We don’t usually see much when comes to 16 inch laptops, as some may think the size could be slightly bigger than the 15.6inch laptops, some might even think about the aspect ratio may not be suitable and another crucial aspect one may also consider is the weight of the laptop.
Today we will look at the ASUS Vivobook 16X (M1603), an offering that we see it as a laptop candidate that one could carry around by size and power that it offers.
Who is this for?
The ASUS Vivobook 16X (M1603) very aspect of the reason it exist is for the balance all rounder specification that it has, by targeting the segment from undergraduate students studying in an university to young adults that just need a Laptop that sits in a room of comfort, work and studies as a package. It carries a quite attractive price tag also starting from RM2,999 with a dated, but still power packed AMD Ryzen 5 5600H.
Design & Build Quality
The whole body of the Laptop is actually made of plastic but the overall look is premium with the colors that is fairly safe in Quiet Blue or Transparent Silver. The review unit that we received is Quiet Blue which brings a calm overall look and simple looking that looks adaptable practically everywhere you wish to work or play.
The size of the laptop is on a 16 inch display with a 15.6 inch body that is fitted and compacted within a 1.8KG footprint, which still shows strength when it comes to the build quality, with steady hinges that can open up to flat down to the table surface up to 180 degree angle with US MIL-STD 810H military-grade standard. The laptop is also ISO22196 tested for ASUS Antibacterial Guard that repels bacteria up to 3 years of protection.
Typing experience is nice and comfortable with reasonably good tactile feedback with a tasted long key travel rated at 1.4mm with dished key caps and white LED backlight. Besides that the trackpad is reasonably sized for multi gesture support, fingerprint scanner and it is Windows Precision Drivers certified for Windows 11. The physical webcam provides an actual sliding privacy shutter which is a bonus but it is just good enough for normal web conferencing.
A good amount of ports are available ranging from 2 USB 3.2 Gen 1 Ports, A Type C Port, 1 HDMI port and a combo Audio Jack for a fairly good amount on peripheral extensions.
Display & Audio
While ASUS is well known for the OLED series from Vivobook, the inclusion of the 16 inch, 1200P, 16:10 aspect ratio was actually an IPS panel, this is due to the consideration that this specific model is for the budget and affordable oriented market segments. However it still boast an anti glare display and a brightness boost up to 300nits which is fairly good enough for day to day operations and all your video streaming entertainment with a larger viewing size. This is further backed by a good pair of stereo speakers located below the sides of the keyboard area, just dont expect very punchy bass there, but it still offer a decent loud and does not break on any weird noises when playing music.
Performance & Benchmarking
The ASUS Vivobook 16X is powered by the AMD Ryzen 5 5600H Mobile processor with 8GB of integrated DDR4 3200MHZ RAM in single channel, 512GB of PCIe Gen 3 SSD and built in AMD Radeon 7 VEGA APU.
Day to day use on the ASUS Vivobook 16X is no problem, from authoring to work, stream and play is smooth thanks to the processor TDP that goes up to 45W and the inclusion of the Vega iGPU actually enables content creation smoother and it handles most recent game titles nicely at 720P with a fairly good framerates. Battery only usage you get you around 7 hours under conservative usage which is good enough to last you over working hours.
If you wish to get more performance out of it, you still can add another stick of 16GB RAM and replace the standard Gen3 SSD to a bigger storage on your own. Since we have opened up the bottom portion, the vents is nicely placed near the hinge and another on the side to make heat dissipates faster.
Above is the benchmarking results, which is still impresses me coming from the price to performance ratio and still offers alot to further push if you wish to run it on full dual channel memory in the future.
AMD Ryzen 5 5600H Series + AMD Radeon Vega APU
The AMD Ryzen 5000 series is known for the stellar performance even for the mobile processor lineups. One may wonder what does the the letters represents ?
In Layman terms, H in AMD represents the mainline within the AMD Ryzen family of processor lineups, which offer near to desktop Ryzen 5000 series performance and reliability, while prolonging battery usage on the go, this is especially great when comes to business travellers, but it does not stop there, creators and gamer can take advantage of it also with the integrated Radeon Vega 7 graphics that plays even current titles comfortably from 30FPS average onwards, including games such as Genshin Impact, while MOBA games such as DOTA 2 will have no issue running over 60FPS with a dynamic maximum TDP of 45W.
Specifications
| Color | Quiet Blue Transparent Silver |
| Operating System | Windows 11 Home |
| Processor | AMD Ryzen™ 5 5600H Mobile Processor (6-core/12-thread, 19MB cache, up to 4.2 GHz max boost) |
| Graphics | AMD Radeon™ Vega 7 Graphics |
| Display | 16.0-inch, WUXGA (1920 x 1200) 16:10 aspect ratio, IPS-level Panel, LED Backlit, 300nits, 45% NTSC color gamut for non-OLED, Anti-glare display, Screen-to-body ratio: 86 ％ 16.0-inch, WUXGA (1920 x 1200) 16:10 aspect ratio, 300nits, 45% NTSC color gamut for non-OLED, Anti-glare display, Screen-to-body ratio: 86 ％ |
| Memory | 8GB DDR4 on board + 1 Vacant Slot (up to 16GB RAM) |
| Storage | 512GB M.2 NVMe™ PCIe® 3.0 SSD |
| I/O Ports | 1x USB 2.0 Type-A 1x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-C 2x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A 1x HDMI 1.4 1x 3.5mm Combo Audio Jack 1x DC-in |
| Keyboard & Touchpad | Backlit Chiclet Keyboard with Num-key, 1.4mm Key-travel, Touchpad |
| Camera | 720p HD camera With privacy shutter |
| Network and Communication | Wi-Fi 6(802.11ax) (Dual band) 2*2 + Bluetooth 5 |
| Price | RM2999 |
Verdict & Conclusion
The ASUS Vivobook 16X (M1603) is one we can actually recommend for the masses especially those who are looking for a worthy affordable laptop that cares for the essential everyday use, while retaining on all what a basic laptop has, this actually offers more to the potential owners with good features ASUS has implemented over the chassis build and all the Zen 3 processing power from AMD.
Pricing & Availability
It is now widely available at RM2999 and for more information, you may CLICK HERE to find out more.
Special thanks to ASUS for loaning us the laptop for the purpose of this review.