ISSUE 380|COMPUTER SHOPPER|OCTOBER 2019 25
240HzREFRESHRATESrecently became the
pinnacle of desktop monitor speed, and now
the ROG Strix Scar is the first laptop to have
such arapidly-refreshing displaybuilt right in.
At least it does if you buy the 1.5in model
we tested; the 17in version has aless
groundbreaking but still very fast 144Hz
display. Our £2,800 spec also includes an Intel
Core i9-9880H CPU, 32GB of RAM, a1TB SSD
and Nvidia GeForce RTX2070 graphics.
It’s not asuper-slim gaming laptop like
the ROG Zephyrus SGX701 (Shopper377),
but at 2.57kg the ROG Strix Scar III isn’t too
unwieldy,even if lugging around both it and
the power brick is an unappealing notion.
OVERDRESSED
One reason it’s lightisthat it’s mostly made of
plastic and, as such, lacks the sort of premium,
sturdy feel we’d expect of such acostly
notebook. The design is very busy too, with a
variety of textures across the plastic body and
an overabundance of RGB lighting.
The slim bezels at the topand sides of
the screen look classy,but at the bottom of
the screen, there’s amuch bigger bezel with
an asymmetrical cutawayonthe right-hand
side.Wereally don’t like this design choice,
as all it really does is give you aview of the
cables sticking out of the rear.
On that note, there’s adecent range of
connectors. On the leftedge are three USB3
ports and acombined mic/headphone
3.5mm jack, while on the back is an HDMI
2.0b port, an Ethernet jack, aUSB Type-C
slot (with DisplayPort support) and the
proprietary power socket.
The right edge hosts only asmall
illuminated port, intowhich you can slot a
compact orange wedge called aKeystone,a
proprietary memory drive that allows you to
transfer ROG profile and lighting settings
quickly to another Keystone-supporting
laptop.Unfortunately,for now this only
ASUS ROGStrixScarIII
★★★★★
£2,800•From http://www.amazon.co.ukWINDOWS 10 GAMING LAPTOP
includes the ROG Strix Scar III and the ROG
Strix Hero III, so it’s as niche as it gets.
However,the Keystone also enables access
to an encrypted partition on the SSD,allowing
you to hide sensitive files there and leave
them inaccessible to prying eyes.
The Scar III’s island-style keyboard is
perfectly adequatefor typing. There’s adecent
amount of keytravel, and even though there’s
asignificant give to the laptop’s plastic base
when pressed down, each keypress feels
sturdy and elicits asolid clunk. The touchpad
has anice trick, too, in that can double up as
adigital number pad. The same feature has
appeared on afew different Asus laptops
now,and every time it’s been aclever wayof
including the number pad without squeezing
the main keyboard.TAKETHE SHEEN OFF
Besides that 240Hzrefreshrate, the ROG Strix
Scar III’s displaycomes with a1,920x1,080 IPS
panel and amatt finish. The latter is helpful, as
peak brightness only reaches 278cd/m^2 ,but
reflections are neutralised regardless.
Colour reproduction is good, with 94% of
the sRGB gamut being covered, and colour
accuracy is outstanding: we measured an
average delta-E of 0.94, the kind of result
you’d see from aprofessional-grade monitor.
Only contrast disappoints, coming in at 972:1;
the gap between dark and light colours clearly
isn’t as striking as on some other screens.
The refresh ratepromises the smoothest
experience of any gaming laptop,although
the ROG Strix Scar III bumps up against the
same problem as 240Hz desktop monitors:
current GPU hardware rarely gets frame
rates high enough to take full advantage of it.
Forexample,weran Dirt Showdown –our
most undemanding benchmark game –ata
mere 720p resolution with High settings, and
averaged 123fps as aresult.
Normally,this would be cause for
celebration: that’s the best result we’ve ever
seen from Dirt under the given conditions,beating the ROG Zephyrus S, Alienware m15
(Shopper375) and the new Razer Blade 15
(page 30). Still, it means that you’re paying
forafeature that you will very rarely get to
use to its full potential.
To stayonthe positive side,the ROG Strix
Scar III also scored aperfect 11 in the SteamVR
Performance Test, and its CPU makes it even
more of apowerhouse.With an overall score
of 210 in our 4K benchmarks, incorporating
230 in the multitasking test, it’s the second-
best-performing laptop to pass through our
labs. Only the Acer Predator Helios 500
(Shopper379) scored higher overall, with 215.THREECHEERS
The ROG Strix Scar III immediately got its
own back in our battery test, lasting 3h 39m
to the Predator Helios 500’s 2h 27m. Both are
underwhelming in the grander scheme of
things, but forabeefy gaming laptop,Asus’s
model didn’t burn out excessively quickly.
Forpure power,the ROG Strix Scar III is
hard to beat even at its current high price,
although the new Blade 15 comes close,
while being slimmer and lighter.Our advice is
to buy Asus’s laptop if you want games
running at their best, but Razer’s is more
practical if you intend to travel with it often.
TomBruceVERDICT
Anuncompromising240Hzgaminglaptop,the
ROGStrixScarIIImusclesitswaytogreatness
SPECIFICATIONS
Windowsoverall
Multitasking
Batterylife
0% -50 Reference + 50 + 100
Seepage90forperformancedetailsPROCESSOROcta-core2.3GHzIntelCorei9-9880H•RAM
32GB•DIMENSIONS360x275x24.9mm•WEIGHT2.57kg•
SCREENSIZE15.6in•SCREENRESOLUTION1,920x1,080•
GRAPHICSADAPTOR8GBNvidiaGeForceRTX2070•
TOTALSTORAGE1TBSSD•OPERATINGSYSTEMWindows
10Home•WARRANTYOneyearRTB•DETAILSwww.asus.
com•PARTCODEG531GW-AZ055R3h39m