9.0
Score

We have not checked out ASUS’ bigger Zenbook from the past and this is the first time we are doing that. And that’s not all, the Zenbook S has finally gotten a new refresh since its debut two years ago. So, let’s check out this ASUS Zenbook S16 UM5606G Review.

ASUS Zenbook S16 UM5606G Review

Beautiful 16-inch Display

 Right off the bat, the one that caught my attention with this laptop is how big and beautiful the 16-inch display is. It’s amazing to note how think the bezels are and giving a much huge screen to body ratio in such a compact body. That said, this is their 3K OLED display with 16:10 aspect ratio with 120Hz refresh rate. So, say if it did have a dedicated GPU, well, this would be a fantastic display to play games on. But this laptop is not for that, its more for those who want a laptop for their creative and productive work.

In that case, personally, I do rely on Adobe suite, more specifically Premiere Pro and Lightroom. In this laptop, I do use Lightroom a lot more and for that, this display is pretty amazing. Not to mention, having touch screen also improves the productivity by a mile or so. In moments where I don’t want to use the trackpad, I could just touch the display and get my job done.

Lives up to the Thin and Light Build Quality

ASUS has this ethos for their newer Zenbook, which is this timeless design and I must say that I am a fan of that. The clean and bespoke finish fits into any room without any issues whatsoever. On the back, the laptop features a Ceraluminum coating which helps with scratch resistance (not scratchproof), and this material does give the laptop the premium finish it deserves.

Surprisingly lighter for a 16” at 1.5kg which is lovely and I have no qualms with that. For those who say this is heavy, well, I can say that its not easy to come by a laptop with this configuration under that weight and if you do, you best believe it has a lot of compromises.

AMD Ryzen AI 9 Processor is Pretty Efficient and Powerful

AMD has been amping up their processors on the laptops for a while now and the one we have here is the AMD Ryzen AI 9 465 with 10-cores and 20-threads with 50TOP NPU, and AMD Radeon iGPU. With that it also has 32GB LPDDR5X RAM, and this is soldered to the laptop, not upgradable. But 32GB is plenty for everyday use if you ask me.

Based on our benchmarks, which you can take a look above, the ASUS Zenbook S16 does not shy away from being a capable laptop for moderate work, which includes productivity, creativity (in fact, ASUS includes a 3-month free Adobe Suite subscription) and entertainment. For me personally, I see this laptop excelling in all that aspects very well. Now don’t expect this laptop to perform as good as, say, a laptop with NVIDIA or AMD dedicated GPU under the hood for graphical intense tasks. This is not what its designed for and if you want a laptop for that, you can go for the ProArt, TUF or even ROG.

The Zenbook S16, with its battery life is great to bring the laptop from your board room, to your desk to your car and to the airport without the need to worry about a lot of things. It charges via USB-C, so get yourself a good power bank that can handle high Wattage output and you got yourself a great laptop to bring on the move of course.

The Keyboard and Trackpad is Nice (With some Quirks)

The layout of the keyboard is rather centered so, I did have a little bit of a time to get used to, as I am not a fan of the empty space on the side, which I feel could have been a great spot to place speakers. Besides that, the chiclet styled keyboard is nice to type and the more square and rectangular shape of the keycaps is nice to look at and type on as well.

The trackpad is humongous and it’s the size of my hand. That said, the trackpad has Windows Precision and with MyASUS you get more gesture controls which is nice to have. I am not a fan of the clicks in this trackpad as it is rather stiff than well balanced. Especially when you click on the top end of it, its stiffer. Because of that, I did go to my external mouse time to time.

Fantastic Speakers though

If there’s one thing I know about ASUS laptops, is their Zenbooks have some really good speakers. This time they have been using Cirrus Logic Audio, more specifically the Cirrus Logic XU which is interesting. And these fire great sound for media consumption. I was on my bed and watching Netflix shows on this laptop – safe to say, with that good OLED display, the speaker really lived up to my expectations. Generally a lot of laptops have inferior speakers, but this one, man, what a treat.

Good Port Selection with a Proper SD Card Reader

Modern laptops like this ASUS Zenbook S16, no longer have legacy ports, instead, you get modern ports like USB4, well there are two in this case, HDMI 2.1 FRL, 3.5mm Headphone/Microphone Jack, a USB 3.2 Gen 2 and a prim and proper SD Card Reader 4.0.

The SD Card slot made me the most happy user because finding one in a laptop, and a fast speed one is hard and to see the ASUS Zenbook S16 feature one is a treat. So, for a photographer like myself, doing fieldwork, I know for a fact I can count on this laptop to not let me down in anyway possible.

But here’s where my Concern is

Priced at RM 7,999 at the time of launch for this ASUS Zenbook S16 UM5606G, I would say its well priced despite the current climate of how RAM and Storage is affecting the prices. But I have a bad feeling that this price might not be available for long because we are seeing spikes and increases with a lot of devices starting this May. So, if you are looking for this laptop at this price point, just get it before it sees a price spike and see prices like what the current Zephyrus laptops are at.

Although they aren’t the right laptops to compare the Zenbook to, but our point is that price hikes can happen anytime due to the shortage and just be prepared for whatever that’s about to happen.

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