Republic of Gamer’s Latest P369,995 Pro Gaming Laptop is The Latest Entry in the War of Brands

Unveiled yesterday at the Reign of the Republic event, the ROG GX800 promises to be Asus’ most powerful — and lavish — gaming laptop to date. Available for the price of a second-hand sedan at P369,995, the ROG GX800 became available for the Philippine market yesterday since it was teased at Computex in 2016.

But apart from being able to game at 4K resolution thanks to its dual NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 SLI graphics cards, Asus’ new flagship model also boasts an unlocked latest generation Intel i7 processor, its own hydro cooling unit and a custom-made luggage case for storage.

Designing a beast

From the outside looking in, a laptop marketed with its own luggage case seems ridiculous.

After all, the main selling point of a notebook is portability. While the GX800 luggage case is a full-fledged trolley, it isn’t exactly “portable”.

“The thing we wanted to do with the GX800 was to make it really a statement of who you are as a gamer,” says Joey Nocom, Country Product Manager for ASUS notebooks. “It’s already eye-catching on its own but once you put it inside a bag, it loses its character. You’re not going to turn heads. By marketing it with its own luggage case, its a clear statement: I’m a member of the Republic.”

But taking into account that the case doubles as the GX800’s own housing and carrying unit for the Hydro Overclocking system, and the idea of a trolley to fit your laptop doesn’t sound too far-fetched. The Hydro Overclocking system is a back-mounted dock that serves as the unit’s main exhaust pipe to support the two beastly graphics cards the GX800 utilizes.

“This isn’t the first time we’ve made a separate cooling unit for a laptop,” says Nocom. “Last year’s GX701 had a cooling unit that’s almost the same size as the notebook itself.”

“For the GX800, we wanted a smaller profile for the Hydro Overclocking system but still deliver efficient cooling.”

And the reason for the dedicated exhaust and cooling unit? Nocom summarizes it in one word: Performance.

“First of all, it can game on native 4K resolution, so it’s important that the heat is actually dissipated and not just moved around the chassis,” says Nocom. “We worked and consulted with gamers and enthusiasts to make sure that we can hit those high-performance targets.”

While Nocom concedes that the hefty price tag of the GX800 will confine it to the hardcore gaming enthusiasts, the fact that it can keep up with desktop performance metrics is a big selling point towards multimedia practitioners. The ability to seamlessly render visually demanding assets is a walk in the park for the GX800.

The War of the Big-Ticket Laptops continues

While the hefty price tag is sure to pique interest — good and bad — for the GX800, this isn’t the first similarly over-the-top gaming notebook to hit the Philippines as of late.

At the Highgrounds Cafe, powered by TNC, launch last February 8, 2017, Acer’s gaming line — Predator — also publicly displayed the $9,000 (roughly equivalent to P450,000) Predator 21X. Headlining it is the world’s first curved screen laptop display, and a similar dual GeForce GTX 1080 graphics card set-up.

Asked if the unveiling of their own flagship notebook is a response to the Predator’s 21X, Nocom candidly replies that ROG is simply fulfilling its promise to gamers.

“I can’t speak for all of my colleagues, but I view the 21X as Acer’s push to build goodwill with gamers,” explains Nocom. “They had a brand identity of being more budget-friendly at the expense of power and performance. So in order to make sure that the Predator line connects with gamers and hardcore enthusiasts, they needed that big, top-of-line model to sit atop the throne of their current notebooks.”

“For ROG on the other hand, we’ve been serving gamers since 2006. The GX800 is just a fulfillment of that promise.”

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