Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 review: a powerful gaming laptop with a unique design and a premium price tag

• Asus has launched the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 gaming laptop in India.
• The premium gaming laptop is priced starting at ₹4,29,990 in the country.
• Here’s my review of the Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 that will help you decide whether you should buy the device.

Taiwanese giant Asus has launched the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 (2023), India’s latest flagship gaming laptop with the popular dual screen design. The laptop is a premium offering from the company in its ROG lineup and is aimed at gamers and content creators.

The ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 is feature-packed and comes with top-of-the-line hardware, including the Ryzen 9 7945HX processor and up to NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 graphics with the top-end variant.

I have been using the Zephyrus Duo 16 with the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 graphics for a few days now, and here is my detailed review of the latest premium gaming laptop from Asus.

Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 price and availability

The Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 is priced starting at ₹4,29,990 and will be available from Amazon, Flipkar, Asus online store, Reliance Digital, Croma, Vijay Sales and authorised Asus retail stores across the country.

Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 specifications

Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 pros and cons

Pros

• Excellent design and build quality.
• Dual screen display, with a 240Hz primary display.
• Impressive gaming performance and audio.

Cons

• Bulky and difficult to carry.
• Expensive
• Battery life

Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 design

The Asus ROG Duo 16 comes with an identical design as its predecessor and not much has changed in terms of design. Then again, the design is anyway very unique and there’s still no alternative of the same in the market.


The laptop features an all-black design, which makes the RGB effects on the keyboard that much better. Just like its predecessor, the laptop comes with a line across the lid, with the company’s “Republic of Gamers” branding. The back also features the ROG logo and a dotted pattern.


Unlike its predecessor, the back is no longer fingerprint magnet and thanks to the matte finish, fingerprints and smudges are not a big issue.

While the lid is made out of aluminium, the body is made out of mag-alloy. Due to the hardware packed in the device and the secondary display, the laptop weighs on the higher side at 2.67 kg. The charger is also quite heavy, making carrying both the laptop and the charger a chore.


The primary display on the laptop is bezel-less and the secondary ScreenPad Plus display is placed on top of the keyboard. The company has used the AAS Plus 2.0 mechanism, which raises the secondary display by 13 degrees.


In line with the laptop’s gaming vibe, it comes with RGB lights, which can be customised using the Armoury Crate app. The device also features a glass panel that comes with a transparent design, giving a view of the motherboard. The glass panel also features the ROG logo in the middle.


If you are coming from a traditional laptop, it will take some time for you to get used to the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16’s keyboard and trackpad. The keyboard has been pushed down due to the secondary display and the trackpad is placed on the right side of the keyboard.

Despite its awkward layout, the keyboard feels good to use once you get used to the design. The keys are responsive and have a 1.7mm travel time between them.

The trackpad also doubles up as a number pad once you click on the number pad button on it. This makes it easy for professionals to quickly type in numbers.

Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 display

For the primary display, the Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 features a 16-inch Quad HD+ (2560 x 1600 pixels) Mini-LED panel with a 16:10 aspect ratio, 240Hz refresh rate and a max brightness of 1100 nits. The display comes with Dolby Vision HDR, is Pantone validated and offers a 3ms response time. Dolby Vision HDR ensures you get great contrast and colour, and Pantone validation ensures colour accuracy, which comes very handy for video and photo editing.

Starting with gaming, the panel’s 240Hz refresh and 3ms response time make it a treat to game on, especially if you are a fan of first person shooter (FPS) games wherein even a slight delay could end up costing you and your team the game. I had a great time gaming on the laptop and after gaming on several laptops over the years, I can easily say that this is one of the best displays. I can confidently say that you won’t need an external monitor if you own this, unless you want a bigger real estate to game on.

The peak brightness of 1100 nits and DCI-P3 colour standard make it a great device for content creators as well. The display is also Pantone validated for greater colour accuracy.


Coming to the second display, the device is equipped with a 14-inch 4K IPS panel that offers up to 400nits of brightness and 100% sRGB colour gamut. It is a touch enabled display and comes with stylus support. It is equipped with Gorilla Glass DXC to make it scratch resistant and durable.

While most users may not have much use of the ScreenPad Plus, it is a good feature to have. I often found myself using it to add notes, or pin information that I was referencing for work. Overall, it is a good addition and sets it apart from the ton of gaming laptops flooding the market.

Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 performance

If you are looking for a powerful gaming laptop, the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 will not disappoint. It is equipped with the AMD Ryzen 9 7945Hx processor with 16 cores and 32 threads. This is coupled with up to NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4090 16GB GDDR6 graphics.

The laptop comes with 32GB DDR5 4800MHz RAM, which can be extended up to 64GB. For storage, it offers a 2TB M.2 PCIe 4.0 SSD, which can be upgraded to 4TB.

I tested the laptop with several games, including Red Dead Redemption 2 and Forza Horizon 5. Both the games performed well and the laptops were able to handle them without any issues. The powerful hardware means that you will be able to run any game without even having to look at the system requirements.

The games ran smoothly on the device, even at Quad HD resolution and I got high FPS at all times, even going above 350 in games like CS: GO. If you are someone who plays lighter games like Counter Strike: Global Offensive or PlayerUnkown’s Battlegrounds, the laptop is an overkill to handle such games.

One of the issues gaming laptops usually face is they tend to heat up if you are playing heavier games for extended durations. This device however performs well even in this area. While it gets a bit noisy, the laptop is able to keep the temperatures under control.

While the laptop is equipped with a 90Whr battery, the battery life is not one of the strongest points of the laptop. While gaming, I was able to get around 3 hours of battery life out of the device. Then again, as with most gaming laptops, most of the time you are going to be gaming at your home with the device plugged in, so battery life may not be an issue for most.

Verdict

The Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo is a powerful and feature packed device, offering top-end hardware and an excellent gaming experience. The only drawbacks I found with the laptop were the battery life and the weight, which makes it difficult to carry around.

Coming to the price, the laptop is aimed at enthusiasts who are willing to spend a huge amount of money to get a top-end laptop that is different from most other devices available in the market.

At the end of the day, if you are willing to spend the big bucks, the Asus ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 is a great option for you. But also note that it’s not for everyone, only professional gamers, video editors or even coders can consider it but if you are a casual gamer, you can consider other Asus laptops like the new ROG Strix Scar 16 and Scar 18 that will cost you way lesser.

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