When it comes to laptops, especially ones of the gaming variety, I ask you: How many lights are too much? 10, 20, 100? Well how about 1,215, because that’s the number of LEDs Asus put on the new Zephyrus G14’s lid alone.
While I’m not a huge fan of Asus’ AniMe name for the G14’s LED matrix (which presumably is short for “animate me”), they definitely put on a good show. Using a pre-installed app, you can make the lights display text, custom graphics, the time, and notifications. Alternatively, you can also sync up the LED lights with music, which should be good for DJs or people who really want to pretend they’re DJs.
The one thing that’s a bit disappointing though is that Asus only covered half of the G14’s lid with lights instead of the whole damn thing. However, in Asus’ defence, the company claims that not only did it want to maintain the Zephyrus line’s distinctive styling, all those LED lights can get pretty power hungry too, drawing up to 10 watts of power on their own when they are all lit up at the same time, which would obviously put a big hurt on battery life.
Light aside, the Zephyrus G14 is actually a slick little gaming laptop. It’s one of the first laptops to feature AMD’s new Ryzen 4000 Series mobile processors, and it can be configured with up to a Nvidia RTX 2060 GPU, and either a 1080p display with a 120HZ refresh rate or a 2,560 by 1,440 display with a 60HZ refresh rate—with both also sporting a wide colour gamut and Patone validation. You even get built-in Adaptive Sync thanks to the Ryzen 4000’s integrated Radeon graphics.
On top of that, the G14 has a healthy selection of ports including two USB 3.2 Type-C ports, one USB 3.2 Type-A port, HDMI and a 3.5mm jack. Meanwhile, to help make the G14 even more portable, Asus went out and created a super small 180-watt power brick. And in case that’s still too big, as long as you’re not gaming, you can also keep the G14 topped up using its USB-C port.
Finally with a 14-inch screen and a chassis that weighs in at just 3.5 pounds, the G14 is pretty easy to carry around. Sure, it’s not the most powerful or the most portable gaming laptops around, which for some might make the G14 a jack-of-all-trades but master of none.
But thanks to all those LED lights, this thing’s got style and personality for days, so it doesn’t even matter if its lights are limited to white and not full RGB. And if you aren’t a fan of all those lights, there’s a plain version without all the flash.
The Zephyrus will be available in both black and white, and while Asus hasn’t provided final pricing, you can expect the G14 to go on sale sometime before the end of autumn.
Editor’s Note: Stay tuned for news of an Australian release date and pricing.