Gaming laptops today come in a variety of configurations and sizes, ranging from thin and light portable laptops that make use of Nvidia’s 10-series Max-Q graphics cards to beefy desktop replacements that pack in the top of the line specifications that companies can possibly cram in a laptop. Here, we’ll be taking a look at one such behemoth from Asus – the ROG Chimera G703 – which packs in an 8th Gen Intel Core i9 processor coupled with a desktop grade Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 GPU. The massive laptop, which comes with an equally massive price tag of Rs. 4,99,990, offers the absolute best that you can expect from a laptop in 2018. So, let’s jump right into the review and find out what exactly does the Asus ROG Chimera G703 bring to the table.

Before we proceed with the Asus ROG Chimera G703’s features, lets take a quick look at its hardware specifications:

Design and Build Quality

Design wise, the Asus ROG Chimera G703 looks and feels like a very premium gaming notebook. Unlike most other gaming laptops, however, the G703 sports a different color scheme. The brushed aluminum lid is colored silver with a large illuminated ROG logo and a copper accent between the hinges.

As mentioned earlier, the Asus ROG Chimera G703 features every port that a gamer would ever require. The ports are well spaced out and are located on the left, right and rear of the device, so you won’t face any issues plugging in accessories with an unusually large connector. On the right edge of the device lie two full-sized USB 3.1 Type-A ports along with an SDcard reader.

Once again, the port selection on the ROG G703 is pretty great and possibly the only thing that can improve the port selection is another USB Type-C port.

The Asus ROG Chimera G703 packs in an impressive 17.3-inch full HD display with a 144Hz refresh rate and a 3ms response time. While it may seem like Asus has made use of the same display that was included with the previous generation of the G703, the newer laptop packs a better display with a higher contrast ratio and better color reproduction. Asus claims that the display on the ROG Chimera G703 covers 72 percent of the NTSC color gamut and in our testing we found that there is definitely some truth to those claims.

Large gaming laptops like the Asus ROG Chimera G703 are known for their great keyboards and the G703 is no different. While the laptop doesn’t include a mechanical keyboard, it’s membrane keyboard is an absolute pleasure to type on as it has a substantial 2.5mm key travel. The keys have a 0.3mm keycap curve which gives the keys a very ergonomic feel, further improving the typing experience.

The trackpad on the Asus ROG Chimera G703 is quite satisfactory to say the least. It’s quite large, complementing the size of the laptop itself and it tracks quite well, registering inputs without any issues whatsoever. I also like the fact that Asus has included dedicated left and right click buttons, which I personally prefer over the in-built buttons that don’t quite have the same tactile feel.

The trackpad makes use of Windows Precision Drivers and therefore handles gestures quite well, however, I would’ve preferred it if it had a more premium glass surface. Other than that, I have absolutely no other complains with the trackpad. Since it’s a gaming laptop and more of a desktop replacement than a thin and light portable unit, it’s quite likely that most users will make use of a mouse while using the device, and I have to give props to Asus for including one (albeit a very basic one) in the box.

The Asus ROG Chimera G703 packs in a total of four speakers giving it one of the best audio outputs as far as premium gaming laptops are concerned. The laptop has two 2 Watt speakers placed on the bottom bezel along with two 4.5 Watt speakers which are faced on the front edge of the laptop. Since all of the speakers fire audio directly at the user, it really improves the overall audio quality, compared to other laptops that feature bottom firing speakers.

Asus has packed in a whole bunch of bundled software with the ROG Chimera G703. There’s the usual Asus ROG Gaming Center, which not only displays real-time system information including CPU and GPU clock speeds and temperatures, but also serves as the command center for other Asus software, including ROG Aura, Fan Overboost, ROG GameVisual, ROG Game First, XSplit Gamecaster, Sonic Studio III and Sonic Radar.

  • Benchmarks

Coming to the most important section of the ROG Chimera G703 review, its performance. As mentioned earlier, the laptop is powered by the top-of-the-line hardware, including an Intel Core i9-8950HK processor, coupled with an Nvidia GeForce GTX 1080 GPU and 64GB of RAM, which ensure the laptop breezes through everything that you can throw at it. Starting off with the synthetic benchmarks, the laptop manages to score 4917 and 6562 in PCMark 10 and PCMark 10 Extended, which is slightly lower than the scores obtained by the Acer Predator Helios 500.

Benchmarks

Gaming

Moving on to the gaming performance. The Asus ROG Chimera G703 faced absolutely no issues running modern AAA titles at ultra settings, thanks to the GTX 1080 GPU. The laptop easily managed to breach the 100 fps mark while playing demanding titles like Far Cry 5 at ultra settings, sitting comfortably at an average 103 fps in my gaming session. In PUBG as well, the laptop managed to push over a hundred frames, occasionally dropping down to 92 fps, marking an average score of 98 fps.

Thermals

The ROG Chimera G703 packs in two large fans and eight heat pipes in total, which play a major role in keeping the components cool even under immense load. The laptop remains pretty cool around the palm rest, so you won’t have absolutely any issues playing games for hours at a stretch, however, the side-facing vents will blow warm air directly onto your mouse, which might be an issue during the summers.

Battery life offered by the ROG Chimera G703 is exactly what you’d expect from a high-end gaming laptop – abysmal. At minimum display brightness and just a light workload, the 71Wh battery dies just shy of two hours, which doesn’t come as a surprise because of the powerful components included in the package. Even though gaming on the laptop while you’re unplugged is highly unadvisable, we still gave it a shot and the laptop was barely able to make it to 60 minutes on a single charge.

The presence of two 280W power bricks solidifies the ROG Chimera G703’s desktop replacement status, as they add on a significant amount of weight to the already heavy laptop. Even with two power bricks, the laptop takes quite some time to charge and in my testing it took about two hours to charge to a hundred percent while under a minimal load. Battery life is definitely not one of the ROG Chimera G703’s strong suits and I didn’t expect the laptop to perform any better to begin with.

Cons:

SEE ALSO: Alienware 17 R5 Review: Your Tank for All Sorts of Fights?

Priced at Rs. 4,99,990, the Asus ROG Chimera G703 isn’t for everyone. The laptop offers solid build quality, plenty of ports, amazing performance and a decent keyboard. It’s sheer size also allows it to keep its powerful components quite cool under immense load and its beautiful 17.3-inch 144Hz display contributes a whole lot to the gaming experience. On the downside, however, the laptop itself is very bulky and it ships with two large power bricks that add on to the total weight. It makes a whole lot of noise under load and it definitely doesn’t offer the best value for your money.

So who exactly is this laptop for? Well, if you’re looking for an over the top desktop replacement which is just a bit more portable than a new desktop and you have a ton of money to spare, then you can opt for the Asus ROG Chimera G703. In all other cases, you’d be better off with a different laptop with a similar hardware configuration or perhaps a new desktop if you can deal with the lack of portability. We’d suggest that you also take a look at the MSI GT75 Titan 8RG (Rs. 3,35,000) or the Alienware 17 R5 (Rs. 3,36,000), which offer better value for money, without skimping out on the performance.