ROG Strix SCAR 18 (2025) Gaming Laptop, 18” ROG Nebula HDR 16:10 2.5K 240Hz/3ms, NVIDIA® GeForce RTX™ 5080, Intel® Core™ Ultra 9 275HX, 32GB DDR5-5600, 2TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, Wi-Fi 7, Windows 11 Pro

Checked the reviews so I was afraid of thermal issues but mine seem to have came absolutely problem free. So I assume the issues every one of those 1 star people were having were just bad samples.The laptop itself has zero thermal issues but setting up Windows was a pain. It froze on me multiple times requiring force shut downs. Though that's just an issue with Windows and not exactly with this laptop per se. Running AAA games with full ray tracing on and max settings I still get 60-100 FPS (smooth enough to see that it's "smooth" and not laggy), and temps stay at 60s with my separate foam sealed laptop fan on a lower setting.As advertised, backing plate can be removed very easily, and RAM and SSD upgrades can be done with your fingers alone. Downside is that there's only 2 SSD slots, meaning, you're probably going to want to run 2 TB or 4TB in the remaining slot to maximize your storage, which to be fair, 4-6TB total storage is more than enough for mostly anyone, anything else can just be offloaded into an external SSD.The RBG is super programmable, Armoury Crate gives you almost a video editing software lookalike to edit exactly how you want your RGB to work. For example, I have three layers set up. The base layer I have all keys breathing slowly in rainbow RGB, then I have WASD, IJKL, and arrow keys as solid colors, then on top of that, I have a reactive keyboard layer, meaning, every key lights up a certain color if I press on it, making the keyboard even more magical to look at when typing.To save you some time researching like I did, this device does NOT top the charts in anything. It isn't the best in terms of pricing, not the best in heat management, (is the best in screen brightness and fan sound but those aren't really big sellers for most people), and actually relatively lower in performance compared to its competitors with the same hardware. Currently, Alienware's 18 Area-51 stands king. It's one of the best performers and with the exact same specs, outperforms this laptop while only costing $3199 on Dell's website while also being better with cooling results using 4 fans (this uses 3). The only thing that's better is the Lenovo Legion 9i which beats out the Alienware in basically every category by A TINY TINY bit but is $500-1000 more expensive for the same specs...Not only that, think warranty. If something happens to this laptop, you can get it warranty fixed at a local Microcenter (which maybe not all countries, or even states in the US have nearby) as ASUS has a contract with them, which is already MUCH better than many other brands like Acer, Razer, Lenovo, and MSI, but otherwise you're sending it in to get fixed. Dell will actually SEND A TECHNICIAN to your house to do warranty work on your laptop for the Alienware.So why did I choose this inferior product over the Alienware (and I historically only owned Alienware) this time despite being more pricey AND worse on performance? Well: repairability.Alienware laptops are well built and have great cooling partially because of their inverted heat sink design. HOWEVER, this means that every time you need to clean or replace the fans, you have to remove the entire motherboard and heatsink. Especially with these modern computers that use liquid metal, constant putting together and removal of important parts can always cause damage, especially just to service something as regular as the fans which you should be cleaning at least once a year, if not once half a year if you have a dusty house/pets/live in a hot climate.The STRIX SCAR only needs a couple screws for you to access and remove all the fans.So if you're looking for a laptop/desktop replacement long term, THIS IS IT. Regardless of how future-proof your specs are, those high spec computers are not future proofing damage. I have two Alienware laptops with dead motherboards sitting in my house that have previously been to the shop for a failed keyboard and bad fans/regular fan cleaning, then the motherboard fried weeks or a few months after the service, and there's zero things for me to proof that the damage is caused by the technicians. BOTH OF THEM.Just get a laptop that doesn't require you to constantly remove the heat sink and motherboard.Then the other reason is just flare. The LED panel flashing STRIX on the lid with the ROG symbol is so much more flashier and stylish along with the RGB 360 around the laptop. It's showy but if I spend 3-4 grand on a laptop you better make it flashy. The Alienwares have all gone "sleek" and "mature" and toned down design elements in favor of a "minimalist" style, which in my opinion is just synonymous for lazy designs and lame. Who cares about RGB at the lower BACK of the laptop? I got the laptop FOR ME, so I can look at the RGB, not to take it to public and show others. Even the STRIX animated LED panel is FOR ME to look at when I put the lid down.Find out what YOU value. If it's the same as me then this laptop is a no brainer.

The Good:Thermal Performance: The Tri-Fan system and liquid metal application do an incredible job keeping the Intel Core Ultra 9 275HX and RTX 5080 cool under heavy workloads.Upgradability: The new tool-less bottom panel design is a massive win for users. Upgrading M.2 SSDs and DDR5 memory is seamless and risk-free.I/O Selection: Thunderbolt 5 support provides excellent future-proofing for high-bandwidth desktop accessories.Areas for Improvement:Software Bloat: Control software continues to consume too many background resources. A leaner, more lightweight control center would vastly improve out-of-the-box system responsiveness.Power Brick Size: While expected for a 330W+ machine, the power brick is incredibly bulky. Exploring high-wattage GaN charger options for future models would improve portability.

The laptop is perfect.

This laptop is better than my desktop pc. I got the Intel 9 Ultra 5080 2TB version. I play a lot of War Thunder, I cranked up the settings to test it with DLSS Native turned on and I got a whopping 440+ fps. No lag, no screen tearing, no jitter. And this was in performance mode mind you, not even turbo mode.Speaking of turbo mode, thanks to the rear facing exhaust ports, heat and noise are minimal. Even while in turbo mode. You can still hear the fans but it’s surprisingly muted despite it having 3 fans. You can also take the bottom plate off with no effort and no tools to clean the fans and install upgrades.The RGB and animated display on the back of the lid are genuinely unlike anything else I've seen in a laptop. The level in which you can customize the colors, patterns, brightness, and anything else you can imagine is astounding. You can make the animated lid say/do anything you can think of. Whether it’s a sentence or a gif you can put whatever you want.If you have the money, I’d recommend this laptop and would consider ROG again.

Awesome machine.