ASUS Zephyrus G (GA502DU) Thermal Testing - AMD Runs Cooler

The Performance and Thermals of the Asou Sepphoris GGA 502 Gaming Laptop

For this review, we wanted to see how different performance modes would affect gameplay on the Asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop. To do this, I've compared the laptop's performance in silent mode, turbo mode, and regular mode in a series of tests.

In terms of performance, it appears that silent mode may be more suitable for everyday use than gaming. In the game Battlefield 5, which was tested at Ultra settings with silent mode enabled, the frame rate dropped by around 15 frames per second compared to running in turbo mode. However, this difference was not as pronounced when playing other games, such as Shadow of the Tomb Raider and Far Cry 5. While some games may benefit from running in silent mode, it's unlikely that you'll want to rely on this setting for gaming.

One game that did show a significant difference between performance and silent modes was Watchdogs: Legion. In this test, I couldn't even get the game to run at all when using silent mode. This is likely due to the fact that the laptop's cooling system is not designed to handle the high heat output of demanding games like this one.

In terms of external temperatures, it appears that running in performance or turbo modes results in higher temperatures than running in regular mode. At idle, the temperature was a bit warmer than usual, but when stressed, the temperature rose significantly - especially at the back of the laptop. However, when I customized the fan settings to run in silent mode, the temperatures were actually quite reasonable.

It's worth noting that this is not entirely surprising, given the fact that running in performance or turbo modes results in higher fan speeds and increased heat output. As a result, it was hot to the touch at the back of the laptop when testing with high loads. However, in terms of areas where you'll actually be touching the laptop, the temperature did not seem too bad.

The fan sounds during these tests were also quite interesting. In idle mode, I could barely hear the fans running - only just audible. When stress-testing and running in performance or turbo modes, however, the fan speeds increased significantly, resulting in a more noticeable sound.

In terms of customizing the fan settings, it appears that you can adjust the speed to find a balance between performance and noise levels. While I couldn't test this feature while gaming, I did notice that when running in performance mode, the fan speed was only slightly higher than when running in turbo mode. This suggests that there may be some room for adjustment here, depending on your specific needs.

In conclusion, the Asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop does appear to have some thermal issues, especially when running demanding games at high loads. However, with a cooling pad and some careful fan settings, it's possible to manage temperatures and noise levels effectively. Whether or not this is sufficient for your needs will depend on the specific games you play and how important temperature management is to you.

Asou Sepphoris GGA 502 Gaming Laptop Review - Conclusion

The Asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop is an AMD-based machine with a custom cooling system. While it does have some thermal issues, especially when running demanding games at high loads, there are ways to manage temperatures and noise levels effectively. With the right settings and adjustments, you should be able to get good performance out of this machine without overheating.

One of the standout features of this laptop is its custom cooling system, which includes a combination of fans, heat pipes, and thermal pads. This allows for better airflow and heat dissipation than some other laptops on the market. However, as we've seen in our tests, there are still some issues with temperatures, especially when running demanding games at high loads.

Despite these challenges, the GGA 502 is a solid machine that should appeal to gamers looking for an AMD-based laptop option. With its custom cooling system and powerful GPU, it's capable of delivering good performance in a variety of games. Whether or not it will be enough for your needs depends on what you're looking for in a gaming laptop.

In terms of thermals, the GGA 502 is not as bad as some other laptops on the market. While it does have some issues with temperatures, especially when running demanding games at high loads, there are ways to manage these temperatures effectively. With a cooling pad and some careful fan settings, you should be able to get good performance out of this machine without overheating.

The GGA 502 also has a more compact design than some other laptops on the market. It's not as large or heavy as some of its competitors, which makes it easier to carry around. However, this may also mean that it doesn't have as much room for cooling components, which could potentially affect performance in hot temperatures.

Overall, the Asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop is a solid option for gamers looking for an AMD-based machine. While it does have some thermal issues, there are ways to manage these temperatures effectively. With good performance and a compact design, this laptop should appeal to a wide range of users.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enthe asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop combines an AMD cpu with nvidia graphics inside a thin a machine but just how hot does it get and does this hurt performance in this detailed thermal testing we'll find out how it runs and see what improvements can be made I've got the GA 502 D u model so there's a Verizon 737 50 H quad-core CPU NVIDIA GTX 16 60 TI max Q graphics 16 gig of memory and dual channel and a 120 Hertz 1080p screen you can find up-to-date prices linked in the description the zephyrus design is traditionally known for raising the back of the machine up when the lid is opened to aid with air flow however that feature is not present in this more budget-friendly design there are some air vents on the bottom however interestingly the sections that are actually above the fans are blocked off so it may primarily bring in air through the keyboard and the vents just above it inside we've got a few heat pipes with a couple shared between the processor and graphics and we can see that air is exhausted out the side and back with the left fan and just out the back with the opposite fan the asou summary kraits software allows you to change between three different modes silent performance and Tubber and i've tested all three out here basically these modes are just maximum fan speed CPU power limits and control GPU overclocking as defined here you can easily swap between these modes through software or by holding the function key and pressing f5 the key with the fan icon Thermal testing was completed in an ambient room temperature of 21 degrees Celsius so expect different results in different environments no CPU under volting has been done as this is not currently possible with AMD mobile CPUs and Idol both the CPU and GPU were on the warmer side there realistically not a problem as the fans were quiet as you'll hear later the rest of the results are from combined CPU and GPU workloads and am meant to represent worst-case scenarios as I ran them for extended periods of time the gaming results towards the upper half of the graph were tested by playing watchdogs turn as I find it to use a good combination of processor and graphics the stress test results shown on the low half of the graph from running the aida64 cpu stress test with only the stress cpu option checked and the heav'n GPU benchmark at max settings at the same time to fully load the system starting with the stress tests in silent mode the 1660 T I max Q was thermal throttling at 86 degrees Celsius if we change to performance mode the GPU thermal throttling is removed as this boosts the fan speed however the CPU was now hotter as this mode raises it to power limit I think it was thermal throttling however hardware info doesn't currently report on this for the 37:58 CPU so I can't say for sure there were no differences in temperatures with performance or turbo mode because as you'll hear later the fan speed didn't actually change in this workload using a cooling pad did help a little despite the vents directly above the fans being blocked off by the bottom panel as we saw earlier the gaming results saw a similar trend with some GPU thermal throttling and silent mode with slight improvements to thermals as we continue making changes these are the average clock speeds for the same tests to shine in silent mode we're seing lowest CPU clock speeds compared to the other tests as this mode caps the CPU power limit to 8 watts although the clock speeds and watchdogs to look good here the game was actually unplayable but we'll check out some FPS benchmarks with different modes soon in performance mode there's a nice boost to CPU clock speed as the power limit raises to around 21 watts and the GPU sees an increased her as this boosts fan speed and removes thermal throttling turbo modes saw no changes to CPU performance due to suspected CPU thermal throttling however the reported GPU clock speed raises due to the overclocking turbo motor pliers as there was more thermal Headroom for the gaming tasks the performance and turbo modes are making more noticeable improvements the cooling pad makes a big improvement to CPU clock speed while under stress test as it helps address the CPU thermal throttling however it hardly did anything while playing this particular game as temperatures weren't too bad with it these are the TDP values during these same tests I've used Hardware infer for the GPU shown by the green bars and when not hitting the 60 watt power limit of the 1660 T IMAX Q with silent mode enabled due to the GPU thermal throttling covered earlier in first still seems to incorrectly report the TDP for the 3750 H CPU so I've used AMD's you profit all instead however as this doesn't give an average over time these results are only approximate values I don't have results for the gaming tests because without a consistent load it was difficult to report an average the 3750 H has a 35 watt TDP and as this is only hit once the cooling pad is in use it sort of implies that we were thermal throttling in this workload without it there as we saw this seems to be less of a problem with an actual game running these are the TDP values I was seeing reported by U prof while under a CPU only workload so it looks like performance mode has a 28 what limit though this was not being hit under combined CPU and GPU loads as we just saw before Judith Thermal limitations these are the average clock speeds under these same workloads as the power limit increases so does the clock speed and performance more power and performance typically equals more heat however we saw the highest temperatures in silent mode simply because the fan speed was so much quieter when compared to performance or turbo modes to demonstrate how this translates into performance I've got some Cinebench CPU benchmarks with Intel's lust gen I 580 300 H quad-core CPU in red just for comparison though keep in mind the i-5 does have a higher 45 watt TDP limit I've compared these two in a separate video if you're interested in more comparisons so how do these different performance modes actually affect games I've tested a few games with silent performance and turbo modes to find out battlefield 5 was tested in campaign mode at Ultra settings with silent mode enabled it was still quite usable the 1% allure wasn't too different to the other results and it was only around 15 fps lower compared to turbo mode with much louder fans shadow of the Tomb Raider was tested with the built-in benchmark at highest settings again there wasn't much difference to framerate between performance and turbo mode however silent was a fair bit lower this time far cry 5 was tested with the built-in benchmark at Ultra settings in this test there was a much larger drop with the silent profile in use and like I mentioned before I couldn't play watchdogs to in silent mode so it seems to vary by game basically wouldn't rely on silent mode for quite a gaming I did test these games at max settings learn they'll likely be more playable with lower settings if you want to see more gaming benchmarks on this machine check the card in the top right where I've tested 20 games at all 7 levels as for the external temperatures where you'll actually be putting your hands at idle it was a bit warmer than the standard 30 degrees I usually see there are only in the center towards the back with the stress tests running in silent mode it's in the mid 50s in the center getting up to the 60s right up the back where it was hot to the touch granted you won't be touching here in most cases anyway it was a bit cooler in performance mode as this also raises fan speed and we can see the cooler spots on the left and right where the fins bring in air through the keyboard there wasn't too much difference in turbo mode still getting to 60 right up the back but again for the areas you'll actually be touching it's not too bad here's what the fan sound like during these different tests I'd idle in silent mode it was only just audible with silent mode and the stress tests running it's much quieter compared to most other laptops I've tested and as we saw some games were playable in this mode but you could always customize band speed to find a sweet spot that's playable without getting too loud in performance or turbo mode the fan speed was the same and pretty average when compared to most other gaming laptops that I've tested I forgot to test fan speed while gaming and although it will vary by game I did notice that while in performance mode the fan speed did you up back a couple of decibels when not being smashed with a stress test overall the assist GA 502 gaming laptop doesn't appear to run that hot at least purely in terms of internal temperatures granted it does thermal throttle under graphics if you run it in silent mode but as we heard the fans were significantly quieter in that mode so that's going to be expected this is only the second AMD laptop with nvidia graphics that i've tested in general I found the AMD CPUs to run cooler compared to Intel based laptops that easily run anywhere from 90 to 100 degrees Celsius under the same load however this is because the Intel CPUs have a high of 45 watt TDP and as we saw this results in increased performance - it appeared that there was thermal throttling on the CPU under worst case trust us however when actually playing a game it seemed alright but this will depend on a specific game and workload I say appeared because I don't actually know any software that correctly reports thermal throttling on AMD mobile CPUs I'm just basing this on the results I saw 89 degrees is a maximum average doesn't seem too high they're using a cooling pad helped address this and improve performance in terms of clock speed though it may have been more effective if the bottom air intakes weren't blocked off it's hard to say for sure without damaging the bottom panel to remove the plastic it may be possible to further improve temperatures by swapping the thermal paste however as this is a review unit that I have to send back I'm not able to change the paste otherwise the next reviewer will unknowingly report different results due to what I've done raising fan speed and using a cooling pad are much easier for most people to do than changing paste anyway and as we've seen these tweaks did help improve performance and temperatures with the GA 502 let me know what you thought about the thermals from the asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop down in the comments and if you're new to the channel you definitely want to get subscribed for the upcoming full review to see everything this machine has to offerthe asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop combines an AMD cpu with nvidia graphics inside a thin a machine but just how hot does it get and does this hurt performance in this detailed thermal testing we'll find out how it runs and see what improvements can be made I've got the GA 502 D u model so there's a Verizon 737 50 H quad-core CPU NVIDIA GTX 16 60 TI max Q graphics 16 gig of memory and dual channel and a 120 Hertz 1080p screen you can find up-to-date prices linked in the description the zephyrus design is traditionally known for raising the back of the machine up when the lid is opened to aid with air flow however that feature is not present in this more budget-friendly design there are some air vents on the bottom however interestingly the sections that are actually above the fans are blocked off so it may primarily bring in air through the keyboard and the vents just above it inside we've got a few heat pipes with a couple shared between the processor and graphics and we can see that air is exhausted out the side and back with the left fan and just out the back with the opposite fan the asou summary kraits software allows you to change between three different modes silent performance and Tubber and i've tested all three out here basically these modes are just maximum fan speed CPU power limits and control GPU overclocking as defined here you can easily swap between these modes through software or by holding the function key and pressing f5 the key with the fan icon Thermal testing was completed in an ambient room temperature of 21 degrees Celsius so expect different results in different environments no CPU under volting has been done as this is not currently possible with AMD mobile CPUs and Idol both the CPU and GPU were on the warmer side there realistically not a problem as the fans were quiet as you'll hear later the rest of the results are from combined CPU and GPU workloads and am meant to represent worst-case scenarios as I ran them for extended periods of time the gaming results towards the upper half of the graph were tested by playing watchdogs turn as I find it to use a good combination of processor and graphics the stress test results shown on the low half of the graph from running the aida64 cpu stress test with only the stress cpu option checked and the heav'n GPU benchmark at max settings at the same time to fully load the system starting with the stress tests in silent mode the 1660 T I max Q was thermal throttling at 86 degrees Celsius if we change to performance mode the GPU thermal throttling is removed as this boosts the fan speed however the CPU was now hotter as this mode raises it to power limit I think it was thermal throttling however hardware info doesn't currently report on this for the 37:58 CPU so I can't say for sure there were no differences in temperatures with performance or turbo mode because as you'll hear later the fan speed didn't actually change in this workload using a cooling pad did help a little despite the vents directly above the fans being blocked off by the bottom panel as we saw earlier the gaming results saw a similar trend with some GPU thermal throttling and silent mode with slight improvements to thermals as we continue making changes these are the average clock speeds for the same tests to shine in silent mode we're seing lowest CPU clock speeds compared to the other tests as this mode caps the CPU power limit to 8 watts although the clock speeds and watchdogs to look good here the game was actually unplayable but we'll check out some FPS benchmarks with different modes soon in performance mode there's a nice boost to CPU clock speed as the power limit raises to around 21 watts and the GPU sees an increased her as this boosts fan speed and removes thermal throttling turbo modes saw no changes to CPU performance due to suspected CPU thermal throttling however the reported GPU clock speed raises due to the overclocking turbo motor pliers as there was more thermal Headroom for the gaming tasks the performance and turbo modes are making more noticeable improvements the cooling pad makes a big improvement to CPU clock speed while under stress test as it helps address the CPU thermal throttling however it hardly did anything while playing this particular game as temperatures weren't too bad with it these are the TDP values during these same tests I've used Hardware infer for the GPU shown by the green bars and when not hitting the 60 watt power limit of the 1660 T IMAX Q with silent mode enabled due to the GPU thermal throttling covered earlier in first still seems to incorrectly report the TDP for the 3750 H CPU so I've used AMD's you profit all instead however as this doesn't give an average over time these results are only approximate values I don't have results for the gaming tests because without a consistent load it was difficult to report an average the 3750 H has a 35 watt TDP and as this is only hit once the cooling pad is in use it sort of implies that we were thermal throttling in this workload without it there as we saw this seems to be less of a problem with an actual game running these are the TDP values I was seeing reported by U prof while under a CPU only workload so it looks like performance mode has a 28 what limit though this was not being hit under combined CPU and GPU loads as we just saw before Judith Thermal limitations these are the average clock speeds under these same workloads as the power limit increases so does the clock speed and performance more power and performance typically equals more heat however we saw the highest temperatures in silent mode simply because the fan speed was so much quieter when compared to performance or turbo modes to demonstrate how this translates into performance I've got some Cinebench CPU benchmarks with Intel's lust gen I 580 300 H quad-core CPU in red just for comparison though keep in mind the i-5 does have a higher 45 watt TDP limit I've compared these two in a separate video if you're interested in more comparisons so how do these different performance modes actually affect games I've tested a few games with silent performance and turbo modes to find out battlefield 5 was tested in campaign mode at Ultra settings with silent mode enabled it was still quite usable the 1% allure wasn't too different to the other results and it was only around 15 fps lower compared to turbo mode with much louder fans shadow of the Tomb Raider was tested with the built-in benchmark at highest settings again there wasn't much difference to framerate between performance and turbo mode however silent was a fair bit lower this time far cry 5 was tested with the built-in benchmark at Ultra settings in this test there was a much larger drop with the silent profile in use and like I mentioned before I couldn't play watchdogs to in silent mode so it seems to vary by game basically wouldn't rely on silent mode for quite a gaming I did test these games at max settings learn they'll likely be more playable with lower settings if you want to see more gaming benchmarks on this machine check the card in the top right where I've tested 20 games at all 7 levels as for the external temperatures where you'll actually be putting your hands at idle it was a bit warmer than the standard 30 degrees I usually see there are only in the center towards the back with the stress tests running in silent mode it's in the mid 50s in the center getting up to the 60s right up the back where it was hot to the touch granted you won't be touching here in most cases anyway it was a bit cooler in performance mode as this also raises fan speed and we can see the cooler spots on the left and right where the fins bring in air through the keyboard there wasn't too much difference in turbo mode still getting to 60 right up the back but again for the areas you'll actually be touching it's not too bad here's what the fan sound like during these different tests I'd idle in silent mode it was only just audible with silent mode and the stress tests running it's much quieter compared to most other laptops I've tested and as we saw some games were playable in this mode but you could always customize band speed to find a sweet spot that's playable without getting too loud in performance or turbo mode the fan speed was the same and pretty average when compared to most other gaming laptops that I've tested I forgot to test fan speed while gaming and although it will vary by game I did notice that while in performance mode the fan speed did you up back a couple of decibels when not being smashed with a stress test overall the assist GA 502 gaming laptop doesn't appear to run that hot at least purely in terms of internal temperatures granted it does thermal throttle under graphics if you run it in silent mode but as we heard the fans were significantly quieter in that mode so that's going to be expected this is only the second AMD laptop with nvidia graphics that i've tested in general I found the AMD CPUs to run cooler compared to Intel based laptops that easily run anywhere from 90 to 100 degrees Celsius under the same load however this is because the Intel CPUs have a high of 45 watt TDP and as we saw this results in increased performance - it appeared that there was thermal throttling on the CPU under worst case trust us however when actually playing a game it seemed alright but this will depend on a specific game and workload I say appeared because I don't actually know any software that correctly reports thermal throttling on AMD mobile CPUs I'm just basing this on the results I saw 89 degrees is a maximum average doesn't seem too high they're using a cooling pad helped address this and improve performance in terms of clock speed though it may have been more effective if the bottom air intakes weren't blocked off it's hard to say for sure without damaging the bottom panel to remove the plastic it may be possible to further improve temperatures by swapping the thermal paste however as this is a review unit that I have to send back I'm not able to change the paste otherwise the next reviewer will unknowingly report different results due to what I've done raising fan speed and using a cooling pad are much easier for most people to do than changing paste anyway and as we've seen these tweaks did help improve performance and temperatures with the GA 502 let me know what you thought about the thermals from the asou Sepphoris GGA 502 gaming laptop down in the comments and if you're new to the channel you definitely want to get subscribed for the upcoming full review to see everything this machine has to offer\n"