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REVIEW: Asus Vivobook S 16 delivers power efficiency with Ryzen AI

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Arthur Fuentes

ABS-CBN News

<div><span class="fr-img-caption fr-fic fr-dib" style="width:950px"><span class="fr-img-wrap"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1730864053929ASUS VIVOBOOK S 16.jpg" style="width:950px" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/><span class="fr-inner" style="text-align:left">The Asus Vivobook S 16 features the AMD &quot;Strix Point&quot; Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 chip that is more power efficient than previous x86 chips. <em>Arthur Fuentes, ABS-CBN News</em></span></span></span></div><p>MANILA - The Asus Vivobook S 16 is the Taiwanese tech giant’s first laptop featuring the much-awaited “Strix Point” processors from AMD.</p><p>Tech pundits had been raving over these new chips for months as they promised the power efficiency of Apple’s M-series chips, without compromising on app compatibility and gaming performance. So when Asus asked if we could review the Vivobook S 16 featuring the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 chipset, we immediately jumped at the opportunity. So did the Ryzen chip live up to the hype?</p><p>First, we need to talk about this laptop. The Vivobook S 16 is a Copilot+ notebook with unique AI features. This is a well-designed laptop with great build quality. Its slim aluminum body feels solid, with very little flex on the frame and keyboard. While it’s not exceptionally thin, it doesn’t feel very bulky either, weighing just 1.5 kilos. It shares the same design as its Snapdragon brother the S 15, which we reviewed a few weeks back. The design is admittedly not groundbreaking like Asus&#x27; Zenbook series but it is still good looking and more importantly very functional.</p><div><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1730865054835ASUS VIVOBOOK S 16 BACK.jpg" style="width:950px" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/></div><p>As the name implies, this laptop features a 16-inch screen, with a productivity-focused 16:10 aspect ratio. People who write, code or work with huge spreadsheets love this screen ratio as they can see more information vertically.</p><p>The OLED screen is also rated at 3.2k with a 3200x2000 pixel density and can go up to 600 nits peak brightness, with a 120Hz refresh rate. It’s bright, with vibrant colors, smooth action, and thin bezels.</p><p>It also has a huge trackpad that Asus packed with a few tricks that allow you to control the screen’s brightness and volume.</p><p>Its keyboard is decently clicky, with a satisfying depth and travel with each press. Users who need to work with a lot of numbers will also like its numeric keys on the right side.</p><p>But just like with the S 15, I found it odd that Asus would put RGB lighting on a silver-colored keyboard. I get the gamer aesthetic, but dark blue light emanating from whitish keys doesn’t really help you see the keys any better. Thankfully, it was easy enough to switch the backlighting to a neutral white.</p><p>It also comes with Dolby Atmos and Harman Kardon-certified speakers, which have very good sound quality, as long as you don’t turn up the volume to 100.  </p><p>People who need to use a lot of peripherals will also like the plethora of ports on this notebook:</p><ul style="padding-left:20px"><li>• 1 x USB4 (supports 4K UHD external displays and up to 40 Gbps data transfers)</li><li>• 1 x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-C</li><li>• 2 x USB 3.2 Gen 1 Type-A</li><li>• 1 x HDMI 2.1 (TMDS)</li><li>• 1 x MicroSD card reader</li><li>• 1 x Audio jack</li></ul><div style="line-height:1"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1730864365356ASUS VIVOBOOK S 16 PORTS.jpg" style="width:950px" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/></div><div style="line-height:1"><img src="https://od2-image-api.abs-cbn.com/prod/editorImage/1730865088535ASUS VIVOBOOK S 16 PORTS 2.jpg" style="width:950px" class="fr-fic fr-dib"/></div><p>Our review unit, the Vivobook S 16 M5606, came with 24 gigabytes of memory and 1 terabyte of storage. And of course, the star of laptop was the AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 w/ Radeon 890M  which was running at 2 GHz.</p><p>This is also a Copilot PC, which means it has AI capabilities not found in other laptops. Asus said these include:</p><ul style="padding-left:20px"><li>• Live Captions - which <span>gives subtitles in real time</span></li><li>• Cocreator - which lets users generate AI drawings with text prompts</li><li>• Windows Studio Effects - which improve lighting and blur distractions in the background during video calls</li><li>• Automatic Super Resolution - which upscales games in real time to deliver high-definition, high frame rate gaming</li></ul><div><br/></div><p>The fact that Asus was able to cram this much capability in a device weighing just 1.5 kilos is pretty incredible.</p><p>But now, about that “Strix Point” Ryzen chip.</p><div><br/></div><div><strong>REVENGE OF THE X86?</strong></div><p>After getting left in the dust by Apple Silicon in 2020, and with Snapdragon threatening to eat its cake, AMD, and later Intel, finally woke up about the need to make their chips not just more powerful, but also less power-hungry.</p><p>Strix Point was AMD’s answer to this challenge, and Asus claimed that with the Ryzen AI 9 chip, the Vivobook S 16 could go up to 14 hours on a single charge of its 75Wh battery.</p><p>This was still not quite the 18 hours claimed by Apple on its M3 laptops or even Asus’ own Vivobook S 15 Snapdragon variant, but it was close enough to get lots of people excited. After all, switching to Snapdragon presented compatibility problems with many apps, especially games, and AMD was a company that built its brand on gaming.</p><p>So did I get 14 hours? Not really, but I did get a full workday done without needing to charge. I got 8 to 9 hours depending on the number of things I was working on.</p><p>I work mostly on a browser --often with up to 30 tabs open at any one time, including 3 or 4 tabs on YouTube, several Facebook pages, websites of media, and online tools for writing and copyediting, and Spotify on the side. </p><p>After 7-8 hours of work, I would still have around 15-20 percent battery life, which is pretty good for a laptop, especially one with a 16-inch screen with the brightness set at 80 percent most of the time. People who do video editing, animation or other processor-intensive tasks may see a different battery performance.</p><p>I was hoping to test the laptop on some games, but I had to return the review unit before I could borrow game keys from friends but the presence of the AMD Radeon 890M graphics should give gaming performance a boost.</p><p>The Vivobook S 16 retails for P84,995 which may seem like a lot, but consider that Apple’s 15-inch Macbook Air with 24GB and just 512GB storage retails for P106,990. Bump it up to 1TB and the price hits P118,990.</p><p>For users of Windows laptops, 2024 has proven to be an exciting year as chipmakers seem to be finally delivering on power efficiency. Should you go for a Snapdragon or a Ryzen AI laptop? Snapdragon still leads in battery life so pick that if you absolutely need your notebook to stay unplugged for 12 hours. But if you want app compatibility, and want to play games, then AMD Ryzen is a better choice. </p><p>But wait! Intel also claims that its new Lunar Lake chips can go toe-to-toe with Qualcomm and AMD.</p>

<p>Tech pundits had been raving over these new chips for months as they promised the power efficiency of Apple’s M-series chips, without compromising on app compatibility and gaming performance.</p>

Tech pundits had been raving over these new chips for months as they promised the power efficiency of Apple’s M-series chips, without compromising on app compatibility and gaming performance.

REVIEW: Asus delivers a power-efficient x86 laptop with the Vivobook S 16 with Ryzen AI

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REVIEW: Asus delivers a power-efficient x86 laptop with the Vivobook S 16 with Ryzen AI

Arthur Fuentes,

ABS-CBN News

Published November 06, 2024 12:12 PM PHT

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Updated November 06, 2024 12:42 PM PHT

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