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Under the hood, Battery life and Verdict

Performance

Our unit of the Asus VivoBook 14 (X412) is powered by 8th generation Intel Core i5-8256U processor with 2GB NVIDIA GeForce MX230 that supports the graphics end of things. This is paired with 8GB of RAM and 512GB SSD to boot.

In day-to-day usage, the VivoBook 14 is able to easily handle general tasks like browsing the internet, watching videos or movies, multitasking, photo editing among others. Anything else than these use cases and the laptop begins to shows signs of stress.

The same holds true for gaming as the laptop will not be able to run fairly newer titles. But if you're a casual gamer who doesn’t mind playing yesteryears titles, then you’ll feel right at home with the VivoBook 14.

Video editing on this machine is doable as it can survive a 1080p render, just that it takes longer than usual and you can feel the laptop firing on all cylinders to accomplish that task.

VivoBook 14 also incorporates a different cooling mechanism than other laptops. As opposed to the regular cooling solution which requires heat pipes to work with the heat sink in order for the fan to bring down the temperature, this one uses a blower-style cooling method. There are vents in the chassis of the laptop for air intake through the fan which then gets circulated across the internals to lower down the heat.

In benchmarks, the VivoBook 14 scores fairly well which proves that it is a dependable machine. We ran 3DMark’s Sky Diver test which gave it a score of 7529. The sequential read and write speeds tested through CrystalDiskMark6 were 1833.6 MB/s and 990.9 MB/s respectively.

Asus VivoBook 14 has two downward firing speakers that are located towards either of the edges. Notwithstanding the bad placement, the stereo speakers are further tuned by SonicMaster technology but every optimization falls short when you get on playing music. Audio output is bad if you’re in a noisy environment, so much so that you wouldn’t notice it at times. We found it best to use the laptop with a headphone and would recommend the same to potential buyers.

Keyboard, I/O and Battery Life

Typing on the VivoBook is a sheer delight with the perfect amount of key travel (1.3 mm) and feedback. The keys are average in size which assist in typing fast and accurately. Furthermore, the hinge design comes into play here as it raises up the keyboard platform by 2-degrees and the hands fall naturally in place for typing away.

During our usage, we didn’t encounter any issue with the keyboard and due to its backlit nature, one can use it well under dark environments.

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Coming to the I/O ports, the VivoBook 14 has a decent set of options on both its edges. This includes one each of USB 3.1 Type-C, USB 3.1 Type-A, USB 2.0 Type-A, 3.5mm audio jack, HDMI and a microSD card reader.

The touchpad is topped with a layer of glass for smooth touch input. It also supports native Windows 10 gestures like 3-finger/4-finger swipe, tapping, zoom in or out among others. It is also home to a fingerprint reader using which users can log in to the laptop courtesy of Windows Hello.

As far as the battery life is concerned, the VivoBook 14 (X412) lasted for close to five hours on a single charge before dying down on us. This is pretty average performance as we have come to see on Asus’ laptops and is nothing noteworthy. If you are someone who works on the go, the VivoBook 14 is sadly not for you.

Verdict

For its asking price, the VivoBook 14 (X412) is a value for money investment. It is a dependable ultrabook that will handle daily tasks with ease but if you’re looking to game on this thing, you’re bound to get disappointed.

The display could have been better at reproducing colours, saturation and contrast which would have earned it more points in the running. Even the audio is below average so forget watching movies and videos if you’re showing it to a bunch of people at the same time.

But with these drawbacks, the general performance of VivoBook 14 remains unfettered. The hinge design is a delicious cheery atop a rather bland cake, as it makes typing easier and enjoyable.

To top it off, get the VivoBook 14 (X412) if you’re a college goer, at a desk job or even a casual laptop user and it will serve you well. Also, if you type a lot on your laptop, the VivoBook 14 is a great ultrabook for that purpose. For everyone else, you may need to look elsewhere.