ROG Zephyrus S GX701 review: So powerful yet so slim

The new ROG Zephyrus S GX701 is the new entry to the Zephyrus model, an upgraded version from its past predecessor. The new laptop didn’t merely just receive an upgrade on size but an upgrade on everything. There’s even a powerhouse packed inside this slim and delicate body of the laptop that can rival the performance of a gaming desktop. The ultra slim gaming laptop will be priced at RM13,999 and here’s our ROG Zephyrus S GX701 review.

Design

First off, let’s take a look at the design of this ultra slim laptop. The new Zephyrus S GX701 has very slim bezels and smart design with 17-inch display in a 15-inch form factor.

Moreover, it’s highly portable thanks to it being the smallest in its class. Also, this beast here is tough because it’s body is made of magnesium-alloy that can stand up to everyday life.

Like its predecessor, the keyboard position will come forward when the lid is lifted and the bottom will elevate allowing cooler air intake. So, the design that ROG came out does not only aim for a better appearance but also a better performance.

Besides that, they have upgraded their keyboard to single key AURA RGB backlight making it possible for every keys to have different colors. Plus, you can customize the colors of it using the Armoury Crate software. However, the laptop has a very awkward space which is for the fan but they should have make use of it more.

ROG Zephyrus S GX701 Specifications

The specifications on this ultra slim laptop is insane! It’s powered by the 8^th Gen Intel Core i7-8750H Hexa core processor with HM370 chipset that enhances overall performance.

Besides that, there’s the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 (Max-Q) 8GB GDDR6 VRAM, one of the most powerful graphic cards around that allows photorealistic graphics in game. Furthermore, this beast of a laptop also offers 8GB + 16GB DDR4 2666MHz SDRAM that totals up to 24Gb, how amazing is that! Games running on this laptop can never be any smoother compared to any current gaming laptops.

However, the laptop doesn’t have an HDD instead of 1TB of SSD which is frankly quite enough for gamers looking to game heavily. In addition, the 17.3-inch Full HD (1920×1080) display with G-SYNC is on a whole other level that offers up to 144Hz refresh rate and 3ms response time. All of this is possible with the bezels being super narrow and the removal of internal webcam, but they did provide one for free in the bundle though. Most importantly, ROG has even incorporated the Optimus mode into the laptop due to how bad the battery last on the last model. Now, light task without any plug-in power can last to 5 hours long!

GX701 Performance Benchmarks

• 3D Mark

ROG Zephyrus S GX701 scores an incredible result of 8151 in 3D Mark test, the Graphic score is 8566 while the CPU is 6397. Moreover, it also manages to get 49 to 59 FPS on both graphics test and CPU test got a 21 FPS. This result shows how it can handle high-graphics video game with ease.

• PC Mark 10

For the test on PC Mark 10, GX701 got 5733 which is also quite an impressive score on a laptop. Then the scores for Essentials, Productivity, and Digital Content Creation are 8423, 7294, and 8324 in the following order. With results like these, video content creation is not a problem at all.

Gaming Performance 

A ROG Zephyrus S GX701 review can’t miss out on gaming performance right? So, here it is! We tested games that require high requirements and the games are Devil May Cry 5, Battlefield 5, PUBG, Apex Legends, The Division 2 and even Sekiro: Shadow Die Twice. To our surprise, all these games run really smoothly on the ultra slim and powerful laptop.

With Apex Legends and PUBG reaching FPS of 144 and maintaining the frames at 135 above. As for Sekiro: Shadow Die Twice, the FPS for windows version is only capped at 60 FPS, so we only got 60FPS and maintain it throughout the game!

While testing out Devil May Cry 5, we noticed how the 8GB VRAM of RTX2080 is pushed to the limit. Even though it’s at its limit, DMC5 still runs extraordinary smoothly having stabilizing the FPS at 10 and reaching the peak at 120FPS!

Verdict

In a nutshell, the ROG Zephyrus S GX701 is without a doubt a beast of a laptop which can easily play games at 80FPS and above thanks to RTX2080 graphic card. Other than that, the sleek and magnesium-alloy design is very cool looking. At times the laptop will heat up after long-session of gaming but that still doesn’t affect much on our gaming experience. So, to those very hardcore gamers that is always on the move. This is the one gaming laptop that you are looking for! The ROG Zephyrus S GX701 is now available in Malaysia and is priced at RM13,999.