Gaming Laptop Analysis

Is the ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 good as a gaming laptop? Excellent

Processor - This processor, the Core i9-10980HK 8-Core 2.40GHz, is excellent and can meet 2021 AAA title requirements with relative ease. Games are beginning to lean on more CPU cores for extra processing. Fortunately this CPU has 8 cores, making it an excellent gamers processor choice.

Graphics Card - With the GeForce RTX 2080 Super Mobile graphics card this is an excellent gaming GPU for 2021 AAA gaming With 8GB of VRAM available to the GPU, this graphics solution doesn’t have to worry about a shortage, when it comes to modern AAA gaming, making it an excellent choice..

System Memory - The 16GB RAM found in this machine is considered an excellent 2021 amount for modern AAA titles and a solid gaming machine.

Screen Size - We were looking for 17 inch panels as the gaming standard for top tier gaming laptops. You can certainly game on smaller laptops but we have found that often the extra physical space helps provide 2021 games with the chance to read and make out in game menus and details that smaller panels can struggle to display clearly. So this 17.3" panel is an excellent gaming laptop choice for screen size.

Refresh Rate - Refresh rates can be hard to see, when the laptop reseller doesn't make it clear. Assume 60Hz if this is the case. Ideally for a gaming laptop you want 120Hz. This means the games you run can get up to 120 frames per second, assuming the hardware inside them is powerful enough to deliver that FPS. The refresh rate caps a games deliverable FPS even if the hardware can deliver more FPS than the Hz. This laptop can be picked up with a refresh rate of 300Hz option. It is an excellent gamers choice for screen refresh rates.

GeForce RTX 2080 Super Mobile graphics card gaming performance in the ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop

Gamers looking at laptops will be needing to carefully consider the performance of the machine in relation to modern, often demanding, games. So getting the mobile graphics selected correctly is key to identifying the best price-to-performance laptop for you. We will take a look at the hardware and graphics card in this laptop in relation to how well it can deliver frame rates when running modern demanding or popular games like, Back 4 Blood or Battlefield 2042. We will consider the laptop when it runs these games in ultra graphics settings while gaming at its native 1080p screen resolution. The GeForce RTX 2080 Super Mobile in this machine is currently capable of running 500 games at minimum system requirements of the 500 most demanding games available today. Where as it is capable of running 491 games of the top 500 most demanding recommended system requirements.

Comparing ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 to today’s best price to performance laptop ranges

As you have probably discovered during your research into buying your next gaming laptop, getting an up-to-date value assessment that enables you to compare a laptop’s hardware performance against today’s games is tricky. And especially so, when we factor in all variations of hardware and prices that the ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) comes with. What we have done in this ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop review is give a price to performance rating to help standardise our comparisons.

A 6.6 P2P score rating out of 10 has been allocated today to the ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2. This value will adjust automatically as hardware and modern performance requirements from laptops improve over time. As not all laptops and their prices are of course valued equally we can see that this version of the ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) laptop is in 2nd position on the best Price to Performance value rating. Those closer to 1st place are simply better gaming laptop options regarding the gaming performance they deliver for their price.

Our ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) laptop should also be compared to today’s best Price to Performance model, the ASUS TUF A15 R7 4800H GTX 1660 Ti 16GB RAM 512GB M.2. When stacked up against this, our laptop has 158% worse rating difference on its P2P. It's worth noting that the very best P2P model has a recorded price of $999 to consider and of course this is purely a value for performance basis. Another one to consider is the 2nd placed Price to Performance laptop, the MSI Bravo 15 R7 4800H RX 5500M 16GB RAM 512GB M.2. This one has a price listed as $1049 and our laptop gets 125% worse against its price to performance rating.

How does the ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop compare to the best CPU performance focused laptops and today’s most popular games?

One of the key components in a laptop is of course its CPU. So let's see if our ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) laptop compares favourably when placed against the laptop that has one of the most powerful CPU’s around today. This comparison will at least help us know how this laptop performs against the top end CPU laptop and we can then see the amount of money we might have to pay to get that sort of laptop. Selecting todays ASUS ROG Zephyrus G14 R9 4900HS RTX 2060 Mobile 16GB RAM 1.0TB M.2 laptop, we will use its mighty Ryzen 9 4900HS 8-Core 3.0GHz to compare against our Core i9-10980HK 8-Core 2.40GHz processor from our review laptop. We can see that the top end CPU currently delivers 23% better performance when benched against our own review laptop’s Core i9-10980HK 8-Core 2.40GHz.

A snapshot today of performance for our processor, we can currently see it beating 474 of the 500 most demanding games available right now. This is considering their recommended system requirements. For a the top 500 Minimum system specs this is 500 games.

A game’s listed recommended CPU requirements are a good way to compare the performance of our laptop CPU. Lets see today's popular titles up against our laptop processor. First off let's look at Battlefield 2042 which shows our laptop CPU has 35% better performance than it. How about Grand Theft Auto VI, where we see our CPU is 17% better. Then there is 38% better performance when compared against today’s most popular title, Back 4 Blood.

How does the ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop compare to the best graphics card performance focused laptops and today’s most popular games?

Wondering how strong this laptop is in the GPU department, then let's have a look at it compared to one of the current best GPU performing laptops available today and this should show us the relative graphics performance of our review model. Lets grab a graphics focused laptop for comparison then. We have chosen the MSI GT76 Titan i9-10900K RTX 2080 Super 64GB RAM 2.0TB M.2 4K laptop for its graphical performance. This big hitting GPU laptop comes with a GeForce RTX 2080 Super 8GB video card in it that performs 11% better if we bench it against our laptop’s GeForce RTX 2080 Super Mobile graphics hardware.

Currently 491 games of the top 500 most demanding games today (recommended graphics requirements) can run on the review laptop’s GeForce RTX 2080 Super Mobile. Or 500 games of the top 500 most demanding for minimum GPU specs can run on it.

Games these days have a range of graphics requirements so let's look at a few popular games of today, and check our laptop GPU against the games recommended requirement. First off, Back 4 Blood and our laptop graphics gets 87% better performance rating. Next we have Battlefield 2042 where our graphics card gets 17% better performance and finally another popular title at the moment is Grand Theft Auto VI, which has a performance difference of : 17% better, when put against our laptop’s GeForce RTX 2080 Super Mobile.

The ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 has a 1080p screen resolution, should I get a 4K resolution gaming laptop instead?

If you are looking for future proof laptops it doesnt take long before people are exploring the 4K panel laptops, but are they really the right choice or should you be focusing on a top end laptop that has the hardware to deliver 1080p gaming. The ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2’s 17.3" physical panel produces a native 1920 pixels wide by 1080 pixels tall. The refresh rate of a 4K laptop panel is often 60Hz. This figure sets a 60 frames per second cap that locks a game to no matter the capability of the hardware in the 4K laptop. However, today’s AAA games, when running at Ultra graphics settings and 4K resolution, usually require hardware that we don't see in laptops or desktops to even reach that 60FPS cap. With a bigger refresh rate helping your FPS this ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 has 300Hz screen refresh rate variants available.

Dropping a game’s screen resolution down below the native 4K resolution to 1080p or 1440p, would possibly deliver the much needed FPS for stable modern AAA gaming. Down scaling that native resolution comes at a price, though. As soon as you step away from the native resolution of any monitor/ panel it lowers the clean definition of a game as the physical number of screen pixels don't match those being sent by the game. The game starts to look blurry. The 1080p laptop could run games you love at 4K resolution, with a few tweaks to the graphics settings? In this situation you can always plug the gaming laptop you are not on the move, plug the laptop into a 144Hz or better desktop monitor that’s 28inches and comes with a 1440p or 4K resolution to enjoy modern gaming without FPS or size limits.

Possibly a suitable purpose for a 4K laptop would be if you were keen to watch 4K streaming services like Netflix. At which point perhaps it's enough of a selling point for you to consider a 4K laptop?

At the moment our advice would be, stick to the 1080p laptop panels for now. Your laptop remains portable and 4K laptop’s just aren't quite there yet. The 4K needs to be a no brainer but at the moment you will still have to lower resolution in game to get playable but sub par visuals that still can't raise above 60FPS.

Today’s best 1440p desktop monitor for a laptop is - ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV 27 inch 1440p 75Hz 5ms IPS

A well priced 1440p gaming monitor today is the ASUS ProArt Display PA278QV 27 inch 1440p 75Hz 5ms IPS. With its 75Hz refresh rate and a current price of $311.99 it should go nicely with this ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop. Our cheapest tracked price for the desktop 1440p monitor was $229.99, which we recorded on 9th Mar 2021.

Today’s best 4K desktop monitor for a laptop is - Asus Predator XB273K 27 inch 4K GSYNC IPS 1ms 144Hz

Asus Predator XB273K 27 inch 4K GSYNC IPS 1ms 144Hz is a good value, high performing desktop display that might work well with this laptop. It's currently priced up at $618 and also has a 144Hz refresh rate. It's interesting that even though this is a well priced 4K monitor today, our price tracking shows it has gone up in price by $618 during recent weeks. Helping us to round out our information for this 4k monitor we can see it reached a low price on 13th Nov 2020, we noted the low price at $549.99.

[Note - check that monitor display connectors are compatible between a monitor and a laptop before purchase]

If you are looking to view 4K streaming content, while keeping yourself mobile with your laptop, then maybe a 4K resolution panel would be a better experience than the normal 1080p. In general, we think it's probably not worth the extra money for any visual gains you might not spot, without a direct comparison, especially if you are thinking to game on your laptop as well.

As you can probably gather from the information above, it's probably not worth the extra cash for a 4K laptop if gaming is your Laptop purpose. 1080p is likely plenty and has enough alternative gaming options for when you want better resolution. It feels like you might not get what you were after if you picked up a shiny new 4K laptop, then was needing to lower game resolution, while getting blurry in-game experience and achieving a max 60FPS when you could push the hardware into better frame rates.

Today's Best Priced Mouse and Headset for ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 laptop

We price track a number of good value gaming mice and the one that currently stands out is the Kayinuo M738 Gaming Mouse 3200DPI wired 6 Buttons, which is currently available for $12.99. We have seen this mouse lower its price during these past couple of weeks by $32.26, which is part of the reason we are considering it as a good option for this laptop. Another point of reference for this mouse, is that our lowest recorded price for this mouse was on 15th Aug 2020 where it was costing $11.99.

A good value gaming headset available at the moment, one that should go well with the ASUS ROG Strix Scar 17 (2020) i9-10980HK RTX 2080 Super Mobile 16GB RAM 512GB M.2 is, Corsair HS45-7.1 Surround with a price of $36.99. Out of interest our lowest price tracked on this headset was on 28th Nov 2019 where we saw it for $34.99.