Asus Strix Republic Of Gamers Laptop

TechRadar Verdict

The Asus Strix Scar xv boasts plenty power under the hood to rival desktop gaming PCs and a 1080p screen with a whopping 300Hz refresh rate, to start. If merely that irksome trackpad worked better, this laptop might have gotten a college score.

Pros

+
Powerful performance
+
Incredibly fast screen
+
Plenty of trimmings and hardware setting customizations

Cons

-
Trackpad is frustrating
-
No webcam
-
Fans can get pretty loud

Two-minute review

Gaming laptops like the Asus Rog Strix 15 are fast communicable up to their desktop counterparts, proving that they too can handle the fastest and most demanding PC games (and toughest creative tasks) out at that place without and so much as blinking an eye. That's while also offer the convenience of portability that the modern world seems consumed with these days.

The Asus Rog Strix fifteen is hardly the perfect portable gaming machine. Its fairly thick and heavy chassis has some communicable upwards to do, now that a few slim yet powerful gaming laptops are already hitting the shelves. Its fans are still pretty loud despite that larger space inside and its screen is dimmer than ideal. And, that pesky trackpad, while niftily moonlighting as a numpad, just can't be reliable enough to salve its life.

Still, it's a gaming laptop that carries a lot of power. Our review unit, for example, rocks Intel'south flagship i9-10980HK, an Nvidia RTX 2070 Super and 32GB of memory – there's more enough juice there for nigh AAA games. And, it's definitely scoring a lot of points solely for that.

But then, you factor in that cute 1080p screen with a delectable 300Hz refresh rate, a number of actress features similar Keystone Two and the incredibly immersive, highly customizable RGB lighting, and the availability of hardware setting customizations, and you've nonetheless got a powerhouse of a gaming laptop that's worth shelling out for.

That is, as long every bit you have the money to trounce out, equally the Asus Rog Strix 15 starts at a hefty $2,200 (nearly £ane,700, AU$three,000).

Spec Sheet

Here is the Asus Strix Scar 15 configuration sent to TechRadar for review:
CPU: Intel i9-10980HK @two.4GHz, boost to 3.10GHz
Graphics: Nvidia RTX 2070 Super viii VRAM
RAM: 32GB DDR4
Screen: xv.6" FHD 300Hz IPS-level
Storage: 2TB (1TB + 1TB Raid 0) SSD
Ports: 3 x USB 3.2 A, USB-C, Ethernet, 3.5mm Audio, HDMI, Keystone reader
Connectivity: Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth
Cameras: North/A
Weight: 5lbs (two.27kg)
Size: 10.75 x 14.2 x 1 inches (273.1 x 360.seven x 25.4 mm; W x D x H)

Price and availability

If you're looking for a budget gaming laptop, you lot'll have to look elsewhere. The Asus ROG Strix 15 is inappreciably wallet-friendly.

Our review unit of measurement, which boasts an Intel i9-10980HK, Nvidia RTX 2070 Super and 32GB RAM, volition set y'all back $2,800 (about £2,140, AU$3,900). To exist off-white, y'all're getting a lot of power nether the hood with that, besides every bit a full of 2TB storage and a super-fast 300Hz/3ms IPS-level panel. Premium specs, after all, come at a hefty price.

If you practice accept a bit of cash merely non quite as much, lower-end configurations are a bit more accessible. The lowest at $two,200 (well-nigh £1,700, AU$3,000) volition go y'all an Intel Core i7, Nvidia RTX 2070 Super and 16GB RAM, with a 240Hz display and 1TB SSD. It'due south notwithstanding a pretty penny, merely y'all're saving a wad of greenbacks while still getting a powerful GPU.

Asus Strix Scar 15 — (Image credit: Future)

Design

The Asus ROG Strix fifteen is made of sturdy, durable plastic dressed in that same ROG "advanced alien tech" aesthetic as its predecessor and that immersive RGB lighting on the keyboard and fringing 3 sides of its bottom rim.

In fact, there's quite a scrap of RGB lighting hither, ideal for all the RGB loving gamers out there, with viii areas that are all extremely customizable via the Aura Creator and Armoury Crate apps. The RGB lighting for each individual primal on the keyboard is customizable too, if you lot have the patience and fourth dimension to practise then.

In that location'southward also a decent option of ports on the Asus Rog Strix 15, with three USB ports and a 3.5mm audio jack on the left side, the Keystone reader on the right, and the HDMI, USB-C and Ethernet ports in the back just beneath the brandish.

Sadly, there's no Thunderbolt 3 port on hand, which may plow some people off, and the placement of the USB-C port in the back seems a strange placement. However, if you're not nitpicky near your ports, there's picayune to complain nearly here.

The display is the marquee feature. This 1080p panel is standard in terms of resolution, so if you're all about AAA single-player games y'all may not be wowed by it. However, the 300Hz refresh rate (240Hz for the low-end configuration) and 3ms response time exercise bring the goods for esports players. Mirror's Edge Catalyst, Rocket League and Doom: Eternal at the highest settings all look incredible on it, with no signs of screen tearing or stuttering. As practise, of grade, the not-so-fast games like Red Expressionless Redemption and Marvel'south Avengers.

Some other selling betoken here is Keystone II, a concrete cardinal that you insert in the reader on the right side of the laptop and is designed to gear up and restore system configurations. If yous're non familiar, this allows you lot to salvage settings such as lite effects, trigger sounds and fan settings, quick launch apps or games of your choosing (at default, it's the Armoury Crate), and access an encrypted virtual drive that yous tin use as your ain private storage.

It's certainly a nifty addition, particularly for those who do a lot of personalization and handle sensitive files. It certainly won't be necessary for everyone, though. Then over again, it'south non really what yous're paying that hefty sum for, and so it's something nosotros tin can appreciate here without worrying about the price.

The keyboard is decent, comfortable to utilize and with a decent amount of hotkeys, including ane for disabling the trackpad, one for fan management and another for loading the Armoury Crate app.

Information technology isn't perfect, however. Some keys – including the Home, Page Up and Page Down keys have been moved to the right in a column, shifting the whole keyboard slightly to the left. And, that takes some getting used to. Combined with the fact that the key symbols are harder to run across, you lot can't really get away without RGB lighting if you're gaming in the nighttime. If yous're hoping to use the Reactive RGB nowadays on paw in the Auro Creator software, exist sure that you're already used to this new configuration.

We do have a os to option with the trackpad on the Asus Strix Scar xv. It has this nifty feature of moonlighting as a numpad, activated when you concord downwardly the top right corner of the trackpad, and that comes in handy. You might even use them every bit hotkeys in games, whilst using an external mouse, for convenience.

Notwithstanding, the trackpad itself is pretty erratic to the bespeak of being abrasive. It'due south non very responsive or accurate, and it sometimes moves too freely, making it an unreliable tool for gaming. If you plan on gaming while traveling, make sure to pack that gaming mouse yous have at home every bit well.

Performance

Benchmarks

Here's how the Asus Strix Scar 15 performed in our suite of criterion tests:
3D Mark: Time Spy: 8003; Burn Strike: 17816; Night Raid: 40134
RDR2 Ultra: 59.97; Low: 106.52
Total War: 3 Kingdoms (1080p, Ultra): 66.3; (1080p, Depression): 197.7, 194.half-dozen
PCMark 10 (Home Exam): 5528
GeekBench v: 1270 (single-core); 7882 (multi-core)
Cinebench xv: 1699 cb
Cinebench 20: 3276 pts
PCMark 8 Battery Test: 2 hours, 24 minutes
TechRadar Flick Battery Test: ii hours, 18 minutes

Featuring an Intel Comet Lake CPU and the RTX 2070 Super, there wasn't any doubtfulness that this particular configuration of the Asus Strix Scar fifteen was going to exist powerful. Later on all, the RTX 2070 Super is meant for 1440p gaming with ray tracing, and it'southward but working at 1080p resolution here. But, even its lowest configuration should be able to run graphics-intensive games at high settings.

Of grade, for the purpose of this review, we're looking at the quondam – the highest configuration in this series. It's certainly powerful plenty to rival some of the more powerful gaming PCs out there. Information technology can run the nearly demanding games right now at 300Hz and its response time can exist driven down to 3ms via the software, because of those aforementioned specs.

It's able to run Horizon Zilch Dawn at the highest settings the game looking as immersive every bit it would on a fairly powerful gaming desktop. Equally information technology does with Red Dead Redemption two and Shadow of the Tomb Raider, without whatsoever signs of ghosting, stuttering or latency.

And, as we mentioned earlier, fast-paced games like Mirror's Border: Catalyst and Rocket League, where y'all're making fast movements and turns, look butter smooth and crisp.

The start fourth dimension we tested it with Marvel's Avengers, there were signs of ghosting at the highest setting with the 300Hz refresh rate. Still, seeing as that game is somewhat buggy, we decided to restart the game. The second test ran smoothly, and we haven't experienced any issues since, so we're chalking that up to the game'south issues.

One thing also worth mentioning here is that this configuration boasts ii SSDs running in RAID 0, giving you a whopping 2TB of infinite. Nosotros have at least 20 games installed on this thing – non all of them AAA, but a adept chunk are – and at that place weren't any bulldoze bug or bottlenecks here.

For thermal efficiency, y'all tin can customize the fans setting via the Armoury Crate app, giving y'all the pick to set them to Windows, Silent, Turbo, Performance or Manual. So, for the near demanding games, y'all can gear up them to 1 of the highest settings to keep your laptop adequately cool. That's because on Silent style, the internals exercise get hot, with the CPU getting into the 90s Celsius and the GPU getting into the 70s.

Setting them on Performance or Turbo, you obviously end up with ameliorate estrus management – 70s Celsius for the CPU and 60s for the GPU. Notwithstanding, the fans besides get pretty loud and blow hot air out the side and back. Be sure to keep your headphones handy and your external mouse a decent altitude away when you lot're about to play something intensive. Luckily, while the keyboard does heat upward while gaming and may become a little uncomfortable to use, we've definitely experienced worse.

Bombardment life

The Asus Strix Scar fifteen'due south battery life is not annihilation to write home about. It's typical of gaming laptops, coming in at under 2 and a half hours for both our movie and PCMark 8 bombardment tests. There are other laptops for gaming with battery life worthy of Ultrabooks – the Asus TUF A15, for case, can deliver up to 12.v hours. During our moving-picture show battery test, we as well noticed a bit of stuttering every x-20 seconds when the battery was really low.

Yet, considering this laptop is powering a heavy-duty RTX 2070 Super, that battery life is not egregiously bad. Just bring the charger with y'all, if yous plan on gaming on-the-go – and possibly a portable laptop charger, if you know there won't be outlets where you're going.

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Michelle Rae Uy is the Buying Guides Editor here at TechRadar. She'south a Los Angeles-based tech, travel and lifestyle writer covering a wide range of topics, from calculating to the latest in green commutes to the all-time hiking trails. She'due south an ambivert who enjoys communing with nature and traveling for months at a time but as much every bit watching movies and playing sim games at dwelling house. That likewise means that she has a lot more avenues to explore in terms of understanding how tech can meliorate the unlike aspects of our lives.