Despite being a member of Asus’ gaming-focused ROG family of laptops, the G14 has a more creative bent; it’s technically considered an Nvidia Studio model and ships with Nvidia’s Studio driver rather than the more common Game Ready version. (You can switch to the latter if you want the more frequent and game-optimized updates.) It comes in two models: the $2,000 version I tested, equipped with a AMD Ryzen 9 8945HS, GeForce RTX 4070, 32GB RAM and 1TB storage; and a $1,600 version with 16GB RAM and an RTX 4060.
2 x USB-A, 2 x USB-C (1 x 4.0 w/ 100w PD, DP mode), 1 x HDMI 2.1, combo audio
Networking
MediaTek Wi-Fi 6E MT7922, Bluetooth 5.3
Operating system
Windows 11 Home (22H2)
Weight
3.3 lbs./1.5kg
The cheaper model can probably suit most people’s needs. If you play games at 1080p or lightweight ones at 1440p, the 4060 should be OK; if you’re not a big multitasker or don’t work with a lot of large photo or video files the 16GB of RAM shouldn’t be much of a limitation. But if you’re going to push to, say, 1800p (the screen’s maximum resolution) for gaming or editing complex video projects, you’ll need at least the 32GB and RTX 4070. Both models come equipped with the 14-inch, 2,880×1,800-pixel resolution OLED screen.
New and novel, a diagonal set of white LEDs on the top flashes in patterns, for example, to sync with audio or for notifications. It can be useful, but some applications don’t work very well. Sonic Match, for instance, needs some way to fine-tune it beyond “sensitivity.” It just ends up just being solidly lit when there’s no real silence (it can’t seem to pick up the beat effectively), which means it’s not great for music; it’s most effective for spoken word. You can turn it off and adjust the brightness. When it’s off, it just looks reflective. I don’t know how durable it is against scratches, though.
A pair of USB ports on either side makes them a little more convenient.
Lori Grunin/CNET
It’s not an especially thin design, and some people might consider the top and bottom display bezels a little thick, but in those ways it’s reminiscent of the MacBook Pro 14 and very similar to the Razer Blade 14. Overall, if you take away the slash on the cover it gives off a more serious vibe than you get from a gaming laptop. That includes the decent business-quality 1080p webcam.
There are a few things I wish it did have — RGB backlighting on the keyboard and the slash and a full-size SD card slot rather than micro SD, for example, as well as support for USB-C charging and the ability to open to a wider angle — but none of them are critical. It even supports Nvidia’s Advanced Optimus, which means you can force it to exclusively use the discrete GPU without rebooting via the Nvidia driver. It gets confusing, though, because Asus’ software also lets you force discrete-GPU-only, but that uses the traditional must-reboot MUX switch.
Preset
Gamut (% coverage)
White point
Gamma
Peak brightness (full screen, nits)
Accuracy (DE2K average/max)
Native (default)
100 (P3)
6500
2.2
414
2.97/5.32 (P3)
sRGB
104
6500
2.2
415
1.06/4.05
D65 P3
100
6500
2.2
416
1.52/4.81
DCI P3
100
6300
2.6
416
1.93/4.21
HDR
100
6200
n/a
652
n/a
Cinema
n/a
varies (modal 7000-8000)
1.9
399
n/a
FPS
n/a
varies (modal 7000-8000)
1.9
419
n/a
Racing
n/a
6500
1.6
419
n/a
RTS/RPG
n/a
varies (modal 7700-8300)
2.2
399
n/a
Scenery
n/a
6500
1.3
419
n/a
Vivid
n/a
6500
1.8
419
n/a
But overall it’s still one of the better prosumer implementations I’ve seen, including nailing the three standard color spaces. That includes limiting the gamut primaries to the relevant space. (Many profiles, for example, will extend the maximum-saturation red, green and blue points to those of the largest space, typically P3. That can become a problem in sRGB, a small subset of P3 which can’t hit those saturation levels.)
As for typical performance measures, the G14’s Ryzen 9 8945HS tends to underperform occasionally, which tends to happen when manufacturers’ use conservative power usage and profiles (such as biasing towards quiet, which means little to no fan noise, translating to less cooling power). You can get better GPU performance plugged in and running on Turbo, but the CPU only showed insignificant upticks in limited testing. It did seem to perform relatively well on Procyon’s AI inferencing tests (Windows ML), but I haven’t built up enough results for comparable systems and have only just started testing the Intel Core Ultra processors.
On the flip side, it seems like the performance takes a big hit on battery, where the G14 switches to its Silent power profile — it roughly halved on Geekbench 6 multicore. (At review time, a bug in the Nvidia driver prevented getting accurate battery testing results.)
The GPU, on the other hand, which shows middling results for an RTX 4070, got a significant performance lift in Turbo, but not enough to pull it up to full power. In part, that’s because “full power” is lower than before. The 4070 in the 2024 G14 is limited to 90w; in comparison, last year’s model maxed out at 125w.
That’s not to say it performs badly, it just doesn’t stand out from the crowd for gaming or heavy-duty 3D graphics manipulation. Overall, though, thanks to smart design and tradeoffs, the ROG Zephyrus G14 is a content creation crowd pleaser that has plenty left over for good gaming.
