Last year ASUS introduced its exclusive ZenBook Pro Duo laptops with a secondary display aimed at creative professionals with performance-hungry color critical workloads. At CES 2020, the company revealed a new iteration of its dual-screen notebook — the ZenBook Duo UX481 — designed for road warriors (or creators in budget) and promising to offer decent performance and battery life in addition to the second monitor.

The ASUS ZenBook Duo model UX481 comes in the company's signature Celestial Blue aluminum unibody and is equipped with a Pantone Validated 14-inch Full HD display with optional touch support and a 12.6-inch auxiliary screen. The latter can be used to run apps designed for the company’s ScreenPad or just extend Windows programs to it and increase useful screen real estate. It will be interesting to find out how significantly will the auxiliary monitor improve performance in productivity applications used by people who work on the go, but at least ASUS believes that this LCD makes sense for the target audience.

Inside the ZenBook Duo machine is Intel’s 10th Generation Comet Lake Core i5-10210U or Core i7-10510U processor (with UHD Graphics) that can be optionally enhanced with NVIDIA’s discrete GeForce MX 250 GPU with 2 GB of GDDR5 memory. The system comes with up to 16 GB of soldered-down LPDDR3 DRAM as well as a 256GB/512GB/1 TB PCIe SSD. Connectivity wise, we have a fairly standard 2020 laptop here, so it has Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5, USB 3.2 Gen 1/2 with Type-A as well as Type-C connectors, HDMI, microSD, and a combo audio jack.

ASUS equipped its ZenBook Duo with a 70 Wh battery, but it is rather hard to make predictions about actual battery life of the notebook given its second screen and applications developed for it. As for portability, being aimed at road warriors, the ZenBook Duo UX481 is relatively compact and lightweight for an aluminum 14-incher (especially when an additional screen is taken into account): it weighs 1.5 kilograms and is 19.9 mm thick.

The ASUS ZenBook Duo UX481 Laptop
  UX481
Primary Display General 14-inch
Resolution
Color Gamut
1920×1080
?
Features Pantone Validated
Optional Touchscreen
Secondary Display Diagonal 12.6-inch with touch
Resolution ?
Viewing Angles 178˚ (?)
CPU Options Intel Core i7-10510U
Intel Core i5-10210U
Graphics Integrated Intel UHD Graphics
Discrete NVIDIA GeForce MX250 w/ 2 GB GDDR5
RAM up to 16 GB LPDDR3
Storage SSD 256 GB PCIe 3.0 x2
512 GB PCIe 3.0 x2
1 TB PCIe 3.0 x4
Wireless Wi-Fi Intel Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax)
Bluetooth Bluetooth 5.0
USB 1 × USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C
1 × USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-A
1 × USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A
Thunderbolt -
Display Outputs 1 × HDMI
Gigabit Ethernet none
Card Reader microSD
Webcam Windows Hello-capable webcam with IR sensors
Fingerprint Sensor none
Other I/O Microphone, stereo speakers, audio jack
Battery 70 Wh Li-Poly
Dimensions Width 32.3 cm
Depth 22.3 cm
Thickness 19.9 mm
Weight 1.5 kilograms | 3.3 lbs
Price various

ASUS will start sales of its ZenBook Duo model UX481 sometimes in the first quarter. The company does not announce pricing of its unique laptop, but it is natural that they will be sold at a premium.

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Source: ASUS

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  • PeachNCream - Tuesday, January 14, 2020 - link

    I'd really miss being able to rest my palms on the laptop. A supplemental wrist rest would be almost a necessity due to the additional strain on tendons due in no small part to keyboard positioning. While I love the idea of more screen area, this design looks like it gives up a lot of comfort for something of a gimmick feature.
  • samcolam - Friday, November 13, 2020 - link

    Thank you for this review. I use this device for my work here https://lawncaregarden.com/best-pre-emergent-crabg...
  • pirspamela90 - Tuesday, December 15, 2020 - link

    Great review. I like this brand and want to buy a new laptop.

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