Today I will tell you about the ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 miracle laptop with two screens, a powerful processor and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070. If you want to spend considerable money on a modern laptop, isn’t it better to buy something that will be not only powerful and practical, but also… at least a little different than a regular laptop?
I think that’s what ASUS developers thought when they introduced their first ZenBook Pro Duo. By the way, you can read a review of this amazing device, which was tested by my colleague Vladislav Surkov here. A strange, very strange beast it was, and when everyone saw it, they just shook their heads and said: no one needs this.
Yet the ZenBook Pro Duo was so warmly received by users that ASUS decided to further develop the concept of laptops with two displays, both for the average user and gamers.
The ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED UX582 is the company’s latest development. I spent some time with it and ready to share my thoughts.
Read also: ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo UX581GV review – Unique Laptop of the Future
The ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 at first glance is almost identical to the UX482 I tested earlier this year, but this time it’s a little larger ( 15.6″ vs. 14) and has a much more efficient configuration. The version I got for testing is equipped with an eight-core Core i7-10980HK processor (there is a version with Core i7-10870H) with 32 GB of RAM, NVIDA GeForce RTX 3070 graphics and a 1TB SSD.
In addition, there is also an OLED screen with a resolution of 4K and a diagonal of 15.6 inches and an additional ScreenPad screen with a resolution of 3840×1100 pixels. Mention should also be made of the very impressive battery, which offers 92 Wh. It is one of the first laptops on the market to be equipped with HDMI 2.1 (4K, 120 Hz), and it also has 2 USB 3.2 Gen2 Type C (Thunderbolt 3.0) ports and a 3.2 Gen2 Type A USB port.
Here is a complete list of ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 specifications:
I’m always pleasantly impressed by the premium set of ASUS devices.
The laptop cames in a huge cardboard box, inside which there are two more premium boxes and other components. This is a branded backpack and a special laptop stand with instructions for its use. This stand will allow you to change the angle of inclination of the laptop relative to the surface of the table, which will increase the ease of use. By the way, the stand is convenient on a flat surface, but not very good if you place your laptop on your knees.
There is a separate rectangular box for the external power supply and power cable. The power supply itself is large and quite heavy. This is not surprising, given that the battery of such a laptop requires powerful power. Therefore, the unit has a power of 240 W.
The ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED UX582 itself is in a separate box, with a branded stylus and a bunch of instructions and a warranty card. The box also has a branded backpack and wriststand necessary when working with a laptop.
Read also: ASUS ZenBook 13 (UX325) review: New Member of the ZenBook Family
Externally, at first glance, it is really difficult to find any differences from the previous model. The ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 is a very good machine in a durable aluminum-magnesium case that looks very good, but only until we touch it with our fingers. Unfortunately, the surface collects fingerprints very well, although it should be noted that they can be easily removed with microfiber fabric.
As I mentioned, the main screen is an OLED display with 4K resolution, which is pre-calibrated.
The matrix offers 100% sRGB color coating and 96.6% of Adobe RGB space; ordinary IPS matrices rarely exceed 70%. The OLED sensor is manufactured by Samsung, and the contrast it offers truly boggles the mind, all thanks to its perfect black color. It also looks great in terms of backlight uniformity. At 440 nits brightness, the display remains readable even in the sun.
Since it is an OLED display, ASUS has implemented several solutions called OLED Care to prevent it from burning out. It’s about shifting an image or wallpaper, which not only looks great, but also prevents individual pixels from burning out, which can happen if they constantly display the same color.
Read also: ASUS ROG Zephyrus Duo 15 review – Premium Gaming Laptop with Two Screens
The ScreenPad is an IPS screen with very good parameters that deserve more detailed attention. This 14-inch touchscreen rises nearly 10° when the laptop is opened, and also essentially has a 4K resolution, albeit in an unusual ratio of 3840×1100. The colors are not very bright, but in general it is a pleasant additional display, the response to the touch is good and the readability at wide angles is excellent. The brightness of 400 nits is also a significant improvement, but I would still like to see the same 440 nits like on the main screen. Due to the matte surface, the touch screen lacks a bit of brightness.
I’d like to share some interesting observations. The additional “floating” screen solves three problems of the first ZenBook Pro Duo and the “junior” version of the ZenBook Duo.
Of course, the first problem that the floating screen has solved is ergonomics. I use the original ASUS ZenBook Duo UX481 and have to admit that the auxiliary display is sometimes annoying, as you have to tilt your head every time to see the image on it. The new ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED got rid of this problem. The display rises to a position that it is enough to lower your eyes to see its contents, and when the main display is adjusted accordingly, it seems that both screens are merged together. The effect of combining screens here is even better than in the ASUS Zephyrus Duo 15, because the ZenBook Duo does not have a thick bezel under the screen. In addition, it is easier to get to the raised display with your hand or stylus that comes with the kit. In terms of usability, this is a significant improvement.
The second point where a floating auxiliary display helped very much is the culture of work. The original ZenBook Duo was not too loud or hot most of the time, but all changed after enough time has passed. In particular, the auxiliary screen sometimes heated to alarming levels.
According to ASUS, the use of a floating display has increased air flow by 36%. This, combined with the updated cooling system, has significantly improved the working culture. And you can feel it from the very first minute. The ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED is silent most of the time. The fans either do not rotate at all or are so quiet that they cannot be heard under normal conditions. And when it’s time to run demanding photo processing and video editing programs, or you want to play games, you can immediately notice that the noise of fans has become noticeably quieter than in the ASUS ZenBook Duo UX481 and UX581 models. The auxiliary screen also does not overheat, as it is far enough from the surface of the case, where the temperature increase is the largest.
What does it look like in practice? Well, for example, when I processed a batch of 100 high-resolution photos on the original ZenBook Duo, after about half an hour the computer usually started to slow down, and Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop reacted noticeably worse. On the ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED, the same load does not cause any slowdowns, even after long-term use.
The same applies to games. The NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 is a much faster chip than even the first-generation RTX 2060, where the fans did not have enough power to cool it efficiently. Of course, it’s also largely related to NVIDIA’s optimization.
The third problem that a floating auxiliary screen solves is… sound quality. The Harman/Kardon speakers in this laptop aren’t outstanding, but compared to the first generation, they sound much louder and cleaner, while offering deeper sound. Although it’s not the Zephyrus Duo 15 SE level, the ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED still sounds above average.
Read also: Logitech MX Keys for Mac review — The Wireless Keyboard that Apple Should’ve Made
As for hardware, you probably won’t be surprised that the ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 is a powerful work machine. The eight-core 10th generation Intel Core i9-10980HK processor complements 32 GB of RAM, 1 TB of ultra-fast SSD and powerful NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3070 graphics.
This is not a gaming laptop, but you can comfortably play even the latest games on it. Even a device from the ROG workshop wouldn’t be ashamed of such hardware. Although it is better suited for video and photo editing.
A few words about the Intel Core i9-10980HK. This is a 10th generation processor based a 14 nm process. It contains 8 physical cores with HT technology. The main clock speeds of 2.4 GHz can be increased by the manufacturer to 5.3 GHz, as is used in this laptop. The base TDP is 45 W, it can be upgraded to 65 W. In its generation, this processor has the highest performance per core, but the i7 of the 11th generation has already surpassed it. However, you’ll definitely have enough power.
Installing such a powerful GPU as the GeForce RTX 3070 in such a small case is certainly a problem, but ASUS developers managed it. Thanks to this, you can enjoy great game performance on the RTX 2080 Super Max-Z level.
Given that the matrix has only 60 Hz refresh rate, these values are more than enough, but if you want to play in 4K, you shouldn’t have serious problems either. Especially since the presence of HDMI 2.1 port allows you to connect your computer to your TV and enjoy images with a refresh rate of up to 120 Hz.
The 1TB M.2 NVMe PCIe 3.0 SSD used is a midrange model that offers good, but not excellent performance. The volume of 1 TB is enough to store files and media content. Perhaps, given the direction of this device, a card reader for SD and MicroSD cards would have been a nice addition.
The ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 also received a new version of MyASUS, which is quite interesting in itself. For example, the software allows you to watch for the battery so that it is never charged to 100%, which should extend its life. Here you can also choose two modes of operation, standard and performance mode, which obviously differ in the limits of maximum power for the processor and GPU. In standard mode, it is 46/80 W for the processor and 85 W for the GPU (max. 120W), and in mode performance is 70/107 W for the processor and 110 W for the GPU (158 W in total), which allows you to achieve higher clock speeds, and therefore more efficiency. Unfortunately, the laptop is quite noisy in this mode.
MyASUS also allows you to connect our smartphone (Android or iOS) to your computer using the MyASUS Link app, which allows you to make calls, access files and even control the camera on your computer from your phone.
Theory and various technical characteristics are enough. Let’s move on to the practical part. Of course, many people wonder what two screens are needed for. If you’ve never worked on a two-screen laptop before, having them in this device can be surprising. However, once you have got used it, you start feeling that there is no way back.
The dual display opens up a number of new features, regardless of whether you work on the laptop itself or connect it to a special monitor. In this generation, ASUS also made an effort to increase the functionality of the auxiliary screen. An example of this is the Control Panel, which works with Adobe programs. For each of the available programs, we are free to assign macros to sliders and handles on the display, creating something like a Loupedeck virtual controller.
As with any other laptop with two screens, in ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED we can assign shortcuts to programs that open on the second display. For me, however, the second display is always useful simply as an additional display.
Windows 10 recognizes the helper panel as an additional monitor, so we can freely drag and drop windows and attach them to the edge of the screen. In my daily work, I usually placed Telegram and Spotify messenger on the bottom panel. These are two programs I need to see, but I don’t want them to occupy my main work area.
In addition to the second display, the ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED works exactly as we expect from a premium laptop for professionals. It’s impossible not to enjoy this equipment. With this configuration, it can cope with any creative challenges and run any game you throw at it. Although it would be better to reduce the resolution to Full HD in games, or use DLSS technology for greater smoothness. The screen, however, has a frequency of 60 Hz, so there is no point in trying to reduce the display to hundreds of frames per second, because it will still not be able to cope with it. To do this, you need ASUS Zephyrus Duo 15 SE.
The OLED screen itself is also great. I generally really like this ASUS idea with OLED screen in laptops. The sooner the production of such displays becomes cheaper, the more often we will see them in laptops. I’m sad the aspect ratio isn’t 16:10 or 3:2, but I can forgive it in exchange for real OLED blacks and Pantone support, which guarantees great color reproduction… unless we change the brightness of the screen. This is the specificity of OLED that the color saturation changes according to the brightness of the screen, so if you want to get uniform results when working with color, you need to maintain constant brightness of the display.
I also get the impression that ASUS has either replaced the infrared camera or improved the software, as facial recognition occurs immediately after opening the lid. Zero delay, zero downtime – we open the lid and the laptop recognizes us at the same moment. The previous ZenBook Pro Duo takes 2-3 seconds to “think”.
Of course, you need to get used to the non-standard location of the keyboard and touchpad a little. However, from the experience of working with the first generation of ASUS ZenBook Duo, I can say that this is a matter of several weeks, and the muscles will get used to the unusual location of elements, especially since their quality is very decent. Especially the keyboard, which is very rigid, has a nice stroke and sensitive keys. A vertical touchpad sometimes makes it difficult to use Windows Precision gestures, but it is also a matter of practice.
While the new ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED is wonderful to use and is a machine for literally everything, it has several features that can scare away potential buyers.
The first of these features is the insufficient mobility of the ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED. I would rank this computer more as a DTR (Desktop Replacement), as it really isn’t that comfortable to carry around. Three factors hinder this: size, weight and battery life.
As for size, the ZenBook Pro Duo 15 is noticeably larger than the 16-inch MacBook Pro and thinner than its gaming brother, the Zephyrus Duo 15 SE. It’s good that there’s a special branded backpack in the kit, because it certainly won’t fit into the usual one for 15-16-inch models, and those designed for 17-inch laptops are usually very large and uncomfortable.
The double screen is also quite heavy. Therefore, a laptop is half a kilogram heavier than most 15-inch premium laptops, its weight is almost 2.5 kg. Worse still, a large power supply and cables add another kilogram, which you can’t do without, as the ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED can survive for about few hours without recharging. That’s why you have to keep the power supply at hand.
As much as I tried, even with economical use, all I was able to get was 5 hours with average brightness and strictly office programs. Browser, Telegram, Spotify, text editor. Nothing else. Add, for example, an episode from the series on Netflix or watching several videos on YouTube, and working hours will be reduced to almost 3.5 hours.
Also, you don’t even dream of comfortable working with videos or photos without plugging in. In this case, the performance of the computer is severely limited (as with any Windows laptop and a special GPU), and the battery power melts in front of your eyes. When using Adobe Lightroom Classic, the charge was only enough for one hour.
Although the cooling system in this model is sensational, unfortunately it is also quite noisy when you run heavy programs. It should be noted that even at heavy loads, the processor temperature does not exceed 86°C, and the GPU does not exceed 77°C, and moreover, I have not recorded any throttle. True, it becomes loud (over 54 dBA) and hot air comes out of the ventilation holes on the sides, but this cooling system works. The hinge hinge lifts both the bottom of the computer and the top screen, allowing cold air to enter the system, which contributes to efficient cooling.
The unusual keyboard placement can also be a problem for someone. But the problem almost disappears on a flat surface as it is possible to use a special handstand. Then typing is as convenient as on any other keyboard. However, typing while holding a laptop on your lap or on a narrow table is very difficult.
When considering buying a ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED, you should remember that you buy an almost stationary device.
ASUS once again proves that an unusual approach to laptop design makes sense and allows for a lot of opportunities. In other circumstances, placing such effective components in a small computer would hardly be possible. However, the system used by ZenBook Pro Duo UX582 does a great job and provides high performance in any situation. However, it creates quite a lot of noise, and the processor itself is not the best for today. But maybe that’s what will be fixed in the next model.
But of course, the UX582 makes a great impression in other aspects, the OLED screen is wonderful, it perfectly reproduces colors, provides perfect contrast and is suitable for both work and media consumption. The additional display is a very individual matter, I am sure that most people will find its use, especially since the work area there is large enough (3840×1100 pixels). The only possible issue is the keyboard that is installed on the very edge of the laptop. It requires patience, especially if you work on the go and do not always have a wrist stand at hand. In some situations, having only one USB Type A port can also cause inconvenience, but otherwise there is nothing to complain about.
However, I am very impressed with this amazing laptop. In my opinion, the ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED UX582 is a really high-performance workstation with quality components. It is thanks to this that you can not only organize a full-fledged workplace to perform tasks of any complexity, but also have a reliable modern laptop for other needs. If you need a laptop from the future, feel free to buy the ASUS ZenBook Pro Duo 15 OLED UX582. It’s worth every penny.
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