Asus ZenBook 13 review

The Asus ZenBook 13 is a really light, powerful, and vibrant ultraportable notebook with the latest AMD Ryzen processors and a gorgeous HD OLED display, but its Radeon graphics can't match Intel's Iris Xe performance, and it makes some unfortunate compromises when it comes to ports.

The Asus ZenBook 13 is back, powered by the most recent AMD Ryzen 5000 series processors and featuring a full HD OLED panel for gorgeous, vibrant colors and some outstanding CPU performance. However, its Radeon graphics fall short of what Intel Iris Xe is capable of, and the lack of Thunderbolt 4 support and the absence of a headphone jack prevent it from being truly great. That’s not to say that this isn’t currently among the greatest Ultrabook’s available; it most certainly is.

This Ultrabook, which isn’t the Dell XPS 13 and Apple MacBook Air (M1,2020), is among the best looking ones available because to its superb design, lightweight frame, and 400-nit OLED display. Only the lightest laptops, like the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Nano, can compete with it in terms of weight because it is significantly lighter than both of those. The AMD Ryzen 5000-series CPUs are among the greatest multitasking CPUs available in terms of speed, easily handling work, homework, or just filling up loads of Google Chrome tabs (having 16GB RAM definitely helps as well).

The AMD Radeon graphics on the ZenBook 13 are definitely respectable, although they fall short of Intel’s rival Iris Xe integrated graphics in terms of performance. Some people may find the keyboard and trackpad to be a little too small, however it isn’t overly so. If you have quick access to wireless earphones and don’t require the most advanced integrated graphics, you should give the Asus ZenBook 13 a try even though these flaws do hold it back a little. Some of them may even be true deal breakers.

Design

The 13.3-inch 1080p OLED screen is one of the main selling points of this Zenbook, and in person it looks beautiful and vibrant. It’s quite rare to find an OLED screen in a laptop for less than $1,000, and I’m happy to report that it brings out contrasts very well, with both deep blacks and bright, saturated colors. In our tests, we found that the Zenbook 13’s OLED screen can display 132% of the sRGB color spectrum, which basically means that colors can look overly saturated. This means it’s not suitable for precise photo editing, but if you’re just going to use it for watching videos and playing games, you probably won’t notice.

Compared to its main rival, the Dell XPS 13 with its white or black fiber keyboard deck and slim silver aluminum case, the Zenbook looks quite minimalistic. Compared to the Lenovo ThinkBook 13x with its sleek silver case, on the other hand, the Zenbook looks downright extravagant. Either way, it’s an attractive look.

Display

The 13.3-inch 1080p OLED display is one of the main selling points of this Zenbook, and in person it looks beautiful and vibrant. It’s pretty rare to find an OLED display in a laptop for less than $1,000, and I’m happy to report that it brings out contrasts very well, achieving both deep blacks and bright, saturated colors. In our testing, we found that the Zenbook 13’s OLED screen can display 132% of the sRGB color spectrum, which basically means that colors can look overly saturated. This means it’s not suitable for accurate photo editing, but if you’re just going to use it for watching the videos and playing games, you probably will not notice.

According to Asus, the display can reach a maximum brightness of 400 nits, and in our testing, we discovered that this is almost true: at its brightest setting, several corners of the screen reached a maximum brightness of 396 nits, which is superior to the OLED display on the Dell XPS 13 (361 nits) and the  Super AMOLED screen on the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro 360. (264.4 nits). However, the OLED screen of the Asus Zenbook 13 is still not bright enough to prevent you from seeing your reflection in it on sunny day. That’s not a problem, but it can be a little distracting when you’re trying to observe something during the day.

Keyboard and Touch Pad

The large ClickPad works very well in practice and gestures with up to four fingers are also performed correctly. Pressing the upper right corner brings up a numeric keypad on the touchpad, which works well and proves very useful when entering many numbers. Normal cursor control also works impeccably. The bottom half of the pad can be clicked mechanically, but as with many other laptops, this is accompanied by a very loud clicking noise.

Audio

Although Asus has tuned the stereo system to achieve incredible volume, it’s not as even as we’d like for my music. We listened to “Everything But Me” by MUNA in a conference room filled with sound from both speakers. But the Zenbook put the focus on the vocals and not everything else, and we found that the guitars, keyboards, and drums kind of blended into each other.

This focus on vocals is good for calls, but less so for listening to music on Spotify while you work. If you prefer some control, you can use the Dolby Access app to change the EQ. We found that setting the equalizer to “detailed” gave me a little more of the biting drums and melodic keys that we like in our music.

Graphics

New processor, new integrated graphics processor. With the arrival of the 11th generation CPUs, we also get a new integrated graphics chip, Intel Iris Xe. With this new component, Intel promises that gamers will be able to play more games at 1080p by doubling the gaming performance of the previous generation of chips.

The ZenBook 13 achieved 21 fps in the 1080p benchmark of Sid Meyer’s Civilization VI: Gathering Storm. However, this is below the average of the premium notebooks with 26 fps and our average of 30 fps. The Envy (13 fps, Intel Iris Plus) and MacBook Air (7 fps, Intel Iris Plus) performed worse, while the Swift 3’s AMD Radeon graphics achieved 27 fps. In the 3DMark Fire Strike benchmark, the ZenBook 13 scored an impressive 4,407 points, clearly beating the Swift 3 (2,847) and Envy (2,071).

Performance

This is fairly typical of AMD chips, which tend to outperform Intel’s in multitasking, but lag behind in particularly intensive applications that require higher single-core performance, such as gaming or video encoding. Fortunately, you probably won’t do the latter often on an ultrabook like the ZenBook 13, so the multicore performance is certainly more relevant for general use and productivity work.

Another area where the ZenBook 13 falls a little short is the performance of the GPU. The built-in AMD Radeon graphics have made a lot of progress, but they don’t reach the level of Intel Iris Xe. In the 3DMark benchmarks we ran, the Ryzen 7 5800U fell noticeably behind the i7-1165G7 on the XPS 13 and Razer Book 13.

Battery Life

Asus has fitted the Zenbook S 13 OLED with a 67 watt-hour battery, which is very large for a very thin 13-inch laptop. The Dell XPS 13 has just 52 watt-hours in comparison. But we’re dealing with a brand new CPU, so we doesn’t know what to expect in terms of battery life.

Heat

To get an idea of how hot the Zenbook S 13 OLED runs, we measured skin temperatures during the stress test, running Cinebench R23. During this hook, 39 degrees Celsius (102.2 degrees Fahrenheit) was measured in the center of the keyboard. That’s a bit toasty, and we could feel heat on the keycaps even in normal use. However, it was never too uncomfortable to use.

The touchpad temperature was 32.8 degrees Celsius (91 degrees Fahrenheit), which is very hot for a touchpad, but I didn’t notice it much during normal use. The hottest spot on the bottom of the laptop was measured at 49.5 degrees Celsius, although most of the surface is more like what you’d find on the keyboard.

Price

As we write this, the Asus Zenbook 13 OLED is available at select third-party retailers and on Asus’ website with a starting price of $799. For that amount, you get the 13.3-inch 1080p OLED display, an AMD Ryzen 5 or Intel Core i5 processor, 8 GB of RAM and a 256 GB or 512 GB SSD. At the time of publication, the Intel-equipped model comes with the smaller SSD. When we asked why this is the case, an Asus representative explained that this is due to cost differences in CPUs, supply issues and the limitations of Intel and AMD motherboards.

Conclusion

As you’ve seen in this review, Asus ZenBook 13 Review. The Asus Zenbook S 13 is a highly popular little laptop that combines the brand-new AMD Ryzen 7 6800U processor with several cutting-edge technical capabilities. Throughout the review process, we encountered no major weak parts, and overall, we had a lot more favourable than negative thoughts.

John Brister
John Brister
Meet John Brister, the prolific content writer renowned for his perceptive comparison articles on Bollyinside. Specializing in topics ranging from TVs to headphones and other accessories, John's knack for breaking down intricate details into reader-friendly insights has garnered him a dedicated following. Beyond his literary pursuits, John is an avid swimmer and equally passionate about tracking, often exploring new trails and routes, feeding his sense of adventure.

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

Related Articles

Hubspot Service Hub review 2024: a comprehensive platform

When it comes to customer support operations, HubSpot Service Hub is an all-encompassing customer service platform that is meant to...
Read more
When players on Windows 11 or 10 try to log in to Steam, they may get the error code E87....
Users of Windows 11 or 10 may find it frustrating to deal with the error number 147-0 in Microsoft Office....
The Microsoft Store is an important part of the Windows operating system because it gives users a single place to...
It can be hard to find the right balance between usefulness, durability, and cost when it comes to kitchen storage....
Both AirDroid and Vysor are well-known tools that help Android users control their devices and mirror them. One of the...
The Asus Zenbook S 13 is a very popular small notebook that combines the brand new AMD Ryzen 7 6800U processor with some cutting-edge technical capabilities.Asus ZenBook 13 review