CES 2022: Asus ROG renews its laptops and releases a Windows gaming tablet

The Asus ROG Flow Z13 is a 13.4-inch Windows 11 tablet with a detachable keyboard, or a laptop PC with a detachable keyboard depending on your point of view. The Taiwanese manufacturer offers two definitions for the 16:10 touchscreen: 4K at 60 Hz or QHD at 120 Hz, with a brightness of 450 cd / m² for the first option and 500 cd / m² for the second. The panel also benefits from a protective Gorilla Glass treatment.

Under the hood, Asus takes advantage of the latest news from its partners. And in particular the Alder Lake architecture from Intel, with an Intel Core i9 12900H (14C / 20T) processor with a TDP of 45 W. For the graphics part, the ROG Flow Z13 is equipped with the RTX 3050 Ti GPU of Nvidia with a 40 W TGP. DDR5 type RAM is part of the game, with 32 GB onboard and 1 TB of storage supporting the PCIe 4.0 standard.

To boost the performance of its ROG Flow Z13, Asus has an asset called XG Mobile. In sedentary use, it is thus possible to connect the manufacturer’s external graphics card to it via a specific port. At Nvidia, a GeForce RTX 3080 is available, while a new version of the ROG XG Mobile arrives with an AMD Radeon RX 6850M XT.

Asus provides a detachable keyboard similar to the one offered with Microsoft’s Surface. What to consider different scenarios of use: classic laptop thanks to the integrated kickstand, tablet, or even powerful gaming station with an external screen and the connected ROG XG Mobile.

The connection includes a Thunderbolt 4 port, a USB-C port, a USB port, and a microSD card reader. A port dedicated to ROG XG Mobile is also present on the lower left edge of the tablet. Finally, wifi 6E completes the connectivity of the tablet.

Side measurements, the ROG Flow Z13 displays a thickness of 1.29 cm for 1.1 kg without keyboard but with its kickstand. Count a little less than 5 mm more and 350 g more once the keyboard is assembled. This model will be available during the first quarter from € 1,499.

Update of the entire range

The rest of the ROG laptop line is undergoing component renewal following announcements from AMD, Intel and Nvidia.

Thus, the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16, a dual-screen gaming laptop, revises its opening kinematics. The new hinges now allow the lower screen to be brought closer to the upper screen to become almost one. Asus also took advantage of this modification to offer a mini-Led panel (depending on the configuration) displaying 2,560 x 1,600 pixels at 165 Hz on the main panel.

The processor and graphics card also evolve with, respectively, an AMD Ryzen 6000, the Ryzen 9 6980HX, and a GeForce RTX 3080 Ti (150 W) from Nvidia in the most muscular configuration. The ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 will be on sale during the first quarter from € 2,999.

Like the Zephyrus Duo 16, the ROG Strix Scar 15 and 17 as well as the Zephyrus M16 now feature Intel processors of 12^e generation, accompanied by the new Nvidia GPUs. While the ROG Strix G15 and G17, the ROG Zephyrus G15 and ROG Flow X13 host Ryzen 6000 from AMD, still with Nvidia GPUs.

Note that the ROG Zephyrus G14, the 14-inch gaming laptop PC equipped with its AniMe Matrix cover made up of nearly 15,000 perforations and 1,449 LEDs, joins the AMD Advantage fold. It is now equipped with an AMD Ryzen 9 6900HS processor and an AMD Radeon RX 6800S graphics card with a 105 W TGP. Its price starts at 1,599 € for availability during the first quarter.

Asus is taking advantage of this renewal to integrate 6E wifi and a MUX switch into its ROG laptops, which provides the best performance from dedicated graphics cards (the signal no longer passes through the iGPU of the processor), while saving battery life. once the PC is disconnected. A more than welcome development.