ASUS’s slinky new ultrabook

CHENNAI: BUSINESS travel has bounced back, recovering from the pandemic blip. Road warriors are back and so are slinky ultrabooks that don’t just slip into your slimmest backpacks, but also deliver on battery and performance.

The ASUS’s Zenbook S13 OLED (2023) takes over from its 2022 predecessor. It’s 30% slimmer than last year’s edition but that’s not the only enhancement. It’s finished in a material ASUS’s calls ‘plasma ceramic’ that lends it a premium finish. ASUS’s has built this laptop with environmentally friendly materials. All metals and plastics originate from recycled sources.

Even the box is entirely recyclable. It’s not just the slim form (this Zenbook is just 1 cm thin and weighs around 1 kg), we also approve of the immersive display. Laptops are no longer just work machines.

This one features a 16:10 13.3-inch OLED HDR NanoEdge display with 2880 x 1800 resolution with up to 550-nits peak brightness. Colours are vivid and are complemented by deep blacks. This is a great binge-watch and gaming screen; a touchscreen could have sweetened the deal.

The Zenbook S 13 OLED is backed by best of breed hardware - a 13th Gen Intel Core i7 1355U processor, up to 32 GB of onboard LPDDR 5200 memory and a 1 TB PCIe 4.0 x4 NVMe M.2 SSD. Battery life is another win – we found the ASUS’s claim of 14 hours quite accurate. ASUS’s manages to cram a 63-watt hour battery despite its slim form.

There’s a 65-watt in-box charger that powers this laptop in quick time. You can also use your USB-C type mobile charger to power this device when you are on a business trip, doing away with the need to carry multiple chargers.

This laptop also scores on the connectivity front - you get a full-size HDMI and USB 3.2 Type-A (10Gbps) ports, plus dual Thunderbolt 4 connections.

If you’re looking for a lightweight Windows laptop, the ASUS’s Zenbook S13 OLED (2023) deserves to be in your consideration set.