ASUS ROG G20BM Review

👤by David Mitchelson Comments 📅14-03-16
Conclusion

Firstly, ASUS has done a great job with the aesthetics on the G20BM – this unit looks stylish without going over the top. As such, the chassis won’t look out of place in a number of different environments. The shape and size of G20BM also play a big role in how portable this system is, thanks to the weight and size users will be able to transport this device to a friend’s house or LAN parties without too much difficulty

The trend nowadays is to opt for Intel-based prebuilt systems but with the G20BM the ASUS ROG team has decided to equip the core components with AMD parts. The CPU arrives in the form of the AMD FX 770K and the GPU is a special edition R9 370 2GB card. Both pieces of hardware are regarded as lower-mid end and as our benchmarks revealed, G20BM does struggle in certain aspects of processing power – more notably, the 1080p performance with some gaming titles presents us with low framerates while other titles offer reasonable performance results. It will really depend on the games being played. One great thing about the CPU and GPU inside G20BM are the temperatures – although the chassis relies heavily on mainly the ventilation for heat dissipation we found the temperatures considerably low after sustained use, although the impressive temperatures do come with a compromise; noise.


There are some areas which we feel could be improved. The lack of any primary SSD is disappointing, it’s actually been a long time since we last tested a full system which had such a storage drive omitted. Having even a small-sized SSD is regarded as standard nowadays and the small cost yields huge benefits. Ideally, we’d have liked to see a 128/256GB SSD and a 1TB mechanical for bulk storage instead of just a standalone 2TB option. Another factor which will be rather cumbersome is the requirement for two wall sockets just to power G20BM. Including a monitor, this would take three sockets at the wall and in some cases this could be problematic. Although replacing these power units would be easier, we’d prefer to see a small form factor PSU integrated, especially since we’re dealing with a low-end configuration.

At a cost of £699 GBP, the G20BM is a good value for money option for those without the confidence or expertise to build their own system.

The G20BM is a stylish computer system which will appeal to casual gamers who require a compact and portable system configuration.

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Pros
+ Compact & portable
+ Lightweight
+ Low temperatures
+ Lighting can be customised
+ Plenty of USB 2.0 ports
+ Features an optical drive
+ Options for expanding in future

Cons
- Lacks USB 3.1 functionality
- Noisy under load
- Some gaming titles struggle @ 1080p
- No SSD
- System alone requires two wall sockets


Click here for an explanation of our awards at Vortez.net.

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