ASUS ROG Strix Scar 16 (2024) Gaming Laptop, 16” Nebula HDR 16:10 QHD 240Hz/3ms, 1100 nits, Mini LED Display, GeForce RTX™ 4090, Intel® Core™ i9-14900HX, 32GB RAM, 2TB SSD, Win 11 Pro, G634JYR-XS97

A nearly perfect king of portable gaming
Alright alright, if you’ve made it to the reviews for this machine then you may be considering spending the insane amount of money it costs to buy it. I figured I’d leave a non bias and straight forward review. I’ve been building PCs for two decades, and have had gaming laptops on and off for travel. It’s safe to say I know how the tech works on desktops and laptops. I’ve also used parts from essentially every manufacturer at this point, so I’m not here for cherry pick brands. With all that said, let’s get into the review.Design 4.5/5- The laptop is made primarily of very high grade ABS plastic that is incredibly durable, and feels good. The RGB accent bars around the laptop, keyboard, and logo are nice and have great brightness. The weight is heavy for a laptop, but that’s to be expected at 18 inches. It’s not as heavy as other top gaming laptops, but it definitely isn’t the lightest. Port access are in the expected areas (power is on the left, where as USB in on the right). So why the 4.5? Honestly it’s the ABS plastic. Sure it feels very durable and looks really nice, but compared to the metal on the Legion series, it’s not as nice. At this price point, having all plastic seems a tad cheap.Keyboard/Mousepad 5/5- Both of them feel and respond wonderfully. There is no noticeable input delay with either, and the keys, while not being mechanic, still feel exceptionally good. Typing it very easy, and I instantly found myself sinking right into the keyboard. This is by far one of my favorite keyboards in a laptop.Screen 5/5- If you’ve done your research then you know that this monster packs the best MiniLED out of any laptop into it. The only rival is the Legion 9s 3.2k miniLED and MSI Titans 4k MiniLED. However, neither of those screens having the brightness peak in HDR/SDR, and the Asus has the most backzones. Another perk is the resolution. At QHD+ (2560×1600), you are able to run games maxed out and get much more frames, and honestly, at 18 inches, you are not seeing a difference in detail between QHD+ and UHD. At 240hz and Gsync, this thing is unbelievable paired with the CPU and GPU. Honestly, at this point I am probably rambling about how good this screen is, but I must add one more thing. This is the first non OLED screen I’ve ever seen that looks better. That’s thanks to no aggressive ABL, nearly the same perceiving contrast, and ridiculous brightness. Also, I’m not sure how ASUS did it, but there’s nearly zero MiniLED blooming.GPU/CPU 5/5- This is self explanatory. I don’t feel like I need to explain why the 14900HX and mobile 4090 got 5/5 here. This machine can run any modern game maxed out and get great frame rates, that’s to be expected. I’ll add one thing in the event people are wondering. The GPU in this machine maxes out at 150w, but still pushes the same frames as other top end contenders who push there’s to 175. You can overvolt/overclock if you’d like but it’s not necessary.Temps 5/5- This laptop runs markedly cooler than its rivals (especially the Titan Pro), and it impressed me. As a desktop builder im used to the beauty of low temps thanks to AIO cooling and fans. I was surprised when I saw temperature under stress stay between the high 60s and low 80s. I have yet to see temps on either the CPU or GPU go above 90, unless I’m benchmarking.Battery 3.5/5- unfortunately the battery in this beast isn’t the best, even under lite loads such as simply browsing or doing office work. You can tweak power settings in windows and armoury create, but it doesn’t help much. Average battery life without gaming and lite work is around 1.5 hours with moderate screen brightness. If you dim it down to 20% you’ll get an extra thirty. I wouldn’t even consider doing any demanding gaming without being plugged in, unfortunately with great hardware counts great power drain. This is issue with all current top end gaming laptops, not body this one. However, it could be better while doing simple work.There you have it. Hopefully this helped you either buy it out decide to go elsewhere. For me, this thing is exactly what I want out of a mobile gaming machine.

Beasty performance for a price
I will update over time. First impression is it’s a beast and screen is super bright and beautiful. Also big shoutout to Ted at HiD. I bungled my order and he rushed to get it to me before I flew. Great customer care and communication. Thank you!UPDATE AFTER 1 DAY: out of the box had terrible coil whine and mini led whine, but after updating bios to v 306 it went away almost completely. Timespy result 18759. Thermals are great. This was a big worry w gaming laptop, so hopefully low temps will help longevity. Will update over time.UPDATE AFTER 2 WEEKS: I mostly gave up using this thing on the go. Battery life is too short, even for web browsing/YT. I’m a programmer and it breaks my concentration after an hour warning about battery life. So now I treat this as a “portable desktop” — it must always be plugged in. And no, USB-C is not a good solution because it reduces performance and battery life (the USB-C just charges the battery, which is then used to power the laptop). I knew battery life was bad on gaming laptops, but this really surprised me.Another issue is the software. As reported by many users on reddit (r/gaminglaptops shoutout), Nvidia drivers are causing constant black screen freezing. Seems related to iGPU/dGPU switching. I guess that will be fixed eventually, but for now I downgraded to 528.66 provided by ASUS directly which are stable no crashes.With BIOS 307 you are able to undervolt the CPU. I’m running stable at -100 now. Very nice. Combined with PL limit to 60W, my CPU stays 70-90 C temp range with no thermal throttle and still v good perf. Altho this laptop has a good cooling system, the 13th gen intel gets very hot in this smaller chassis so I found these steps necessary.Overall, I’m still satisfied w the system because of beast performance. I will update again, but hopefully ASUS and Nvidia sort out stability issues. For now lowered to 4 stars due to software issues, coil whine, and extremely short battery life.UPDATE AFTER 4 WEEKS: All good basically just waiting for software updates. Once you learn to work around the issues it’s a beast. BTW, I registered this review to get a warranty extension. So disclosing that I am receiving a warranty extension from ASUS for this feedback. Will keep updating this review over time…UPDATE AFTER 3 MONTHS: New BIOS upgrades have brought stability and support for 5600mhz memory sticks. Also coil whine mostly went away. Not sure if it’s from new BIOS or laptop finally “wearing in” as I read. I still hear it momentarily when loading stuff up, but it’s 95% less than before. Feels great cuz this laptop is a beast. Rendering videos and reloading assemblies like a champ.HOWEVER, graphical problems still persist like flickering and black screen. ASUS recommended using 4 month-old Nvidia drivers to fix this. Those old drivers do solve some problems, but performance drops in some games (I get 45 FPS in C2077 Overdrive using old drivers vs 75 FPS w new). And if you use latest Nvidia drivers you get a perf boost but then screen flickers returns. Lastly, maybe related but I noticed some old games run hot as hell. My CPU hit 110 C (!!!) momentarily playing Phantom Doctrine. But most new games don’t go above 95 C hmm…One big takeaway from this whole experience is that gaming laptops are still niche. # of users is prob 1/10 of desktops, so drivers and software are not tested as well and bugs not caught quickly and treat w urgency. And importantly there’s less info out there to help you solve your problems. So if you don’t like tinkering, stick w desktop for your workhorse.

This laptop is so great but there are some issues with the battery. Just 1 hour without power. The first time there was some problem with the monitor, when you turned off the power, the monitor could turn off and not turn on again, but this was fixed by software. I can recommend this laptop after several months of use, I always use it with great pleasure. Even if Windows itself is buggy, it’s not Asus’s problem.