ASUS Zenbook S 14 (UX5406AA) Review – It Goes On And On And On

Unboxing

As usual, we got the yearly refresh of ASUS Zenbooks on the market, and the latest entry, Zenbook S 14 (UX5406AA), has brought some design changes on top of the usual component upgrades. What didn’t change, though, is the packaging – the charging hardware is packed separately, while the laptop has its dedicated packaging as before.

The accessories are pretty sparse when it comes to this laptop, and they include:
– Type G (UK) socket adapter
– 68W USB-C charger
– Laptop user guide
– Laptop quick start guide
– MyASUS leaflet
– Photo card
– The ASUS Zenbook S 14 (UX5406AA) laptop

Unlike the last generation, you no longer get the USB-to-LAN adapter, and the smaller 65W GaN charger is also absent this time, sticking to a traditional cable + charger combination. Perhaps this is a cost-saving measure? (Not that this laptop is cheap by any means.)

Walkaround

The new Zenbook S 14 adopted the lid design that debuted from the Zenbook A14, with a full Ceraluminum-based chassis and a more minimalist look. The shade of gray is now a slightly lighter-colored Antrim Gray, but otherwise, it’s got the same anti-smudge properties that solves the smudge issues from Zenbooks of old.

Inside, you’ll find the 14-inch display that retains most specs as before, including same 2.8K resolution, same 120Hz refresh rate, same 100% DCI-P3 gamut coverage with Pantone validation, among others – the only change here is the max brightness, which is raised to 500 nits on standard, or 1,100 nits on HDR peak. Also new this time is touchscreen support, although do note that this is not a flip-style laptop, so it’s practicality will be somewhat limited.

The keyboard remained unchanged layout-wise, although the legend has been updated with cleaner styles and less labels on certain keys. For example, page controls like Home, Page Up, Page Down, and End used to be labeled alongside the arrow keys (where you hold the Fn key to activate those functions), but they are no longer labeled this time around. The PrtScn key has also been moved into a function key via F8, and in its place is the “ScreenXpert” key that brings up quick access controls like performance profiles, battery settings, and more. Mic and webcam killswitches, meanwhile, remained at the same spot as before.

There’s also a small change made on the cooling system. The CNC-milled perforations above the keyboard now features alternated patterns of recessed and flat cutouts (instead of uniformly recessed pair of holes), which ASUS said plays a part in ensuring the laptop can manage 28W of heat output from the processor. The heat is carried away through a pair of fans attached to a vapor chamber system, then towards the rear exhaust ports hidden beneath the hinge.

As far as the shape of the chassis is concerned, there’s not a single millimeter changed – the dimensions remain the same as the last generation, and that meant the same design quirk of 135-degree hinge has unfortunately remained here. It’s a minor thing all things considered, but most ultralight laptops can easily open the display all the way out, so why not, ASUS?

We’re sensing a theme of ultra-minimalism here, with ASUS going as far as removing the labels of ports, and that’s a tad annoying considering the labels exists for a reason. I shouldn’t have to read through the spec sheet to know what that USB-C port does, and especially for that USB-A port which we all know is the unfortunate victim of USB-IF’s seemingly head-spinning naming conventions, for which they actually tried to address with clearer labels only for the laptop maker to hide it entirely on this laptop.

For your reference though, these are the exact same ones you get from the Core Ultra 200V-based models in the last generation, which involves a HDMI 2.1 TMDS port (not the high-speed FRL kind), two Thunderbolt 4 ports, a headphone jack, and a USB 3.2 Gen 2 (10Gbps) Type-A port. One exception is the charging indicator light, which is now situated on the left side of the chassis instead.

Specifications

ASUS Zenbook S 14 (UX5406A-ASU386WS)

Full specifications available on product page.

Performance

Storage

This particular ASUS Zenbook S 14 uses a Samsung PM9C1b SSD, which has a rated sequential speeds of 7,100MB/s read and 6,700MB/s write; its controller can handle up to 1M IOPS read and 1.3M IOPS write too. We measured around 5,800MB/s write, but read speed mostly aligns with manufacturer’s claims; all in all, this is a performant SSD even if it’s not a PCIe 5.0-based model (and to be fair, almost no one can tell the difference in practical uses between those two standards anyway).

CPU

The Intel Core Ultra 9 386H processor powering this laptop is a powerful piece of silicon, bringing back E-cores proper from the Lunar Lake (Core Ultra 200V) that lacked them (Intel technically referred them as LPE-cores). The combination of updated 4P+8E+4LPE cores resulted in respectable multi-core scores among laptops we have tested in this chart, and a stark contrast over the predecessor’s Core Ultra 258V being massively underpowered in this regard due to its meager 4P+4LPE configuration.

GPU

GPU performance, however, is a whole different story. Intel has split the lineup into standard models and X-series models, like the Core Ultra X7 358H in the MSI Prestige 14 Flip AI+ we recently reviewed, which packs a powerful Arc B390 onboard graphics that can handle some AAA games with relative ease.

That GPU comes with 12 Xe3-cores, while the Core Ultra 9 on this laptop only has four of them, and the result, as shown above, is less than half the performance overall. In fact, it’s more akin to the Radeon 780M graphics from AMD, found on Ryzen 7000 series APUs, and it’s also weaker when compared to the previous generation (Arc 140T) from the Lunar Lake chip. Granted, you can still play games on it – but don’t expect much.

System

The new ASUS Zenbook S 14 overall sits in the middle of the pack in the NovaBench benchmark, with its superior CPU performance contributing to its scores and covering the deficit of its weaker GPU performance when compared to all of the other laptops on this chart. It’s a big score bump over its predecessor for the same reason.

We did notice something unusual on PCMark – despite sharing the same CPU architecture as the MSI Prestige’s Core Ultra X7, the Zenbook has significantly higher scores in Productivity category across three power modes, contributing to some of the highest scores we have recorded to date. Do note that Digital Content Creation – which needs GPU performance – is still a fair bit short of the Core Ultra X7.

Batttery

Battery life is where Panther Lake architecture absolutely excels: the new ASUS ZenBook S 14 managed to record over 22 hours of battery life on a single run on PCMark 10, which is a new record! On Procyon video playback tests, the processor managed to eke out 18 hours of battery life across the board, outlasting everything we have tested so far.

The Good

For the new ASUS Zenbook S 14, there’s a lot of good things to talk about. Starting with the new Intel Core Ultra 9 386H processor – this new silicon has brought back the multi-core deficit seen on the Lunar Lake processors, with its unique MoP design somewhat restricted its capabilities from the get-go; more importantly though, despite the loss of memory integration like before, Intel has managed to squeeze out even more power efficiency out of the architecture to make this laptop among the longest-lasting ones we have ever tested.

ASUS is also very proud of its Ceraluminum material since it debuted in 2024, and not only does it upgrade the looks of the laptop, the practical benefit of being smudge-resistant allows it to look pristine down the line. If you like minimalism, this laptop gives you exactly just that (although I somewhat disagree with some of the things they have done design-wise).

The laptop maker also give it proper internals, too, with an excellent cooling system that cools the flagship Intel chip whilst keeping the system quiet most of the time (and simultaneously keeping the laptop this thin), while the speaker output is plenty solid, as we have found since the last generation. The OLED display is now also brighter and gains touch support, so there’s very little to complain about it.

The Bad

There are some things on the new Zenbook S 14 that we consider a downgrade. Firstly, unlikely the previous generation, the included charging cable reverted back to the laptop-standard combination of separate AC cable and charging brick with integrated cables, and for a 68W charger, it’s really bulky to carry it around when the premise of this laptop is portability. On that note, you’ll also need to bring your own 100W charger if you want to utilize fast charging speeds supported by this laptop (and there’s a good chance it’ll be easier to carry around than what ASUS provides).

Another thing to note is the GPU performance of the Intel Core Ultra 9 processor. While on paper it sounds powerful (and it is, if you look at the CPU aspects), the GPU performance has regressed when comparing to both Core Ultra 200 equivalents, be it Lunar Lake (Arc 140V) or Arrow Lake (Arc 140T). That will limit your options in terms of AAA gaming, so be sure to double check which processor you’re going for if GPU performance is what you want.

Verdict

Finally, let’s address the price. We’re fairly certain that the current memory pricing situation has played a part in this laptop’s pricing (and it will affect everything for that matter), but at RM8,499, it’s still a very steep price tag to stomach for an ultrathin laptop. Granted, what you get for this price is pretty much everything you’ll want out of a great laptop: excellent performance, quiet fans, long-lasting battery life, great audio and display, and them some.

With this kind of price though, we expect darn near perfection – if this laptop came with the Core Ultra X7 or X9 processors with the GPU performance to back it up, there is at least a solid case to be made on the value proposition; but in current form and current market climate, it’s a tough pill to swallow, even though it’s a great laptop otherwise.

Special thanks to ASUS Malaysia for providing the Zenbook S 14 (UX5406AA) laptop for this review.