The new Asus G751JL is a curious gaming portable. On the outside it’s all bluster, with a body styled on the F-22 Raptor fighter jet and a 17.3in screen that looms over rivals. The G751JL is one of the most striking gaming laptop chassis we’ve seen recently, sporting an angular design and a back end that features a thick ventilation grille. The design is a tweak of previous Republic of Gamers models, but with refinements visible in every area.
Designing, Screen And Sound Quality
The brushed metal accents sit among areas of smart-looking matte plastic, and the red-and-black theme continues throughout. It is undoubtedly a gaming laptop, and its looks fall somewhere between the cheaper, plasticky MSI GE62 2QD Apache and the loud, lit-up Alienware 15. It’s not all looks, though the Asus backs up its visual flair with practicality throughout. The keyboard is designed to have more travel than most Scrabble-tile units, and it benefits from extra buttons: three for macros, one to open Steam and another to begin recording a neat feature for Twitch and YouTube streamers. The trackpad is huge, there’s a Blu-ray drive a boon for such a modestly priced gaming machine, and the edges of the G751JL are covered with ports: four USB 3 connectors, a trio of headphone jacks, HDMI and Thunderbolt and an SD card slot. You also get dual-band 802.11ac wireless and Gigabit Ethernet.
The Asus matches its sensible resolution with good quality. Its 353-nit brightness level is considerably high and it’s helped by a black point measured at 0.37 nits. Combined they make for a display that’s punchy yet is still able to display deep, dark colours without looking washed out. While the contrast ratio of 954:1 isn’t class-leading, it’s well up there with the better displays.
Colour accuracy isn’t quite so impressive. The average Delta E of 5.3 is middling, but the colour temperature of 6,490K is excellent. The upshot of this is that the overall tone of the display is spot on, but it isn’t quite as good as the best at showing the finest variations in colour.
The Asus does maintain its quality across much of the display, though, with the screen’s brightness levels never deviating by more than 10%; its already-excellent colour temperature deviated by a maximum of only 5%. If we were reviewing this as a standalone screen, we’d be pleased.
Determination
A traditional gaming portable that’s bigger and heavier than its rivals, the GL751JL uses its size to excel in several areas. It offers a competitive specification, a good screen and an excellent keyboard at a price that’s reasonable for this category of machine. It’s an impressive heavyweight contender.
