Double the fun and productivity – ASUS ZenBook Duo 14 UX482E review

The main draw of the ASUS Zenbook Duo 14 will certainly be the signature dual screens. Our review model is the ZenBook Duo 14 UX482E, which you’ll be able to find here. Let’s not pre-amble too much and get right into the machine.

DESIGN

The laptop has a pretty understated design. It looks clean, sleek and minimalistic, in a solid colour with the ASUS logo on the back lid. At 1.69 – 1.73cm thick, weighing in at 1.53kg, it’s not bulky and will easily slip into your bag and won’t feel like you’re carrying a brick around. Due to the Ergolift Hinge, there are some rubber bits sticking out when the monitor is closed. It could be a cause for concern if they come off, so some care is advised.

The hinge does enable the ScreenPad Plus to lift up on opening the lid. Not only does this make the screen easier to see and use, there’s more space given for airflow. An additional stand is provided to further increase the space between the bottom of the laptop and the surface you have it on for that Maximum airflow.

In terms of ports, there’s:

• HDMI 1.4
• USB Type-A
• 2 x Thunderbolt for power and display delivery
• 3.5mm headphone jack

While simplicity is nice, these are simply not enough ports for more flexible use, more or less limiting you to just one other external accessory. There’s also no apparent indicator to inform you if the laptop is charging or otherwise. The LED on the power button doesn’t light up with the cable plugged in, where it might otherwise stay alight for whatever reason.

KEYBOARD AND MOUSE PAD

The ZenBook’s portability results in a really compact keyboard and mouse pad layout, with minimal gap between keys on the keyboard. Given time, you should be able to get used to the size, and you would need to due to the lack of ports not affording you more options for a full-sized external keyboard. Besides that, the ZenBook’s keyboard is almost entirely silent and is white back-lit, though even on the brightest settings, you’re unlikely to notice it much.

The Fn key has two modes: Hotkey Priority and Function Key Priority. You can toggle between the modes by pressing Fn + ESC, with the Fn key lighting up for Function Key Priority mode. It’s probably more redundant than anything, as you can just hold the Fn key for the Hotkey Priority mode.

The mousepad is positioned on the right side, vertically-oriented, setting it apart from typical center-bottom placements. You have more space for vertical movement, but it’s clearly not designed with lefties in mind.

MAIN DISPLAY AND SCREENPAD PLUS

The main display supports up to 1080P resolution, IPS-level sRGB 100% panel for more vibrant colours, which is pretty good for a 14″ screen. It’s not going to go head-to-head with a 2K / 4K display, sure, but it makes up for it in more flexibility, supporting touch screen and Stylus pen input.

The secondary ScreenPad Plus is a 12.65″ ( 1920 x 515 ) display and is IPS-level, also with Stylus pen input support. It makes the Duo part of the ZenBook 14 Duo, a second screen with functions including handwriting recognition and designed to make creative work easier when it comes to photo and / or video editing. In this respect, it functions excellently. The ease of access is helped by two keys above the mouse pad in relation to the ScreenPad Plus; one is for a quick swap of windows on both displays, and the other is for turning on / hiding / turning off the secondary screen if you need to save on battery.

OTHER FUNCTIONS

BATTERY

They’ve given you the ability to turn off the secondary screen to save on battery, but honestly, that would be a pretty rare occurrence if at all. On initial boot at 50 to 55% battery and various tests 2.5 hours later, it was still holding on at 10% battery.

AUDIO

While the speaker is on the bottom of the laptop, the design is as such that there remains an opening for the sound even when you lay it flat. It’s pretty good quality with accurate stereo effect, so if you’re less of a discerning audiophile, this will suit you just fine.

COOLING

Overheating? Not in the ZenBook Duo 14 UX482E’s house. Throughout the benchmarks and game tests, it never went over 70 degrees Celsius. That ErgoLift Hinge and airflow space at the bottom of the laptop and the ScreenPad Plus keeps the machine from sizzling the ol’ palms.

MYASUS

The built-in suite is pretty much for you to fiddle with a variety of settings so tinker with it as you please, be it from battery charging plans or performance profiles.

PERFORMANCE

Our review ZenBook Duo 14 UX482E model has an Intel Core i7-1165G7 for the CPU and Intel Iris Xe Graphics for the GPU. It’s not meant to be a gaming laptop per se, but it’s still incredibly good for the productivity market. You can check the scores below:

3D MARK

PCMARK 10

Throwing on some games, we have:

COUNTER-STRIKE: GLOBAL OFFENSIVE

On default high settings, the laptop can run at an average 34 FPS, with occasional dips to 25 FPS. On the lowest settings, it goes along at a steadier 55 – 60 FPS, sometimes 40 FPS.

RISK OF RAIN 2

Considering all the particle effects as runs go on, the game was tested at its lowest setting for an average of 40 FPS. Sparks won’t really be flying, but you can play it without issue.

BIOSHOCK: INFINITE

At the lowest settings, the game crawls along at 7 FPS, with a random spike to 10 FPS. Needless to say, don’t.

SCARLET NEXUS

The game is quite well optimized for PC, and runs at a modest 30 FPS on average using the lowest settings.

VERDICT

The ZenBook Duo 14 UX482E is geared towards assisting in creative production, specifically for editing and isn’t gaming focused. Thus, it can be surprising that it’s capable of running a variety of games, like a competitive FPS and even a very recent release, though granted they are also accordingly well optimized for PC.

Helping its incredibly portable design is its massive battery life. Benchmarking isn’t the lightest process around, and yet it holds up really well. Furthermore, the cooling ensures one less accessory to bring, even as it lacks in overall port variety.

If you’re looking for a great productivity companion with the occasional gaming session, the ZenBook Duo 14 UX482E will be an excellent option.

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