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Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

asus.com

111–120 of 594 posts

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#111

It blows my mind that companies have the resources to sink into "innovations" like this that are just so far out that they are sure to fail. The mere sight of this stresses me out with how fragile it looks, and how clumsy it would be to use

Why does it look any more fragile than an iPad, for example?

We haven't solved the "bendable glass" problem yet, so foldable displays are made of soft plastic which is extremely easy to damage compared to the toughened glass you're accustomed to. You can put a permanent dent in them with your fingernail if you're not careful.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#112
post #61
post #20

Looks fancy. Is this what the market wants? I don't particularly like Apple, but I use a Macbook Pro. I've been keeping an eye out for a non-Apple alternative to a Macbook, but nothing seems to come close in terms of hardware. I don't mean technical specs. I mean a beautiful screen, reasonable dimensions & weight, a really good touchpad, great battery life, etc. A big foldable screen looks cool, but doesn't feel at a…

In East Asia, novelty or "cuteness" of a product, i.e. the look of things, is mostly what counts. That's how East Asian makers try to stay ahead of the competition, because actual innovation that goes beyond the surface (no pun intended) is hard and not actually encouraged in societies with a confucian view of the workplace.

I think this is too shallow a dismissal of innovation in an area so large that it spans 35% of the globe, and there are quite literally numerous existence proofs that it isn't correct.

The idea that all innovation happens in the United States and Europe is fairly ridiculous, innovation happens on all levels of product development, both deep in the guts of products as well further up as well as sometimes entirely new classes of products.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#113
I don't really get the appeal of folding screens, but then I didn't get the appeal of iPads when it was announced.

One thing I would love is an iPhone / iPad that docks and dual boots into macOS powering a monitor- surely that should be technically possible by now.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#114

The responses to this are more interesting than the device itself. It's innovative, it's done by a brand that has a reasonable reputation for reliability and for standing behind their products and it may well fit a niche. Innovation is always going to be risky, and Asus stands to lose some of their credibility if the device does not hold up over time. So I'll be more than happy to let them do their thing. As for sust…

Is it really an innovation? If I look at foldable S smartphones then this is like a bigger version with an external keyboard.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#115
post #25
post #3

I can't help but see folding screens as a limited-life product. Sure, laptops only last, usefully, about 6 years anyway, but it's such an obvious wear spot which would cripple the entire device. Thanks, but no thanks.

It's advertised as being stress tested with 30,000 folds. That should last quite a bit longer than 6 years for most people.

Micro-USB plugs are supposed to be designed for a minimum rated lifetime of 10,000 cycles of insertion and removal. My experience has not had one last even 2,000 cycles before becoming unreliable, even for cables that have always been used in ideal circumstances (gently plugged in, resting on a table). As for ones where the device gets used while plugged in, moved around, occasional lateral forces on the plug, well, they’re generally just about completely useless before 2,000 cycles.

USB-C plugs are supposed to be 10,000 cycles too. The A–to–C cable that came with my PinePhone was dead at the C plug end within four months of daily usage with occasional somewhat-stronger-than-ideal-but-not-all-that-excessive forces being applied. A couple of other cables haven’t had issues so far.

When they say 30,000 here, I’d be surprised to get 3,000 before significant problems are apparent, and wouldn’t be surprised if I failed to get 300. I like the idea and want it to work, but don’t expect it to just yet. I wish they’d focus their effort on having two separate screens with a small gap between them rather than trying to straddle the hinge, because that would be somewhere between almost as good and slightly better, and much more likely to be reliable.

This is still early tech. Early generations of mechanically-difficult things are generally terrible. I can speak to the unreliability of the Surface Book hinge: I had four units (19 months with moderate issues by the end (mild battery pillowage, screen yellowing, several split keycaps) that led to warranty replacement; 8 months then battery 2 spontaneously died; roughly DOA; two years before battery 1 died and it was out of warranty and after only a little more use it’s now pretty much a brick, can’t even stay powered on and significant pillowage on both batteries), and their base/clipboard, base/power and clipboard/power connections (which were basically the same interface) always became not completely reliable well within a year, though they weren’t particularly troublesome until maybe fifteen or eighteen months. I do acknowledge that I used this hardware fairly hard, but it was consistently well under a thousand cycles before at least minor issues in the connection were apparent, and these OLED hinges are probably even more demanding.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#116

I don't really get the appeal of folding screens, but then I didn't get the appeal of iPads when it was announced. One thing I would love is an iPhone / iPad that docks and dual boots into macOS powering a monitor- surely that should be technically possible by now.

> but then I didn't get the appeal of iPads when announced.

Let me guess you dont have kids.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still going. I remember I t ied one in person, felt like a layer of tape on top of two displays.

IIRC the first thing people did with those phones is rip the “tape” off just to realize their phone was now broken.

That was just the first Galaxy fold. On the later ones you can safely remove the screenprotector

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#118
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>30,000 alledgedly

30k folds with forces applied optimally by a test rig, no clumsy humans involved?

The official numbers will be from an optimal test rig, but someone did do a more "realistic" folding screen test recently by flipping a Flip3 manually until it died.

Samsung rates it for 200,000 folds, and it lasted 418,500 folds before the hinge failed, with the screen actually still working.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k86vsQEDKlg

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#119
post #10

Fold or not, what I want for a laptop is: A tablet with a matte screen. That can run Linux. So I can put it on a stand and a keyboard in front of it. That would be the ultimate travel setup! Working in cafes without having to look down all the time. Does something like this exist?

I use the Microsoft Surface Pro 3 this way (other models run Linux well, also). However, the screen is not matte.

Re: Asus Zenbook 17 Fold OLED

#120
Using a touch screen as a keyboard when it's folded in laptop mode just looks painful.

If the technical issues could be ironed out, folding phones would seem to make a lot of sense theoretically since it would be great a device that's small in your pocket but has more screen real estate when you're using, but this device doesn't seem like it would be that pleasant to use even if it worked perfectly.

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