Video: Asus ZenBook Flip UX360CA Review

The ASUS ZenBook FLIP UX360CA is ASUS latest entry in the popular but crowed convertible laptops market. The ZenBook Flip is a thin and light laptop that the screen folders around making it into a tablet. Priced at £699 how does it compare with other convertibles on the market?

Design

The outside of the ZenBook is aluminium which has premium feel to it. At 13.9mm it feels, actually it is just a fraction thicker that my Surface Pro 4 which is surprising given it has “proper” keyboard. The screen folds right around so you can use it as tablet. It weighs 1.3kg which light enough to use it as a tablet despite it having a 13.3 inch screen. As well as using it as a laptop and tablet you can fold the screen around into presentation mode.

Once you open up the laptop it doesn’t have the same premium feel that the outside does. The keys are the island type that have a small amount of travel, the problem with the keyboard is that it flexes as you type so feels more like a budget device. Having said that there is no problem typing on the device and I found I could type quickly on it.

The precision trackpad is large and supports Windows 10’s multi-touch gestures, so you can setup three and four finger actions as well as supporting touch scrolling.

Screen

The IPS screen is 13.3 inch and supports multi-touch (10 touch points). It runs at 1920 x 1080 which by today’s standards is a little disappointing. I found the colours a little bit washed out so the blacks end up dark grey, it could be the way the touchscreen layer is bonded to the display, overall the screen is not the devices strongest point.

Specs

The processor in the Flip is a Skylake Intel Core M3-6Y30 processor with 8GB RAM and 128GB SSD drive. This combination of RAM, processor and SSD drive means that Windows 10 runs really well, Microsoft Edge is quick, switching apps is fast and there are no problems running multiple apps at the same time. It isn’t a gaming machine but it would be ok for light games and even a bit of photo editing. The sound is good considering the weight of the device, it not particularly loud and there isn’t a lot of bass but good enough for the size.

ASUS says that the battery should last 12 hours, I found it was more like 10 to 11 hours in the real world which is very impressive.

Connectivity

There are plenty of connectivity options on the UX360CA, there is a USB C port which is USB 3.1 (not Thunderbolt 3), Micro HDMI, two USB 2 ports, full sided SD card slot, headphone and power. Included in the box is a USB Network adapter and MicroHDMI to standard HDMI adapter. It has 802.11ac Wifi and Bluetooth 4.1 support.

Verdict

The UX360CA is a strong competitor in the two in one convertible space, the strong points are thin aluminium design and good all-around performance. The down sides are the average keyboard and washed out screen. If you want well designed, lightweight traditional style laptop with the option of using it as a tablet then this would be an ideal devices. In this price range you could also look at the MIIX 700 which is tablet first and laptop 2^nd but has slightly better specs (see my review). If you are not bothered about the tablet features then you should look at the none touch versions of the ZenBook.
Here is my video review: