two thousand dollars twelfth gen core i7
rtx 3050 ti
the asus zenbook pro duo 14 is a premium
package with premium specs but let's be
honest you don't care about that boring
stuff you care about this little guy
right here the screen pad the 12.7 inch
120 hertz touch screen here on the
keyboard the tiny external monitor
that's built right into the chassis it
looks very cool but what do you actually
do with it
in the past the answer has been not that
much asus has been trying this sort of
thing for a number of years and it
hasn't gone great there's been a
14-incher a 15-incher even a giant
gaming rig and in reviewing those models
i always had trouble figuring out
exactly what to do with that second
screen on these past models that screen
pad has been tiny it's been low
resolution it's been dim it's been full
of glitches and resizing issues and
worst of all it's been fairly flat to
the ground meaning i couldn't really see
much of what was there without creating
my neck to look for as long as i've been
reviewing zen book duos the screen pad
has been a place to dump twitter and
facebook and whatever other distractions
i didn't want to look at
but asus has done this zenbook pro duo
differently in a few ways
so this year's screen pad is very bright
it has a higher refresh rate and more
importantly asus has raised the screen
pad 12 degrees above the keyboard deck
and for the first time since i started
reviewing dual screen devices i can
actually see the stuff that's on it i
can see every detail of pictures and
read every word of articles and i don't
need to lean over at all this has
changed the game i've actually been
using the screen pad i've been using it
in a variety of different ways and to
show you how useful i found the second
screen i figured i'd take you through
the typical day of a dual screen laptop
user
so the first thing i do when i sign on
at 9am is take a few minutes to chat
with my colleagues check my emails and
get up to speed with the news of the
previous day so i put slack on the
screen pad and split the top screen
between emails and the news slack
doesn't quite fit on the screen pad and
it looked a bit weird when i expanded it
but hey i could read my messages and
that's the most important thing
i could easily view all three things at
once from my office chair things were
starting to feel a bit quiet so i opened
up spotify and stuck that on the bottom
screen with slack so it was out of the
way the screen pad was perfect for
scrolling through playlists and skipping
through tracks while i sipped my morning
coffee as the morning dragged on i got
bored of sitting at my desk so i took
the zen book over the couch and this
turned out to be a huge mistake
the location of the keyboard at the
front of the device means there's
nowhere to put your hands and on a desk
that's not a huge problem you can just
push the laptop further away but on the
couch you are going to be typing with
your hands tucked up against your chest
like a t-rex
so i ended up just ditching the keyboard
and touch pad and just using the stylus
to navigate everything but that's also
not ideal because the top screen has
some serious screen wobble
now some of you love having your
keyboard in the front this kind of
device would be great for all of you but
if you haven't tried a front mounted
keyboard before and you do intend to use
this device on your lap that's something
to keep in mind
anyway back at my desk i had an article
i needed to write referencing a bunch of
in-depth spec sheets which is what you
spend 99 of your time doing if you're a
laptop reviewer like me
so i full screened my google doc on the
top screen and put the spec sheets on
the screen pad i actually kind of prefer
this to an external monitor setup for
this kind of workflow because i didn't
need to alternate between looking at one
interface and looking at the other i
could easily see both windows at once
and don't worry spotify was still on the
side of the screen pad cranking out
tunes without needing to be on the main
screen and potentially distracting me
okay lunch time i usually just scroll
through twitter and emails while i eat
lunch so i wasn't going to need the
second screen with a three finger tap i
could turn on touchpad mode which turns
the screen pad into a massive touchpad
and use that to navigate now this isn't
a great touchpad there's no physical
clicking mechanism and you're also like
reaching over the keyboard which is a
little bit weird but the tap to click
mechanism does work quite well and it's
a nice way to take a break from the tiny
little touchpad in the corner of this
device which is just really tiny and i
hate it now touchpad mode did cover up
all the windows i had on the bottom
screen so i wasn't able to see what i
had down there while i navigated this
way
but my spotify stream did keep going and
when i exited touchpad mode which i
could do with another simple three
finger tap they were right there where
i'd left them
now we happen to have some other members
of the verge team in the office as well
so i brought this thing around and asked
what they thought of it
whoa okay
wow
oh that's cool i feel like a child who's
using a computer for the first time oh
so far nice it's a little mushy
um doesn't sound too clicky i'm
expecting it to like mold to my hand
i do like how seamlessly it just goes
from one screen to the next like i was
expecting it to be a little bit more
hitchy so i could see this being helpful
is this also touchscreen
you can touch everything like i like
that it can do this this is nice like a
ta you do want a tablet that goes out
because it will destroy your wrist if
you're drawing all day on flat this is
actually awesome is this like 120 hertz
you know oh
if i was guarding a museum you know and
i had to have a lot of screens that
would be my best use case
okay so back to my day in the afternoon
i had to do some light editing on a
batch of photos this zenbook has this
neat feature called task groups where
you can save a group of tabs and apps
and open them simultaneously later with
a single click so if you wanted a quick
way to open lightroom at photoshop at
the same time which i did here you can
put them in a task group on the screen
pad and save yourself a click this is
probably my favorite screen pad feature
i'm a huge fan so to finish off the day
i had a zoom call where i needed to
reference some spreadsheets so i stuck
the zoom call on the bottom screen and
put the spreadsheets on the top screen i
could then pop the screen pad into
touchpad mode without interrupting the
zoom call and use it to scroll through
the data
when we were done with the spreadsheets
i swapped the two screens content to put
the zoom call upstairs and the
spreadsheets downstairs using this handy
little swap button that's right above
the touchpad seriously this button is
the best it is my favorite button ever
this was about when i had to plug the
device into power it generally lasts
around a little over 5 hours with this
workload that's not a super long
lifespan and it is a bummer that this
device may not last everyone an entire
workday but the duo is running two
bright high resolution screens so it's a
little more excusable than it would be
on most laptops if you're trying to save
power you can also turn off the screen
pad with this handy button here
seriously this row of buttons is my life
finally work was over and that meant it
was time for some gaming now the rtx
3050 ti isn't designed to play the
latest and greatest games at the highest
frame rates and resolutions but it can
certainly make lighter titles a
possibility including overwatch which
i'm playing here now you'd think a dual
screen device could be a dream machine
for gaming you could run a twitch stream
or have your discord open on the bottom
screen while your game runs on the top
but it's not quite that simple when you
click on something on the bottom screen
you actually click out of the game which
means that some titles will just
minimize now you can get around this in
some cases by running the game in
windowed mode but i mean come on are you
really trying to run your game in
windowed mode like all the time really
come come on come on now this doesn't
mean this is a bad laptop for playing
games it just means that they're still
very cool use cases i think it could
have that asus hasn't quite figured out
yet
and that's sort of a theme of this
laptop it's still not quite everything
it could be but as of now it does what
it's supposed to do i figured out things
to do with it that i can't do on any
other device despite the fact that the
touch pad is minuscule despite the fact
that i was typing like a t-rex for quite
a while and despite the fact that the
lid wobbles like a nervous kid at a
spelling bee i had a good day with the
zenbook pro duo 14.
now is this a laptop you should buy
only you know the answer to that
question in your heart but on a device
like this that's high praise for quite a
few years the answer to that question
for many of these funky dual screen
devices has been
absolutely not and i don't want to say
that anymore i think most people will
figure out ways that this dual screen
setup could add to their workflow so the
decision now mostly comes down to one
question
do you want a keyboard in the front
thank you so much to all the verge staff
who helped out with this video and one
thing we learned from all of those
interviews is that at least some of them
think i'm very cool for having this
laptop like some of them so if you think
i'm very cool or if you don't i don't
really care please like and subscribe to
the verge