Asus has slapped a fresh coat of gamer paint on its ROG Strix lineup, pushing out updated Strix G16 and Strix G18 models with Intel’s Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus processor.
The new machines are aimed at gamers and creators chasing maximum grunt, from twitchy esports titles to chunky AAA games and content creation jobs.
The main talking point is the Core Ultra 9 290HX Plus at the centre of the new ROG Strix range. It is pitched as a high-end chip for heavy multitasking, next-gen gaming and AI workloads, with Asus pairing it with up to an Nvidia GeForce RTX 5080 laptop GPU.
That CPU and GPU combo is about as spicy as laptop configs get for enthusiasts who want higher frame rates, faster rendering and something that will not feel ancient next year.
Both laptops lean heavily on fast panels, with the Strix G18 featuring an 18-inch MiniLED display with 2.5K resolution, a 240Hz refresh rate, and a full DCI-P3 colour gamut.
Asus is throwing in its ROG Nebula display branding too, promising improved brightness, contrast and colour accuracy for anyone who cares about more than just raw FPS.
On the spec sheet, the 2026 ROG Strix machines can be configured with up to 64GB of DDR5 RAM and up to 2TB of SSD storage, and the tool-less design means upgrades should be less of a faff for tinkerers.
Connectivity looks suitably stacked, with Thunderbolt 5, a LAN port, HDMI and the usual spread of other ports to keep peripherals happy.
Cooling gets a boost with an updated thermal design, including a tri-fan setup and a vapour chamber to prevent overheating when pushed hard.
Asus is still sitting on the full details, so pricing and release dates are unknown, but nobody should expect these to come cheaply.
