Innovation is the reason so many of us are fans of tech and when it comes to laptops these are
the ones that dare to try something new this year and they are definitely worth talking about
hey everyone this is Luke it's nearing the end of 2022 and you know what that means it's time to
start looking back at the year and considering the tech that really blew us away or tried something
bold and new some of which I count as some of the best laptops of the year and others
are more just fascinating experiments that point towards the future before we get to my first pick
it's right behind me make sure to subscribe to our channel for more Tech videos as we close out this
year so you've already seen it my first pick for Innovative laptop of the year is the Asus Zenbook
fold 17 and The Innovation here is really obvious it's all about form factor the zenbook fold 17
isn't the first laptop with a foldable screen but it might be the first one that really makes
any sense of that concept it's really all about this 17 inch screen and imagining how this could
actually be useful in your daily life sure you can fold it up into a compact laptop with the magnetic
keyboard on top or even use it as a massive oversized tablet but but easily my favorite way
is this desktop mode which gives you this huge 17 inch 4x3 screen that feels amazing to work
on as if you're carrying around a little portable monitor that can unfold into this large canvas for
all of your Computing needs the larger screen also makes room for a larger more comfortable keyboard
at least compared to the ThinkPad X1 fold which was the original foldable laptop from a couple of
years ago this takes that design to the next level along with some much needed extra performance and
the result has me excited for the viability of future designs like this the outrageous price
obviously makes this kind of a niche device for sure but is it Innovative absolutely next up is
another experimental two-in-one device again from Asus but with a far different purpose in
mind and that's the Rog flow z13 when this thing was announced I was pretty skeptical like what's
the point of a Surface Pro that you can play games on I assume this would kind of be Innovation for
innovation's sake but no the idea of building a little two-in-one tablet with an RTX 3050 TI
inside does have a purpose first of all it's kind of a sounding that you can get as much performance
out of the flow z13 as you can and of course you can buy the XG mobile external GPU accessory if
you really want to pump up the graphics but the real Innovation is just this form factor
in general and the experience of what playing games on it feels like because one of the biggest
problems with gaming laptops we all know this it's the surface temperatures under the keyboard and
the Palm rest at some point it doesn't matter how much performance you've got in your gaming laptop
if the thing is totally uncomfortable to play on what's the point the flows D13 completely fixes
that problem by putting the actual computer here behind the screen rather than under your
fingertips it makes for a far more comfortable gaming laptop in this tiny little package and
it's got a ridiculous cool factor that still no other device has been able to replicate my next
pick is the Dell XPS 13 plus which probably won't come as a surprise to anyone this little laptop
shocked the world back at CES this year completely ditching The Familiar XPS design for something
pretty radical don't worry I'm not considering cutting a headphone jack to be Innovative but
the XPS 13 plus does far more than that to earn its badge for being one of the most Innovative
laptops of 2022. the Innovation with this thing is really more about the laptop's design and the
tech that makes that possible and there's three elements here in particular I'm talking about
you've got the new haptic feedback track pad which in itself is not Innovative right we've
seen a lot of laptops use these but the way Dell has integrated it into the Palm rest is something
I've never seen before and it makes for a really eye-catching look it's totally seamless the same
is true of the keyboard in that it's now edge to edge and that the keycaps run right up against
the sides of the chassis but also have removed that lattice in between the keys it all gives
the impression of a super Sleek minimalist keyboard that's completely free of wasted
it's great to tie up onto the last element which is the most controversial is the replacement of
the function row keys for these capacitive touch buttons now there's nothing practical
about these touch buttons you're probably going to wonder why you don't just have keys up there
but when you're talking about doing something new with laptop Design This is certainly new
these touch buttons are essential too to the overall design because it enables you to have
that edge to edge keyboard while still having somewhere to put the ports by the way in case
you're wondering the standard XPS 13 also has a crazy amount of innovative engineering happening
but it's all under the hood Dell found really innovative ways to shrink down each component
and element from the thickness of the PCB down to the package on package memory it's all pretty
interesting so make sure to check out our full review on the channel for that one if you're
interested in hearing more a lot of innovation goes into making a laptop as thin as possible
and that's what my next pick is all about the M2 MacBook Air may not have been as big
Archer visually from previous models but man it is so incredible how thin this laptop is at
just .44 inches thick it's easily the thinnest laptop currently being sold and somehow the
performance in battery life are so way ahead of the competition for laptops of this type and sure
you could certainly make the argument that the real Innovation happened with the original M1
chip itself but it's amazing to see what Apple was able to do when it went back and redesigned
a laptop around the extreme efficiency of this chip kind of like what they did with the M1 iMac
now the M2 MacBook Air has not been a laptop without controversies certainly not but almost
anyone who holds this thing in their hands will realize there's some real Innovation happening
here especially when you compare it to what's possible on comparable Windows devices with
those traditional Intel or AMD processors okay my last choice is another laptop where the focus of
the Innovation was all around making the chassis thinner but unlike the magma here this pick is all
about making a proper gaming laptop as compact as possible and that's the Alienware x14 this
thing is just 0.57 inches thick which is unheard of for a gaming laptop and it actually makes it
thinner even than the XPS 13 plus and remember this thing can have up to an RTX 3060 inside
it's actually so thin that all the ports have been moved to the back including the power which is now
entirely connected through USBC another thing you just don't hear of on gaming laptops but relying
only on USBC for power does mean that there aren't some of those more powerful configurations offered
and the thickness or I should say thinness in general of this chassis does reduce some of the
performance you can expect but when you just sit back and consider what is possible in a laptop of
this size these days it's kind of mind-blowing now I know there are people out there who will
scoff at the idea of trying to make gaming laptops as thin as possible especially when performance
is the main thing that people are looking for but there's room for both and even though the audience
for the Alienware x14 is pretty narrow for my money this is clearly one of the most Innovative
gaming laptops of the year and when you consider all these laptops I talked about they all get me
excited for what's coming next in 2023 CES is just around the corner and hopefully that means new
laptop designs new technology and new innovation and that's about it for me so I'm curious what you
all think do you think any of these laptops stand out as particularly Innovative which of these do
you think best represents the future of laptop design drop me a comment down below and hey if
you enjoyed this video give us a like that always helps us out and thanks for watching foreign