Amazon.com: Customer reviews: ASUS ROG Zephyrus S Ultra Slim Gaming PC Laptop, 15.6” 144Hz IPS Type, Intel Core i7-8750H CPU, GeForce GTX 1070, 16GB DDR4, 512GB PCIe SSD, Military-Grade Metal Chassis, Win 10 Home

Excellent Work+Gaming Laptop, definitely an 8/10, possibly 9/10

Reviewed in the United States on November 27, 2018

Long Story short, would I buy again?
- Yes.
Do I regret buying this laptop over others?
- Not at all.

Pretty much well rounded, great material quality, great performance balance between work and play.
For reference, I use Visual Studio 2017, Adobe CC Photoshop/Illustrator, Autodesk Maya 2018.4, and Mudbox 2018.2 to do different types of development, mainly Game Development with my own tools and software. It handles each of the applications I've listed very well, so transitioning from my Desktop to this Laptop with work is a good experience. I only play games occasionally, but the hardware specs suit my development and gaming use very well.

After some setup it's proven to be a wonderful laptop, it's definitely not ready right out of the box, or even charged for that matter, that was the case for mine at least. For my programming, the text by default is scaled 125%, so setting it to 100% for me made it much better, because at the 125% scale, text is noticeably blurry.

In hindsight, the only things I would want different with the hardware is there to be 2 RAM slots, and I'm fine with having a single M.2 SSD, although having two M.2 SSD's would be prefect. Also maybe a higher capacity battery, although I don't know where they'd be able to fit it, would be cool if there was a matching external battery pack for this laptop.

Pros:
- CPU is fantastic, it's a great balance between work and gaming on a laptop.
- GPU, well it's a 1070 under-clocked with some less features than a regular 1070, but it handles gaming quite well.
- Display is beautiful, even though it's only 100% sRGB. I haven't tested the refresh rate yet, so all I can say is it's good so far, haven't noticed any screen tearing in games yet.
- Keyboard is smooth and silent, the keys do require a bit of a heavy typing hand to function. I also like the keyboard layout along with the space between the F4 and F5 keys, since I use the function keys quite a bit with development. The Print Screen button is in an unusual position next to the right Alt key.
- The Touchpad + Numpad I was at first skeptical about, but it's not a bad experience actually.
- RGB Lighting looks pretty nice, gives it that extra quality appearance, haven't played around with the lighting too much, mainly just wanted it so I could see the keyboard if I'm not in a well lit environment.
- Very solid materials, gotta give ASUS props on the materials used for this laptop.
- Webcam is actually comparable to a Logitech C920 Webcam. I have only tested in the Skype video settings preview and not full screen yet, but I've seen much worse image quality on other laptops in the same Skype video settings preview. I have not tested the Microphone yet either, so we'll see how that turns out.
- Wireless Adapter works very well, on both 2.4GHz and 5GHz it's been steady, stable, and strong. I haven't noticed any defects or issues with the Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. So even though there's not an RJ-45 Ethernet port, I don't see it having any stability issues with online gaming or even with streaming, although I'd trust using a USB Ethernet Adapter more than Wi-Fi for streaming anyway. I ran a speed test which gave me the maximum up/downstream of my internet service subscription. (attached image)
- 25 GB's of Dropbox storage, not really a benefit for me since I don't use Dropbox, but whatever, free GB's I guess.

Cons:
- Runs a bit hot and loud under medium-high load.
- Kingston SSD, would be nice if they put a 1 TB in since they're going with a cheaper brand SSD, it's decent though, and I'll probably end up replacing it later on since that's not enough space for having multiple games installed and doing work. The actual size of the drive ends up being 476 GB, not very close to the 512 GB it's labeled as, I believe that's due to the drive reserving space for performance and durability purposes.
- Not really that bad, but the light bleed is noticeable if the video output is all black. Although, it's not anything noticeable with normal scenarios.
- Battery Life can range from 5 Hours to an hour or less, depending on what you're running and your power settings.
- Gets Dirty very easily, like most laptops, but this one if you're OCD like myself, you'll spend a lot of time cleaning it up after each use.
- On-Board 8 GB RAM, instead of having two slots so we can upgrade to 32GB of RAM, there's just one slot which you can put a 16 GB stick in to get 24 GB's, unsure if it supports a 32 GB stick in the one slot though, my guess would be no, but I haven't seen or read anything that says any higher than 16 GB's for the one slot.
- Claiming the Call of Duty - Black Ops 4 game made me lose a bit of respect for ASUS on this one, they made it such a painful experience, it was almost not even worth it. To obtain the code for obtaining the serial key to obtain the game, you have to run the MyAsus App and run the Update to get the ASUS Promotion App, which gives you the code to register and obtain the serial key, where you have to post a picture of the packaging and your invoice, that just seemed a bit too over the top for my liking, but whatever, finally got the game after waiting about 10-20 minutes for a response email after submitting the form and pictures.
- Candy Crush, and other bad promo stuff preloaded without a straight-forward way of removing, I'm actually not even sure how I removed mine, I ran the Powershell in Administrator mode with "Get-AppxPackage -Name king.com.*"
(without the double quotation marks) and it turned up with nothing, now I don't see Candy Crush Saga and Candy Crush whatever it was in the start menu anymore, doesn't make any sense, but whatever, as long as there isn't candy crush.
- Windows 10 Home, for this price and compared to other laptops with Windows 10 Pro in the same price range and specs as this laptop.

Notes for the Attached Images,
- The game screenshot is Call of Duty - Black Ops 4 with whatever optimal settings GeForce Experience set by default.
- The spreadsheet is the output of getting the Physical Device Limits from Vulkan 1.1.85.0, between the GTX-1070 with Max-Q Design and Intel HD 630 that are part of the ASUS ROG Zephyrus S GX531GS. I've got a GTX-1060/1070/1080 that I haven't ran the code on yet, I may update this review later and add another spreadsheet image with those values added in comparison.
- CPU-Z windows stacked next to each other for reference, on the benchmark - I had two instances of Visual Studio, Adobe Photoshop, and Discord+Skype running during the benchmark.
- Task Manager Screenshot is just because I like seeing all those logical processor graphs.
- Speedtest results on 5GHz, on 2.4GHz I got around 130 Mbps Download, and 12 Mbps Upload, Although this is a Speedtest.net result, I tried testmy.net and the test was just taking forever, possibly because the ISP throttling those test servers or the servers themselves, who knows.. (Internet service package tested is rated at 250 Mbps).

**UPDATE DEC 5, 2018**
I found out that the typical Alt+NumPad [Key Code] shortcut doesn't work, from testing different combinations I found that to do this, you use Alt+PgUp+NumPad [Key Code]. So just remember to press the Alt Key then PgUp or PgDn (both work) before typing the key code.
(e.g. Alt+PgUp+NumPad [0169] = © "copyright symbol")
(e.g. Alt+PgUp+NumPad [0153] = ™ "trademark symbol")

36 people found this helpful

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Nicholas Perry

I Love It, and You Will Too

Reviewed in the United States on July 24, 2019

Verified Purchase

You've likely read other reviews regarding Asus' ROG Zephyrus S Ultra Slim, hesitating on issues relating to heat, light bleed, and battery life. I purchased my laptop during the Prime Day sale event and spent a lot of time debating between this laptop and another, less expensive unit. I was scared off by some of the earlier reviews because, let's face it, this is a large expenditure you likely don't need, unless you are replacing your PC or you or your child participate in esports. I'll tell you now, this is a fantastic machine!

Light Bleed: I have none. It affected a small number of machines, and Asus dealt with the problem.

Battery life: It sucks. What do yo expect from a high-performance machine?? It sucks power like crazy, but there are modes to help alleviate some of the battery issues with a balance between performance and use, extending the battery life. But if you are eyeing this laptop, you already know battery life is not the most important factor since this is a gaming laptop, not an 8 hours in a coffee shop for fake production and social media machine. You want power!

Heat: I ran my Zephyrus for while and, yes, it heats up as any machine does, but the cooling system in this unit is great! It has a purr to it, rather than the screech or loud, extended growls like you've landed in some 80s jungle film. The purr is pleasant and the air disperses through several vents.

Things I like:
- Attention to detail! The laptop is self is really thin, as the name suggests, and it feels solid. You'll want to be careful with the top because it smudges and marks easily, but it's a powdered black metal with a contrasting eggshell and Republic of Gamers logo I find attractive and tasteful. It feels professional, classy, and rugged.
-Don't think "flimsy" when you think "thin." I did....and I was surprised and satisfied with how solid laptop the laptop feels.
-When you press that power button, you get a super quick splash for Republic of Gamers and a small sound effect. It's quick, slick, and stands out from the other laptops I've used. Boot was FAST and I can be in a game in moments rather than wait for any bloatware or background services.
-Fans have a satisfying purr
-The screen is beautiful and I had no light bleed. It clicks closed with a magnetic seal. It does not feel like i am going to break it, and the 144hz, while not quite the same quality as a full PC monitor, is the best I have seen on a gaming laptop.
-Keyboard has a slight bounce to the keys, and the numpad is actually controlled by a separate button, allowing you to turn the touchpad--all of which were created by Satan and sacrificing small animals--into an illuminated 10-key. It's very chic. Some complained about keyboard placement and no wrist rest, but you really won't miss it. Besides, people, wrist rests are for your palms, anyway, no your wrists!
-Plays all my games with panache. I have had no issues with any of the games I run, which are mostly Blizzard products, warframe, whatever Steam has on sale, and similar ilk. I jack up those settings and GO! It's beautiful.

Things I dislike:
-There is no ethernet port option on this machine. I miss my jack, Asus! Why 4 you take my jack from me?? At the very least, Asus *could* have included some kind of ethernet USB adapter for those of us who have unreliable wifi. For the pricetag, something like that would have been appreciated.
-Hinges will be an issue. You can only push the screen back to a certain point, which is not 90 degrees, but maybe 110? 115? If you are the type who likes to push your screen back beyond that point like it's a recliner, you will NOT like this laptop. The hinges offer additional stability and postpone wear, I'm sure, but Asus had to make a sacrifice somewhere to do it, and it's the recliner crowd who paid. If I am sitting on something with my laptop at the same elevation as my knees, I am going to have to crane my neck or get a stack of books to make the screen level.
-Touchpad placement is...weird. You would think being used to using a mouse with your right hand would make using a touchpad on the right a no-brainer, but it's weird. We are raised with a centered touchpad and it takes your brain some time to adjust to its new placement. Did for me, at least. Maybe I'm just dumb. Or inflexible. Maybe my ex-wife was right...Asus, you sided with my ex!?

Thank you for reading this far, if you did. The Asus ROG Zephyrus S Ultra Slim is an artful laptop and you will be pleased with the look, feel, and function.
I love you.

16 people found this helpful

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Jason H.

Almost 5 stars; fan volume and a faulty screen on my first order takes it down a notch

Reviewed in the United States on October 16, 2018

Verified Purchase

Updated: 10/28/18

I really wanted to give this laptop five stars. It has just about everything you could every want in a light, thin, and powerful package.

If you check the review sites for gaming laptops, this one is in or near the top three (with MSI, Razer, and Dell all vying for top spots) for performance, features, and size.

The advantage to ASUS is price...this is a good $500 less than the top three with configuration and performance that is pretty darn close and with the brightest screen of them all.

It has an innovative, redesigned cooling system that helps set it apart from it's competitors. It's definitely a step up from their ROG systems a year ago and keeps the system cooler and operating at peak performance. However; with better cooling comes a penalty: fan volume.

THIS IS LOUD. Equivalent of a vacuum cleaner loud (between 72-74db) from 3 feet away.

It's loud enough that I can't set it for Turbo (max FPS) when sitting on the couch next to my spouse. If you turn down the performance to Balanced (noise drops down to about 66-69db) or Silent (40db), it limits the framerate (90 and 60FPS respectively) and fan speeds; but heat becomes a problem again. It's loud enough on Turbo that I need to use headphones because white noise from the fans (there are two) drowns out the audio from the connected soundbar.

You'll also hear a lot of gripes about the keyboard. Personally, I love it...especially moving the track pad to the right (I always accidentally hit the trackpad when it bottom middle).

If you are resting your wrists on the laptop itself or the surface below, then you are setting yourself up for an RSI. The Zephyrus forces you to float your wrists and move the laptop forward more than normal...which is ergonomically better for you; but it will take some time to get used to.

The one area where the keyboard is a pain is on airplanes. You don't have much room to begin with and then forcing the keyboard into your stomach makes it darn near impossible to type on. If you travel a lot, then you may want to consider a different laptop.

Battery life. Well...it's a gaming laptop: if you are looking for economical power savings then perhaps something that consumes a bit less power might be more attuned to your needs. I get about 2hrs max when playing games (max performance is limited to 90FPS "balanced" while on battery). I had issues with framerates while on the battery; but that may be my own custom settings.

The screen is gorgeous at 1920x1080 (1080p) native. It'll output up to 3840x1600 (4k/HDR) through the external Nvidia USB-C port Note: the laptop screen uses an integrated Intel UHD driver, not the Nvidia...you get the same functionality; but it's a bit strange and it also means you can't use Nvidia's tools while running directly on the laptop screen.

Audio is also fantastic; great sound for such a small system.

There is a full array of ports for all your needs; but if you want external 4k/HDR, then you'll need to use USB-C.

Great product and well worth the money!

11 people found this helpful

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Colin Rindlisbacher

Great Laptop despite concerns

Reviewed in the United States on July 16, 2019

Verified Purchase

I was very hesitant when deciding to buy this, I've read all the reviews and seen some of the potential issues but I ultimately decided to buy it anyway. I've had it for a month now and can tell you its one of the better laptops I've seen, it looks sleek and doesn't scream "I'm a gamer" which I prefer. It's a little bigger than I had anticipated, it doesn't really fit in my backpack sleeve very well, but for its size its not that heavy. In terms of performance it was amazing, I have a PC back at home (I'm with my parents during the summer, left most of my stuff at the university) with around the same specs other than I have a 1060 in it rather than the 1070 in this laptop, this laptop runs games very well it honestly surprised me. The display was pretty great as well, for the longest time I've been looking at it paranoid everyday for the dreaded screen bleed that has plagued a lot of these but have yet to see any 1 month in. Only issues with this computer are portability, battery life, and noise when gaming. While its sleek and smaller than a lot of laptops, its still relatively big and like I said doesn't fit in my backpack sleeve for laptops, along with this the battery life isnt great and def dont try to game on battery life, it wont last very long. Due to both of those I wouldn't suggest this laptop for long school days or work days where you won't have access to an outlet. The last issue of noise isnt really an issue for me, the laptop does get noticeably loud, especially when playing graphic intensive games but I almost always have a headset on that blocks out that noise for me but do be mindful of it if you're playing in a public area with people around.

Overall I have had an amazing experience with this laptop, I was coming into it VERY skeptical and looking for every possible flaw to potentially have to send it back and to be honest I haven't found any. If you're looking for a laptop strictly to game on, this is the perfect laptop for that, but if you need a laptop to last you through long work or schooldays I would suggest elsewhere.

For context I'm usually playing Assassins Creed Origins, Apex Legends, League of Legends, Rocket League, The Forest
and have great performance on all of them, Origins would run at ~60fps at the higher settings, and Apex I can get to run at 110-144 at low settings. The other games run at pretty much max fps, even at higher settings. Definitely a great laptop.

2 people found this helpful

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Dylan F.

Died on me after a year

Reviewed in the United States on May 21, 2020

Verified Purchase

I bought this laptop in July 2019. It worked great and I really loved it, though the fans were kind of loud and after just a couple of months they seemed to be even louder. I cleaned them out with canned air often. In October of 2020 it suddenly shut off while I was working. I thought maybe it had just overheated and left it to cool down before turning it back on. It got stuck in a boot loop and no matter what I tried I could not get it to access the bios, or start in safe mode, or anything. Figured the hard drive had died.

I took it in to get the drive replaced, brought it home, and it died in exactly the same fashion. I was told it had just been a bad drive and they replaced it again. Same issue. Decided to take it someplace else for a second opinion, and that opinion turned out to be that basically everything had fried.

Now, I am at fault for not getting the extended warranty on it, as Asus customer support said there is nothing they can do, I'd have to pay to have it fixed which would cost about as much as just getting a new one. I didn't find the support staff rude or unhelpful, I understand how warranties work and I took a risk by not paying extra for an extended one.

But I am disappointed that such an expensive laptop would die so completely in such a short amount of time. I wasn't doing anything strenuous on it, I played some MMOs and that was about it, nothing that even pushed the graphics at all, and I wasn't doing anything like mining crypto or something. I had purchased a cooling pad for it that had 5 fans and I had the app to keep track of the temperature, so I don't think it was anything I did.

Instead of paying to get it fixed I built a new desktop. I think I'm just done with gaming laptops, they are too expensive to fix and not as easily upgradeable, and tend to be louder fans and hotter temps.

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Mike D

All Around Amazing Laptop, Truly Innovative Design

Reviewed in the United States on January 10, 2019

Verified Purchase

The Asus ROG Zephyrus S is a great deal for the hardware it offers. It is slim, sturdy, graphics are clean with no refresh rate issues even in intensive modern shooters. The keyboard layout is perfect and the case design incredibly innovative both supporting and enhancing it's top of the line designed cooling system. The ASUS Armory Crate software that comes standard allows for customization of how much or little system resources are utilized to achieve different results (i.e. a Silent profile for on the go use, balanced, for tabletop, and Turbo for optimized GPU performance, CPU performance, and cooling) as well s keyboard lighting among other functions. As far as a laptop designed for on the go gamers this is the best I've found. It's lightweight design and slim form factor make it the most portable laptop I've ever owned yet it still rivals and often dwarfs the performance of many of my acquaintances desktops. This ROG (Republic of Gamers) product more than lived up to the ROG claim of being designed by gamers for gamers. In addition the laptop is sleek and professional looking making it unobtrusive in a work/school setting. Running three tier 2 virtualized OSes concurrently with 4 GBs of RAM dedicated to each caused no problems. Scans and queries of the filesystem are incredibly fast. I absolutely love this laptop and it is exactly as advertised on ASUS' website if you look up the model. The only "negative" aspect of this product that you could point to is that it's battery life is fairly short but given the performance and form factor of the device I personally find it more than adequate and I never bring a laptop anywhere without a charger like most users so it's essentially irrelevant. If you need to use it without a charger you can get 4-5+ hours of fairly high intensity operations without even turning down the performance from balanced or disabling keyboard backlighting and screen brightness.

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Kevin

Love at first sight

Reviewed in the United States on October 2, 2018

Verified Purchase

Have had my eye on this PC for a long time and picked it up yesterday and ran some tests. I previously had a MSI GT80 Titan with two 970m SLI, this PC performs about 10 percent better than my old PC, but pretty much 1/5 the size. Laptop, although much lighter than my old PC, is actually surprisingly heavier than it looks (which is a plus for me, I like a PC with a little heft).

My main concern was cooling, and I can say this PC has it in SPADES. I ran a RE6 Benchmark Test (it's what I had on me at the time) on High Settings as well as two 60 fps youtube channels and the temperature never spiked past 82 C, it usually kept to a general 75-78 C temperature range. You can quickly bring up Armoury Crate Software with the Asus Logo Button (located on the upper right hand corner of the keyboard, above the trackpad) and set Fan profiles based on the game, or let it automatically set it's own fan speed depending on bearing load.

I'm still performing some tests so things can be subject to change, but so far, this PC has turned out to be the real deal. A bit of caution for anyone looking to buy though, remember this PC does NOT came with a Thunderbolt Plug, I knew this going in and it didn't effect me but it may matter to you. Also remember, naturally, if you plan to use this for heavy use this version of the Zephyrus S (1070 Max Q Version) ONLY has SSD, there is no extended hard drive so you will need an external one. Also keep in mind, much like the Razer Blade 15, this laptop has NO Ethernet Port. If you're going to buy this and you're a serious no holds barred gamer, then you can pretty much consider buying a USB Type C Hub (the ones with the Ethernet Port) pretty much part of the deal as well.

Pros:

+ Arguably the Strongest Contender for the best thermals and cooling of any current super thin gaming laptop on the market. You can clearly tell the main thing that keeps this puppy cooled is nothing but good old fashioned mechanical ingenuity.
+ Extremely Light and Powerful for it's size, using Armoury Crate Software you can overclock the GPU and reach pretty much full GTX 1070 level performance.
+ Very reasonably Priced for what you get.
+ Slim and Sleek Design. The Zephyrus S is designed elegantly, but at the same time it's not ostentatious. You could most likely bring this into a business meeting or a library and you wouldn't draw unneeded attention.

Cons:
- No Ethernet Port or Thunderbolt Connection
- The side by side trackpad and keyboard is considered unconventional by some (I consider this a pro though, I LOVE the setup, it's so fancy)
- SSD ONLY (for the 1070 Max Q Version) be prepared to pick up an External HD or be ready to carefully manage the games you download
- RGB lighting is kind of soft on the keyboard. You can increase the lighting intensity, but by most modern day standards it's still going to have more of a soft glow then an in your face level of intensity.
- Fans are SURPRISINGLY LOUD when they are at their maximum setting, especially for something so small. Again, I also like this because I respect a machine with a little kick and can flex it's cooling muscles when it needs to. But this could be considered a con for some. Remember that you can always manually adjust fan settings using a button or set an automated profile in Armoury Crate depending on what game you play.

Admittedly, I gave this 5 stars because just about all the cons, at least to ME, weren't really cons save for the Ethernet Port and Thunderbolt connection, but I already had a USB Type C hub when I bought this so I was good to go. But I wanted to list those warnings out there for people who are considering this laptop.

Before buying, KNOW what you are getting before purchasing this, READ THE FINE SPEC PRINTS, if you can keep that in mind, this PC is a real beauty.

**UPDATED REVIEW AFTER MORE THAN ONE YEAR OF USE**

Hey guys quick update. After just a little more than one year of use the laptop speakers have broken down and I decided to send the laptop in for repair (for reference the laptop is out of warranty). After about a week I received a repair quote from Asus for a hellaciously high amount of money ($1437). According to Asus, in order to fix the speaker issue the Motherboard will need to be replaced, and along with the Motherboard all of it's appropriately soldered components.

I chose to reject the payment and have the laptop returned. While the laptop still works great I've decided to purchase a bluetooth speaker and pair it to the laptop but truth be told, the speakers shouldn't have broken after literally only a year and like 2 months of use. I have always taken great care of the laptop (never dropped, hell never even bumped into a wall) so not entirely sure why the speakers crapped out.

In any case, because of this whole ordeal I'm going to have to lower my review from Five Stars to Three Stars instead. Just thought some of you out in Amazon land should know.

275 people found this helpful

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Jonathan

Need a portable machine for playing games on ultra settings anywhere? This is it.(AC Adapter Req.)

Reviewed in the United States on August 12, 2020

Verified Purchase

I have been using this laptop close to 2 years now. It's great. Performance is not throttled by heat on turbo mode. Can be a bit noise, but if you use headphones, you won't hear it. Game performance is still great on silent mode. The fan noise is barely noticeable, if you have music playing or game sound on, you won't hear it at all. The sound system is great. It is high quality sound for it's size. Obviously don't expect very deep bass on this, just put on headphones. My current boot time is still 6 seconds even after all this time using it. Screen refresh rate is very nice. The 1070 has handled all of the AAA games that I played at max setting with at least 144 frame for that nice smooth refresh rate. Don't expect to game much on battery. On battery it has lasted around 3.5 hours watching videos. It has a very good engineering in terms of not killing your battery on countless hours of AC adapter plugged in while gaming. The only complaint I have on this product is the AC adapter, it is massive. 6.5x3x1.2 inches. It's not heavy for it's size, feels around 1.5 pounds. It's pricey but you get every penny of it in portability to performance ratio.

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Tim

My review of my ASUS ROG Zephyrus S Gaming Laptop after 2 weeks of use.

Reviewed in the United States on December 15, 2018

Verified Purchase

As a college student, I was looking for a laptop that can be the best of both worlds, something that was light, portable, had decent battery life while having the power to play AAA title games or whatever I threw at it. I decided to wait and use my unit for 2 weeks so I can give a more comprehensive review, though I will say that my review will be written from a college student's perspective and not so much from a professional computer reviewer's perspective.

PROS:

DESIGN: This laptop is one of the most uniquely designed gaming laptop being sold on the market. Build quality is very nice, sturdy, metal-ly, and minimal flex. The unique keyboard/mousepad layout and its fancy Active Aerodynamic System allows the laptop to stay cool when gaming. Its thin bezels around the display makes the laptop look much more modern and does help contribute to its slim form factor. This laptop is just ever so slightly bigger than the Macbook Pro 15 with Touch bar, very impressive. ASUS did a great job designing the outer shell of the laptop to be subtle and clean, allowing you to take it to the office or coffee shop and not attract attention to itself, though I would be lying if I did not say that the laptop did catch some intrigued glances in my classes.

PERFORMANCE: This laptop makes procrastination very easy to achieve as it can run close to any game currently out and popular smoothly. With the fans running on balanced mode, graphics all maxed out, CPU/GPU stock, (See attached photos), I was able to get around 140-230 fps on CS:GO with GPU and CPU temps around 64C and 75C respectively. For Far Cry 3 (I know, I know, it's an outdated game but I really enjoy playing it), I was getting around 60-80 fps with GPU hovering at 62C and CPU at around 75C. I was able to redeem Black Ops 4, play it on max, and was alos getting performance slightly better than Far Cry 3. This laptop should be able to play any games on the market and sustain minimum 60fps most of the time.

DISPLAY: Color accuracy is great. Colors look vibrant from every video I watched. I've used my laptop out in direct sunlight and never really had an issue with visibility, thanks to its decent max brightness as well as its matte-finish, eliminating major glares. Its fast 144hz refresh rate and 3ms response time makes gaming and even just swinging the mouse cursor back and forth really fast enjoyable.

BATTERY LIFE: Some may list this as a con but some people tend to forget that gaming laptops are very power hungry. I did read somewhere that the battery size of the GX531 was around like 50Wh, a bit on the smaller side. The Nvidia Optimus technology monitored the laptop's battery usage quite nicely and I was able to squeeze out a good 4.5 hours on 33% brightness cramming for my finals before the laptop needed to be charged. That for me is more than enough to make me happy but of course, more would make me happier.

CONS:
(Before continuing reading, most of the cons I list pertain to what I experienced on my unit. I may have gotten unlucky I guess.)

DISPLAY: Some reviewers on Amazon post that their unit has backlight bleed and I am sad to say that my unit suffers the same fate. From the attached picture(I don't know why my phone was having a hard time focusing), there are noticeable backlight bleeds on the top-left and bottom-right corner. The picture makes it difficult to tell but in actuality, the top-left corner is the worst out of the bunch. The bleeds are not that noticeable but every now and then when the screen becomes black, from like a video or a game-loading screen, it becomes painfully obvious.

SPEAKERS: Sound quality is great but once I start to raise the volume past 50%, the sound becomes progressively distorted, especially on high notes. Not good :(

KEYBOARD: This one is interesting. You know how keycaps are elevated above the 'keyboard frame'? For my unit, the 'keyboard frame' around the 'i' keycap is elevated to the point where the keycaps and the 'keyboard frame' are flush with each other (see attached picture for better idea). I often found myself trying to press the 'i','j','k', (any keycaps essentially in that area), only to push down on the 'keyboard frame' instead. I could push the frame back down with my fingernail, but within a day, the frame slowly rises up to match the height of the keycaps.

FINAL VERDICT: I wanted to give MY specific unit 3.5/5 stars. Even though 2 of the 3 cons I listed above are negated by the external peripherals (headphones, USB keyboard and mouse) I connect and use when I game, when time comes to use the laptop without those peripherals and I notice the cons, it makes me think "I shouldn't be experiencing these issues, especially for the price I paid". After noticing these cons, everyday I think to myself whether I should just return the item as defective, get a replacement, and hope for the best or I should just live with these issues. I will probably return it for a replacement. The reason I rounded up and gave my unit an overall 4/5 stars is because of this. The laptop, in my opinion, just looks so cool and the performance the laptop outputs is very impressive. It is pretty much everything I wanted in a laptop. So for those that find my unprofessionally written review, take the time to read it all, and are deciding on whether or not to buy the device, I would personally recommend it.

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Keekz

Gaming/Animation College Student Review

Reviewed in the United States on September 7, 2019

Verified Purchase

PROS
- Runs games very well, good frame rate
- No thermal throttling
- Lightweight, Thin, Portable
- Perfect for everyday tasks
- Good sound quality
- Great screen, good color accuracy
- Beautiful design
- Innovative cooling system

CONS
- Very, very loud fans
- Runs HOT when playing games
- Trackpad can feel funky at first, recommend a mouse
- Fingerprints show up easily
- Can't hear speakers while fans are on, Must use headphones

UPDATE 1#
The laptop just arrived today, so far so good. It took a while to start up but that is expected. Personally, I've only had a Macbook Pro 2010 so I'm really excited to test this laptop out and see how she runs.

Also, this review coming from the perspective of a college student. I'm no professional. I've been researching gaming laptops for the past month. Looking for something relatively cheap with good specs and GOOD COOLING! The Zephyrus S caught my eye due to its cooling centric design and its thin and light weight for facilitated portability.

After opening it up, the laptop is so beautiful. The design is pretty elegant and not so "gamery". The design on the outside is really cool, its brushed metal with the ROG logo. The shiny metal accents on the brim is just gorgeous. It's also light weight (4lb.) and crazy thin! The weight distribution is also nice.

After testing out, the only thing I have found irritating are the USBs. The placement of the USBs are close to the corner of the chassis ( most likely due to the cooling system on the top part).

Also, I've found most of my USB "inputs" don't fit the 2.0 USBs on the left side... so that's a bummer. I'm don't want to force anything in. For now, I'll use the 3.0 USB on the right side.

It also lacks a thunderbolt port and SD card slot, which for me kinda sucks.

The placement of the keyboard and trackpad are interesting and NOT bothersome at all. You get used to it quickly. Though, I recommend a mouse for better experience.

I'll keep testing it out! Hopefully I'll update this review later.

UPDATE 2#
After about a week of playing games and doing day to day tasks on this bad boy... I decided to return it.

Overall, this is a BEAST of a machine. For something so thin, light and elegant you can play some incredible games for several hours at a time. The zephyrus S pushes out great frame rates and I personally have experienced zero flaws.
I've played Monster Hunter World and the Witcher 3 all week and this laptop never faltered or shut down. The graphics were pretty great too.
The computer itself is super light weight and is pure bliss to just carry around in your bag. It's also incredibly thin which I find astounding. So, you definitely wont be having any back problems with this baby.

NOW, the only thing I disliked and what pushed me to return the Zephyrus S were the fan noise and thermals.

The fans are CRAZY LOUD. I expected this of course. It sounds like a small vacuum cleaner. With fans running so loud and so fast, you'd expect the laptop to be pretty cool... however this laptop remained very hot. I played for about 4h at a time, the laptop would reach the same temperature and maintain it for as long as I was playing. I didn't see a difference in temperatures between Balanced mode and Turbo. Only difference was fan noise.

I decided to return it because as a college student I felt I could get more value for my money if I built a desktop PC instead of buying a laptop. Even though I absolutely adore this machine, I don't think it would be wise to have something that runs so hot, makes so much noise, and costs so much only to have it malfunction and breakdown in 2-3 years.

Honestly, if you want to get a laptop, just get a laptop. You cant expect laptops to be perfect or as powerful as PCs without a few flaws.

Thank you ASUS for making such an incredible machine. Hopefully I can buy it later in the future.