Streetwear collabs are all the rage these days, but some are pretty weird.
Who can forget the effervescence that was the Nike x SpongeBob sneakers, or the madness that is the Supreme x Advanced Elements blow-up kayak?
In technology, there are few examples of streetwear getting in on the gadget game. A few exceptions would be the LG x Prada smartphone (technically, the first ever all-touchscreen mobile) and the seminal Braun x Supreme calculator.
But today, thanks to a new collaboration between computer-maker Asus and streetwear staple ACRONYM, there’s a new technological drop on the horizon. Meet the ASUS ROG ZEPHYRUS G14 ACRNM RMT01.
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ACRONYM has made gaming laptops cool again
Back when gaming happened mostly on desktop PCs and games consoles, the humble gaming laptop was a thing of beauty.
They were powerful and portable and lit-up like a new year’s fireworks display when you hit the power button. These laptops were over-the-top and unashamedly so. They screamed, “Hey, look at me! I can play CS 1.6 at max resolution and still get 100 frames per second”.
Fast forward a decade and gaming laptops have become a stereotype. All LED sparkle and hardly any soul. In fact, these days manufacturers will stick a few coloured lights under the keyboard and say any old laptop is meant for ‘gaming’.
ACRONYM has done well then to wrestle control from Asus’ ROG designers. The LED lights remain on the laptop’s cover (but the colour is limited to ‘sakura pink’), and the keyboard has been spray-painted a gorgeous muted technicolour.
It’s silly and over-the-top and unashamedly so (see where I am going with this).
Even the packaging (which we’d dare say many people will decide to keep, to cart the laptop around in) is some of the most extra we have ever seen.
One does not simply ‘turn on’ this laptop
The first time you boot up the machine is an experience. Hit the power button, and after your token Windows 10 setup you’ll be presented with a warning on the desktop, prompting you to enter a WRKGRP USB key to continue.
The USB sits inside a little brown envelope in the packaging and comes with a coded piece of paper (no doubt there is some sort of code on there, but I didn’t have the time nor the proclivity to try and work it out).
Plug it in, and you will see several files that say things like, “do not open” and “delete me”.
Obviously, you’re supposed to ignore those warnings (you rebellious streetwear person, you) and open the ‘don’t open’ readme file, before being led down a digital rabbit hole.
Not to spoil the experience for those looking to pick one of these up, but you’ll end up in a special ACRONYM area of the internet, reserved solely for people who have that WRKGRP USB key.
Best guess; over time more information will appear in this special area. Will it be exclusive offers for ACRONYM products? A place where likeminded ROG x ACRNM owners can collaborate? No idea. But I am excited to see what happens over the next few months.
That familiar G14 grunt under the hood
Great styling and a truly remarkable boot-up experience aside, ACRONYM’s contribution to this G14 is little more than skin deep. But that is no bad thing.
We loved the original Zephyrus G14. It rocks an AMD RYZEN 9 4900HS processor that can be overclocked to 4.4GHz. The 14-inch screen has a speedy 60Hz refresh rate, and there’s an NVIDIA RTX 2060 MAX-Q video card under the hood. You also get a 1TB SSD thrown in just for fun.
All that translates into a laptop that really is rather powerful. You’ll be able to push most games up to their highest settings, and multitasking is a doddle.
Given that this laptop was based around a streetwear collab, we reckon that more than a few creators will have their eye on it. Fortunately, the G14 is a dab hand at multimedia; video editing is smooth as is processing heavy images via Lightroom or Photoshop.
Style and substance
ASUS ROG ZEPHYRUS G14 ACRNM RMT01 (that’s one heck of a model name, I might add) isn’t the first collaboration between big tech and fashion, but it might just be the most functional.
From the ace design to the power and portability, it’s hard to fault the laptop in any meaningful way. We could bang on about the price; it will set you back a cool US$2,700 (AED10,000) which is almost a thousand dollars more than a bog-standard G14, but we’re not.
There will always be cheaper laptops out there (as indeed there are sneakers and hoodies) and you’re paying extra for the ACRONYM brand association, but that’s not important.
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