Being a content creator today seems to be one of the professions that many people covet. Especially millennials who really like to show their existence, either through writing, pictures, or videos.
This is read by laptop manufacturers as a very big opportunity, because it means that the need for a machine that is strong enough to support the work of content creators is currently becoming more and more sought after, and compactness / practicality is an added value.
This is also what Asus reads as an opportunity to open up new markets. Until 2020, Asus launched the Asus Zenbook Pro Dua, a laptop with many innovations that is ready to penetrate the content creator market !
General Specification
- CPU: Intel Core i9 9980 HK 2.4 GHz octa-core up to 5.0 GHz, 16 MB cache
- RAM: 32GB 2666MHz DDR4 dual-channel soldered
- Storage: 1 TB SSD NVMe PCIe x4
- GPU: Intel UHD 320 + Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 6GB GDDR6
- Display: 15.6-inch OLED 4K (3840 x 2160) touchscreen, 89% screen-to-body ratio, 100% DCI-P3
- Ports: DC-in port , HDMI 2.0, 2x USB-A 3.1 Gen 2, 1x USB-C 3.1 Gen 2 (Thunderbolt 3)
- Battery: 71Wh (up to 4-8 hours)
- Dimensions: 359 x 246 x 24 mm
- Weight: 2.51 kg
The advantages of two very high quality screens, very high performance for working and playing AAA games, very fast SSD, excellent heat management.
The drawbacks are too big and the weight is quite heavy for today’s laptops, the battery life is quite short, the audio quality is average.
Looking at the content creator market , Asus is trying its luck by working on a laptop entitled Asus Zenbook Pro Duo UX581 . With all the improvisation and creativity, Asus provides a lot of things that are quite new on this laptop.
One of them is two high-quality screens that are intentionally paired in one laptop. Although the presence of this second screen then makes the space from the keyboard narrow, and makes this laptop swollen and heavy.
However, this laptop has excellent power for daily use. Good for working as a content creator, as a graphic designer, as an illustrator, or even as an animator.
So in the end, we think that Asus has succeeded in making a laptop that can attract many pairs of eyes on the market. Especially from those who really make a living from the field of content creation.
But is the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo really worthy of being used as a daily laptop for content creators ? Or even, could the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo even be worthy of being a gaming laptop?
So, so as not to be confused, let’s just read the full review of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo!
Pricing and Availability
For the size of a laptop that is made for content creators , the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is actually quite cheap. Especially when compared to some of the competitors from this laptop, which is indeed far above most laptops in price.
Asus itself offers two SKUs for this Zenbook Pro Duo. The first SKU, which has an Intel Core i7 9750 H specification, is priced at a relatively ‘cheap’ price of IDR 42,999,000 at the official Asus store.
As for the highest SKU or the one we discussed this time, with the specifications of the Intel Core i9 9980HK CPU, Nvidia RTX 2060, 32 GB RAM, 1 TB SSD, Asus is priced at IDR 52,999,000 at the official Asus store.
Looking at the numbers given by Asus, indeed, for a laptop worth 40 and 50 million rupiah, this is a very high value. You can even buy a motorbike for this much money.
For this reason, Asus itself does branding openly. Where Asus Zenbook Pro Duo was created for content creators (eg youtubers ) or people who need a fast rendering machine .
In the end, we really don’t recommend this laptop to be purchased by those of you who ‘do not have a need’. If you just want to buy a fast gaming laptop, of course there are many cheaper gaming laptops that offer similar performance.
As for those of you who really need this kind of laptop for work, of course we highly recommend buying it. Of course, with the hope that your work will return to yield and ‘return on investment’ so that the price of 50 million feels cheap.
Even if you think the price is still too expensive, wait until you hear some of the ‘bonuses’ given by Asus. Among them are palmrest extenders, Asus Pen, to Adobe Creative Clouds subscription for 3 months worth IDR 3 million!
In addition, it should be noted that the content creator that is closely attached to this laptop is not without reason. A laptop content creator must meet some of the standards set by Nvidia.
Among them are having a minimum GPU spec of RTX 2060 / TITAN RTX / Quadro RTX 3000, a minimum CPU Intel Core i7 or equivalent, a minimum of 16 GB of RAM, a minimum of 512 GB SSD, and a minimum screen of 1080p or 4K.
Fortunately, all the criteria set by Nvidia are actually fulfilled by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo. The consequence is that this laptop can use a special driver for content creators, namely the Nvidia Studio Driver which has a lot of features for creating content.
Design
When viewed from the outside, there is nothing too striking about this Asus Zenbook Pro Duo. Don’t expect RGB lights or firm lines typical of gaming laptops on this Asus Zenbook Pro Duo.
However, in our opinion, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is one of the most beautiful laptops Asus has ever made. With the futuristic Celestial Blue color, combined with full aluminum material and reflective sides, it makes this laptop even more beautiful.
This clamshell laptop body made of aluminum makes the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo look even more premium. Not to mention the erfolift feature that makes this laptop lift around 4-6o when you open the body.
Not only beautiful, but this laptop is functionally very supportive. The ergolift feature, although simple, is very helpful in using a laptop. In addition to making the typing position more ergonomic, the ergolift can also increase the air intake which makes the cooling system even better.
In addition, the airflow system created by Asus was probably made to protect the screenpad which is positioned right above the fan of this laptop. If you imagine, then the air flow will enter right between the screen and the screenpad and then be discharged through the side of the laptop, smart!
With dimensions of 359 x 246 x 24 mm, and a laptop weight of 2.51 kg plus a charger weight of around 800 grams, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is not a lightweight or compact laptop that you can buy.
However, considering that this laptop can indeed be used as a powerstation for content creators , the size and weight above are no longer relevant. Portable? Yes, but its use will be maximized when plugged in.
However, Asus still makes the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo to a fairly high standard. The good build quality of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is evidenced by the military standard MIL-STD 8106 which makes this laptop durable to carry everywhere.
In conclusion, from the design side, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is a content creator laptop that is actually quite portable . But the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo doesn’t seem designed to work outside, in a cafe or anything like that.
Display
As the name suggests, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo has two screens and this is a new breakthrough that certainly shocked the laptop world. Fortunately this second screen can really be utilized.
The main screen of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo has a glossy 15.6-inch OLED specification with 4K resolution and a 16:9 ratio. This screen which is intended for content creators is evidenced by the DCI-P3 value of 100% and sRGB 133%, with a brightness of around 400 nits.
As if that wasn’t enough, the screen on the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is PANTONE® validated and VESA certified. The point is that the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo screen is really accurate and ready to be invited to navigate the world of content creation.
The second screen owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo, or named this screenpad , has specifications of 14 inches (diagonal distance) with an IPS touch screen panel, and a resolution of 3840 x 1100 pixels aka 4K. This second screen has a refresh rate of 60 Hz with an sRGB value of 100%.
In addition, the screen pad owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo already supports a stylus so that it really makes work easier. Even if you’re not using it, you can easily turn off the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo screenpad .
For those of you who are fans of content creator laptops, you must be familiar with some of the terms above. For those of you who are still new to it, the point is that this laptop has ultra-high color accuracy so there is no need to calibrate frequently when used.
As for the screenpad from the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo, you can use it as an extender or as a second screen to navigate various editor applications so you don’t need an external screen to help with your work.
You can even just make the screenpad of this Asus Zenbook Pro Duo as a ‘media control button’. For example, just opening spotify and similar applications, a screenpad will be very helpful.
The main screen design owned by this laptop is also very beautiful, because it already carries an ultra thin bezel with claims of a screen to body ratio reaching 89% based on claims from Asus itself.
However, one of the shortcomings of the screenpad on the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is that it makes the laptop space narrow so that there is no palmrest. Instead you will be given an additional removable palmrest .
Troubled? Hmm, it really depends on you as a user. But in our opinion, even though the palmrest you have must be removed, the presence of a screenpad has far greater benefits than just losing the palmrest .
Keyboard
The keyboard owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo has a typical layout from Asus and is not much different from other 15-inch Asus laptops. In terms of function, we think it is very comfortable to use, with a moderate 1.4 mm travel.
The Asus Zenbook Pro Duo keyboard is quite comfortable to use for fast typing, with feedback that feels quite good, and the keys are consistent when used for typing and writing articles.
Now interestingly, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo seems to adapt the layout from the Zephyrus where Asus puts the numberpad on the right side, which can function as a touchpad . Or is it the other way around? Uh!
The size of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo’s numpad is quite slim so it really reminds us of Zephyrus’ numpad . However, there are no complaints about this touchpad / numberpad because it is very soft and (of course) precise!
However, as we explained earlier where this laptop is quite ‘stuffy’. As a result, you have to use an additional palmrest that is included in the purchase package from this Asus Zenbook Pro Duo.
Could be a dealbreaker indeed. But in our opinion as long as you focus on the function, the lack of space for the palmrest is not something that should be a big problem.
Audio
The speakers that are owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo are of course quality speakers. In collaboration with Harman Kardon, Asus Zenbook Pro Duo offers speakers with a high range and comfortable to the ear.
But again, the position of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo speaker which is at the bottom of the front side of the laptop makes its quality greatly influenced by the surface where this laptop is placed.
However, Asus does not have any other choice to put these speakers. Of course it would be difficult to expect front facing speakers because there is no more space that can be used to place speakers on the top side.
Again, will it be a dealbreaker? We don’t think so!
Ports and Connectivity
For the size of a laptop that will be used for daily work, of course, the availability of various types of ports and connectivity will be a separate consideration. Fortunately, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo has a fairly complete number of ports .
On the left side there is a port DC-in, HDMI 2.0, as well as a single port USB 3.1 Type A. The Gen 2 on the right side there is a port combo audiojack, a single port USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type C Thunderbolt support 3, and a single USB 3.1 Gen 2 Type A.
As for connectivity, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo already carries WiFi 6, the AX-200 which is famous for being fast. Plus, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo also has Bluetooth 5 which is anti- delay .
Even though it doesn’t have an SD card reader port , in our opinion, in terms of ports and connectivity, the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is already very capable. Type A? Yes, Type C? Yes, Thunderbolt? Can! What else is missing?
Battery and Performance
Carrying an Intel Core i9 9980 HK X Series CPU with a power of 2.40 GHz which can be clocked up to 5.6 GHz. It seems that this laptop can run almost any program that is heavy to work with processing content.
The seriousness of Asus in working on the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is also shown by the provision of 32 GB DDR4 2666 MHz dual channel, soldered RAM , which can support all the work of making connections.
The memory owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is also more than enough, which uses a 1 TB PCIe NVMe SSD with a fairly high speed. The read speed of this SSD is 2500s MBps, and the write speed is up to 2300s MBps!
The GPU that is owned is not kidding, carrying the dual GPU of this laptop paired with Nvidia RTX 2060 6 GB GDDR 6 with 1920 CUDA cores and one GPU built-in Intel UHD 630 which can increase the efficiency of using this laptop.
As we explained above, this content creator laptop is supported by the Nvidia Studio Driver. The advantage of using this driver is the optimization of some content creation programs.
Starting from Adobe, Autodesk, Unity, Unreal, and various similar programs. However, this is indeed relatively new and there are still a lot of improvisations and improvements made by Nvidia. However, this particular driver has helped a lot right now.
The performance of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is also not kidding. Testing using Cinebench R15 can produce a score of 1640 and an average of 1550 after looping up to 20 times.
The GPU owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is also very good, where the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo recorded a score of 15,320 points when benchmarking using 3DMark Firestrike.
When we did a rendering test using the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo, we got something very interesting. Rendering 4K 60 FPS video with rendering software recorded a time of 12 minutes 14 seconds, while when the CUDA core was activated the rendering time shortened considerably to 3 minutes 27 seconds!
All of the beautiful performance of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is then supported by high power as well. Armed with a 71 Wh battery, this laptop can last for 4 to 8 hours of ‘relaxed’ use without charging.
However, when testing the charging on this laptop, we also got quite satisfactory results. Where battery charging from 0% to 100% can be obtained in about 90 minutes to 2 hours.
Webcam
For the webcam owned by the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo, there is actually nothing special. Can be used for video calls , but we recommend you buy an external webcam if you want to use it for other, more serious occasions.
However, the webcam from the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo has the advantage that it supports Windows Hello. This means that you can log into the laptop using the face recognition feature . Class!
Hot
Armed with 2 cooling fans on the right and left, which are connected to 4 heat pipes , the actual heat management design of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo reminds us of a gaming laptop.
However, this is not without reason, it is feared that a laptop temperature that is too high will quickly damage the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo’s OLED screen. Therefore, it is only natural that Asus provides “excessive” heat management.
After all, functionally this is really useful. Just look at it, even though the core temperature of the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo CPU can reach 90 degrees Celsius when used optimally, there is no CPU throttling that can reduce laptop performance.
Apart from that, we are quite satisfied with the heat management that the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo has. Where the surface temperature can last at 29-30 degrees Celsius only on the keyboard and around 40 degrees Celsius in the middle, when used in high performance.
Conclusion
Asus Zenbook Pro Duo is a laptop that is really designed and created specifically for those of you who have a profession as a content creator or live in the field of graphic design, video editing , or animator.
The price, which is above the average for most laptops on the market today, in our opinion, is still worth giving to the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo. After all, this laptop is really for professionals, and is intended to ‘make money’.
With the capabilities you have, when you are confident enough to use a machine as powerful as this, it looks like the 50 million figure priced by Asus will come back easily!
As for those of you who only want a gaming laptop, or a standard work laptop, we certainly don’t recommend buying this laptop. Because there are still many cheap gaming laptops with prices below the Asus Zenbook Pro Duo that can play AAA class games with right-aligned settings !