Asus TUF FX-505-DT Gaming Laptop
If you are in the market for a gaming laptop, now is the time to pull the trigger. There are some great deals running on Amazon. My favorite is the Asus TUF FX-505-DT Gaming Laptop, which is currently selling for crazy price.Build Quality
This laptop claims to have military grade durability. It is certified to endure day-to-day use, from accidental knocks to sudden drops on desk. It is made of polycarbonate material which is tough and durable but light in weight. Asus TUF Gaming Laptop weighs around 4.8 pounds. The top lid of the laptop has a brushed metal finish. It has a distinctive design with what looks like a radiating letter ‘X’. The underside of the chassis has hexagonal design which provides additional structural strength. Overall, this laptop has a very macho look and I totally digg it.Screen
The screen is full HD sporting 1920 by 1080 resolution. Its an IPS panel and supports 120 Hertz refresh rate. This is great for gaming because it provides smooth gameplay with minimal motion blur. The screen is really bright clocking 280 nits of brightness and supports wide viewing angles. The color reproduction is vivid and consistent, even when viewing from extreme angles. The bezels on the screen are minimal measuring around 6.5 millimeter. Overall I think this is an amazing display which is punching way over its price point.
CPU: Ryzen 5 3550H
Now let's talk about internal hardware specs. The CPU is AMD Ryzen-5 3550H.
This is a 4 core 8 thread CPU with a base clock speed of 2.1GHz. It is capable of automatically overclocking all the way up to 3.7GHz. The CPU runs relatively cool at 12 to 35 Watt TDP. On Passmark CPU benchmark, this CPU scores 8375 points, which puts it among the top laptop CPUs. Here is a chart of Top 10 Common Laptop CPUs.
As you can see, the Ryzen 5 35-50H belongs in the top tier. The only CPU beating it is the high end Intel Core-i7. But laptops with these high end Core-i7 sell for a lot more than 600 dollars. So I think this is an excellent CPU choice for a gaming laptop
GPU: Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650
In a gaming laptop, GPU is as important if not more than the CPU. This laptop ships with Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 Graphics card. This GPU is over 50 percent faster than GTX 1050. It has whopping 896 CUDA cores which is amazing for a laptop GPU. This GPU has dedicated 4GIG of GDDR5 Video RAM and it supports 128 Gigabits per second bandwidth. This GPU coupled with Ryzen 5 CPU will be able to handle any games that you throw at it. BTW, all this horsepower, can also be utilized for running 4K video editing software. Adobe suite, Davinci Resolve & Photoshop will run smoothly on this laptop. If you are a content creator who is looking for a powerful laptop to edit pictures and create 4k videos, this is an excellent choiceThermals: Cooling solution
Asus has done a great job with the thermals on this laptop. There are 2 fans which create plenty of airflow keeping the CPU and GPU cool. There are 2 dedicated tunnels which expel dust particles, dirt and debris from the chassis. This prevents gunk build-up in the thermal fins increasing system stability and lifespanSystem Memory (RAM)
Asus TUF laptop comes with 8 GIG of system RAM. 8 GIG RAM is adequate but I would recommend upgrading the RAM. Luckily Asus has made it very easy to upgrade the RAM. There are 2 DIMM slots available for memory upgrade. The 8GIG RAM occupies the first DIMM slot while 2nd slot is empty. You can add another 8 GIG RAM in the 2nd slot, thereby doubling the system RAM to 16GIG. This will also enable the dual channel configuration which is about 10-15% faster than single channel. If you want to go crazy, you can add up to 32 GIG of RAM. More RAM not only helps with gaming, but also with photoshop, video editing and productivity softwares.SSD Storage
This laptop comes with 256 GIG of PCIe NVMe SSD storage. The SSD has fast read/write speed, which is great for snappy performance and reduced windows 10 boot times. If you want to upgrade the storage, Asus gives a 2nd SATA3 slot. All the cables and adapter needed to add a 2nd SSD drive are already present in the motherboard. This makes it super easy to add another SSD drive to expand storage. If you plan to use this laptop for other things besides gaming, I would encourage adding another SSDKeyboard and trackpad
ASUS TUF’s keyboard is optimized for gaming. Its a fully backlit keyboard with various zones of RGB lighting that can be controlled via software. The keyboard is large and has a desktop style layout. This makes it very ergonomic to type. I like its broader space bar, isolated arrow keys, and the large gaps between the function keys. The trackpad is also large and supports multi-finger gestures. It comes with windows precision driversPorts
The port situation could be better. There is no USB type C, no thunderbolt. You get 3 old-school USB ports, an HDMI port, an ethernet port and a headphone jack. There is no SD-Card slot which is a bummer, especially if you are a content creator and want to transfer videos and pictures from your camera. I would recommend getting a USB dongle.Conclusion
Overall I am very impressed with Asus Tuff gaming laptop. For a budget price, you are getting a kickass CPU, an awesome GPU and an amazing 120Hz display.Purchase links
Buy this laptopUpgrade to 16GB RAM
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