At a look
Professional’s Score
Execs
- Nice efficiency for a 14-inch system
- Crisp OLED show
- High-notch keyboard and trackpad
- Sturdy, sturdy chassis
Cons
- Susceptible to overheating
- Fiddly Asus Dial
- Costly
Our Verdict
In case you’re searching for severe energy in a tiny package deal, the Asus Zenbook 14 Professional OLED is the one to choose.
Value When Reviewed
$1799
Finest Costs Right now: Asus Zenbook 14 Professional OLED
$1799
$2,299.00
The Zenbook 14 Professional OLED is a compact laptop that, regardless of its small dimensions, packs a variety of efficiency underneath the hood.
However how does it fare in real-world utilization? Right here’s our full evaluate.
Efficiency
The upper tier configuration of the 14 Professional OLED options an Intel Core i9-13900H CPU and a GeForce RTX 4070 GPU and may thus problem beefy gaming laptops in pure brute pressure. The mannequin I’ve for testing is extra modest and has an easier Core i7-13700H and RTX 4060 as an alternative. It additionally has 16 gigabytes of RAM as an alternative of 32.
My evaluate unit isn’t probably the most highly effective configuration, however that’s nonetheless a variety of energy for such a small laptop computer. I can simply hearth up Adobe Premiere Professional and minimize or color grade 4K movie in a number of layers, browse photograph libraries at lightning pace, and twist and switch 3D objects in Blender. It’s possible you’ll wish to keep away from being overly formidable and attempting to do all three without delay as a result of restricted RAM. However even that’s attainable.
You possibly can play video games in your laptop even when that’s not what it’s primarily constructed for. With its little-more-than-2k decision and 120 Hz frequency, the graphics card isn’t actually suited to sustaining a gradual 60Hz in video games, however decrease the ambition and determination and even heavy titles can run easily. For some time anyway, the pc tends to throttle down efficiency considerably throughout longer durations of most load. Not shocking contemplating the small house for cooling and followers.
Mattias Inghe
However just for the graphics card. You possibly can push the processor for hours with none lack of efficiency. Nevertheless, the underside of the pc will get scorching rapidly, so it’s finest to maintain it on a desk and never in your lap. It solely will get noticeably scorching on the highest of the keyboard when the graphics card is working at full pace.
Design & construct
The pc could also be compact, however it’s not notably skinny and light-weight. It’s virtually two centimetres at its thickest level and weighs 3.63lbs – round 1.65kg. Its moderately angular form additionally makes it much less comfy to hold round. The chassis is strong matte aluminium with darkish surfaces, and the edges and again are lined with giant cooling grids. There’s nonetheless room for the anticipated set of connections, Twin Thunderbolt 4 USB-C, a USB-A , HDMI and a headphone jack.
Uncommon to see on this small format is that it has a separate charging port as an alternative of getting energy from one of many Kind-C ports. However then once more, this can be a efficiency laptop with efficiency {hardware}. The charger is a hefty block, as thick as the pc, and weighs an additional couple of kilos to hold round. Three, for those who embody the wall plug cable.
Mattias Inghe
Keyboard & trackpad
The “14” within the title stands for 14 inches in display measurement, however it’s a bit larger than most 14 inchers, with a 14.5 inch floor. That additionally makes it a couple of millimetres wider than an ordinary 13.3 or 14-inch. This will likely appear marginal, and for probably the most half it’s. Nevertheless, it leaves somewhat extra room for the keyboard, which, regardless of having margins on the edges, has full-sized, properly-spaced keys. It’s additionally very effectively constructed. Buttons have distinctive high quality mechanics and the stroke peak is palpable.
The ability button is within the high row between Print Display and Delete. There’s a sure threat of unintended presses, however with a barely smarter placement than in different computer systems and with larger stress resistance, Asus avoids the largest dangers. The backlighting is rarely greater than half-strength within the keyboard, however it’s sufficient to comfortably see the keys in low gentle.
Beneath is a big mouse pad with good management. A recessed ring within the high left nook offers particular controls that emulate a dial management, permitting you to “flip” it together with your fingertip.
The Asus Dial function, which pops up a spherical menu on the display after I faucet the “dial”, could be linked to controls equivalent to quantity and brightness, and in addition management some options in Microsoft Workplace and Adobe Inventive Cloud. You can too construct your personal menu wheels with elective settings and options within the system.
Though it’s frustratingly difficult to do. After years of this function in numerous Zenbook and ProArt computer systems, it’s a disgrace that it hasn’t been developed extra and which you could’t get direct assist for sliders in additional packages. It’s as much as third-party builders to combine, and that’s apparently not interesting sufficient.
Mattias Inghe
Show & audio system
With OLED within the title, it’s after all OLED within the display. Right here, you get a pleasant, sharp and vibrant OLED display with all the great qualities that it brings. The decision of 2880 x 1800 pixels makes it so detailed that I’ve to lean actually shut to tell apart particular person pixels.
You get good distinction all the way down to the smallest pixel, intense colors with wonderful management and color accuracy, and even quick response occasions whenever you wish to play video games. The color gamut goes as much as full DCI-P3 and sRGB, and it’s so near full AdobeRGB that you simply don’t discover the lacking couple of %.
That’s for the usual picture, and reaches a brightness of as much as about 350 nits. If you would like the best possible high quality, enabling the HDR mode within the Home windows 11 settings boosts this to only over 500 nits. Color accuracy is compromised, although you possibly can customise this to your liking and add a blue gentle filter.
Mattias Inghe
That is finished within the My Asus utility, the place you even have controls for community optimisation, keyboard settings, battery charging and followers. Then there’s ProArt Creator Hub, the place you possibly can management the identical followers and a handful of different settings, in addition to professionally calibrate the display you probably have a appropriate calibrator.
Asus ought to think about merging these two packages – it will get complicated to have so many separate apps.
Properly-sounding if not spectacularly good audio system sit on the underside of the pc. They supply clear bass and treble and a mid-range effectively suited to voice replica. It will not be a hi-fi expertise for enjoying music, however it’s acceptable for many issues.
Small however good microphones within the laptop present wonderful noise-free voice, and the 1080p webcam is sweet sufficient. The latter is at all times a little bit of a lottery in Asus laptops, however right here it delivers a principally good image, with some noise in darkish environments however in any other case nothing vital to complain about.
Mattias Inghe
Verdict
Regardless of its compact measurement, the Zenbook 14 Professional OLED can do just about all the things. That features modifying images and movies, compiling code or manipulaing 3D fashions. You possibly can even play most video games with out situation.
However do you wish to do all the things on a 14-inch display which must be linked to the ability so typically? That’s the truth right here – the 14 Professional OLED can’t carry out at its finest for greater than a few hours.
Nevertheless, there’s no doubting this can be a excellent laptop computer with loads of nice options.
Specs
Processor: Intel Core i9-13700H
Graphics: Nvidia GeForce RTX 4060
Reminiscence: 16GB DDR5
Storage: 1TB SSD, slot for SD card
Shows: 14.5 inch shiny OLED, 2880×1800 pixels, 120 Hz
Webcam: 1080p, separate IR sensor for Home windows Howdy face unlock
Connections: 2 Thunderbolt 4, USB 3 Gen 2 Kind A, HDMI, 3.5mm audio jacj
Wi-fi: Wi-Fi 6e, Bluetooth 5.3
Working system: Home windows 11 Professional
Different: Backlit keyboard, Asus Dial
Noise degree: 0-39 dB
Battery life: Two hours 10 minutes (excessive load, full brightness), about eight hours (low load, low brightness)
Measurement: 32.2 x 22.3 x 1.8 cm
Weight: 3.63lbs (1.65 kg)
This text has been syndicated from PCWorld. It initially appeared in Swedish on PC för Alla.