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Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 (2023) review: the grand duke of desktop replacementsThis RTX 4090 gaming laptop leaves a serious mark
This RTX 4090 gaming laptop leaves a serious mark
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
Newgraphics cardgenerations are a typical driving force behind gaming laptop refreshes, butCPUscan floor that pedal with just as heavy a boot. The result is often something like this latest Asus ROG Strix Scar 17, which wields not just a top-spec Nvidia GeForce RTX 4090 but also one of AMD’s newest and most number-crunchy processors, the Ryzen 9 7945HX.
That’s a lot of newness, and even more of a specs list: 32 threads from the Ryzen, 16GB of VRAM,DLSS 3support and so on. And yet, what’s most impressive about the Strix Scar 17 is not simply its immense power, but how balanced – sensible, even – the whole laptop feels like in use. A quality that seems almost impossible at first, given its clear status as a brashly high-end gaming notebook with all the RGB bells and aggressive styling whistles.
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Part of this, I think, is the asking price. Three-and-a-bit grand is obviously a heap of cash, and more than you’d spend to recreate the Strix Scar 17’s specs with equivalent desktop parts. But it’s also short of the silly money that a lot of RTX 4090-based gaming laptops go for, and is even less than what you could spend on certain RTX 3080 Ti models from the previous generation. It is possible to be both expensive and reasonable, which the Strix Scar 17 arguably is, especially considering it also packs a 1TB NVMeSSD, 32GB of system memory, and a 17.3in display running at 240Hz.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
The IPS panel could maybe be a smidge brighter – I measured peak luminance at 347cd/m2, good enough to use in the sun but not quite elite-level. Then again, there’s nothing to nitpick about its colour reproduction. It covers 99.9% of the sRGB gamut, backed up with a good contrast ratio of 1112:1, so brighter hues pop without burning your eyes with oversaturation. Games therefore look brilliant, especially if they’re running fast enough to exploit that esports-grade refresh rate.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
Here’s how it ran our gaming benchmark regulars, all at 1440p (without upscaling) and on their maximum quality presets:
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
I’ve needled thedesktop version of the RTX 4090for its 1440p performance, but within the Strix Scar 17 it does feel truly next-gen. And this is all withoutDLSS, Nvidia’s class-leading upscaling tech that is absolutely viable at 2560x1440. Leaving DLSS on Auto mode allowed me to improve thatCyberpunk 2077result from 72fps to 84fps, while simultaneously adding Ultra-quality ray tracing effects – so it both looked better and ran faster. DLSS also took much of the sting out of activating Ultra-quality ray tracing inWatch Dogs Legion, averaging 84fps with the upscaler on its sharpest Quality mode.
Like the desktop RTX 40 series, the mobile RTX 4090 also unlocks DLSS 3 for significantly better framerate boosts via AI frame generation. This yanked that improved 84fps average all the way up to 132fps, all other settings being equal. A near-doubling of the native, non-ray traced result. Quite the thing, that DLSS 3.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
Of course, it’s not jut the GPU doing the heavy lifting. The 16-core, 32-thread Ryzen 9 7945HX is evidently enough of a heavy hitter in games, though in an interesting reversal of Intel vs AMD war’s desktop front, it’s desktop multitasking where this chip establishes itself as one to beat. Not content with setting a new RPS single-core record in Cinebench R20 – 712, fending off the Raider GE76’s 665 – it went on to score 12,355 in the multicore portion. That’s more than double the GE76’s 5690, and a result so astronomical that we’ve only got one CPU in the books – the Intel Core i9-13900K – with a higher score. And that’s a luxury desktop processor, without the notebook-bound Ryzen 9 7945HX’s heat and efficiency concerns.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
The Strix Scar 17’s true destiny, then, is to sit atop tables as a desktop replacement rather than a more portable sidearm. It does have the screen size for such a job, in fairness, and although this model is surprisingly thin for a container of such mighty internals, it is ultimately more comfortable to use on a desk than on one’s lap. It will suit right-handed mouse users especially, as Asus have wisely kept most of the ports to the rear and left side. Here, at least for nine tenths of the world, connecting cables and peripherals won’t get in the way of swooshing mouse movements. See? Sensible.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
The side vents are also angled so that minimal hot air is blasted onto whichever your mouse hand is, a welcome divergence from designs that seem content to air-fry your thumbs. It’s an effective cooling system, too. Outside of a modestly warmed spacebar, the Strix Scar 17’s chassis never gets uncomfortably warm to the touch while running games, and while the resultant fan noise can distract an uncovered ear, it’s easily drowned out out with aheadset.
Props to the SSD as well, which hit some appropriately zippy sequential read/write speeds of 5190MB/s and 3632MB/s respectively. It wasn’t so outstanding in AS SSD’s random tests, where it scored a 50MB/s read and 190MB/s write, though those are still reasonable enough results for a PCIe 4.0 drive.
In any case, most aspects of the Strix Scar 17 aim much, much higher. And they don’t miss either: the amount of raw power within that black plastic shell represents a distant leap for gaming laptops in general, and if it can be applied without melting anyone’s fingers or needing a cooling system the size of a burger van, then all the better.
Image credit:Rock Paper Shotgun
Very little is out of place, or overdone, leaving the whole thing feeling balanced and considered in a way that the flashiest gaming laptops rarely are. I’ve tested a few of these big-money notebooks on RPS in the past two years, and out of all of them, the Strix Scar 17 is easily the best yet.
