We took the ASUS ROG Strix Scar G533 for a spin, and oh boy, it took laps like a prancing horse at everything we threw at it. It’s unapologetically fast and will blow you away with its performance. Aside from its sheer power, this gaming laptop is not shy to stand out in a crowd. ASUS ROG dropped minimalism off the board and gave the 2022 version of the ROG Strix the gaming laptop treatment.
Design
The ROG Strix Scar G533 is not afraid to show its true colors, which is R, G and B. It’s packed full of RGB from the lid to the chassis, and per-key RGB all around. It comes in 2 flavors, a 15-inch, which we have here; and a 17-incher if you’re looking for more of a desktop replacement rather than a machine you can bring to travels with you.
ROG brings back the T H I C C with the ROG Strix SCAR G533 as this gaming laptop comes in a chunky 27mm body. If you’ve seen our other reviews, we had laptops as thin as a 10-centavo coin. But this one is a 10-peso-thick machine and weighs in at about 2.3kg. The thickness comes with robustness though. The ROG Strix SCAR G533’s build quality is top-notch. There’s virtually no flex on the keyboard and minimal flex on the screen.
You have majority of the ports on the back side of the Strix SCAR G533. You can find an RJ45 port with 2.5G capability, an HDMI 2.1 port and 2 USB Type-C ports for your accessories. One of the ports has a DisplayPort and PD capability and the other Type-C delivers Thunderbolt 4 for the latest accessories.
The left side has 2 USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A ports and a combo headphone/mic jack.
On the right you only have the vents and a notch for the ASUS Keystone II, which can store your settings from RGB lighting to keyboard macros to unlocking encrypted stuff on your machine.
The keyboard is a bit of an upgrade. The keys have a more pronounced tactile feedback with enough travel that gives you a satisfying click. The numpad on the 15-inch model can be found on the trackpad and can be activated by touching the Num LK inscription. The 17-inch version has a full keyboard with a numpad on the right-hand side. Personally, I like the spacing of the 15-inch version more.
Of course, the keyboard have a per-key RGB lighting and you have 5 additional dedicated keys for volume, muting your mic and controlling the fan speed and a hotkey for the Armoury Crate. Do note that these dedicated keys can be customized to other functions from launching apps or triggering a macro. The trackpad on the Strix SCAR G533 is huge which is suitable for multi-finger gestures. The glass material is very smooth and accurate. The left and right clicks are very responsive and gives a satisfying click.
For additional personalization, the ROG Strix SCAR G533 has customizable Armor Caps. Out of the box, you get 3 different styles. But to take it one step further, ASUS actually has a downloadble 3D file where you can create your custom design and have it 3D-printed.
Performance
The ROG Strix SCAR G533 is powered by the latest 12th generation of Intel Core CPUs. Our review unit came with an i9-12900H which has 14 cores that consists of 6 performance cores and 8 efficient cores with a turbo max frequency of 5 GHz. It’s definitely mind-blowing that we have this much power in a portable machine with only 115W of max power. It also has 32GB of blazing fast DDR5 memory and 2TB of PCI-e Gen 4 NVMe SSD.
In terms of GPU power, we didn’t get the 3080 Ti variant, but the 3070 Ti was plenty of muscle for today’s games. The 125W card definitely delivers almost desktop-level performance as it can be boosted with another 25W of power and I’ll let the benchmarks speak for itself. There’s also a dedicated MUX switch which routes the GPU directly to the laptop’s panel to reduce latency and maximize the power of the GPU.
But with great power comes great temperatures. The ROG Strix SCAR G533 still uses liquid metal for maximum conductivity. Cooler machines help sustain higher performance for longer and gives longer life to internal components. And over the years, the fan noise on these machines have only become quieter.
As you can see from the benchmarks, the Silent fan mode gives a lot less performance to extend your battery life when you’re out and about. And we see a huge boost with the Performance and Turbo mode, maximizing the capabilities of the ROG Strix SCAR G533.
What to do with that power if you don’t have a panel fast enough to show it all off? Good thing that the ROG Strix SCAR G533 comes with a 240Hz 1440p display. The colors are vivid thanks to the IPS panel, even though the screen maxes out at 300 nits. Not the brightest, but just enough when used in a moderately-lit room. Dolby Vision HDR doesn’t help in this scenario as the screen is not bright enough to showcase HDR capabilities.
The ROG Strix SCAR G533 comes with a 90Wh battery, which can last around 9 hours if you’re watching videos and about 12 hours doing lightweight tasks. If you’re on the go, you can bring the supplied lightweight 100W charger. The Strix SCAR G533 also supports fast charging with its 240W power brick. It can go from 0 to 50% in just 30 minutes.
Verdict
The ROG Strix SCAR G533 is not much of an upgrade if you’re coming from the last generation, but it’s definitely a huge jump if you’re coming from 10th gen or older machines. It’s just so good inside and out, with plenty of features that will surely enable you to enjoy the latest generation and upcoming gaming titles. It’s definitely a good buy if you have the money for it. But with the prices of desktop components normalizing for a few months now, you should ask yourself if you need to be hauling this much power every time or if you should build yourself a powerful desktop PC at home and get an entry-level laptop for portability.
The ROG Strix SCAR G533 is available in 3 variants listed below:
| G533ZX | G533ZW | G533ZM | |
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| Battery | 90WHrs, 4S1P, 4-cell Li-ion | ||
| Weight | 2.30 Kg (5.07 lbs) | ||
| Dimensions | 35.4 x 25.9 x 2.26 ~ 2.72 cm (13.94″ x 10.20″ x 0.89″ ~ 1.07″) | ||
| Price | ₱214,995 | ₱179,995 | ₱129,995 |
You can check out ASUS’ minisite for the ROG Strix Scar 15.
