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00:00So laptops with two screens are now a thing, and this is the ZenBook Pro Duo.
00:08This is the first laptop that I've used that had a full-width screen.
00:12I mean, there's the touch bar from Apple, but this is like an actual usable screen.
00:15And when they first announced this thing, I think the thought that ran through a lot of people's mind
00:19was, is this a gimmick, or is this actually going to bring functionality?
00:23And this is what this video is about. Like, how usable is this screen?
00:27Now, just to get this right out of the way, Asus includes a bunch of kind of built-in applications
00:32and a built-in UI for this secondary screen.
00:35It's cool that they made custom apps for this display, but they didn't feel useful to me.
00:39I found that the real value of this bottom screen was just using it as an extended screen,
00:44or just like a second screen for your computing experience.
00:47The thing I wanted to use this device for was for video editing.
00:50I use Adobe Premiere, and the idea was to run the application
00:53so that it would just basically stretch across both screens,
00:56and it would run my timeline on the bottom screen.
00:58Because when I edit videos, I usually stare more at the image instead of the actual timeline,
01:04and I found it to be useful, but there are a few things you should be aware of.
01:07First, you have to adjust your workspace so that it fits into these two windows,
01:11but you have to understand that this bottom panel does not have a great viewing angle
01:16from your regular sitting position.
01:17You do have to look basically flat down at it, so you don't want to have your really important stuff down there.
01:22You want your critical work up top, and kind of like your supplementary work at the bottom.
01:26The other thing is that in Adobe Premiere, if you want to view something in full screen,
01:30you hit the tilde key, and it'll fill up the whole screen.
01:33The problem is the program now thinks the top and the bottom panel are the full screen,
01:38so the image is now stretched across both screens.
01:40It's something that I could personally work around,
01:42but I think for some content creation, that might be a bigger issue.
01:45But the whole idea of having two separate screens that have extra real estate for your workflow is really nice,
01:51and this works for any kind of content creation, whether it be Photoshop, Illustrator,
01:55or any kind of creation of work where you want to have a lot of stuff on your screen, this is nice.
02:01Now, the second thing I thought that this double screen setup would be useful for is for just multitasking.
02:06So you can have YouTube running, and like a web browser, and Reddit,
02:10or just have multiple windows running, so you can monitor multiple things at the same time.
02:14Now, as for how useful that is, I really think that depends on what you're using those screens for.
02:19If you're just browsing the web, I don't think this is worth the extra money over a normal laptop.
02:23But if you're using it in terms of like having reference material on one screen,
02:27and then typing on the other screen, like doing some kind of publication,
02:30then yeah, I could see this being useful.
02:32But in terms of just multi-paneled workflows, it's not bad.
02:36The last scenario I thought this could work for is for gaming.
02:39Now, this isn't a dedicated gaming laptop.
02:41It's a pretty powerful system.
02:42It's running an 8-core Intel CPU and an RTX 2060, so it's got some powerful components.
02:48But the idea was to run a game on the main screen, and then have info on the bottom screen.
02:52Like you can have build guides, or Discord, or Twitch if you're a streamer.
02:56You could just run whatever you want on that second screen.
02:58But the issue I found with this particular scenario is that the game that you're playing in,
03:02because these are 4K screens, you can't easily switch between them unless your game is running in 4K.
03:08And this system isn't great for 4K gaming.
03:10So the scenario of gaming on this device and using that secondary screen for something is cool.
03:16It sounds great on paper, but I just found that it was difficult to actually make it a worthwhile experience.
03:20I think most people are better off buying a regular gaming laptop,
03:23and then plugging up a secondary screen to their device.
03:26So with all three scenarios, I found video editing to take advantage of this bottom screen the most readily.
03:31But it's still not a perfect situation.
03:33The biggest issue is the angle of the screen.
03:36It's not, like, when you're viewing from top, it's weird to kind of glance down,
03:40and then back up to whatever you're looking at.
03:42So you really need to run just secondary info on that bottom screen.
03:46I do kind of wish that this screen would pop up a little bit.
03:49Like, there's already a bit of lift from the Ergolift mechanism,
03:51but I wish it would just tilt up a few degrees more so you could see it more easily.
03:55But that's what we have.
03:57Now, speaking of Ergolift, when you open and close this laptop,
04:00there is a mechanism to raise the back of the laptop to help with airflow.
04:05So this screen, just by nature of its position,
04:08makes it more difficult to cool this device than a regular gaming laptop,
04:12because this screen is sitting on top of the hottest components.
04:15The CPU and GPU are right underneath here.
04:18And to compensate for that, they have to do this Ergolift system,
04:21and they're pulling air from the sides and underneath the laptop to cool this.
04:24They've done an adequate job.
04:26When I'm running renders, there's no thermal throttling.
04:28But when I'm playing games, after like 40 minutes, it does throttle a little bit.
04:33Granted, this is not a gaming laptop, and this is just an engineering sample,
04:36but I actually think they could have run these fans a little bit harder.
04:39It's a pretty quiet system, even on load.
04:41Okay, just a quick review for the rest of the device.
04:43It's a 15-inch laptop, but it's not super thin.
04:46For a performance laptop, it's on the thicker side,
04:49but it's the secondary screen and the way they have to cool this thing
04:51because of that screen that gives it that extra thickness.
04:54The screens are really nice.
04:56The top is an OLED panel, the bottom is an IPS panel.
05:00If you're worried about OLED burn-in, like we've seen on phones,
05:03I don't think it's as big of an issue on laptop screens.
05:06Maybe they're not running them as bright,
05:08but the few burn-in tests that I've run on these devices,
05:10I'm not seeing any issues.
05:12So I feel relatively confident purchasing OLED screens right now.
05:15The keyboard is shifted down.
05:17Obviously, they've done this to fit that secondary screen.
05:20The typing experience is okay.
05:22They include a wrist rest, but even typing without that wrist rest is perfectly fine.
05:25It's just that the keystrokes are a little bit shallow.
05:28They're 1.4 millimeter travel.
05:30The trackpad's on the right, and this is something you have to get used to,
05:33but I think most people using this device are going to be running an external mouse.
05:37So battery life on this system, I was hitting four hours, a little bit less than that.
05:41It's a 71 watt-hour battery. It's not a huge battery.
05:44And I'll be honest, I thought the battery life would be shorter,
05:46but four hours is not bad.
05:48On the inside, you also have access to the Wi-Fi card.
05:51It's running the new Intel Wi-Fi 6 chip,
05:54and you also have access to the NVMe, but the RAM is soldered on,
05:57so you have to figure out at the time of purchase how much RAM you want,
06:00because you cannot upgrade that on this system.
06:02The port selection is also fair.
06:04There's two USB-As, one Thunderbolt 3, and that's basically it.
06:07There's also an HDMI port, but in terms of USB connectivity, it's just those three.
06:11It's usable, but for a laptop that's geared towards creatives,
06:14I would have liked to have seen an extra port, or maybe two.
06:17The speakers sound nice, though. It's a Zenbook. They often have good speakers.
06:20Now, if you're looking at this device, and you're wondering,
06:23should I actually get this?
06:25Like, is this something that's going to fit my workflow?
06:27The one kind of suggestion that I would have is,
06:30if you're someone that could benefit from extra screen real estate on your laptop,
06:35then consider this, but keep in mind that because the screen is on a weird viewing angle,
06:41you need to be someone whose workflow doesn't require both of your screens
06:45to have perfect viewing angles.
06:47This bottom screen is useful, but it's best when you put secondary information in it,
06:52or some kind of, like, reference material, or stuff that is important,
06:55but not as important as the stuff that's on your main display.
06:58So, reviewing a product like this is difficult,
07:01because when you put your mindset into the average user that might actually consider this,
07:06usually there's no, like, learning curve when it comes to using a product.
07:10But for something like this, you actually have to sit down and, like,
07:14if I bought this thing, if I spent the money to buy this device,
07:17I would spend the time to customize my workflow and customize my workspace
07:21to make it fit this dual-screen device.
07:23But if you don't do that, it's difficult to really maximize the usability of this thing.
07:28Like, you do need to learn its nuances and figure out how it'll fit into your workflow
07:32to make this device really worth the money.
07:34But if you can make it fit, I think, for those people, it's a cool device.
07:38Okay, hope you guys enjoyed this video.
07:39Thumbs if you liked it, subs if you loved it.
07:41See you guys next time.
07:47Transcribed by https://otter.ai