Asus ProArt StudioBook 16 OLED Laptop

This review is about the H7600 model (i7-12700H). I have tested investigated several other laptops in this class and decided to keep this one despite come cons you'll read below. If you will make money with this, GET THE EXTENDED WARRANTY incase it becomes impossible to find an identical replacement a few years down the line. Quick mention about i7 vs i9 versions...the performance is going to be virtually the same due to thermal envelope (heat tolerance of cpu and components). When doing work that would theoretically make the i9 better, the laptop will get so hot that it throttles the speed to maintain safe operating temperature. So the best i9 will never have a chance to outshine the best i7 in any laptop really, granted we're talking about same generation or just 1 or 2 generators apart. So this is why I chose the i7. Don't let synthetic benchmarks persuade you. You'll never notice the few percent differences. I do pro audio, animation and video production. I have a powerful desktop and needed a laptop close enough to take work on the go. This ProArt laptop is the closest I've come to not having an air fryer on my lap. but it still gets a bit hot and I need da lap-table. I like the general design and inclusion of thunderbolt 4 ports. The Asus Dial is very versatile and saves a lot of clicking and keyboard shortcuts...it's more intuitive than my stream deck for fast incremental changes. I put 64GB of Kingston Fury DDR5 ram and it is stable. The 2.5G ethernet is a great edition. If your internet is 500mbps or more and you only use wifi, you are not getting the Internet speed you're paying for. My WAN is 2G and LAN is 10G, so this laptop's ethernet port really comes in handy with our NAS systems and remote access. Within an air conditioned room this machine will run like a desktop workstation, even in clamshell mode while powering two monitors. Why only 3 stars? (Maybe 3.5) 1) Sleep mode is weird...Microsoft disables S3 sleep mode for modern laptops and uses an S0 sleep mode. They call it modern sleep, but it poorly mimics Apple's 'Power Nap' feature, and it drains the batte of high end laptops like this one. I had to restore the better-working S3 sleep mode by typing a registry modification command that I googled. I have high tech tolerance, but some people may not want to bother with this. Unfortunately this problem exists with many laptops. Nevertheless, the registry mod worked and now the laptop sleeps as expected when lid is closed - it took me almost two years to discover this solution on the internet. 2) There is no documented support for 4TB NVME SSDs, which means 'at my own risk'. I expected a little more for "studiobook" Only 2x 2TB are supported for a total of 4TB internal. Only M.2 NVME Pcie drives work, no support for M.2 SATA. If you will be brave to use 4TB or more, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND you find NVME SSDs that has all chips on one side. You may be limited to 4TB max and a few brands, but its only possible to install heatsink on one side. 3) Bloatware. One thing I hate above all...installing programs I don't want or ask for. Asus (like most others) has done it again with McAfee antivirus and malware protection softwares. It's one thing to uninstall, but then you have to be careful when updating certain Asus apps as their settings by default authorizes them to reinstall said bloatware. So disable in settings of Asus apps. Don't uninstall the actual ASUS app because it has beneficial settings to control the hardware. Windows has all the protection you need. Everyone else just wants to get in your pocket or use your data...don't forget that. 4) As for battery life...not impressed. I didn't expected it to compete with my M1 MacBook Pro. I just need power when I'm far away from the workstation. There is usually an outlet where I go. Anyone wanting superb battery life should question if they NEED a Windows machine or not because Macs will win that category for the foreseeable future. After all, this has a discrete GPU which will eat your battery quickly. 5) As a personal preference, I like my wife's Zenbook better because the keyboard is very similar to Apple's Macbook Pro. The StudioBook keyaboard is not the ideal layout and feel for me, so I use Logitech MX Keys and Trackball Mouse when I can. Regarding the other reviews seen here about screen tearing: I chose the RTX 3060 model to get decent power but not overheat the tight space. 3070 cards produce much more heat, and depending on the environment, could be their issue. It's still not acceptable, but I lucked out with my 3060 not having these issues. Next time I may consider the Zenbook for better aesthetics.