ASUS South Africa has unveiled its new premium ZenBook series – the ZenBook 13, ZenBook 14 and ZenBook 15, and most importantly, ZenBook Pro 14 – just weeks after its debut at CES in Las Vegas earlier this month.
The ZenBook Pro 14 features an innovative trackpad called ScreenPad, which is a matte touchscreen in place of the and is designed for artists, designers, or any creator who’s on-the-go. It can also serve as an additional productivity tool for business users.
The ScreenPad combines a touchpad with a high-resolution, full-colour touchscreen to offer new ways of interacting with both Windows apps and dedicated programs called “ScreenPad Apps”. Adaptive functions with context-sensitive tools can simplify workflow, and it is customisable to allow users to personalise their experience.
“Since 1992, there hasn’t been much innovation on the touchpad,” said Jasmine Lin, product manager and marketing head at ASUS South Africa, at the local launch event on Tuesday. “That’s why we researched what consumers need from their computers – working with the consumer to create the ScreenPad.”
Lin added that the new laptops demonstrated significant development in a field that had not seen a lot of innovation in the past few years.
“Our new models all feature four-sided frameless ultra-slim bezels, which mean that screen size has increased significantly while the actual devices themselves haven’t. And they feature ASUS’ numeric keypads, which are built into the touchpads and allow for easier data entry. We also have fingerprint and face recognition options to make logging in easier and more secure.”
Click here to see the rest of the ZenBook range and the features of the devices.
The rest of the ZenBook range – the ZenBook 13, 14, and 15 – is redesigned with new frameless NanoEdge display, which features ultra-slim bezels on all four sides and up to 95% screen-to-body ratio. This technology also allows for a more compact design, with some of the notebooks being up to 25% smaller than their predecessors.
The 13-inch and 14-inch models also include the options of the new NumPad, a productivity enhancement that provides a full-size LED-illuminated numeric keypad built into the touchpad.
All models feature a special 3D IR camera that allows fast face-login using Windows Hello, even in low-light environments, similar to facial recognition seen in high-end smartphones.
The new models feature a full complement of high-performance components, including the latest 8th Generation Intel Core i7 CPU, options for an NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 Max-Q graphics chipset, 16GB RAM, ultrafast PCIe SSDs and gigabit-class Wi-Fi.
Designed to be versatile, powerful, and portable, the 13.3-inch ZenBook Flip 13 and 15.6-inch ZenBook Flip 15 are 10% smaller than the previous models and feature the same frameless NanoEdge mentioned above.
Both models incorporate a world-facing camera, designed for use with mixed-reality applications that allow users to interact with 3D virtual objects in the physical world. ZenBook Flip 13 also introduces the new NumPad trackpad.
ZenBook Flip 15 adds high-performance discrete NVIDIA graphics and a PANTONE Validated display for accurate colour rendering. This means that colours you see on screen will be printed with the exact same shades and tones.
All models are torture-tested to military-grade (-810G) reliability standards, with demanding tests that include environmental extremes of altitude, temperature and humidity, in addition to extensive drop, shock and vibration testing.