Asus Strix Scar 17 G733QS Laptop Review: Liquid Metal 7 nm AMD Zen 3 Is Stunning

[Redaktion]

Asus has quickly become one of the biggest supporters of mobile AMD Ryzen by entrusting the series to power some of its most well-known gaming laptops. The latest ROG Strix Scar 17 forgoes Intel entirely for a liquid metal-cooled Ryzen 9 5900HX to be as fast as an Intel Core i9 desktop PC.

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Asus-Strix-Scar-17-G733QS-Laptop-Review-Liquid-Metal-7-nm-AMD-Zen-3-Is-Stunning.540483.0.html

[Andy M]

Goodness gracious so many fingerprints !

[duzenko]

300nits 1080p screen for $3k? thanks, no

[Femo]

What is the Freesnyc range for the 360 hz panel ? 48-300 for the 300 hz model but what for this ?

[sadfjk]

300nits 1080p screen for $3k? thanks, no

Scar is all about gaming and for gamers. 1440p will destroy fps and MLG 360 no scope moments.

[Dorby]

300nits 1080p screen for $3k? thanks, no

Scar is all about gaming and for gamers. 1440p will destroy fps and MLG 360 no scope moments.

Exactly. As a gamer, not having 16:10, 500nit, P3, 120Hz+ QHD and 4K UHD displays is a deal-breaker on a premium gaming laptop. The PPi you get with QHD on a 17 inch screen is an absolute minimum, and still not enough for many people who aren't just playing games on their laptops.

Asus dropped the ball with this one.

[coolstorybruh]

Scar is all about gaming and for gamers. 1440p will destroy fps and MLG 360 no scope moments.

Exactly. As a gamer, not having 16:10, 500nit, P3, 120Hz+ QHD and 4K UHD displays is a deal-breaker on a premium gaming laptop. The PPi you get with QHD on a 17 inch screen is an absolute minimum, and still not enough for many people who aren't just playing games on their laptops.

Asus dropped the ball with this one.

idk about 16:10, Dave2D said there will be black bars in games.
idk about P3, games and entertaiments are sRGB content.
For competitve gaming and cool MLG tricks player needs all fps available. For solo games like Cyberpunk 2077, I mean 3070 desktop (220W?) barely gives stable 60fps with Ultra and meaningful RTX enabled...
btw there are at least three ~34" 1440p premium display on the market for those reasons.

[S.Yu]

Though the design is an aesthetic mess in and out, all the measurable parameters seem very solid. Very interesting competitor.

[Dorby]

Scar is all about gaming and for gamers. 1440p will destroy fps and MLG 360 no scope moments.

Exactly. As a gamer, not having 16:10, 500nit, P3, 120Hz+ QHD and 4K UHD displays is a deal-breaker on a premium gaming laptop. The PPi you get with QHD on a 17 inch screen is an absolute minimum, and still not enough for many people who aren't just playing games on their laptops.

Asus dropped the ball with this one.

idk about 16:10, Dave2D said there will be black bars in games.
idk about P3, games and entertaiments are sRGB content.
For competitve gaming and cool MLG tricks player needs all fps available. For solo games like Cyberpunk 2077, I mean 3070 desktop (220W?) barely gives stable 60fps with Ultra and meaningful RTX enabled...
btw there are at least three ~34" 1440p premium display on the market for those reasons.

I'll take black bars over less screen real estate for productivity work. 16:10 should be standard on gaming capable laptops, and 3:2 on non-gaming laptops.

When watching 21:9 movies on a 16:9 laptop and TVs, you get black bars anyway, which I do far more often than playing games on my "gaming laptop". Also most modern games have resolution options for 16:10 aspect ratio, so I don't see that being an issue going forward, unless you want to play on ultrawide.

P3/AdobeRGB is about being able to see more colors, regardless of what color format a content is mastered in. Most digital content today is created in P3, which is only 60% of Rec2020 for HDR color space. Most movies I watch are original Blurays in 4K 10-bit HDR, encoded to 4K 8-bit SDR. That means even with P3 8-bit screens on mobile devices, I only get to see 60% of original colors.
sRGB is a very limited format for old web browsers. When you watch content on sRGB and P3 laptop screen side-by-side, the difference is quite noticeable.

QHD is the most optimal resolution to balance
1. perceived sharpness
2. graphical demand
3. battery life
on any mobile screen that you look at up close. Thus not having QHD resolution available is a dealbreaker for me, regardless of screen size and price. (Looking at you, X1 Carbon)

On a 17", 4K UHD is 260ppi, which is the same as a standard iPad. I would say that 200ppi is absolute minimum, so 260 is not really an overkill for a big screen size. For some people who don't need the battery, it's definitely worth paying the premium for, and the technology of downscaling from 2160p to 1440p in games has gotten better, so not a big of an issue on a small laptop screen.

So yes, 16:10, 500nit, both QHD and 4K, P3/Adobe, preferably high-refresh. I believe these screens are currently available on
- Lenovo Legion 5 Pro and 7
- MSI Creator Z16 and M16
- Asus Zephyrus M16
as well as "gaming capable" laptops like the XPS.
And while they're not for gaming, top tier MacBooks had this standard since 2015 I believe, so I think having the same quality on a $3,000 gaming laptop 6 years later is not asking for a lot.

Really, I don't mind 16:9, 300nit, sRGB, QHD on 17" budget gaming laptops that go for $1,000, and I don't even mind FHD (120 ppi) on some entry-level laptops that need to cut costs.
But AFAIK, the Strix Scar is a flagship laptop from Asus, designed to be most premium and distinguished from something like the Zephyrus.

[neblogai]

If it lasts 13h 17m idle on 90Wh battery- then surely lowest idle must be 90/13.3=~6.77W (include minor differences due to real vs rated battery capacity), not 10.9W.

[Dude what]

No mention about the lack of MUX switch? Shame.
Great cpu for productivity but this thing is a solid 20% behind the competition in gaming.

[S.Yu]

If it lasts 13h 17m idle on 90Wh battery- then surely lowest idle must be 90/13.3=~6.77W (include minor differences due to real vs rated battery capacity), not 10.9W.

Good point!

[redmanticore]

Exactly. As a gamer, not having  4K displays is a deal-breaker
Asus dropped the ball with this one.

why would a gamer want 4k laptop displays that make fps to a crawl? why do you play your games on 4 fps?
you can even barely see the difference on 17inch laptop displays, 4k screens are meant for very large television-sized external screens that you use for productivity or watch Netflix with.
4k is a meme on laptop displays. not only making games to a crawl, they usually have low hertz and big latency on laptops making them unusable for gaming.
1080p 100+hz 1ms screens are a completely optimal choice for mobile gaming laptops.
you use gaming laptops so you can put them in your backpack and go to a friend to lan on a train or on a plane. even when just driving it's much less hassle to use just a single backpack. you can take taxis with it, you can comfortably fit many guys into a single car when everyone just has a backpack.
the fact that you prefer black bars making 16:10 to be made as default on games, just to watch your movies, already showed you as a different type.
either you don't game at all or you are a troll. in either case, you should not be let to decide what to put on a gamer laptop.

maybe he is the CEO of Alienware, which seems to only make 4k laptops for gaming these days and makes me pull my hair out. their clientele doesn't even use the laptops for gaming like the original poster admitted,

When watching 21:9 movies on a 16:9 laptop and TVs, you get black bars anyway, which I do far more often than playing games on my "gaming laptop". MacBooks had this standard since 2015 I believe..

the Alienware wanted to broaden to the casuals like him, for increased profits. to them, it was just another calculated tradeoff to lose the old clientele.

[Dorby]

why would a gamer want 4k laptop displays that make fps to a crawl? why do you play your games on 4 fps?
you can even barely see the difference on 17inch laptop displays

If you're telling me you can't tell a difference between FHD and UHD on a 17 inch screen, or that most people use more than 1 laptop, or folks buy gaming laptops to game away their lives do nothing else, then I'm afraid you are living in a world of your own.

[fatpolomanjr]

This is one of the first newer 17" laptops I've seen with QHD and at least 120 Hz display. I've been hanging on to my Alienware 17 r4 with its GTX 1080 and 120 Hz 17.3" display for dear life. Even better that I can undervolt the CPU and control fan speed with HWinfo to get 70-75 C under load and 120 fps on ~high settings in the games I play.

Seeing an RTX 3080 option with 5900H is so nice, and comes in under $3K. This gaming laptop is a winner. More QHD gaming laptops pls.