As far as it’s contemporaries, the Aorus X5 is on par with the Razer Blade 2015 regarding the total package. It falls short of the Blade in some functioning areas, but just barely, while making up for those shortcomings elsewhere. Granted, the X5 falls short of the utterly brutally Origin EON15-X in terms of pure functioning, but for its price point and the fact that it weighs nearly 2 pounds less makes it a serious challenger for anyone looking for a hardcore gaming laptop.

X5-Aorus

There’s no question that this is a hardcore gaming machine, either. The Aorus X5 has a ton of gaming-specific features beyond just its powerful graphics capabilities and 2,880 x 1,620 15.6-inch screen. On the far right of the full-sized keyboard are five programmable macro keys. There’s even the option to add a dedicated hardware encoder, which takes the strain of live streaming and recording gameplay off of the CPU.

Gamer’s Laptop

Its smooth lines give way to sharp points and angular vents that would look like right at home on a Lamborghini. High-performance laptops seem to be following the design examples set forth by high-performance automobiles, and the X5 is no exception. The black aluminum body is interrupted by several exhaust ports, which helps facilitate the heavy cooling necessary to run the X5. The side vents also continue the super-car feel, and the vents in the rear leave no question that there’s a lot going on under the hood. The lid comes to a slight point at its peak, with a small raised line running about an eighth of the way down. The Aorus logo, a brutal design that would be right at home on the war machines in a futuristic anime, lights up when the laptop is on. When not powered up, however, the laptop logo is just as visible, thanks to being silver and a polished finish that reflects light like a mirror.

The full-size keyboard has low, high and off backlighting settings. The programmable macro keys run in a vertical line to the left of the keyboard, with the top key highlighted in one of five colors, depending on which set of macros is in use.

Assessment

Instead of trying to match the overall feel of the OS, Aorus’s software tries to match itself to the design of the laptop itself. The result is an unattractive user interface (UI) that sticks out and ends up looking cheap despite its usefulness.

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