Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 (2024) Laptop Review: Fiery performance and mini LED brilliance with a price to match

[Redaktion]

The Asus ROG Strix Scar 16 (2024) is an iterative upgrade over last year's model, now featuring the Core i9-14900HX and a 175 W RTX 4080 Laptop GPU. The Scar 16 continues to uphold Asus's peak gaming performance tradition. However, it comes with a few caveats and faces an equally performant competition that vie for your hard-earned cash.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Asus-ROG-Strix-Scar-16-2024-Laptop-Review-Fiery-performance-and-mini-LED-brilliance-with-a-price-to-match.826931.0.html

[Extragooey]

Wish you guys would compare this year's screen with 2k+ dimming zones to last year's SCAR 16 screen with 1k+ dimming zones. Does the extra 1k+ zones make any difference?

[NikoLeven]

Hey there, I recently just replaced the panel of my Scar 16 2023 (the NE160QDM NM4) with the new 2024 panel (NE160QDM NM7) with 2048 zones. I lost G-Sync capability, game visual in Armory Crate, and I don't have the extra multi-zone strong mode in Armory Crate.

But holy hell do I just not care. The new panel makes a huge difference. Noticeably less bloom, especially white text on grey backgrounds. This makes sense because the dimming zones are much smaller now. Contrast has vastly improved as well, especially in HDR videos (LG's "The Black" demo looks absolutely stunning compared to the old panel), and also because of that improved contrast, colors just appear to pop better (the highlights are more localized).

I highly recommend doing the upgrade for anyone comfortable with taking apart their laptop. It's relatively simple because the bezel is easy to remove (although you will likely need to purchase a new bezel since it's fragile and breaks easily), and the panel is attached via adhesive pull tabs, which are easy to remove as well. Best part is that the new panel roughly costs around 180 USD from the vendor I purchased it from (LPScreen).

[NikoB]

especially in HDR videos

And you still don't have real HDR10 support, because... no miniLED panel will ever receive the official True Black HDR XXX nameplate.

And permanent artifacts at the borders of zones.

2048 zones on a 2.5k 16:10 screen = 2000 pixels per zone. 1(one) switched-on subpixel is enough for the contrast inside the zone to drop to the average IPS level (or even worse).

What is the point of miniLED panels? They are bad in cinema and in text in multizone mode - constant artifacts.

4k IPS with a contrast of 1500:1+ is better than this. Or VA with 2500:1+.