Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo review: This laptop with two screens is too addictive

Its 2022 and multi-screen devices are becoming fairly common. If Samsung is championing this form factor in the smartphone space, Asus is giving rivals tough competition in the PC segment. After launching the gaming-centric ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 a few months ago, Asus introduced a more creator-focused Zenbook Pro 14 Duo (UX8402) that also features two screens.

On paper, laptops with dual screens are not just creator-friendly as they can help other professionals. For instance, traders can use multi-screen laptops to observe daily stocks. Video creators, on the other hand, can use one screen to browse files and the other for editing. If you’re a writer or a journalist, a multi-screen laptop can be a blessing to track or read articles on one screen and write on the other.

And mind you, the hardware under the hood of the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo (UX8402) is no joke. It comes equipped with up to 12th-Gen Intel Core i9 processor paired with 32GB of RAM, 1TB of NVMe SSD storage and GeForce RTX 3050 Ti GPU. In theory, it should handle multiple apps seamlessly. Moreover, it is more than a decent laptop for gaming. In that case, one may ask, why isn’t this laptop being adopted widely?

A simple answer to this plain question is the cost. The fancy hardware on the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo bears a big cost. The laptop comes with a starting price tag of Rs 1,44,990. The variant with the Intel Core i9 CPU, which I received, costs Rs 2,24,990, which is enough to buy two decent monitors and a laptop to create a multi-screen set-up.

Therefore, this review is not about whether you should buy a dual-screen laptop like this one. Rather, I will address how Asus is championing this space with this new dual-screen laptop and what I’d like to see with the next-gen model.

Design and display: The new Zenbook Pro 14 Duo is slightly more compact than the Zenbook Pro Duo 15 OLED (2021). It carries a relatively smaller 14.5-inch main OLED display with a 2.8K (2880×1880 pixels) resolution and a 120Hz refresh rate. The secondary IPS screen, or what Asus refers to as ScreenPad Plus, measures 12.7 inches. It offers Full-HD resolution and the standard 60Hz refresh rate.

Before I come to the displays, it is relevant to highlight that Asus has not compromised on the build quality. It gets a metal finish that adds some robustness. I still have concerns related to dust seeping in through the big vents under the second screen. At least, in my brief usage, I did not face such problems, but you never know.

Starting with the primary display, the OLED panel does not disappoint. It offers boosted colors with deeper blacks, which remains highly pleasing to the eyes. The OLED display does have limitations when it comes to brightness, but under the right lighting conditions, it’s a piece of art. In fact, watching movies on OTT platforms is equally pleasing as there’s support for Dolby Vision. To enhance the experience further, the Zenbook Pro 14 Duo comes with dual speakers by Harman Kardon and Dolby Atmos support.

Honestly, there’s not much to complain about the main display, although I found using the Asus stylus on this glossy surface slightly impractical. The 12.7-inch ScreenPad Plus, on the other hand, has a coarse finish, which is far more suitable for the stylus. It does have an odd aspect ratio that awkwardly stretches the web browser across the screen. But I guess that some creators would still love this large touchscreen while mixing music or editing videos. For spreadsheet lovers, a multi-screen laptop can be a gem.

There is a dedicated button to disable the second display, which helps save battery. The boot time of the secondary screen is not as fluid. This could be fixed with the next-gen model. Maybe next year, Asus might also consider adding a second OLED display to up the game. Frankly, I couldn’t care much as the secondary IPS display on the Zenbook Pro 14 Duo offers a very practical experience.

Performance: The top-variant that I received comes equipped with an Intel Core i9-12900H processor paired with 32GB of DDR5 RAM, 4GB of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Ti Laptop GPU, and 1TB of NVMe SSD storage. Despite being loaded with high-end hardware, the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo surprisingly remained cool. Of course, the temperature will go up, and the fans will get noisier if you push the laptop’s limits. As mentioned, the secondary screen tilts up by roughly 10 degrees when the notebook is opened. This mechanism enables airflow for better cooling.

I don’t identify myself as a big gamer, but I do enjoy playing popular titles like Age of Empires 4, Forza 5, Apex Legends, and Fifa from time to time. All these titles ran smoothly at maximum settings. As expected, the best settings consume more battery. Asus has bundled an annual Xbox Game Pass Ultimate subscription with the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo, which is a pretty good deal at this price point.

In terms of accessibility and convenience, the port selection is also very solid. The Zenbook Pro 14 Duo OLED comes with two Thunderbolt 4 ports (for 40Gb/s data, 100W power, and external 4K displays), USB 3.2 Gen 2 (Type-A), HDMI 2.1, microSD Express 7.0, and 3.5mm combo audio Jack

For those number-centric customers, the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo scored 3,127 points in PC Mark 10’s CPU test and 5,507 in the Geekbench multi-core test. It attained a 3,937 score on the 3D Mark’s GPU test – much below the average score (4,580) by laptops with the same configuration. It could be because of this form factor, but these figures aren’t disappointing at all. Lastly, the screen refresh rate while playing Forza and Apex peaked at around 50fps, if that matters to you.

Battery: The Zenbook Pro 14 Duo has a large 76WHrs battery with support for 180W fast charging. The charger is definitely chunky and adds a lot of weight to the bag. I truly want brands like Asus to work harder to make chargers light and more compact, but that day is still far away.

One of the main concerns of a laptop with dual screens is the battery backup. The Zenbook Pro 14 Duo offered decent performance, but it was average at best. At maximum settings (both screens on), the laptop offered up to four hours of battery. If you need more juice, turning off the ScreenPad helps to an extent. It lasted for an hour and a half while gaming without the charger, which is okay, if not the best.

Zenbook Pro 14 Duo takes an hour to charge with the bundled charger.

Verdict: The only issue I have with the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo is its compact keyboard. The secondary screen, which Asus calls ScreenPad Plus, takes up a lot of space, and as a result, the company compromised on the keyboard experience. The keys are tightly placed, and the key travel is also quite average. The trackpad is on the extreme right, which I found confusing and slightly impractical. This issue is partially fixable with an external mouse and keyboard, but I wish for a more thoughtful design for users who don’t want to carry these accessories.

However, the dual screens on the Asus Zenbook Pro 14 Duo are highly useful, and support for touch control is an added bonus. Be it editing, gaming, or daily productivity, the laptop handles it efficiently. Since I haven’t tried the base model, I can’t say whether it is worth the price. The top model with an Intel Core i9 processor is undoubtedly expensive, but the experience is totally worthwhile.

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