March 14th, 2008Review Of Asus G2K
 
ASUS has two major series of gaming laptops - the G1 Series and the G2 Series. While the G1 Series more often than not sports NVIDIA graphics, the G2 Series features ATI graphics. Around the middle of last year, we tested a gaming laptop from the G1 Series, the G1S. It was happy; it offered the latest NVIDIA mobile graphics. A year afterward, and with ATI taking to the competition, ASUS has a new AMD-ATI setup below the G2 Series of gaming laptops, the G2K. Can the G2K give (more-or-less) equivalent or better performance than the best the G1 Series has to present?
AMD Turion 64 X2 Dual-Core TL-64 2.2GHz, 2-CH DDR2, L2 cache
AMD ATI RS690M chipset
2 GB DDR2 667 MHz
ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2600, 256 MB DDR3 VRAM
250 GB SATA HDD (7200 rpm)
8x LightScribe Super Multi Dual Layer DVD Writer
17-inch WSXGA+ (1680 x 1050) ColorShine TFT LCD
Standard 88-key keyboard
Touchpad with 2 buttons and 2-way scroll
Modem: 56K internal
Ethernet LAN: 10/100 Gigabyte LAN
WPAN: Integrated Bluetooth 2.0
5 x USB 2.0 Ports
Card Reader 5 in 1 (SD, MMC, MS, MS Pro, XD)
Dimensions
Size: 40.5 cm (W) x 31.4 cm (D) x 3.84 cm (H)
Weight: 4.1 kg (with 8-cell battery pack)
Layout and Design
The Asus G2K is hideous: just a quick look and you get the sentiment it’s a powerhouse. It has brushed metal all around, which makes it rugged, and has red slapped onto it instead of the green on the G1S. In the G1S, the green signify the NVIDIA setup, and here (in the G2K), it’s red for ATI. You do get the feeling that this laptop screams, “I’m a Gaming Laptop.”
The layout is dirt free from the front, giving the gamer all the comfort, with only the right and rear featuring ports. The pica below should give you a perfect idea. The front, though clean of ports, has the media buttons, which feature the same way in the G1 as well as the G2 series.
Turn the laptop so its back faces you and you’ll notice the neat layout of the hardware behind screwed doors; it’s very simple to improve or even put back things if something goes faulty. Open the lid and take a quick look down; it’ll be reminiscent you of fish gills because of the air vents located on either side of keypad. Unluckily, the keypad design has stayed the same, with pretty thin directional keys.
Performance
The Asus G2K will be the first of the AMD Turion TL-64 we’re testing — it sits on a chipset of its own, the ATI RS690M, which is basically the mobile version of the better-known 690G motherboard. The setup seems very talented, but it doesn’t beat the G1S hands down. Here are the artificial benchmarks — and an analysis will follow.
Battery Life
The G2K has an 8-cell battery with a rating of 4800 mAh. The battery pack does very well, according to specifications. The laptop delivered 2 hours of standard usage; when used for gaming, it would last around an hour and a half, which some gamers will protest is a bit poor.
In Lastly, The Asus G2K sells for around Rs 1, 17,000 exclusive of taxes, and comes with a one-year warranty. The price is way too much as compared to what the G1S is being offered for: Rs 88.3K these days, elite of taxes. It’s a kilo less in weight, and is a better at graphics performance. We’re here looking for a gaming laptop, which puts the G1S back at the top as one of the best gaming laptops around; the G2K is more like a powerhouse, a desktop stand-in with a 17-inch screen and good presentation overall. Still, agreed the price, we aren’t pastime for it.
