You won't be able to buy it for the advertised prices anyway.

If you were able to, sure, it might make sense as a budget option. If you don't mind the shoddy construction. The fan noise. The flickering display. And the flex on the lid and the hinges are bad.

Yesterday, Qualcomm introduced its Snapdragon X2 Elite series of chips to consumers in partnership with major OEMs like ASUS and HP. On the same day, ASUS released additional laptop models based on Intel and AMD SoCs. However, just a day after some media outlets published their reviews, ASUS increased the prices of its products through its launch partner distributor, Best Buy, significantly affecting some reviewers' conclusions. Reportedly, ASUS raised prices by $100 to $350, depending on the laptop model and configuration, regardless of the platform. This is a substantial change; for example, a $350 increase on a $1,000 model like the Zenbook 14 represents a one-third increase in the device's advertised price. Reviewers, such as those at TechPowerUp, evaluate the model based on its value. If a model is aimed at budget users, the perspective of a budget user is applied, and if a model is aimed at workstation users, a small price increase may not be a dealbreaker. However, in the $1,000 range for a laptop, ASUS is now pushing these laptops into a completely different category.

2.67 pounds for a 16 inch laptop is very good. But the disadvantage is, depending on how you look at it, is that it, unlike the Air 15, has a fan. The power supply is kinda heavy and negates the weight advantage, but it can be changed, I guess.

Good Mozilla Kraken score, very close to M5 (M5 +9%).

48 GB RAM for 1600 bucks is good. It's soldered, but it's 48 GB and it's running at 9523 MT/s.

Quotewhile the GPU performance of the M5 is comparable

Expected, because of the same memory bandwidth:
M5: 153.6 GB/s = 128-bit * 9600 MT/s / 1000 / 8.
X2 Elite: 152.4 GB/s = 128-bit * 9523 MT/s / 1000 / 8.

The X2 Elite' iGPU being slightly faster than M5', despite the same memory bandwidth, confirms what is said here:

Quote from: Good,but inefficient iGPU on March 09, 2026, 09:37:35Wish the iGPU was faster/better utilized/more efficient:
Steel Nomad (Vulkan):

• Radeon 890M: Average score: 753
  
  • Bandwidth: 89.6 GB/s (= 128-bit * 5600 MT/s / 1000 / 8)
  • -> FPS score per GB/s = 753/89.6 = 8.40
• Apple MacBook Air 15 M5: 1070
  
  • Bandwidth: 153.6 GB/s (= 128-bit * 9600 MT/s / 1000 / 8)
  • -> FPS score per GB/s = 6.97
• 4050 Laptop: Average score: 1789
  
  • Bandwidth: 192.0 GB/s (= 96-bit * 16 Gbit/s / 8)
  • -> FPS score per GB/s = 9.32

M5' 6.97 * 1.2 (the 20% of the X2 Elite) = 8.364 and now the M5 would be there, where it ideally should have been. And * 1.335 to reach the efficiency of the 4050 Laptop GPU, so there is still room for improvement.
Wonder what a memory bandwidth improvement LPDDR6 (next year?) will bring, as the limit of LPDDR5X is reached.

AIDA64 finally measures the memory bandwidth correctly (174586 MB/s). (has still problems in Strix Halo?)

f, looked good so far (120 Hz, OLED, glossy, 500 nits, full Display P3 Coverage coverage, 1ms pixel response times), but then:

Quote960 Hz
Amplitude: 56 %
PWM (60 % brightness)

The like most used brightness setting gets a stroboscope? Are you trolling us, ASUS? Give me this without the PWM or use a fast (10ms or lower pixel response time) 120 Hz IPS (must be glossy), if you have to, I'd be happy with that.

8w in idle is a joke. battery runtimes are dissapointing.

also the screen that looks like a mirror is a total fail for such a mobile device.

half the weight of the laptop for the charger is also a joke.
plenty of under 200gr gan chargers around with 100w.

lots of space in the chassis, not used for bigger speakers/battery or a second nvme slot!

speakers fire downwards. display only 135° for opening.

why nothing of this is in the cons?? the rating of 88% is another joke here.