Asus ZenBook 14X OLED AMD laptop in review: Lots of color, lots of battery life, low price

Asus bets on OLED: Many laptop series are equipped with an OLED display by default. It’s not only the high-end Zenbooks that are benefiting from more color and contrast, but also Vivobooks, such as the Vivobook Pro 14 M3401QC . This brings OLED and 3K/4K into lower price regions, and more manufacturers will follow suit.

Mid-range customers will start to seriously consider buying OLED when the difference to devices without OLED only amounts to 200 to 300 Euros (~$204 to ~$305). That said, Asus doesn’t present mid-range hardware and workmanship with the Zenbook 14X. The chassis is exceptionally solid and of high quality.

The input devices are first class, and performance with the Ryzen 7 ranks in the top subnotebook league – thanks to the 45-watt processor. The competition also has OLED, such as the Dell XPS 13 9310 OLED or the Lenovo Yoga Slim 7 Pro 14 , which also has a GeForce MX450 . In-house, there’s the almost identically built Zenbook 14X UX5400EA , which has an MX450 on board in its top configuration.

Since there aren’t that many OLED 14-inchers, we’ll also consider IPS opponents. The HP Envy 14-eb0010nr with an Intel processor and a GeForce GTX 1650 Ti Max-Q is probably the most interesting for gaming enthusiasts. The Vivobook Pro 14 M3401QC comes with a nominally more powerful RTX 3050 and OLED, but its case isn’t as slim and high quality as that of the Zenbook 14X.

Other Asus Zenbooks that we’ve reviewed: Asus Zenbook 14X OLED UX5400EA with Tiger Lake MX450 Asus ZenBook 14 UX435EG Tiger Lake MX450 IPS Asus ZenBook 13 OLED UX325EA Tiger Lake MX450 Asus Zenbook S13 OLED Ryzen 6800U The case is identical to the 14X Intel version, and there aren’t even any differences in terms of ports. Asus refrained from making the case as light as possible, but this resulted in a chassis that is resistant to torsion. The lid can’t be warped with regular force.

The lid’s aluminum back forms a seemingly indestructible unit with the built-in display panel. Pressure applied to the back or twisting attempts don’t have any effect on the screen. The solid quality continues with the hinges: The closed position is held magnetically to the base; the small gap above it can be pulled open with one finger.

After that, the hinges stay tightly in place, and nothing wobbles or shifts when carrying or lifting the device. The same applies to the base unit, which is completely made of aluminum, including the removable bottom cover. The keyboard doesn’t yield at any point, and the base itself is completely rigid.

With its 1. 406 kg, the Zenbook is one of the heavier subnotebooks. In the comparison field, it’s only surpassed by the HP Envy 14-eb0010nr with its 1.

6 kg. There’s a difference of 100 grams compared to the average of the lighter 14- and 13-inchers. In return, however, you get a sturdier base.

The thinnest model in the comparison is the Dell XPS 13 9310 OLED at 14. 8 mm and only 1. 2 kg.

The Zenbook 14X is averagely thin at 17 mm, but Asus isn’t setting new standards with it. The AMD version doesn’t have Thunderbolt ports, but externally, the ports look the same. The two Type-C ports support DisplayPort, which means that three displays can theoretically be connected, since there’s also HDMI.

In practice, however, this won’t be the case because one Type-C will be blocked by the power adapter. There’s no longer a hollow connector for a power adapter. The microSD reader performs averagely, but not as well as in the Dell XPS.

We use the AV PRO microSD 128 GB V60 for testing. The Intel AX200 Wi-Fi module is plugged in, and it could even be exchanged. We didn’t experience any connection problems between the brand-new Asus GT-AXE11000 Wi-Fi 6 router and our Zenbook.

Speeds were above average for this chip. The Intel version has an AX201 on board, but it’s soldered. The E-Shutter webcam creates low-resolution and noisy 720p images, even under the best lighting conditions.

E-shutter means that the camera is switched off electrically when the corresponding F key is pressed. Unfortunately, you can’t detect this visually at the camera lens like with mechanical shutters, which show a red “curtain”. However, quality isn’t any better among the competition, as the Dell XPS 13 shows.

The accessories consist of the 100-watt power adapter, a USB Type-A Ethernet dongle, as well as a sleeve for the device. A digitizer pen with a battery and replaceable tips – like with the Intel version of the 14X – isn’t included with the AMD version. The Intel and AMD versions of the Zenbook are currently always equipped with a touchscreen.

Loosen the screws, open a gap at the front, and you can remove the bottom cover. The Wi-Fi module, battery, and SSD can be replaced, while the RAM is onboard. Asus grants a two-year Pickup & Return warranty in Germany.

The matte, anti-slip keys have a distinctive pressure point, a moderate travel, and a firm stroke. Typing is almost silent. Working in dark environments is possible thanks to the three-stage white backlight.

A bit of dexterity is required for the arrow keys, which are unusually small for the benefit of the shift key. The key spacing is quite large by laptop standards (2. 5 mm), as the entire width of the base is used here.

The right side even has enough space for Page Up/Down and Home/End – an accomplished layout for practical use. The keyboard’s firm base is a very positive aspect; nothing yields here, not at any point. All in all, the result is a spacious keyboard that only lags a bit behind business professionals when it comes to its pressure point.

It’s definitely possible to type quickly on the Zenbook. Asus complements the keyboard with a numpad that can be enabled on the ClickPad. The ClickPad is sensitive up to the edges, and it has a short travel.

It operates with a dull, quiet noise. The matte surface is smooth, just bordering on slippery. It guides fingers comfortably.

We find the short travel to be unsatisfactory, though. The main argument for buying the Zenbook 14X is its 14-inch OLED panel. Samsung delivers a WQXGA+ panel with 2,880×1,800 pixels (16:10).

With a refresh rate of 90 Hz and a response time of 2 milliseconds, the display surpasses any IPS panel. It also promises 100% of the DCI-P3 color gamut, something that we can also confirm through our measurements. Asus reports a brightness of 400 nits, while we measured 366 cd/m² on average and a maximum of 372 cd/m².

Nits and cd/m² are converted 1:1, so the manufacturer’s advertised brightness is narrowly missed. The brightness is homogeneously distributed, which is typical for OLEDs (97% brightness distribution). High brightness is harmful for OLED displays anyways, so you shouldn’t use it continuously.

Asus responds to the issue of burn-in with an OLED screensaver that can’t be disabled. It turns on after 15 minutes. Users can deactivate the screensaver after assessing the risk (warning notice).

This is exclusively possible via the personal MyAsus settings . This forces the user to create an account. The screen-to-body ratio is 92％; that’s very little bezel around a lot of display.

The Samsung panel uses DC dimming to reduce brightness. This behavior can also be adjusted in MyAsus. As expected, the OLED display exhibits an outstanding contrast (∞:1); blacks are deep black, and colors are vibrant.

As is typical for OLEDs, response times are also excellent. MyAsus handles the matters of color and OLED. We determined the DeltaE values of the grayscale and colors to be 2.

5 and 2. 9, respectively, before calibration – these are good rates because they’re below 3. 0.

Calibration doesn’t improve the results. PWM for brightness reduction is used at 360 Hz for brightness levels from 0 to 5 (for 10, see upper and lower images); above that, DC dimming is used (no image, line instead of waves). This technology is an alternative to PWM, where pixels are switched off for a short time.

DC dimming reduces voltage, which is why the pixel emits less brightness. Below 60% brightness, DC dimming would cause a significant deterioration of color reproduction, which is why the OLED panel uses PWM here (360 Hz). Sensitive users might be affected by this, although we rarely set the brightness below 60% in practice.

In a normal office environment with daylight, we used a brightness of 70%-80%. The user can adjust the display’s dimming level with the “Flicker-free OLED dimming” option. The glare-type surface suffers from reflections outdoors, and even the good brightness doesn’t help much.

The panel can be used well in shady areas, also because the brightness isn’t reduced on battery power (363 cd/m² at the center of the screen). Without a doubt, the viewing angles of OLED panels are the best available. Colors remain stable even from flat angles, and the brightness doesn’t lose intensity.

The Ryzen 7 5800H is a processor for large laptops, but that doesn’t stop Asus from putting it in a 14-inch device. However, the processor enjoys the luxury of a dual fan, which is unusual for laptop SOCs that don’t have dedicated graphics. The chip includes eight Zen 3 cores running at up to 4.

4 GHz. The 5800H is the only chip option, excluding the Intel version. Even the 16 GB of RAM (onboard) and the 512 GB SSD seem to be standard; there are no other options.

Three different performance modes can be selected in the MyASUS app. Performance mode, Standard mode, and Whisper mode are available here. Performance mode is only available with an external power source.

Depending on the test requirements, we selected different performance modes. In this way, the benchmarks were performed in Performance mode. The battery endurance under load and the energy measurements under average load were carried out in Standard mode.

Whisper mode was selected for the battery runtime measurement and the idle energy measurements. The maximum energy consumption was measured in Performance mode. All three performance modes were also tested for noise emissions.

The AMD Ryzen 7 5800H is a powerful mobile processor with eight cores and 16 threads. In everyday use, the Ryzen 7 can easily handle all loads. In the performance benchmarks, the processor shows the high multi-core performance that typical for AMD, while it’s on par with Intel’s processors in single-core benchmarks.

In this respect, the AMD processor maintains its high performance even under prolonged load, as the Cinebench R15 loop shows. However, there are some laptops with the AMD Ryzen 7 5800H in our database that draw more performance from the processor (-8% compared to the average). In this Zenbook, the Ryzen 7 is allowed to run at 45 watts even over longer distances, depending on the performance mode.

On battery power, the system only allows the processor to run at 24 watts. According to PCMark 10, the Zenbook 14X is at the very top in terms of application performance, and it can even take the top spot in productivity ahead of the AMD Ryzen 9 and the XPS 13. This isn’t necessarily due to the Intel 670p SSD, as the following section on the SSD will show.

The latency test with LatencyMon resulted in a latency of slightly less than two milliseconds. Therefore, the laptop is capable of handling real-time applications in our tested hardware and software configuration. Only one frame was dropped during the playback of our 4K 60 Hz YouTube test video.

The built-in Intel 670p SSD ranks in the midfield. In our benchmarks table of SSDs and HDDs, the Intel SSD takes one of the lower places. The built-in Vega 8 iGPU is one of the more powerful iGPUs, and it can bring many games smoothly onto the screen – at low resolutions and settings.

Running at maximum speed (1,900 MHz) for a long time is possible – this is shown in our The Witcher 3 test. However, this only applies when the “Performance mode” profile is active and the laptop is plugged in. The benchmark results correspond to the average of the Vega 8 iGPU that we’ve determined so far.

The FPS drops to its knees in modern titles like Ghostwire Tokyo , where playable rates aren’t even possible at low settings. Things look different in older titles; at best, 25 to 35 FPS is possible when using Medium settings at Full HD resolution. The Radeon iGPU’s performance is average for its design.

Users who aren’t satisfied with that can consider the Intel 14X sibling model with the MX450, or the Asus Vivobook Pro 14 M3401QC , which isn’t as slim, but it does come with an OLED panel. Regardless of this being a gaming device or not, we tested the iGPU’s stability once. The Witcher 3 runs at Full HD resolution and Ultra settings in a loop here.

We unplug the laptop halfway through the test. At first, the iGPU constantly allows itself its 2,000 MHz clock rate, which is accompanied by a moderate temperature of 62 °C (~144 °F). The clock rate has to drop on battery power, even in Performance mode.

It now fluctuates between 1,400 and 1,800 MHz. The Zenbook doesn’t generate an excessive amount of noise over the entire load range. The fan is silent in everyday use (office, Internet), and there’s no noise.

This also applies to Performance mode, so users don’t have to be constantly switching back and forth. The sound pressure level rises up to 45 dB(A) under load – that’s a bit louder than the Intel version. Positive: It takes a relatively long time for the fan to kick in at all.

Noise development under load can be reduced by using the “Whisper mode” performance profile – at the expense of processing power. However, the drop in performance is small as we saw above in the PCMarks. The temperatures are within the green zone in everyday use (office, Internet).

During the stress test, the temperatures increases in certain areas. The dual fans do a good job; they draw air in above the keyboard and blow the waste heat out of the case through the right and left sides. This way, the palm rest always remains cool.

The CPU and GPU begin the stress test (Prime95 and FurMark) at 3. 5 GHz and 930 MHz, respectively. In this case, the priority is on the CPU, and the iGPU has to take a back seat when there are bottlenecks.

As the test progresses, the clock rates drop to 2. 7 GHz (CPU), while the iGPU stays at 900 MHz. The stress test represents an extreme scenario.

We use this test to check whether the system remains stable under full load. The Zenbook delivers volume, a certain amount of lows and basses, and it reproduces highs in a balanced way. The small speakers sit under the palm rest to the right and left and use the surface as a reflector.

In this respect, sound is better on the hard surface of a table than on a carpet. The dual-array microphone picks up voices without noise, which is ideal for video calls and conferences. The maximum idle power consumption is 11 watts, which is on par with other OLED devices.

Among other things, the maximum achievable brightness plays a role here, which is lower in our Zenbook than in the Yoga Slim or the Dell XPS 13. Unfortunate: The OLED-forced screensaver causes an unnecessarily high extra consumption of 6-8 watts in idle. The Witcher 3 Ultra, i.

e. maximum gaming load, is 54 watts, which is due to the moderately powerful iGPU. There’s no peak at the beginning in graphics load, but there is for the processor part of the stress test with Prime95 and FurMark.

The 100-watt power adapter isn’t overtaxed during maximum load in the stress test. We measure 81 watts for a very short time at the start, and it then settles at 65-70 watts. Power consumption with an external monitor shows one thing across the board: The SoC allows itself a 5-second peak of 80-85 watts at the start during CPU load, and then it constantly drops to 60-65 watts.

Such a high initial kick-off isn’t observed in the Intel Core i7-1185G7 (Dell XPS 13, Zenbook 14X Intel). The 14-incher achieves a runtime of a good 8 hours in our real-world Wi-Fi test. A script is used to reproduce the load caused by accessing websites.

The Intel version doesn’t last as long: 5:30 hours with the same capacity. This is a very good result for an OLED 14-incher; other OLED models last 20% to 30% less. The AMD version of the ZenBook 14X OLED (UM5401QA-XXX) maintains the success of the Intel version , but it focuses on the price.

The result is a high-quality entry-level ZenBook for around 1,000 Euros (~$1,022) that offers significantly longer battery life with an identical display and build quality. The case, input devices, and ports are identical to the Intel version except for the lack of Thunderbolt. The Intel version has the advantage of Thunderbolt 4 and a small dedicated MX450 GPU.

This allows games to run a bit more smoothly. The processing power leaves the Intel counterpart behind; the Ryzen APU has more boost and a higher constant processing power during longer periods of time. This comes along with higher volume under load – but this can be adjusted using the performance modes provided by Asus.

If desired, the Zenbook 14X AMD can be as quiet as a whisper, even during high activity. The performance losses due to conservative settings are low. Users who opt for the Zenbook 14X will get a lot of display coupled with strong 45-watt processing power, and a sturdy, high-quality build.

As before, we have to criticize the mandatory account for MyAsus: Users who don’t register for one can’t access essential performance, battery, and OLED settings. This is the only place where Performance mode can be activated, and the only place where we could disable the annoying OLED screensaver. For 300 Euros (~$306) more, there’s the entry-level Intel version of the Zenbook 14X without a dGPU, but it already comes with a Core i7 and 512 GB of storage.

If you want the MX450, you’ll have to spend a minimum of 1,800 Euros (~$1,833). This big leap in price makes the AMD version (UM5401QA-XXX) interesting, even if Thunderbolt isn’t included. If OLED doesn’t play a big role, then powerful 14-inchers like the Asus Zenbook 14 UX435EG (MX450) or the HP Envy 14-eb0010nr (GTX 1650 Ti Max-Q) come into question, where the Envy 14 has the better IPS display and the best graphics card by far in the comparison field.

At the time of writing, the Asus Zenbook 14X OLED AMD model doesn’t seem to be available within the US. Nonetheless, you can browse similar models, including the Intel version, on Amazon or Best Buy , for example. .