Asus ROG Strix G17 Review – Top-Of-The-Line Performer

The Asus ROG Strix G17 price in India for the model I’m using in this review is set at Rs. 1,50,990. There are multiple other variants as well. There is a Ryzen 9 variant as well that offers the RTX 3050ti instead of 3070. So, why not consider the Ryzen 7, RTX 3070 combo instead? If you are an Intel fan, there are Core i7 variants as well that you can go for.

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Before we talk in detail about the laptop, let’s see what the on-paper specs look like:

Display: 17.3-inch
Processor: Ryzen 7 5800H
GPU: Nvidia GeForce RTX 3070
RAM & ROM: 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD
Software: Windows 10 Home
Weight: 2.7 kg
Dimensions: 395 x 282 x 27.5 mm

As soon as you take your very first look at the laptop, you can’t help but silently praise Asus for making such a great design. Then you touch the laptop and things only get better from there. Not only does it feel premium, you will notice that the lid and body of the laptop barely gets smudged. So, you won’t be finding yourself rubbing your laptop with a microfiber cloth every now and then.

For this review, I used the Eclipse Gray colour option and it is quite stunning, to say the least. The aluminium-capped lid added to the premium look and feel of the laptop. Moving on, the base of the Asus ROG Strix G17 is textured too. The metal top ensures that your laptop doesn’t get dented easily. To be honest, I did accidentally bump against the edges of the wall with the laptop in my hand. The laptop pressed right against the edge and I did think that it must have done quite some damage. To my surprise, there was not a single scratch on the metal lid. Now, that is what I call durability. Take it from me, the laptop will be safe from your everyday knocks and bumps, easily.

Then comes the bezels and I was not disappointed on that front either. The bezels are super slim and do not hinder your viewing experience in any way, which is always a good thing. The RGB on the laptop adds to the overall gamer-ish feel that it wants to achieve with style. Another thing that really gave off a premium feel was how balanced the underglow beneath the chassis looked.

While gaming, one thing that I did notice was that the well placed rubber feet of the laptop doesn’t make it move much. So, when you play games like DOOM, Warzone or the like that makes you go crazy on your keyboard, the laptop doesn’t move an inch from its place. This is a great plus especially if you are a professional gamer. Did I mention that you could easily lift the lid with one hand? Yes, that is a BIG perk on the Asus ROG Strix G17 that you should know. The laptop nails it in the weight distribution department as well, going by this.

One downside in the design is the lid goes back to roughly 140 degrees post which, a hump in the design does not allow it to go back any further. Another thing that I’m not particularly a fan of is the always-on red LED light on the power button. This is something that the Asus TUF F15 and A15 series of laptops come with too. I have been using the Asus ROG Strix G17 for nearly four days now and I still have not gotten used to the red power light. It is not as distracting as it initially was but still, it is still right out there. I can say the same for the panel-lit ROG logo which cannot be turned off. So, if you have the lid up and are using the laptop when there is someone right in front of you, it may be distracting for them.

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All-in-all, I wouldn’t say that the Asus ROG Strix G17 particularly “nailed it” on the design front. However, the laptop offers you style and durability so a little sacrifice is called for.

Right after opening the lid (with one hand by the way), you get to see the big 17.3-inch display that it offers. The magic starts only when you turn it on. A full-HD, staggering 300Hz WQHD matte panel? Count me ALL IN. To be very honest with you all, the display did exceed my expectations. It is way more beautiful than what you read on paper.

Additionally, the 300 plus nits of peak brightness stays true to its word. I actually did not face ANY issues when using it outdoors. Yes, the display did glaze a bit on really bright days outdoors but, nothing to stop you from getting your work done.

Besides, the 3ms gaming panel just takes gaming to a whole new level. Whether you are surfing the internet, watching a movie or gaming, the display makes everything an eye candy. The colour accuracy is far from off for when editing my video, I faced no issues. Another thing that I really liked about the Asus ROG Strix G17 display is how there’s absolutely no light bleeding. There was some minor bleeding when I lifted or adjusted the lid when something was playing. However, that happens in almost every other laptop.

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The model I have used for this review is the one which is powered by the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H processor. This is one of the most powerful CPUs you can get for the price. Coupled with this, you get a dedicated graphics card as well. The GeForce Nvidia RTX 3070 GPU as that. There is the AMD RX Vega 8 as the integrated graphics card. Let me tell you right off the bat that it is a powerhouse. Not just your gaming kind of powerhouse. I’m talking about gaming, having multiple tabs open on Google Chrome, working on Adobe Premiere Pro side-by-side kind of a powerhouse. I have done exactly these things simultaneously and the laptop handled it seamlessly.

The 1TB SSD drive made a world of difference in terms of overall performance. In just the blink of an eye, the laptop booted up. The 16GB of DDR4 3200MHz RAM is icing on the cake. On top of that, the proprietary Armoury Crate app is just stacked with features. You can make use of so many things here.

Furthermore, the Armoury Crate allowed me to set up the laptop in three different power modes as per my requirement. This was a cool feature to have and I used all the three modes extensively. These three modes are as follows:

Silent Mode: The laptop becomes quite and uses the least power. Additionally, CPU and GPU power is limited too.
Performance Mode: With this mode, you get more of a balanced profile. These are what you may call the stock CPU/GPU settings. Using this mode, you will get to hear a bit of fan noise.
Turbo Mode: Just as this mode sounds, you can go all turbo on your laptop’s performance with this. The fan noise skyrockets and you reach the epitome of your CPU/GPU performance. I used this mode extensively when gaming on the laptop.

To add to this, you can also create manual fan profiles and what not using the Armoury Crate. This makes the laptop all the more a grab for all you tech nerds out there (I’m counting myself in too).

Let me now talk about the most interesting bit, the gaming performance. The RTX 3070 is a beast. I tested a bunch of AAA titles and most of these titles could hit 90 frames per second and above at Ultra settings. That is indeed commendable. I could play Red Dead Redemption on Ultra settings at roughly 90-93 frames per second. Further, I could play The Witcher 3 on Ultra settings at easily over 110 frames per second.

The laptop handled games like Far Cry 6 and Marvel Guardians of the Galaxy really well too on Ultra settings. There’s absolutely no reason for me to complain on this front. The Asus ROG Strix G17 is a gaming laptop and does what it sets out to do excellently.

The Asus ROG Strix G17 keyboard is nothing too special. It is very similar to some of the older 17-inch model keyboards from the brand. However, a good thing is that it doesn’t ditch the NumPad keys like on the Dash series of laptops. Personally, I find the NumPad section to come in super handy from time-to-time. Let’s just say that it is something I’m so used to that I can’t get by without it most probably. If you are someone like me, the keyboard will indeed appeal to you, big time.

You get to see rubber-dome keys and the keys are independently illuminated with RGB. This is really helpful when using the keyboard in the dark. Moving to the typing experience, it indeed did feel premium. The precision, key spacing and everything just seems to have been perfectly done on the keyboard. Not only is it precise, it is quite. If you have to type in a lot of content on a day-to-day basis like me, the feel from typing on the Asus ROG Strix G17 keyboard will blow you away.
Although the keyboard does a lot of the things right, there is something that particularly bothered me. The F1-F12 series of keys are not backlit. These keys are criminally underrated but I use them quite often. Hence, it was a drag trying to find the right one in the dark.

Moving on to the touchpad, it is a tad bit noisy. At least, that is what came to my mind the first time I used it. It is wonky and not exactly the kind you would expect. The surface of the trackpad rattles quite a bit. However, it works really well and is fast as well as accurate. All you have to do is just not go too harsh on it. Be gentle with your taps and it won’t bother you much.

The Asus ROG Strix G17 battery life blew me away. Really. The 90Wh battery inside is not just something that appears massive on paper. It actually stays true to its capacity and offered me SOME BACKUP! I capped out the battery percentage multiple times to test it out a couple times. When browsing, the laptop offered near about a staggering 12 hours of battery life. This came down to roughly 8 hours when rendering videos. However, as expected, it ran for just approximately 1 hour 15 minutes to 1 hour 30 minutes when gaming without plugging the laptop in.

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Although this is a massive 90Wh battery we are talking about, it did not take long to charge. In roughly about 2 hours, the laptop charged up fully. All thanks to the 240W charging brick that offers fast charging for the first half an hour. Another thing to note here is that the laptop brings USB Type-C fast charging of up to 100W to the table as well.

The Asus ROG Strix G17 offers a dual speaker system. These are 4W speakers that are also backed by Dolby Atmos. The Dolby Atmos on the laptop really works. I really enjoyed watching movies and listening to music on this beast. However, that is when I use my earbuds. That does not mean that the external speakers are bad. They are good enough but probably not loud enough. You will get to hear a punchy and vibrant tone which is a pleasant thing.

Besides, the sound when gaming was really crisp and clear too. Footsteps, gunshots and the like were crystal clear and often gave me a leverage over other players in games like Warzone and Valorant.

Additionally, the audio system on the laptop is also backed by AI Noise-canceling technology. There is an in-built microphone setup as well for you to make use of. This allows you to give crystal clear calls to your teammates when playing games or sound clear during meetings. I did both and had no issues whatsoever.

Now comes what is probably the most disappointing thing about the Asus ROG Strix G17. It does not have a webcam. Yes, you heard that right. That does explain the super slim bezels at the top. However, webcams have gained a lot of importance nowadays, thanks to the ongoing pandemic. From online classes to meetings and job interviews, webcams have become an underrated luxury indeed. Sadly, the laptop does not provide that and I find dealing with external webcams a hassle for some reason.

Talking about ports, you get 3x USB-A 3.2 gen1, 1x USB-C gen2 with video, data and charging, HDMI 2.0b, LAN, headphone and mic combo jack.

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