Asus TUF Gaming A14 Review: Tough Not to Recommend

Asus recently launched the all-new TUF Gaming A14 with the latest AMD Ryzen chipsets, which promise to deliver excellent performance and power efficiency along with improved AI capabilities. The TUF Gaming A14, on paper, seems to be an incredible choice for someone looking to buy a compact gaming laptop, which there aren't many of. While the new A14, especially the Ryzen AI 9 chipset variant, might not align with the TUF series' reputation for affordability, it does offer a lot for the money.

The variant with the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 SoC, which we received for review, costs Rs. 1,69,990. It is also equipped with 32GB RAM, 2TB storage, and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 GPU with 8GB VRAM. All that is packed in a compact, lightweight body that looks like a regular laptop. Should you buy this? Read on to find out.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Design: Feels tough, is tough

• Dimensions - 311 x 227 x 16.9 mm
• Weight - 1.46kg
• Colours - Jaeger Gray

The TUF Gaming A14 carries a minimalist approach to design, and there's nothing that suggests it's a gaming laptop. It's got a metal lid with a matte finish, and the TUF logo, and that's about it. There's no RGB lighting on the laptop, but you get four system LEDs forming an ‘X' pattern on the slightly protruding rear edge. This is most visible when the lid is closed.

The exhaust vents are at the rear edge

The bottom panel is also metal, and is mostly covered in diamond-shaped intake grilles. The rear edge houses the exhaust ports. When you open up the lid, you'll find matte finish plastic panels, which tend to pick up some fingerprints and smudges. There are two hinges holding the top half, which seem sturdy and can go a full 180 degrees.

You get two bottom-firing speakers

Asus has managed to give the TUF Gaming A14 a MIL-STD-810H certification, which means that it can stand some rough use and survive harsh conditions. It also doesn't weigh much and is lighter than most of the other laptops in the same segment. It truly is portable and easy to carry around.

There's plenty of I/O ports on the laptop

For connectivity, the left side houses a reversible proprietary charging port, an HDMI 2.1 port, a USB Type-C port, a USB Type-A port, and a 3.5mm combo audio jack. The right side features a USB Type-A and USB Type-C port along with a microSD card slot.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Display: Great for gaming

• Size and type - 14-inch IPS display with anti-glare coating
• Resolution - 2.5K (2560 x 1600 pixels)
• Refresh rate - 165Hz

On the display front, the TUF Gaming A14 offers a good package for mobile gamers. The 14-inch IPS panel may not get super bright as an OLED, but it provides gaming-centric features such as a fast 165Hz refresh rate, 2.5K resolution, 3ms response time, and Nvidia GSync support. The colour reproduction is good, but the anti-glare finish does mean that the colours appear muted when watching movies or TV shows.

You get a 165Hz refresh rate, but you can also go down to 60Hz

The panel offers a 16:10 aspect ratio and 100 per cent sRGB colour support. You get slim bezels on the sides and an 88 percent screen-to-body ratio. If your primary goal with this laptop is to game on the move, the display will do great, even if you're gaming outdoors. There's also a MUX Switch and Nvidia Advanced Optimus support. Asus also allows colour profiles to be changed using the Armoury Crate app.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Keyboard, Touchpad, speakers, and webcam

• Keyboard - Backlit chiclet with Copilot key
• Speakers - 2 x 1W with Dolby Atmos
• Web camera - 1080p with IR sensor

I've come to love the keyboards on Asus gaming laptops, and this one doesn't disappoint. There's 1.7mm of travel and good spacing between the keys, which makes this an excellent keyboard to type on. You also get four extra keys on the top left side, and the arrow keys are all the same size and shape. The keyboard also offers mini LED backlighting, which, although super bright, is only available in a single white colour. If not for the Armory crate key or the hexagonal power button, one could easily mistake this for a regular laptop. There's also a Copilot key here if you need it.

The keyboard offers 1.7mm of travel

Asus has provided a large glass touchpad on the laptop, which worked great during the review. It has a 16:10 aspect ratio, mirroring the display. The touchpad also managed to avoid ghost touches when gaming. It has a 240Hz report rate, and clicks were satisfying as well.

What wasn't satisfying was the pair of speakers on the laptop. They're average at best, lack bass, and aren't great when gaming. Although they can get decently loud, it's not the best audio experience owing to the placement. It's best to plug in a nice pair of wired gaming headphones or connect your favourite wireless earphones when gaming or watching content. Dolby Atmos works best when connected to headphones.

The laptop has a 180-degree hinge

Lastly, the 1080p web camera on the laptop is above average. It performs well when there's plenty of light but is noisy in low-light conditions. The colour reproduction is decent. You get IR sensors for Windows Hello support, but there's no physical camera privacy shutter.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Software: You get what you need

• OS - Windows 11 Home
• Additional apps - Armoury Crate

The laptop runs Windows 11 Home out of the box, and you get Microsoft Office Home and Student as usual. Asus also bundles McAfee antivirus, which is more of an annoyance than help. The included Armoury Crate tool is helpful, as it lets you customise various aspects of the laptop. You can also easily switch between performance profiles using this tool. The Armoury crate button at the top left of the keyboard also makes switching profiles easy.

The Armoury crate is a useful tool

The Ryzen AI 9 CPU on the laptop features a powerful NPU so that you can run AI programmes. Thanks to the dedicated key, you have access to the Copilot+ chatbot whenever you need it. The chatbot can help you get quick answers to queries, summarise text, and even control Windows settings.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Performance: Does a lot more than gaming

• Processor - Up to AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370
• RAM - Up to 32GB LPDDR5X 7500Mhz (non-upgradeable)
• Storage - Up to 2TB (Upgradeable to 4TB)
• GPU - Up to Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 with 8GB VRAM

AMD's new Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 is a powerful chipset, and that showed throughout the review period. It's a 12-core CPU with 24 threads and an improved AMD XDNA NPU that is good for up to 50 TOPS. The laptop also gets an integrated Radeon 890M GPU, which I found to be quite good in terms of performance.

The Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 delivers good overall performance

Talking about performance, I ran a couple of synthetic benchmarks on the laptop to see how it did. If you look at the scores below, the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 has managed to outperform its flagship chipsets from Apple and Intel. The benchmarks also show that the laptop delivers better gaming performance than some of its rivals, such as the HP Transcend Omen 14.

For daily tasks, with the profile set to Silent, the laptop performed quite well. I didn't really face any sluggish behaviour while running multiple tabs on Chrome, along with a couple of other apps. If you plan to use it for work, you will have no issues with this. In the silent profile, the fans barely switch on.

In Turbo mode, which is best for gaming, the laptop delivers strong performance. I played several titles, such as Forza Horizon 5, Hogwarts Legacy, Mafia III Remastered, Star Wars Jedi Survivor, and managed to get respectable frame rates (60 to 120 on average) at 1200p resolution. The laptop does get hot and noisy when gaming, but it's incredible how Asus has managed to offer so much performance from such a slim and light laptop.

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060 GPU can draw up to 110W of power in Manual mode, whereas the processor can deliver a max TDP of 65W. While the RAM is soldered and non-upgradeable, you do get an M.2 slot that supports up to 2TB storage for a total of 4TB.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Battery: Excellent

• Capacity - 73Wh
• Charging - 200W

Another advantage of the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor is its efficiency, which, combined with the large battery on the laptop, delivers excellent battery backup. I was pleasantly surprised with the battery life I got on the Asus TUF Gaming A14. For the first time in my life, I survived a full 9-hour workday with a gaming laptop. In the Silent profile and Windows battery management set to Balanced, the laptop managed about 6-7 hours of regular editorial work with ease.

The only LED element on the laptop is this X-shaped system lights

When the battery was nearly empty, charging up the laptop was quick, thanks to the 200W brick supplied in the box. A full charge takes about 1 hour and 10 mins, whereas 50 percent is achieved in about 30 mins.

Asus TUF Gaming A14 Verdict

I'll keep the verdict simple. If you're looking for a compact, lightweight, and powerful laptop that you can game on, the Asus TUF Gaming A14 is very tough not to recommend. It's got a nice display, the battery life is excellent, you can play AAA games on it without any worry, there's plenty of RAM and storage, plenty of ports, and it's super portable.

The Asus TUF Gaming A14 doesn't have much competition in the segment. There's the ROG Zephyrus G14 from its stable, which is better but more expensive. Then you have the HP Omen Transcend 14 (Review), which, although cheaper, doesn't offer the same performance or efficiency.