Asus has built a gaming laptop that is powerful and surprisingly practical, yet it carries its ambitions on its sleeve in ways that not everyone will welcome. In the long line of machines chasing the thrill of high frame rates, the 2022 ROG Strix Scar 17 shows how speed and value can be won while craftsmanship is quietly traded away. The reviewer at The Verge, weighing a $2,500 machine that flexes under the hand and hides no lack of a webcam, arrives at a verdict of 7 out of 10. It stands as a reminder that the best choice is often not the loudest one, and that a sibling model from the same ma
Asus ROG Strix Scar 17 Review: Powerful and Affordable, but Brash and Derivative
A powerful but far less refined laptop
Mark
So what's the pitch for the Strix Scar 17?
Mimi
Power for less money. An i9-12900H and RTX 3070 Ti at about $2,500, when Razer and Alienware with similar specs run well over $3,000.
Mark
And the cost of that saving?
Mimi
Plastic instead of aluminum. It flexes, it creaks, and the trackpad won't click on the right side if you lean on the wrist rest.
Luke
Worth saying the $1,500 gap is against the Razer Blade 17 with an RTX 3080 Ti, a stronger GPU. The Cyberpunk result, almost 50fps versus about 17 more on the Razer, is one game at specific settings.
Mark
Is the design just a matter of taste?
Mimi
Mostly. The reviewer calls it excessive, with RGB strips nearly everywhere, but he even finds the display-edge light tasteful. The missing webcam is harder to defend.
Luke
Right, taste is subjective, but the webcam is a fact. And the source says the bezel looks big enough for one, which is his impression, not something Asus has explained.
Mark
Anything unexpected in the praise?
Mimi
The speakers. Gaming laptop speakers are usually bad, and he rates these near the 16-inch MacBook Pro.
Luke
That's one reviewer's ear, compared with machines he's tested. Battery life is firmer: about three and a half hours of light use.
Mark
So who should skip it?
Mimi
Anyone who wants subtlety, or who might prefer the cheaper ROG Zephyrus M16, which has a webcam.
Le Pouls
- A bold, glowing chassis draws attention in a way that some gamers may not want to share in public.
- Cost-cutting shows through a plastic body that creaks, flexes, and even stops the trackpad from clicking.
- Powerful Intel and Nvidia hardware runs demanding games and video exports at speeds that rival pricier rivals.
- The machine lands as a strong performer at around $2,500, while Asus' cheaper ROG Zephyrus M16 waits as a sleeker alternative with a webcam for $300 less.
Asus has built a gaming laptop that is powerful and surprisingly practical, yet it carries its ambitions on its sleeve in ways that not everyone will welcome. In the long line of machines chasing the thrill of high frame rates, the 2022 ROG Strix Scar 17 shows how speed and value can be won while craftsmanship is quietly traded away. The reviewer at The Verge, weighing a $2,500 machine that flexes under the hand and hides no lack of a webcam, arrives at a verdict of 7 out of 10. It stands as a reminder that the best choice is often not the loudest one, and that a sibling model from the same maker may serve the same needs with more grace.
Asus sells a gaming laptop that starts at $1,999 and wears its personality on every surface. The 2022 ROG Strix Scar 17 has a translucent, glowing chassis, an angular display enclosure, and swappable armor caps. The reviewer at The Verge admits that plenty of gamers would not want to be seen with it, and he finds the design the sore point, since the same company makes far slimmer machines.
The effort went into what lies beneath. An Intel Core i9-12900H, an RTX 3070 Ti, 32GB of DDR5 memory, and a 240Hz QHD screen deliver the case for buying it. Cyberpunk 2077 ran at nearly 50 frames per second on high settings, only a little behind a laptop costing $1,500 more. Video exports moved faster than most recent laptops the reviewer has tested. The keyboard, speakers, and even a business-style NFC login key surprised him in pleasant ways.
The compromises are real, though. The plastic body flexes and creaks, the battery lasts about three and a half hours of light use, and the missing webcam stands out against a top bezel that looks built for one. At $2,500, the reviewer suggests looking first at Asus' own ROG Zephyrus M16, which offers similar power in a sharper design with a webcam for $300 less.
Asus sells a gaming laptop that starts at $1,999 and wears its personality on every surface, and the reviewer at The Verge found that personality hard to ignore. The 2022 ROG Strix Scar 17 has a thick chassis that is partly translucent, with colored LEDs shining through. The display enclosure has an angular cutout, and a set of swappable "armor caps" changes the look of the back. The reviewer says he knows plenty of gamers who wouldn't want to be seen with it.
The design is the sore point because Asus is capable of better. The same company makes the slim ROG Zephyrus G14 and G15, the Flow Z13 gaming tablet, and then this. The 2022 Strix Scar 17 is a refresh, with little changed outside. It still has no webcam. The work went into the internals: an Intel Core i9-12900H, an Nvidia RTX 3070 Ti laptop GPU with 8GB of memory, 32GB of DDR5 RAM, and a 2TB Gen4 SSD. The 17.3-inch QHD IPS panel runs at 240Hz, covers 100 percent of DCI-P3, and peaks at 300 nits. The reviewed unit costs $2,499.99 at Micro Center, and The Verge scored it 7 out of 10.
The performance numbers are the case for buying it. Cyberpunk 2077 at QHD, ultra settings, DLSS and ray tracing on, ran at almost 50 frames per second. That is about 17fps behind the 2022 Razer Blade 17 with its RTX 3080 Ti, in a laptop that costs $1,500 less. Red Dead Redemption 2 at ultra and QHD without DLSS held a smooth 65fps, and DLSS added 7fps. The reviewer says it handled the games he tried at their best settings, mostly without the "performance" or "turbo" modes. Those modes raise CPU and GPU clocks and fan speed. The fans can get loud, but no more than on other high-end gaming laptops, and the speakers cover much of the noise. Only the rear components get toasty.
Creative work holds up too. The laptop exported a 4-minute, 33-second 4K video in Adobe Premiere Pro in two minutes and nine seconds, faster than most recent laptops The Verge has tested. It scored 1,001 on the PugetBench Premiere Pro suite, beating every laptop tested in 2022 except MSI's pricier GE76 Raider.
Some of the details are pleasant surprises. The keyboard is among the reviewer's favorites: nearly silent, tactile, with dedicated volume keys, a power button placed away from the other keys, four programmable keys in Armoury Crate, and a number pad. The speakers beat almost every laptop he has tested, on par with or slightly below the 16-inch MacBook Pro. A Keystone II NFC key can log you in, trigger a performance mode, or open an encrypted "shadow drive" on Windows 11 Pro. The reviewer calls that a business-laptop feature, odd on a gaming machine. The laptop can also now charge over USB-C at up to 100W, where earlier versions all but required the 280W brick.
The drawbacks come from the cost-cutting. The plastic chassis flexes and creaks when the laptop is picked up. In one case the flex affects function: the trackpad won't click on its right side if you lean on the wrist rest. It weighs 6.4 pounds against the aluminum Blade 17's 6.06, and the Alienware X17 can reach seven. Battery life is about three and a half hours of light use on the 90Wh cell. The screen dims and brightens on battery by default, a setting that can be turned off in Intel Graphics Command Center. McAfee pop-ups are another annoyance. The missing webcam stands out because the top bezel looks big enough for one, and Asus added webcams to this year's Zephyrus G14 and G15.
The Razer Blade 17 and Alienware X17 look better, with thin bodies and high-end materials, but similar specs on either cost well over $3,000. The reviewer's advice is to look at Asus' own lineup too. The ROG Zephyrus M16 has similar specs in a sharper design with a webcam and a taller 16:10 screen, slightly smaller, and it costs $300 less than the Strix Scar 17 he tested.
Citations marquantes
The design is excessive, in a word; the lack of a webcam just feels like a miss.— The Verge reviewer (paraphrased)
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