My brother has this laptop, and overall, it is a decent computer. It has a good CPU, a good GPU, and good RAM. There's plenty of upgrade options, as the FSB can handle faster (and more) RAM, and the CPU and GPU are readily upgradeable as well. The major problem is that ASUS didn't design the cooling well. The fan does not have any direct air flow from the bottom of the case and over the heatsinks. It sucks the air from small holes and slots all around the computer's base and then expells it over the heatsinks, instead of standard cooling systems where the fan has a big hole under it for direct air flow. The idea was to make the fan cool the entire system: the disk drive and HDD, the RAM, the mother board, and the battery. But this just results in hot air being blown over already hot heatsinks, and what's more is that there is very litte air flow as it is. There is a mod that can be done where you cut a hole out from under the fan, and this does help to cool it down (I know, I did it to my brother's G50VT). But the temps still skyrocket to well above acceptable temps. Playing Team Fortress 2 we saw 80C plus. I have to say that this is a good computer, but Asus greatly missed the mark in cooling.
With Vista on it is ok, but with Windows 7 on it its awesome. It can play Far Cry 2 and Call Of Duty MW2 on the highest settings. When playing these games, the video card got to 86C after an hour. My frame rate was in the High 20s mid 30s on the highest settings. The hottest the CPU ever got was 72C. Before I upgraded the CPU, it would idle at in the mid 30s(C). After I upgraded it and used Antec Formula 5 it now idles at 27-29C. The GPU idles at 42C and gets to around 50-55 while surfing the net or watching a video. This laptop runs cool compared to other laptops.
Some people have asked if it can handle 8GB of ram. After little research I found that it can take up to 8GB of memory. 8GB (2x4GB) on eBay costs about $240. Now for battery life.
On power save with the screen on the dimmest I get about 3-3.5 hours of life. Some people think that the light and design on the lid look bad, but I think it looks cool. I just wish that you could turn them off sometimes. Hard drive transfers at about 22 MBPS with Windows 7.
Overall its an excellent laptop. I paid $700 for mine on eBay. 5 Star Laptop!
Pros:
Fast Processor
Good Video Card
Big HDD
Long Battery Life
Fast Wireless Card
Excellent frame rates in latest games
Runs very cool
Cons
Lid Design looks bad to some
Screen slightly low resolution
Can't put a quad core in itI bought this when I needed a laptop for class, mainly because I needed a laptop, tablets weren't in existence, and I played quite a few PC games, as there is just some things tablets can't yet replace a laptop for. This thing handled everything I could throw at it, and still does. I later bought a second hard drive, a 320gb, for music and movies etc, to put in the second hard drive slot already included, which is an amazing feature by the by! The factory over clocking is great, and if you install the drivers, the graphics card will run as a m9800gt! Overall I have had this for a few years now and it is still running strong, Asus makes great products, and has one of the lowest hardware failure rates on the market.The G50Vt-X5 is quite a powerful beast of a laptop. Mine doesn't quite match the configuration at the top of the page, and more resembles the one in the description (2.15GHz). It handles games exceptionally well with the GeForce 9800M GS video card, and is quite upgradeable and expandable for a laptop. The built-in overclocking is pretty handy if you need a little more "oomph", and it handles this overclocking safely since it's part of ASUS's own software suite.
This computer has been one of the best I've owned. I'm not kidding. The only negative is that it's big. It's not a "bring it with you everywhere" kind of laptop. It's a little on the large & heavy side with the battery installed, and it might as well be a 17" system, despite the screen being 15.4" (1680x1050), because it does not fit in 15" laptop bags. You need one designed for 16" or bigger. All this size means it can run with more power, more features, and better cooling for that dedicated gaming-level graphics card.
Despite these minor negatives, the system is a joy to use. Stable, sturdy as a rock, and blazing fast-even in games! HDMI out makes this a great home entertainment center, too. Plenty of USB ports, a firewire port, an SD card reader, a second hard drive bay, surround sound output via TOSlink (requires an adapter), and even a keypad make this a laptop for people who don't want to give up all the good things about desktop PCs. It also runs Windows 7 64-bit like a champ, and ASUS has all the updated drivers for Windows 7 on their website. Oh, and with the power off, you can instantly pop into a simple LINUX-style OS with the touch of a button if you don't feel like going into Windows for some reason.
If you're up to it, you can even upgrade the CPU. That's pretty awesome for a laptop. Every laptop I had before this one wouldn't allow it. ASUS built this system for gamers, and it shows. Heck, when you turn it on, the "Republic of Gamers" logo goes BOOM! on the screen before you even get to the BIOS.
I've been 100% happy with this system. It's not as good as a desktop, perhaps (which is why I eventually chose to part with mine) but it's as good as it gets for a gaming PC under a thousand bucks.First I must say that I had the G50Vt-X1. It's video died, and I could no longer get a card that fit it. (Planned obsolescence sucks!) I ordered this one to replace it. I put my two hard drives in it and my ram sticks.
It has worked perfectly! I use it everyday for gaming, even dualboxing in windowed mode, etc. Never a problem!
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