Zephyrus G14 - Anybody got one? Whats it like?

Vince

Vince

Vince

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I accidentally smashed up my Spectre x360 and need a new machine. There really is very little out there taking my fancy right now but I did spot the g14 and thought it might be a decent replacement.

Whats peoples thoughts on these machines? Any good?

Looking at the 4600hs/gtx1650 machine

The current machine spec is a Kaby Lake G 8705g with VegaM GL 4gb HBM.

Obviously there are features on the x360 that the Zephyrus doesn't have but overall it seems a decent package. Whats the thoughts of the forums?
 
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I've got the 4800h/1660ti/120hz screen version.

The good
Build quality is first rate, it feels really high end and looks the part too.
Performance is terrific, it's an absolute beast.
The keyboard - subjective I know but I really like it.
Sound - I don't have a massive amount of experience with laptops but it sounds heck of a lot better than I thought laptops could sound.

The bad
The fans. It gets hot and loud really quickly when gaming (insert your own joke here). The CPU temps aren't a problem, it just seems to kick all the heat straight into your... lap. Thankfully there's a good subreddit with a ton of tips for lowering temps, keeping the noise down etc.
The finger print reader. Don't even bother setting it up.
The asus bloatware.

The ho-hum
The screen. I'm not sure what screen the one you're looking at uses but mine is a little washed out when using desktop apps. The Asus software comes with 8-9 colour profiles but frankly they all look crap except for default and vivid. I might have been slightly spoiled with desktop monitors though and it really isn't bad, I've just seen a lot better.
The battery. It's nothing like they advertise unless you turn everything off but it can be dramatically improved using the tips from the aforementioned subreddit.

I bought it partly for work and partly for gaming - the gaming experience is top notch, while using work programmes is just fine (but not as nice as on an xps or hp Spectre screen). Asus Updates are being released almost immediately after the latest Windows patch breaks something so it feels well supported. Overall if I needed to buy another laptop in this price range I wouldn't hesitate to buy the same one again.
 
[HB]Rugrat said:
I've got the 4800h/1660ti/120hz screen version.

The good
Build quality is first rate, it feels really high end and looks the part too.
Performance is terrific, it's an absolute beast.
The keyboard - subjective I know but I really like it.
Sound - I don't have a massive amount of experience with laptops but it sounds heck of a lot better than I thought laptops could sound.

The bad
The fans. It gets hot and loud really quickly when gaming (insert your own joke here). The CPU temps aren't a problem, it just seems to kick all the heat straight into your... lap. Thankfully there's a good subreddit with a ton of tips for lowering temps, keeping the noise down etc.
The finger print reader. Don't even bother setting it up.
The asus bloatware.

The ho-hum
The screen. I'm not sure what screen the one you're looking at uses but mine is a little washed out when using desktop apps. The Asus software comes with 8-9 colour profiles but frankly they all look crap except for default and vivid. I might have been slightly spoiled with desktop monitors though and it really isn't bad, I've just seen a lot better.
The battery. It's nothing like they advertise unless you turn everything off but it can be dramatically improved using the tips from the aforementioned subreddit.

I bought it partly for work and partly for gaming - the gaming experience is top notch, while using work programmes is just fine (but not as nice as on an xps or hp Spectre screen). Asus Updates are being released almost immediately after the latest Windows patch breaks something so it feels well supported. Overall if I needed to buy another laptop in this price range I wouldn't hesitate to buy the same one again.
Click to expand...

Cheers for the write up. I will be using it almost entirely for work and the only games it will likely see are games like tfl, civ, defence grid and stuff like that. The spectre screen was lovely as were the keyboard and just generally using it was always nice so im looking for something that is nice to do some work on if I want to chill on the sofa rather than sit in the office. The options seem to be the Omen 15 or this. Decisions, Decisions.
 
Envy 13 doesn't have a dedicated GPU but onboard probably good enough for the titles you are looking at, looks like its good value. G14 biggest issue for me was lack of webcam in these Covid zooming times.

when I bought my last laptop after my radius 2in1 broken I focused a bit much on getting some extra gaming grunt over iGPUs around at the time and ended up with a zenbook ux480fd with 1050 (same size and weight as g14) it does really well at the games side and great for everything else but that extra weight @1.6kg meant it was a bit big IMO, obvious you expect a 14" to be bigger than a 12.5/13.3 but its the weight rather than size that I find an issue and actually I rarely get time to game on it when away for shorter periods so would have been better served with the x360 which was lighter and had the tent mode which I liked to use more than I realized particularly when I have had to carry two laptops. Might try an LG Gram next with Intels latest iGPU if I don't go x360.

Downside of x360 is the position of power button on some models I have this on my zenbook, power surround by delete keys....aaaargh, why!!!!

Intel variants of x360 might be worth a punt with mx350 or even g7 as it still keeps weight down but will depend on power profiles and what level they are set to run at as to whether it trumps vega7/8 but it will have thundebolt as a bonus, bit pricier mind you.

Zenbooks are a good option if want the webcam, been really impressed with the build quality, they do have Ryzen options these days and reasonable warranty, think it cost me 50quid for 3yrs. downside many of the screens don't top 300nits and are glossy so outdoors in garden sunshine is a challenge.

www.ultrabookreview.com and https://laptopmedia.com/ are decent site for the low down on compact laptops
 
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@benparker I got the g14 on release in April from Ocuk for £1299. I note the price has risen since then, which is hardly surprising given the apocalypse etc. The new omen 15 wasn't announced at that point and the previous models didn't have a good reputation, particularly when it came to cooling.

The 2020 omen 15 seems terrific value, I'd definitely look at one if I were you. Speaking personally the slightly smaller footprint and lighter weight of the g14 suits my need more but that price difference is pretty big now (though you'd need to add more ram for a fair comparison!).

My advice would be to look at the screen on both of them if you can, as that may be the key difference.
 
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Turns out the entire envy range is like rocking horse ****. I can get a spectre 13 and have it here today but the envy I can't find anything in the channel (did find an ryzen 5 model but that's not going to cut it) I now have 3 disti's on a mission trying to find one. I'm set on the envy 13 I think.

The no webcam on the Zephyrus is a show stopper for me so I won't be exploring that avenue any further, id also hazard a bet that the screen in the envy will be much better.
 
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I ordered the Envy x360 with the 4700u... Spent the whole day trying to find one in the channel... No chance... 10 day min lead on one. Ahh well ill let you know what it is like. There is an Ryzen 5 one in the MM right now but I couldn't bring myself to have a worse machine than I bought for my team.
 
Well it is here, its absolutely stunning but the \ key!!! Why on gods green earth did hp do that with the \ key? I will have to use a keyboard editor to fix this issue! Having the \ key hid behind fn key is all kinds of silly.
 
Also - The 13 doesn't come with a Tilt pen but the 15 does? WTF HP? Luckily I do have 2 new Tilt pens so its not the end of the world but why? Why is the 15 better catered for than the 13 even though the 13 was a cool £1000 the same as the 15?
 
So I have been using this bad boy most of the day and it's all set up with everything I need. It's broadly comparable to my 2018 spectre in most areas, the screen is beautiful, it's light, powerful and just a nice machine. I like it!





On the downside the keyboard has some poor design choices, aside from being really nice to type on there are just keys in odd places, take the two images below:

Whos idea was it to put the power button next to the del key?



backslash key this is just no good... The tilde key is now my backslash key but really I shouldn't have to manually edit the keyboard layout to make it usable.



You know what is worse? Take a look at HP's stuff on their website:



Every image of the machine shows a different (better) keyboard layout with the backslash not hidden behind the fn key... My mind is literally blown. The same applies to the 15". It appears to me that they are not showing the UK layout machine on the UK store!
 
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