Asus’ ZenBook gets small and thinks big
How thin can you get a laptop with discrete graphics? Turns out, pretty thin. Pretty damn thin.
You know that scene in "The Simpsons" where Homer turns 5 pounds of spaghetti into a single, mouth-sized bar? That's what the new ZenBook is like. Asus continues the trend of high-powered, super-thin ultrabooks with the UX430. It's slimmed down from last year's ZenBook models, with a metal construction leaving it just 15.9 mm tall and tipping the scales at 1.3 kg. Which, once you hear about what's inside, will sound even better. So don't go thinking the ZenBook is just a pretty face. Between the battery life, processor and discrete GPU, Asus's sleek metal design belies a whole lot of grunt.
Key specs
- 14-inch FHD 1,920x1080-resolution display
- 1.3 kg
- Up to Intel i7 processor
- Up to 16GB RAM
- Harmon Kardon Speakers
- USB Type-C, HDMI connections
- NVidia GeForce 940 series graphics
- Up to 512GB SSD storage
- Windows 10
- AU$1,399
It's still an impressively slim package, especially with that NVidia GeForce 940 graphics card inside. At the time of release, it even had the distinction of being Asus' thinnest laptop to house a graphics card. Coupled with the i5 processor in the model we tested, it crept up toward the top of the benchmarked pack, outstripped at the end by a few bulkier performance monsters. And those were monsters, not even trying to compete on portability or design like the Gigabyte Aero 15. You can also spec it up a little with an i7 Intel chipset, if you're desperate to eke out even more power.
Sadly it doesn't look as sleek when you pop the top and get a look at the screen. While the display itself is a perfectly serviceable 1,920x1080 14-inch screen, there's a lot of bezel at the bottom. It's very thin on the sides -- just a couple of millimetres, but it makes the thick strip with the Asus branding stand out all the more.
The numbers themselves disagree. The 7.2 mm bezel leaves 80 percent of it as screen, and it's a 14-inch panel in a 13-inch body. Still, there was something I didn't quite like about the plastic frame around the panel.
Touchscreens are creeping onto more and more of these premium notebooks, but the Asus is still keeping things pretty standard. Not that I missed the touchscreen functionality at all -- while it's a nice inclusion, we're dealing with a traditional notebook here, not a convertible device that you'll want to switch over to tablet mode.
Where it does win points is the wide viewing angles and anti-glare coating on the display. It's also using Asus's preset Eye Care modes, letting you do things like reducing the blue light emitted (amazing way to preserve your eyes in a dark room).
That thin frame catches up occasionally, and you'll feel it more in the keyboard than anywhere else. The keys have very shallow travel (1.8 mm), and something about how they sit leaves the backlighting peeking out from underneath in a very glary way. It was a bit of a reach to get backlighting on keys in a keyboard this slim, and Asus might have flown too close to the sun on that one. The ZenBook makes up for it with the glass-covered touchpad. It was good enough that I didn't feel the need to immediately plug in a mouse, which is close to the highest praise I can give a notebook touchpad.
The Harmon Kardon branded audio pumps out of downward-firing speakers, and it's quite good, as far as laptop speakers go. The big winner here is volume -- to my ears, it could get noticeably louder than the Toshiba Portege or Razer Blade that I was testing alongside. But really, don't be that guy. Use headphones.
The battery kept ticking along for just under 13 hours in testing too, which is probably where that FHD screen comes in. Keeping something with a higher resolution alive for that long is a big ask, but the ZenBook is all about balance. It'll do a little bit of everything, and it'll do it on the go. If you're after a hedge, and you don't want to go broke doing it, pay attention to the ZenBook. Asus keep proving they know how to walk that line.