HDMI, USB Type-C, USB 3.0 and 3.5mm. Overall, that's everything you're likely to need. Cooling The Ryzen CPU and the RX 580 are known to be warmer bits of hardware, but with a huge bank of ventilation and a slightly thicker rear end, we don't think that'll be a problem here. Cooling is enhanced further by some strategically placed intakes and vents for extra airflow on the underside. Side note, I love how neat and symmetrical things look on the underside, as they so rarely do. Huge Display Rocking a 17.3-inch display, this laptop certainly has presence. Of course, having a big display allows a lot of other things too, such as the space required for a full-size keyboard. The number pad and arrow keys are a little squashed together to make it fit, but it's all there. This is going to be a big benefit to productivity and gaming alike. It also means the keyboard has a more natural feel to it, thanks to the bigger keys and desktop keyboard like ergonomics. There's a large touchpad too, which isn't much help for FPS gaming, but will get you through general navigation or a days work easily enough. Gaming Keys The keys have a cool red font on them, and the WASD keys have a red trim around the edges too, highlighting the laptops gaming pedigree. The full-size number pad is certainly welcome too, great for gaming macros, or just dealing with spreadsheets at work. Freesync The FreeSync display looks stunning, and while it's "only" 1920 x 1080, it's bright, clear and well suited to enjoying your favourite movies and games. Now, let's find out how it performs! Testing & Methodology To test each system or notebook, we want to stress every component of the system to check stability and performance, giving us an idea as to why those particular components were picked for this particular system. We use a wide variety of applications to gain a broad spectrum of results for comparing diverse aspects of system performance. Games Used All games are tested at both 1920 x 1080, 2560 x 1440 and 2160 x 3840 (4K). Please note that for systems which do not support a particular resolution, such as 1080p laptops, we will not test the higher resolutions on those devices. Rise of the Tomb Raider (Steam) DX12 Medium Preset Pure Hair Off Deus Ex (Steam) DX12 Medium Preset Ghost Recon: Wildlands (Uplay) Medium Preset Turf Effects Off Far Cry Primal (Uplay) Normal Preset Software Used 3DMark Fire Strike (download) FireStrike (1080p) Benchmark Unigine Superposition (download) 1080p Extreme Benchmark PCMark 10 Professional (download) Express Benchmark WPrime (download) 32M and 1024M CineBench R15 (download) CPU Multi CPU Single Handbrake (download) Custom MP4 to MKV 4K conversion (details below) AIDA64 Engineer (download) CPU-Z (download) HWMonitor (download) Handbrake To stress processors to their absolute limit and accurately judge their performance in video editing workloads, we transcode a 7.7GB compilation of gaming footage; this particular file is freely available from here. The captured footage is 22 minutes and 12 seconds long, it has a bit rate of 50.1 Mbps and it uses the Advanced Video Codec. Additionally, the video runs at a constant 30 frames-per-second and opts for a 3820 x 2140 (4K) resolution. Once loaded into Handbrake, we then transcode the 4K MP4 to an MKV file using the "normal" profile. Synthetic Benchmarks 3DMark Firestrike Straight away, the GL702Z posts a solid score, and the Ryzen CPU and the RX 580 post nearly identical to the i7-7700HQ and GTX 1060 equipped Chillblast Samurai. Unigine Superposition 1080p Extreme The same is true in Unigine, falling just behind the Samurai, but only by a small margin. PCMark 10 Having an 8-core CPU is a huge advantage on any system, and the GL702Z rockets into the lead here, scoring a fantastic 4418, beating out many highed laptops inthe process. WPrime 32M and 1024M However, it's WPrime that it re-writes the rules, clocking our second fastest time by a huge margin. The fastest time is with the desktop 1800X, so the mobile 1700 scoring so close is simply amazing. Cinebench R15 The ASUS Zephyrus is one of the fastest and most expensive laptops we've ever reviewed, however, the more affordable GL702Z beat the multi-core performance of everything else by almost double! Handbrake MP4 to MKV Conversion 4K The same for transcoding a 4K video, boasting an impressive 39 FPS. Clearly, the Ryzen equipped laptop is going to be a strong contender for content creators who need processing power on the go. Storage Write Storage performance is competitive, nothing crazy, but it delivers the kind of speeds you would expect from an SSD hard drive. That means faster loading times, and the write times aren't too shabby either. Read Gaming Performance The Ryzen laptop has already blown us away with its number-crunching capabilities, so how does it fair in the gaming benchmarks? The RX 580 isn't the most powerful GPU in the world, but it's affordable and more than powerful enough for 1080P gaming in desktops. Clearly, it's no slouch in laptops either. In Deus Ex, it scored a respectable 84 FPS, and it hit the same 84 FPS in Tomb Raider also. That's easily beating out the refresh rate of the display, so no issues there for our two DirectX 12 benchmarks. Good numbers kept rolling in with Ghost Recon and Far Cry too, posting 64 and 76 FPS respectively. For a GPU that's not exactly bleeding edge tech, that's a solid set of figures and makes this laptop perfect for playing the latest games. Deus Ex: Mankind Divided Rise of the Tomb Raider Ghost Recon: Wildlands Far Cry Primal Power Consumption and Temperatures Temperatures I was quick to think that the Ryzen CPU would be noticeably hotter than the Intel offerings, but that's clearly not the case.. At 74c under heavy load, it's running just fine. Of course, the larger laptop design does mean more room for heat dissipation, but hey, if it works, it works. The same goes for the GPU, as it topped out at 68c, making it one of the coolest mobile GPUs we've tested... didn't see that one coming, I must admit. CPU GPU Acoustics The GL702Z isn't the quietest or the loudest we've tested, if anything, it's pretty average for a gaming laptop in terms of acoustics. Final Thoughts Pricing This is where I let you sit down and wait for the shocking news. Despite beating out ASUS's own monster laptop, the Zephyrus in the number crunching rendering benchmarks, the Ryzen equivalent is about half the price... HALF! At just £1449.99 the GL702Z is a rendering powerhouse of a laptop, and with the RX 580 packing some gaming punch, it's easily one of the better value for money laptops on the market today. Overview I see a lot of laptops come and go here at eTeknix, and for the most part, there's not a whole lot of them that is different. They usually use the same Intel CPU that's popular that year, such as the i7-7700HQ, and the same mid-to-high specification GPU, such as the GTX 1060. To have something that's completely different come through is a breath of fresh air, and only makes me sad that we've not had more competitive AMD laptops in recent years. Rendering Monster The Ryzen CPU range for desktops is impressive, delivering 8-cores of raw power that makes multitasking and rendering a breeze, without spending a small fortune. It seems not of that performance is lost in the move to mobile either, as the GL702Z delivered some earth-shattering performance that blows any Intel laptop we've tested clean out of the water. If you're stuck rendering a lot of videos on the go, you have two choices to get this performance. You can either get a Ryzen laptop or spend 3x as much on a workstation grade Intel laptop. Home and Office For day to day work and gaming, the AMD hardware has a lot to offer. Obviously, it makes light work of multi-tasking. However, when it comes to getting through a days work, it's fast and responsive as you would expect. Furthermore, when it comes to kicking back on an evening, it'll deliver some very competitive gaming performance. The GPU is punchy enough to play any of the latest games. However, it's that huge 17.3-inch display and the FreeSync technology that really help it shine, giving you plenty to feast your eyes on. Everything Else All this laptop had to do is compete with similarly priced Intel offerings, and it certainly did. It beats Intel in the multi-tasking and rendering, and it's almost as fast when it comes to gaming. Throw in a few bonus features like an LED lit keyboard, punch speakers, impressive cooling, robust connectivity, and FreeSync, and you've got a great value for money bundle. It's not as light and mobile as some may desire, but few 17.3-inch display laptops are, if any! Pros Huge 17.3-inch FreeSync Display Competitive gaming performance Class-leading rendering performance Full-size keyboard Competitively priced A viable alternative to Intel/Nvidia solutions Robust build quality Great cooling capabilities Cons None Neutral It's quite heavy, but it does feature a large display. It's not like there aren't small systems on the market if you require them.