ASUS TUF Gaming F16 (FX608JH) Review – Sensible All Around – Pokde.Net

Unboxing

This year, ASUS’s TUF Gaming laptops has undergone a major design change, and here we have the Intel version in the form of TUF Gaming F16 (model number FX608JH). Right out of the gate, opening the box reveals the laptop with a different hinge design.

Unlike the previous generation, ASUS no longer includes a TUF-themed sticker pack, and the laptop also gets a power brick with higher output. Here’s the full list of items:

– Type G (UK) AC adapter
– 280W DC charger
– User guide
– Quick start guide
– MyASUS leaflet
– USB PD documentation
– TUF Gaming F16 (FX608JH) main unit

Walkaround

The newly updated design of the TUF Gaming F16 features a small TUF logo at the corner of an otherwise flush and blank lid, and it also adopts the rear overhang design ubiquitous in gaming laptop these days. (It’s also asymmetrical for some reason, if you pay attention to the corners.) Inside, there’s a 16-inch FHD+ display with 165Hz refresh rate, 100% sRGB gamut, and support NVIDIA Advanced Optimus; up top you get a FHD webcam that lacks a shutter, but supports Windows Hello.

The keyboard is the same single-zone RGB layout as before – with WASD highlighted – albeit with some changes: first, arrow keys are now full size in exchange for smaller right Shift and 0 key on numpad; and secondly, despite Copilot key’s presence, this is possibly the only laptop I’ve seen this year that doesn’t sacrifice right Ctrl key for it.

Safe to say Microsoft decided right Ctrl key was niche enough to warrant a once-in-30-years change, but if you’re a classic Windows power user like me, you know shortcut keys works best when modifier keys live on both sides of the keyboard. While the software giant seemingly thinks Copilot is more important than easily accessing several time-saving shortcut keys, at least ASUS allows you to reclaim the modifier key back to its intended place.

While the redesign didn’t change the system indicator LEDs, there is what I would call a design quirk in this new chassis: it now sits directly behind the display panel, meaning it will no longer be visible if your laptop is open. This change is probably not going to bother anyone, but I imagine it’ll be pretty annoying if you want to monitor these LEDs in the off chance that something goes wrong. Moving to the underside of the laptop, we see two general areas of vents for the dual fan cooling system to collect fresh air.

Unlike the ROG laptops that features a triple-fan system, the TUF Gaming F16 sticks to a dual-fan system but runs the same full-width exhaust channel like its ROG counterparts. Reason being, ASUS has introduced additional channels on the fan exhaust tunnels to redirect some air towards the center of the laptop to cool surface mount components, along with utilizing the center part of the heatsinks. This eliminates side exhausts, which can be uncomfortable if you use a mouse. The redesign also introduces a new hinge that lies flat, with a more rounded look.

For I/O, the majority of the ports are located on the left, leaving only a pair of USB-A ports situated on the right. Note that there is only a single Thunderbolt 4 port on this laptop, which is marked with a sticker (although we’re not sure why this wasn’t labeled directly on the chassis itself). That said, both USB-C ports support DisplayPort and laptop charging capabilities, with the difference coming down to faster bandwidth and NVIDIA G-SYNC support.

Specifications

ASUS TUF Gaming F16 (FX608J-HRV054W)

Full specifications available on product specification page.

*Note: While ASUS’s spec sheet lists memory support as DDR5-5600, the Intel Core i5-13450HX processor on this laptop is designed to support DDR5-4800 only. As such, memory clockspeed will be capped at this 4800MT/s, even if faster modules are installed.

Performance

Storage

The 512GB SSD onboard this laptop is the Micron 2500, which we’ve seen in several laptops we previously tested. It’s a middle-of-the-road model that delivers decent performance overall, so we have no complaints here. The laptop does have a second M.2 slot onboard which is vacant for future storage upgrades.

CPU

The TUF Gaming F16 we have here is the lowest-end configuration available for this model year, and in this case we have the Intel Core i5-13450HX processor, which admittedly has started showing its age. Still, for a budget gaming laptop like this one, the CPU’s performance is still decently serviceable.

GPU

NVIDIA’s RTX 5050 GPU is, for the most part, leading the GPU benchmark charts against RTX 4050 and RTX 4060 laptops; it’s possible that the GDDR7 upgrade (which is not present on the desktop RTX 5050) contributed to the performance improvement. Worth keeping in mind that the TUF Gaming F16 uses all 115W of available power provided by the silicon, so this more or less represents the top end of RTX 5050’s performance spectrum.

System

NovaBench puts significantly more weight on CPU scores, and as a result of this TUF Gaming F16 using a lower-end Intel chip with less cores, the laptop sits on the lower half of this chart as far as overall scores are concerned. Still, GPU scores are ahead of its predecessor, though RTX 4060 in this case does get ahead, unlike the GPU benchmarks we just mentioned.

A slightly different outcome in PCMark 10, with last year’s TUF Gaming F16 slotting in between the newer model; in all cases, the scores are fair bit behind the likes of MSI Sword 16 and Lenovo LOQ 15, with the Productivity score being the biggest difference.

Battery

For battery endurance, while it’s not exactly the kind that last a whole day, the new TUF Gaming F16 does fine with 4-6 hours of usage depending on which power mode you’re on. That’s a big improvement over the 2024 model with less than 2 hours of runtime, which is admittedly a bit uncharacteristic even by gaming laptop standards today.

Gaming

In terms of gaming performance, the gist of it is you can go for medium to high settings in most games and achieve 60FPS average with the RTX 5050 and Core i5 combo; though ray tracing should be avoided whenever possible in graphics-heavy games like Black Myth: Wukong and Monster Hunter Wilds, both of which will likely require enabling frame generation if you intend to hit 90FPS or higher.

The Good

While the specs of this TUF Gaming F16 indicate that this may be a budget gaming laptop, the feature it offers is more akin to a mid-range model. This is not by chance – ASUS has moved TUF upmarket in its laptop portfolio, with the new budget line (simply called Gaming Series) now covering the cheaper side of things. As a result, the laptop now features improved cooling design, NVIDIA Advanced Optimus support, better speakers, and a proper display that doesn’t overly sacrifice color performance.

One of the things that I should praise this laptop for is the updated keyboard layout. More often than not, laptop makers opted for off-standard layouts to fit all the keys, but sometimes this resulted in awkward key positioning – arguably made worse when Microsoft decided all laptops must feature the Copilot key on where right Ctrl key used to be. This laptop allowed both keys to co-exist, which is a big plus in a power user’s book. Also, full-size arrow keys is another notable upgrade with this new design.

Additionally, the laptop’s I/O is quite expansive even by gaming laptop standards. It has a total of four USB ports along with a Thunderbolt 4 port that can be further expanded into a lot more USB ports, along with Ethernet and HDMI onboard, effectively giving this laptop near desktop PC levels of I/O.

The Bad

There are some downsides pertaining to this particular model, as the configuration we have here does feel a bit lacking in terms of the hardware it uses. Firstly, the 16GB RAM is only on ‘single-channel’ mode (DDR5 is technically dual-channel by nature, but we won’t get into the complexities here), so expect some performance to be traded off from the get go. As a matter of fact, despite ASUS listing DDR5-5600 support on its spec sheet, the Raptor Lake CPU is not designed to handle these clockspeeds, so you’re stuck with DDR5-4800 regardless.

Another thing to point out is the lack of storage for this particular SKU. We know modern-day games are more than happy to occupy disk space in the range of 100GB these days, so having a 512GB SSD – while decently performant – is not ideal if your Steam Library involves more than 3 AAA games. That said, there is a vacant M.2 slot available onboard, which I recommend you to get a second SSD if you intend to get this model.

Finally, a small nitpick: the webcam lacks any sort of shutter to disable it for privacy-minded users. No mechanical shutter, and no killswitch via hotkeys – while Windows 11 allows you disable it via software, you’ll have to resort to the classic tactic of taping the camera over if you want absolute assurance of privacy.

Verdict

The new 2025 model year of ASUS TUF Gaming F16 (FX608JH) can be had for RM5,799 right now, which is quite a bit pricey considering it only gets the lowest-end RTX GPU of the Blackwell generation. We don’t know if that’s just NVIDIA GPUs getting pricier as time goes by or other factors at play, but in any case, this is a decent gaming laptop to go for if you want something more pleasant to daily drive.

Special thanks to ASUS Malaysia for providing the TUF Gaming F16 (FX608J-HRV054W) gaming laptop for this review.