Asus had its press event away from the Messe, as usual and called it ‘The Edge of Beyond’. It was introduced by corporate VP, Eric Chen. The company was an innovator in 2in1 systems, with Intel and has worked to make even thinner devices.
Asus wants to be a design innovator and the world is changing from physical content (like books) to digital content to, now, virtual content. Asus is a partner with Microsoft and Peter Han of the company joined Chen on the stage to talk about the new ‘Mixed Reality’ headsets which will arrive with the “Creator’s update”. Asus will have a new HMD at that time. There are new PC specs for Mixed Reality and there will be new PCs from Asus to match those. These will be called Windows Mixed Reality and Mixed Reality Ultra PCs.
Later in the event the new Mixed Reality headset (HC102) was announced. Asus said it chose Microsoft as a partner because of the easy set up with no need for trackers. The displays are said to have ‘3K’ resolution which means 1440 x 1440 per eye with 100 cd/m2 of brightness over a 2.89″ diagonal and with 90Hz refresh. The company said it chose a ‘3D polygon’ design and it also highlighted the comfort of the headset which weighs less than 400g and is spread across the forehead, rather than the face or nose. The material in contact with the face is breathable and anti-bacterial. You can flip the headset back to the ‘real world’. More new MR headsets will be launched. The pricing for the headset will be €449.
Shawn Yen, the Product Director of Asus then came on to talk about some new products. First was “the world’s thinnest high end convertible laptop’ the ZenBook Flip S (UX370UA) which weighs 1.1kg and is 10.9mm thick. Based on an 8th gen Intel Core i7 (apparently with 1GB of SSD, but we think this should be 1TB!). The ‘Ergolift’ hinge raises the back of the unit when the display is pushed back in notebook mode. It has a 13.3” FullHD or UltraHD ‘Nanoedge’ display with Gorilla Glass protection and 100% sRGB colour. The bezel width is quoted at 6.11mm. There are dual USB Type-C ports for charging, data and DisplayPort Alt Mode. A fingerprint sensor is mounted on the side.
The ZenBook Flip 14 is said to be the world’s thinnest and lightest convertible with discrete graphics and uses Nvidia MX150 graphics (GTX 1050) and an 8th gen core i7 processor. That will help with photo editing and video processing. It is 13.9mm thick and weighs 1.4kg and uses a 14″ FullHD touchscreen in a 13.3″ chassis with 80% display surface. It is claimed to have 13 hours of battery life. There is a 15 minute fast charge that will get the system back to use for two hours. Pricing will start from €799.
The ZenBook Flip 15 is the “bigger brother” and offers UltraHD on the bigger screen as an alternative to FullHD. Contrast is claimed at 1500:1. Again it has GTX 1050 graphics and will cost from €899.
The Asus VivoBook Flip 14 that is a 360 deg design with a full metal chassis which is 15.4mm thick and weighs 1.5kg. The bezels on the 14″ display are 8mm and that gives a 74% display to body ratio. It is a fanless design with a pen for Windows Ink. Few other details were released at this time. Pricing will be from €399.
Although not covered in the press conference, the company announced a new gaming notebook and monitor at the show.
The ROG Chimera (G703) notebook is for gaming and has a 17.3″ 144Hz refresh display (G-Sync) that is said to have a 7ms response time (grey to grey) The processor is a core i7 unit and the graphics are high end with GTX 1080 included. There’s a video here. https://youtu.be/bHbXdCws3_s More details of the notebook are still to be released.
The ROG Strix XG35VQ is a curved monitor with 3440 x 1440 resolution in a 21:9 35″ format and with support for 100Hz refresh via FreeSync. Response time is quoted at 4ms and brightness is 300 cd/m2 with support for 100% of eRGB and 2,500:1 contrast from the VA panel. It has coloured LEDs on the rear that can react to in game audio as well as coordinating with the system board and keyboard LEDs. There is a USB hub with two connections and HDMI 2.0, 1.4 and DisplayPort 1.2 inputs. The monitor was first shown at Computex in Taiwan and will be available later this year at €800 to €900.
This is Asus’ first FreeSync-based 21:9 monitors
