Asus ROG GX700 review

Asus has certainly dared to be different with the GX700, which is unique, compelling and a little bit silly all at the same time. Compared to a gaming desktop, or even other gaming laptops, its value is more than questionable.

We liked

The GX700 is the world's first water-cooled gaming laptop, and it's incredibly fun to use - although the novelty of docking it wears off fairly quickly. The real selling point here is flexibility, with heaps of power thrown in for good measure. Here is a laptop that has more than enough power to max out any game on its 1080p display, while taking it home and boosting its muscle through water-cooling places 4K gaming within reach. Unless you're maxing out GTA V, that is.

We disliked

Where the GX700 scores points for innovation and flexibility, it falls short on performance. Though capable of 4K gaming, the GTX 980 inside, even water-cooled, still falls short of the type of performance you can squeeze out of a single GTX 980Ti – not to mention Nvidia's newer and better-value Pascal-based cards. Once Nvidia has launched its next-generation of mobile graphics cards, we expect that Asus will upgrade that GTX 980 inside.

Final verdict

It's tempting to almost think of the Asus GX700 as a proof-of-concept, so few retailers are stocking it. And at its price tag, you'd have to have more money than sense to actually spend your hard earned on it at this moment in time. But at the same time, Asus has achieved a promising setup in the GX700 – one that proves that it's possible to increase performance in a water-cooled gaming laptop using a tidy, stylish base unit that looks incredibly cool.