Asus TUF FX505G review: A gaming laptop packed with power

Asus TUF FX505G price in India: Rs 1,29,990

Asus TUF FX505G review: Design, display

The new TUF FX505G takes design cues from the company’s previous notebooks yet has a distinct profile. It has a silver overall finish, which makes it look nice and more aggressive. The Asus logo is clearly standing out.

At 2.15kg, the TUF FX505G is tad slimmer and lighter than many gaming laptops. Asus claims the TUF FX505 meets a few MIL-grade reliability standards and should withstand minor bumps and drops. The back side of the notebook has a few air vents with four rubber stands on each corner to give sufficient air flow to the fans.

he 15.6-inch display offers unrivaled brightness with generous viewing angles.

Opening the lid, you will notice a beautiful 15.6-inch Full HD 144Hz Anti-Glare display with slim bezels, alongside a full-size traditional keyboard. For ports, you get the charging port, RJ45 LAN port, HDMI port, three USB-A ports, Kensington Lock, and the combo audio jack. The laptop could have a USB Type-C port or even an SD Card reader.

This is the most part of the TUF FX505: the display. The model I reviewed had a 15.6-inch Full HD (1920 x 1080) 140 Hz panel. This is one of the few laptops in the market with a high refresh rate display option. The 15.6-inch display offers unrivaled brightness with generous viewing angles.

Asus TUF FX505G review: Keyboard, trackpad

We get a full-sized chiclet keyboard with its own dedicated Numpad with the FX505G. It took us a few hours to get used to the keyboard. Once accustomed though it is a seamless experience. Travel distance is fairly responsible and tactile feedback is also okay. It’s nice to type and game on.

Travel distance is fairly responsible and tactile feedback is also okay.

Like any dedicated gaming laptop, this one too comes with adjustable keyboard backlighting that’s useful when playing games in the dark. The touchpad is roomy, accurate and responsive.

Asus TUF FX505G review: Performance, Graphics, and sound

Perhaps the main highlight of the Asus TUF FX505G is the ability to play graphics-intensive games. My review unit, which is also the top-end model, has a powerful six-core Intel Core i7-8750H processor, 16 GB of RAM (2x DIMMs), dual storage, the Nvidia GTX 1050 Ti 4GB graphics chip, and of course a 144Hz display. This is a beast, quite literally. I streamed an episode of Narcos on Netflix, with 13 Google Chrome tabs open in the background. During my week-long testing, the system consistently performed above expectations.

The new TUF FX505G takes design cues from the company’s previous notebooks yet has a distinct profile.

As you might expect, the FX505G can play light to heavy games at medium to high settings. I ran a number of games such as Hitman, Rise of the Tomb Raider and Counterstrike to test out the caliber of the machine. With power like this, the FX505G can play most games at high settings.

The FX505G’s speakers are surprisingly loud. The sound from the speakers easily filled a midsize room at just 60 per cent of its max volume.

Asus TUF FX505G review: Battery, Heat

Battery life is, as expected of a gaming laptop, rather poor. It lasted around 2 and a half hours, which continuously runs through web pages and videos over Wi-Fi. The FX505G stayed nice and cool in our everyday testing though it got a bit warmer while gaming and that’s okay.

It has a silver overall finish, which makes it look nice and more aggressive.

Asus TUF FX505G review: Conclusion

For Rs 1,29,990, the laptop offers solid overall performance. I loved the way it can achieve good frame rates on graphic-heavy games. My biggest issue with any gaming laptop is the poor battery life, and this applies to the FX505G as well.