Updated on 18 Jan with pricing and availability for Singapore.
Asus has unveiled its entire gaming notebook lineup for the year at CES 2021. These new Republic of Gamers (ROG) laptops will come with features such as 360Hz high refresh rate displays and opto-mechanical keyboards. There are also improvements under the hood, such as a new cooling system. As expected, these notebooks will be powered by Nvidia's latest RTX 30-series graphics chips. But Intel will be feeling the heat — these ROG laptops will use AMD's Ryzen 5000 series processors instead.
In a nutshell
- Strix Scar 17 with 360Hz/3ms screen
- New Strix Scar laptops with AMD Ryzen 5900HX and Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080
- Dual-screen ROG Zephyrus Duo 15 SE with improved display and latest CPU/GPU
- Ultra-slim 13-inch ROG Flow 13 2-in-1 convertible with GeForce GTX 1650 GPU
- ROG XG Mobile external graphics unit has up to GeForce RTX 3080
Leading Asus' ROG lineup is the Strix Scar 15 and 17 (pictured above). The flagship 17-inch Scar offers up to a 360Hz full-HD display with a 3ms response rate and an opto-mechanical keyboard. The Scar 15 comes with a 300Hz/3ms full-HD display — both models can be configured with a higher-resolution WQHD (2,560 x 1,440 pixels) screen, albeit with a 165Hz refresh rate. Consumers can choose up to an AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 and 64GB of RAM for these two models. Looks-wise, the Scar notebooks have been redesigned along the lines of athletic apparel. The Scar 15 will be available in February from S$3,598 while the Scar 17 will be available in March from S$3,798.
Sitting under the Strix Scar series is the ROG Strix G15 and G17 notebooks, which top out at an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070 graphics chip, AMD Ryzen 9 5900HX and 32GB of RAM. The display, too, is capped at the 300Hz/3ms option — with the 165Hz WQHD option available. While the G15 and G17 have a similar chassis design as the Scar models, the former can either come with a dot-matrix design or a comic-book-inspired appearance with a speckled pink hinge. The Strix G15 will be available in February at S$2,498 but there's no word yet about the G17.
Asus has also refreshed last year's dual-screen ROG Zephyrus Duo 15 laptop with an upgraded display and the latest AMD/Nvidia hardware. You'll still get the tilting ScreenPad Plus secondary screen that can be used to place chats, broadcasts and other windows. But the main display is the focus here — options include a 300Hz full-HD screen and a 120Hz 4K display. The ROG Zephyrus Duo 15 SE will be available in February from S$6,998.
Lastly, Asus announced the ROG Flow X13, a 2-in-1 gaming convertible. Weighing just 1.3kg and measuring 15.8mm thick, this slim ultraportable offers mid-tier gaming performance with its eight-core AMD Ryzen 9 5980HS processor and Nvidia GeForce GTX 1650 chip. It comes with either a 120Hz full-HD screen or a 4K 60Hz display. Complementing the Flow is the Asus XG Mobile external graphics dock. This eGPU can be configured with up to an Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080. It connects to a computer via a custom PCIe 3.0 x8 interface that is said to be faster than Thunderbolt 4. There is also a dedicated USB 3.2 Gen 2 connection for the XG Mobile's ports, which include four USB Type-A ports, Gigabit Ethernet, DisplayPort 1.4 and HDMI 2.0. The Flow X13 with XG Mobile will be available in February from S$2,498.
For more reads, check out our CES 2021 hub.
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