Review: A week with the G50v

Asus's G50V is a reassuringly ugly gaming notebook.

Well-specced but not extravagant, it offers decent performance at an affordable price: depending on the specs you want, expect to sink $1,500-$2,000 into one of these.

Echoes of the same design language seen in the minuscule Eee PC lineup make for a strange first impression, but this machine is not a cheap manpurse occasional. It's 15 inches wide, weighs about 8 pounds, and has glowing blue LED strips and a pulsating "Republic of Gamers" logo on its lid.

Most striking about it is the metallic orange trim, which signs it out of the workplace and firmly into the LAN party. There are 7 stickers on it. The lid is black. A glossy scratch-resistant clearcoat attracts fingerprints. Close inspection reveals countless tiny sparklies beneath it, shimmering like one of Siegfried and Roy's capes.

Photos: Heather Beschizza

As reviewed, the G50V has a Core 2 Duo T9400, 4GB of DDR2 RAM, Nvidia 9700M GT graphics, Vista Home Premium 64-bit, gigabit ethernet, WiFi-n, a 2-megapixel webcam, and that 1650x1050 15.4" display. Two 250GB hard disks are partitioned into a total of 4 drives. It scored 5685 in 3DMark06 at default settings: you'll be pushing it playing the latest games at high settings, but you won't have to dial it back too far.

On the left side is a VGA port, USB port, firewire, E-SATA, Expresscard, HDMI out, and a card reader. On the back is another USB port, ethernet, dial-up modem, power socket and Kensington lock. On the right is an optical drive, two more USB ports, headphones, mic and SPDIF. On the front is a switch to turn off WiFi, and an infra-red beeper.

Two neat features: first, the inclusion of a numeric keypad on a mid-size laptop. Second, SplashTop, the linux-based instant-on environment, which offers browsing and other useful extras. Alas, Vista doesn't load in the "background" while it's on.

There's a glowing row of special keys between the keyboard and the screen, and a miniature LCD display that shows battery life while in-game. A giant speaker is mercifully hidden underneath. Battery life is dismal, unimportant as that may be for a gaming model. Its 6-cell block might get you two hours with settings down, but I got less than 90 minutes when gaming.

Asus's G50 is a fine choice for a mid-range gaming laptop for those wanting a good deal, but who want a more ostentatious look than Gateway's otherwise similar gray slabs. If you like it but don't want to compromise on performance, look to the pricier G70 series.

The Asus G50V is available at Amazon and elsewhere.