Asus G501JW Notebook Review

[Redaktion]

A new republic. The thinner ROG is certainly flashier, but cut corners are inevitable. Asus calls it the quietest ultrathin gaming notebook in the market with one of the fastest solid-state drives available. What can go wrong?

http://www.notebookcheck.net/Asus-G501JW-Notebook-Review.141745.0.html

[960M Throttling]

Pity to see the 960M throttling (reducing it's clocks) during the Heaven Benchmark test - as you say this means that performance is lower than competitor notebooks with 960M, may as well buy a competitor's.  Good review, I particularly like the relevance of the following section which I quote from you:
"Next, we run Unigine Heaven as a more realistic representation of gaming stress. The G501 fares much better under these conditions with consistent Turbo Boost benefits up to its rated 3.4 GHz maximum and even GPU Boost up to 1188 MHz. This high of a boost to the GPU is short-lived, however, as the core will occasionally drop below its base 1097 MHz to just 901 MHz, which would explain why the G501 is slightly behind in both benchmarks and games."

960M is not a very exciting GPU, it's barely any better than the 860M, and like you say is the same GPU but at slightly higher clocks.

[Stitchz]

Hope they do a 17 version of this.

[Me]

Hi, I was just wondering how 4K video plays on this? Surely the GPU is sufficient? Also, is it possible to output 4K to an external display/television?

[wonderm@n]

I see the G501JW as just a GL551 with better display and 2 fans. Is $2000 really worth the price, when there are other ROGs and laptops with better specs around the same price or less? Wait, don't Razer have a laptop with similar specs?

[Allen.Ngo]

4K video playback runs great on the internal monitor. We didn't test 4K output, but it it's virtually guaranteed to work via hdmi or eDP

Like macbooks, much of the price is for the thin form factor and not so much for the specs. The high capacity SSD is probably another huge factor in the price of this review model. Personally we're much happier with the G751

[Skywax90_16]

Asus did try here, but I think they still need to do a lot of things right. Why provide this with 4K panel when most likely we can't play a lot of 3D intensive games on that screen? To say for media consumption, the panel has mediocre result for color representation. It does seem that the panel is rather working against them at this point. I hope Asus will come back with a better solution, since Asus has been a participant in the gaming notebook category for quite some time.

[gyoung]

Is the 1080p screen of IPS panel? or TN?

thanks

[Arti]

Hi,

It was reported that the junior model of G501 with FHD IPS panel uses PWM backlight with comparably low frequency (around 200Hz; http://laptopmedia.com/review/asus-rog-g501-review-the-new-standard-for-next-generation-gaming-laptops). Do you have any information if the 4K model is flicker free (Asus EyeCare?) or at least uses a higher frequency PWM backlight?

Thank you,
Arti

[Graon]

Hello,

Thank you for this review. Did you however notice that the memory timings end with a command rate of 2 and not 1 (as usually met in recent computers with two dimms of DDR3 1600 CL11). The difference here can found around the mix of the the soldered memory and the additionnal dimm one which maybe doesn't allow a CR timing to 1.

This can explain some "low" performances of this model against other similar computers and not necessarily only a hardware throttling issue.

Best regards!

[stanXL]

Hi guys,
Really nice review here and all around the website.

I'm really interested in this laptop in its FHD version. It would be for photo editing mainly so I'd need a nice screen. But I'm disappointed to see the G501 low coverage of the sRGB. Asus advertises with a coverage of a 100%, as this website (almost) measured :

http://laptopmedia.com/review/asus-rog-g501-review-the-new-standard-for-next-generation-gaming-laptops/

What to think about it? Is the UX501 a better choice for the screen? I found a FHD mat version of this one. Should I go for the Schenker M505 (niiice configurations possibilities there! But what about quality and durability?)?

Good day to ya'll

[DennisS]

Nice review, shame they removed the HDD, but looks like they still have the HDD daughter-board port on the MOBO for one. I would've prefer they kept it and could easily lived with shorter battery life.

[Dat]

I am consider between this one and MSI GS60 4k (970m).
There's something i'd like to ask about is:
I'm on side of G501JW now but these 2 i saw on amazon price doesn't far away between these two, so of course MSI is better on performance. But the battery, screen, keyboard are better. Also G501JW is more beautiful IMO.

So does it worth buying a MSI GS60 4k with 970m?
I'm intend to use my laptop for at least 4yrs. Also i intend to play some game on especially Arkham Knight.

[jordan]

Anybody know if the CPU is upgradeable or is it soldered to the MOBO. If so, how can I find out which cards are compatible with MOBO?

[Mike Rinco]

I don't known why, but I have an asus G501JW from bestbuy who has the m.2 slot, I buy the same model you said in the review Samsung SSD SM951 512 GB MZHPV512HDGL and not work, any idea will be very welcome??