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Keyboard and Trackpad
Asus ZenBook UX430 comes equipped with a full-sized backlit keyboard which I really liked. The keyboard is a delight to type on. It provides a nice feedback which is important when you're typing all day long. The keys are at an average distance of around 1.4mm and in my usage, key travel was not a problem. There are three levels of backlit brightness one can choose from. The keys are well built and the overall feel when typing on the keyboard is amazing.
Below the keyboard lies the trackpad which is made out of glass resulting in a glossy finish, different from the chassis. The trackpad accepts touch input accurately and smoothly, although one could need to get adapted to sliding fingers on such a surface. A fingerprint sensor is embedded into the trackpad which in my opinion is just the right place to place one in a laptop. A nifty little feature through which a user can log into Windows quickly and securely. The sensor recognises fingerprints in a jiffy and in my usage it never lagged in unlocking the laptop.
Here’s how the Asus Zenbook 3 performed in our suite of benchmark tests:
3DMark: Sky Diver: 5,394; Fire Strike Extreme: 720; Cloud Gate: 6,862
PCMark 10 (Advanced Edition): 2,966 points
Performance
Asus ZenBook UX430UQ packs in Intel’s Kaby Lake 7th generation Core i7-7500U processor clocked at 2.7GHz with Turbo Boost up to 3.5GHz. A variant with Core i5-7200U is also available which costs tad a bit lower.
The UX430UN comes with a discrete NVIDIA GeForce MX150 2GB graphics chipset while UX430UA just has Intel HD Graphics 620 integrated onboard. Our review unit, the UX430UQ came in with a dedicated NVIDIA GeForce 940MX graphics.
This setup is backed further by 8GB/16GB DDR4 RAM soldered on the board along with 256GB/512GB M.2 SSD. Ours was the variant with 8GB of RAM and 512GB SSD, a perfect combination in my opinion for the kind of tasks we needed to carry around with this one.
In my daily usage, the UX430 cut through anything and everything that is thrown at it. Be it multitasking, switching between apps, writing or editing photos on Photoshop, the laptop fared easily throughout the day.
As for the onboard NVIDIA GeForce 940MX GPU, it performs moderately but wasn't be able to handle too much gaming needs and you will be disappointed if that's a requirement. Part of that has to do with the fact that this GPU is not quite the powerful beast one can expect to run some high-demanding titles. The benchmarks confirmed the same. The other thing is that the metallic body gets really hot, hot enough that you might refrain from keeping it on your lap. This is when I didn't run some graphics intensive game; I played the good ol’ humble Need For Speed: Most Wanted.
The ZenBook UX430 also comes with two stereo speakers placed below the deck, something that I personally am not a fan of. The speakers are backed by Harman Kardon and are above average in performance. The sound output, if listening to in a noise-free room is good but isn’t audible much when placed in a bit of a noisy environment.
The 720p HD webcam present on the ZenBook is pretty decent if put in well-lit conditions. In low-light, the pictures are marred by grains which is a bit of a low-point.
Battery life
The ZenBook UX430 draws power from a 50Wh battery which isn't that bad. In normal usage, the battery performs well but anything close to gaming, it will only disappoint. On an average, the ZenBook lasted me throughout 8-9 hours and then some. This usage includes WiFi switched on all the time, heavy browsing, occasional video streaming and music playback.
Bringing in gaming into the picture, the battery life on the ZenBook dropped severely to just 1 hour 30 minutes-2 hours.
The laptop comes with a 65W power adapter which was able to fully charge it in around 2 hours. The adapter is lightweight and carrying it around isn't a hassle.
We liked
The display on the ZenBook is beautiful. One could just put up landscape shots on it and watch endlessly. It's that good. As the company has given preference to portability, the laptop's sleek profile and lightweight come as a plus to the overall design and feel.
We disliked
Call it my pet peeve or something else, but the heat management could have been a lot better. This is an area Asus should seriously consider revamping. The ZenBook falls short of a powerful GPU as well and even though it is not portrayed as a gaming laptop, when you're spending that much on a laptop it better let you play occasionally.
Final Verdict
Asus ZenBook UX430 is for anyone looking to buy a premium laptop without gaming as a priority. Students, professionals, and people who spend a lot of time with in front of their machines, case in point yours truly, it's for them. Asus has done a great job creating one fine looking laptop that oozes glamour and carries good enough hardware to get power hungry tasks done. Its flaws are something that personally, I would have ignored in lieu of the premium build quality, portability, and a good performance if I were buying one.
