Asus ZenBook Professional Duo Assessment: Two Screens Performed Proper

Asus ZenBook Professional Duo overview: The very best dual-screen laptop computer but?

“The ZenBook Professional Duo pairs an superior dual-screen design with the efficiency to again it up.”

Modern dual-screen design

Distinctive multi-core efficiency

Coloration-accurate, OLED show

Succesful as a gaming machine

Keyboard is fulfilling

Thick and heavy

No SD card slot

Uncomfortable touchpad

The twin-screen laptop computer is an thought whose time has come. Now not left to the fantasy world of idea merchandise, laptops with two screens are a actuality.You should purchase them. As in, there’s a couple of accessible.

However they’re only a gimmick, proper? Asus’ ZenBook Professional Duo says “no.”

It has an expensive 4K touchscreen stretched out throughout the keyboard deck that feels limitless with potential. Greater than that, the ZenBook Professional Duo has the efficiency chops to again it up. That’s what makes it greater than an oddball experiment.

Your multitasking fantasy begins now

Twin-screen laptops spark certainly one of two reactions from passersby. Wondrous creativeness, or skepticism. Individuals think about themselves multitasking away, opening apps to their coronary heart’s content material… or they shake their heads at its sheer extra and surprise how anybody may wish that a lot display of their face. Asus is focusing on the primary crowd with out hesitation or apology.

Not like the MacBook Professional’s squat Contact Bar or the HP Omen X 2S’ smartphone-sized display, the ZenBook Professional Duo’s second display is edge-to-edge. It fills the whole thing of the highest half of the keyboard deck, and with three,840 x 1,100 decision, it’s tremendous sharp. You could be puzzled by the ultra-wide facet ratio at first look, but it surely’s good for pinning two home windows or apps aspect by aspect. It’s a multitasking fantasy come true.

My first response was to drop down Simplenote and Spotify, giving me cursory seems to be at my music and my to-do checklist for the day. Detailed work like typing or studying isn’t perfect, although. Regardless of the bigger dimension and matte end of the display, I needed to hunch over to kind Slack messages or learn articles. It’s not as dangerous because the flat Omen X 2S, however the second display is greatest left for much less pertinent info.

The ZenBook Professional Duo has potential, although it requires some workflow adjustment.

Judging by the value and highly effective elements inside, the ZenBook Professional Duo isn’t simply focusing on individuals who wish to multi-task Phrase paperwork. It’s for content material creators. The second display may help there, too.

A photographer or video editor would possibly wish to use it for his or her timeline, media library, or toolbars, to filter some actual property on the first display. The ZenBook Professional Duo has potential in these eventualities, although it requires a wholesome quantity of workflow adjustment.

Asus has another concepts for the way you should use the second display. One mode allows you to prolong the first show all the way down to the second as if it had been one, lengthy display. It’s a cool occasion trick, although I didn’t discover all of it that helpful.

Handwriting and drawing, then again, is ideal for the ZenBook Professional Duo’s display. Like writing on an iPad, the flat floor is extra pure place than a laptop computer’s vertical display. The Asus Pen is included within the field, in addition to a primary Handwriting utility. Artists ought to discover lots to like about having a flat floor to sketch and write on.

One other useful characteristic is Job Teams, which helps you to save a arrange of home windows that you just would possibly wish to come again to and toggle by means of them. Home windows isn’t at all times good at saving your cut up screens and open apps while you unplug your monitor or shut your laptop computer. Job Teams makes certain you choose up your work proper the place you left off.

As gimmicky as it would sound, I loved the second display. It made me really feel extra productive, and after I returned to my XPS 15, I discovered myself lacking it.

A video editor’s greatest good friend

If all that had been true and nothing else, you’d have already got a case for an fascinating laptop computer. Add within the ZenBook Professional Duo’s unbelievable efficiency capabilities, and you’ve got one thing that might perform as a correct workstation for a artistic skilled.

Its success as a content material creation software comes down to 2 issues. The choice for the highly effective eight-core Core i9 processor, and the color-accurate OLED 4K panel.

Let’s begin with the Core i9. I’ve examined it in numerous laptops this yr; the MacBook Professional, the Dell XPS 15, and now this. This experimental laptop computer is essentially the most highly effective of the three, particularly in video rendering and modifying.

I used to be already impressed by the Dell XPS 15, so I used to be stunned the ZenBook Professional Duo is even sooner. Each laptops have identical Core i9-9980HK processor and 32GB of RAM, but the ZenBook completed the identical process in Premiere Professional 36% sooner. In actual phrases, it was over a minute and a half sooner in the identical 2-minute 4K ProRes 422 export. I chalk up the ZenBook’s result in its higher GPU (the RTX 2060 in comparison with the GTX 1650) and extra environment friendly cooling.

It’s not the sleekest design, however thicker chassis pays off in efficiency.

The ZenBook gives higher air flow. Consumption vents flank either side of the chassis, and the ErgoLift perform props up the bottom of the laptop computer off the desk when it’s opened. It’s not the sleekest design, but it surely pays off in efficiency.

On the draw back, the ZenBook Professional Duo has a a lot thicker chassis than the XPS 15, at near an inch thick. If portability is paramount, this 5 and a half pound laptop computer isn’t for you. Dell’s XPS 15 and Apple’s MacBook Professional 15 aren’t as fast, however they’ll put much less pressure in your again when hauled by means of an airport.

Let’s not neglect concerning the display, which is equally essential for content material creators. What good are quick render occasions for those who can’t belief the colours you’re seeing in your display? We’ve seen some OLED laptops be overly saturated to make the colours stand out extra in video games, comparable to on the Razer Blade. That’s not the sort of display you wish to edit photographs or video on, although.

Asus has tuned its 4K OLED panel — the identical one which lots of laptops are utilizing immediately — for accuracy first. It’s brilliant, it fills 100% of the Adobe and sRGB shade areas, and it’s tremendous shade correct. That makes it a implausible software for content material creators who depend on making exact shade changes in response to what they see on the display.

On prime of all that, it’s an honest gaming machine when it must be too. Regardless that the ZenBook Professional Duo isn’t a devoted gaming laptop computer, missing essential options like a excessive refresh fee or G-Sync, the RTX 2060 is a strong GPU.

The system produced first rate framerates as soon as I dropped the decision down in most video games. Over 60 FPS in Battlefield V or Fortnite at max settings was no downside in any respect. So yeah, do some gaming on the aspect if that’s what you’re into.

The compromises are many

The ZenBook Professional Duo does make a number of sacrifices.  The primary is ports. The choice isn’t horrible, however you get the fundamentals. There’s one USB-C/Thunderbolt three, two USB-A, and HDMI. An SD-card slot is lacking. For a laptop computer made for content material creators, its absence is missed.

One other letdown is the general feel and look of the laptop computer. It might have used extra consideration. Did it have to make use of the now all-too-familiar ZenBook lid? When you might have it open it from the entrance, the futuristic vibe stands out. However from the again, it resembles ZenBooks offered at half the value.

It’s sturdy. I simply want it had a way of fashion.

Its largest sin, nonetheless, will be discovered beneath the screens.

The keyboard is okay. It’s quiet and has sufficient journey that the keys don’t really feel mushy. There’s some good back-lighting with a number of levels of brightness. It’s a-ok.

As a workstation, it’s one of the crucial modern computer systems I’ve ever used.

The touchpad is the place the issues are. Crammed in beside the keyboard as an alternative of beneath it, the touchpad feels inconvenient and and uncomfortable to make use of. It’s not the worst I’ve used by way of monitoring, but it surely’s not meant for use all that always. And for those who’re left-handed, nicely, you’re screwed.

Battery life is one other sore spot. I don’t have excessive expectations for 15-inch 4K laptops as highly effective because the ZenBook Professional Duo, but it surely solely manages four to five hours of sunshine use. That’s beneath the class common and reinforces the very fact this laptop computer makes a poor journey companion.

Our take

The ZenBook Professional Duo is area of interest laptop computer meant for a small viewers. For those who don’t have the necessity for excessive energy, the 2 screens alone gained’t be value shelling out $three,000. Nevertheless, for those who’re a video editor who loves the concept of some extra display actual property, the ZenBook Professional Duo is a one-of-a-kind laptop computer.

Are there are any alternate options?

When it comes to a content material creation laptop computer, one of the best various is the Dell XPS 15. Although it’s not fairly as quick because the ZenBook Professional Duo due to its thinner profile, it’s a succesful video modifying laptop computer with the identical stunning OLED display.

If the second display is the ZenBook Professional Duo’s foremost draw for you, there aren’t good choices for the time being. Asus’ different bigger ZenBook, the ZenBook Professional 15, comes with a scaled down first of the second display constructed into the touchscreen, although it’s not fairly as helpful as a result of its dimension.

How lengthy will it final?

The ZenBook Professional Duo has up-to-date elements and loads of useful ports that ought to futureproof you sooner or later. The ZenBook Professional Duo comes with a normal one-year guarantee, which isn’t so much for a laptop computer this costly. It’s normal, nonetheless,

Must you purchase it?

Sure. I don’t advocate a $three,000 laptop computer casually, particularly not one as unorthodox because the ZenBook Professional Duo. Nonetheless, if the dual-screen idea seems to be helpful to you, purchase it. That is by far one of the best execution of the concept accessible to this point.

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