ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 Review - Quick Verdict
The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is an ultrabook from ASUS that comes with all the essential specs you’d want to see in an ultrabook. With a stunning display, powerful internals, and day-long battery life, this laptop is a perfect fit for mid-range and even some heavy users. Primarily, this isn’t a gaming device, but you still can do some light gaming here but that’s it. Overall, this laptop is a good choice if you’re looking for an affordably priced ultrabook that is almost perfect.
- Sturdy and durable build
- Extraordinary battery life
- SSD is both spacious and speedy
- Only light to mid-range gaming possible
Author's Rating
People love ultrabooks for the benefits they come with. They provide power, an excellent battery life, and they are super portable making them perfect for working on the go. Sadly, there are too many options on the market to choose from. In this ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 review, we are taking a look at this new ultrabook which stands apart from other models.
The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is a perfect example of an upper mid-range laptop. It fits all the criteria for an ultrabook and targets mid-range user who need some power to get through their everyday routine. The spec sheet is impressive without a doubt but how well does this laptop perform in real life? Is it worth your hard-earned money? Let’s find that out.
Design
The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 comes with a stunning design. The laptop comes in a shade they call the slate gray. It is a stealthy color and is something that makes the product look premium. The construction of the laptop is top-notch. Once you lift the laptop, you can feel that this laptop is made from premium materials.
One of the best things about this design is that they’ve fitted a 13″ laptop into a body that is much smaller. By doing this, they’ve made the laptop smaller in size making it more portable. With a weight of just 2.47 pounds, this is one of the lightest ultrabooks out there. You can easily take this with you wherever you go and work on the run without any problem.
The typing experience on the ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is decent. The keys come with a key travel of 1.4mm which is not bad for an ultrabook this thin. There is backlighting on the keyboard which makes it easier to use in dark places. The touchpad is also pretty good and picks up the responses nicely. There is also a fingerprint reader that allows you to login with a fingerprint rather than your password. This is neat as you can now login with a simple touch.
Overall, the ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is one of the well-designed ultrabooks out there.
ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 Specs
In the ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 laptop, we have a 13.3″ display that comes with a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels. A full HD resolution for this screen size means improved pixel density and it shows on the display. Both images and text on the screen are pleasantly sharp.
The display is excellent for media consumption. You can enjoy watching Netflix or Prime Video or any other platform of your choice on this laptop. Thanks to the IPS panel, the viewing angle on this display is fantastic. You get the same screen contents from any angle and that’s a great thing to have in any laptop.
The audio output in this model is pretty darn impressive. The low-distortion smart-amplifier technology boosts up the volume to about 3.5 times which gives you excellent volume without distorting the sound even at high volumes. The audio can easily fill a small to a medium-sized room which is great for casual content consumption.
Raw Performance
The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is powered by an Intel Core i5 8265U processor from the Whiskey Lake generation. This processor comes with 4 physical cores and has a base clock speed of 1.6GHz and a max clock speed of 3.9GHz. This Intel chip has a cache memory of 6MB which is pretty handy when doing simple tasks on the laptop.
The processor does well in terms of benchmarks. It gets a PassMark score of 7956 which puts this processor in the mid-range category. The processor can handle pretty much anything you throw at it. It can run through all your everyday tasks smoothly. It can also run heavy applications without any problems. So if you have to do something work heavy, you can rely on this Intel chip to get the job done.
The i5 8265U is complemented by 8 gigs of DDR4 RAM in the memory department. This memory is more than enough for most users. If you’re a mid-range user or a heavy user, you can use this memory up to its full potential. Or you can open up 5 tabs of Chrome, and the browser will take care of the rest (sorry, not sorry). On a serious note, most ultrabooks arrive with 8GB memory as a standard, and we have to say that ASUS stuck to the standard in this case.
Gaming and Storage
Ultrabooks are not for gaming. The same is true here as well. The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 comes with an integrated graphics card. The Intel Graphics HD 620 is the GPU here and with a really good memory to support, this GPU can reach the performance of an Nvidia GeForce 920M.
You may not be able to play some of the high-end games out there, but there is a lot of potential for light and mid-range gaming. If you’re interested in MMORPGs, then you’ll have a good time. If you want to play the latest and the greatest AAA titles, then you’re out of luck.
The storage on the ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is a 512GB PCIe SSD. Having a solid-state drive for storage is a great thing as it elevates the performance of the laptop. Here, ASUS has been generous with a 512GB SSD which should be enough for most ultrabook users.
Battery Life and Connectivity
The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 comes with excellent battery life. With light use, you can squeeze out more than 12 hours of battery life on this laptop. If you’re going to do some heavy, then the laptop will last for about 5 to 6 hours depending upon the work. Overall, the battery life is very impressive for any user out there.
The laptop comes with a wide selection of ports that cater to all kinds of users. There is a couple of USB 3.0 ports which probably that most used port these days for data transfer. If you want to take a trip to the future, there is a USB type C port as well. There is an HDMI port for high-end connectivity. If you use SD cards a lot, the SD card reader will come in handy. You also get the headphone jack as well. The laptop also supports wireless connectivity essentials like WiFi and Bluetooth.
Bottomline
The ASUS ZenBook 13 UX331FA-AS51 is a compact yet powerful ultrabook that doesn’t cost you a lot. You get enough power to get your job done with a battery life that is miles better than the competitors. Though this isn’t a gaming laptop, you still can do a bit of gaming. If you’re looking for a sleek, powerful and portable ultrabook at a reasonable price point, then this one is an excellent choice.