The new ASUS ProArt PZ14 is a better Windows tablet, but far from a perfect one

ASUS’ latest two-in-one, the ASUS ProArt PZ14, sits under the ProArt umbrella, which has also produced some of the best laptops for graphic design, as well as for other creative endeavours. It’s pretty clear that a Venn diagram of the audience the ProArt PZ14 is aimed at and Creative Bloq’s readership would be a circle.

With a new second-generation Snapdragon processor on board, as well as a sharp and bright OLED touchscreen, the PZ14 is thin, light and capable. There is one thing that’s annoying about it, however, though it will only become a problem if you want to use it like a traditional laptop rather than a digital art platform (perhaps a tablet for drawing?)

Key specifications

Design, build and display

• Thin and light
• Removable keyboard

The PZ14 is a two-in-one design, but unlike the HP OmniBooks we reviewed recently, it doesn’t have a hinge. Instead, the keyboard takes a leaf out of Microsoft's book, specifically its Surface Go devices, and attaches using a magnet, connecting wirelessly. There's a useful niche in the keyboard to store your stylus in - there's an ASUS Pen 3.0 in the box - but what we’ve got here is a Windows tablet with a stick-on keyboard, rather than a pure two-in-one.

This is an advantage if you can make use of it. Discard the keyboard, and you’ve got an A4-ish drawing surface that’s easy enough to hold and take with you, the display full of detail and colour. It’s plenty responsive too, with the Pen 3.0’s Microsoft Pen Protocol 2.6 compatibility, 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity and magnetic wireless charging providing a smooth sketching experience.

The OLED is really bright - ASUS claims 1,000 nits for HDR content, and under the eye of the screen calibration puck, it put out 385 of them in SDR, along with 98% of the P3 colour gamut, 92% of Adobe RGB and 100% of sRGB. It’s a beautiful display, and one that’s a pleasure to work with.

Design score: 4/5

Features

• Two USB4 ports
• Stylus included

One thing ASUS didn’t take from the Surface Go is its single USB port. With a pair of USB4s on the left-hand edge, you can charge and connect to an external screen at the same time, or hook up to a dock easily enough. There’s an SD card reader too, ready to import footage from your mirrorless camera or drone, and a 13MP camera built into the rear of the casing, so you can use it as a digital notebook or easily add photos and video into a group chat without needing to get your phone out of your pocket.

The biggest downside of the PZ14 is the keyboard. It’s awkward to use, doesn’t adjust much, and if you’re unlucky, the pocket for the stylus can flip open and spill it out. There's a bit that folds out from the back to act as a stand for the laptop, but it’s fiddly to use. Also fiddly are some of the keys: they’re a decent size but still feel cramped, and it’s too easy to hit ‘#’ when you want Enter, and the way the keyboard sits completely flat on the desktop doesn’t make for intuitive typing.

It also disconnects from the magnetic fasteners too easily, and despite ASUS claiming 1.7mm of key travel, it doesn’t feel that good to type on. In some ways it’s similar to the keyboard case that fits the latest iPad Pro 13in, though Apple’s add-on may actually be better as it allows the screen to be raised and tilted. The trackpad is quite small and requires quite a lot of force to click. It’s obvious where the compromises have been made to keep the PZ14 slim and light, and they’re all in the keyboard.

Though perhaps none of that matters. This isn’t a device that’s built to be used like a MacBook Neo, an old-school typing-first machine. The creatives who buy this might be thinking of the keyboard as a secondary input device, and will leave it unattached for days on end (though as it can’t be charged when not attached to the screen, it may be flat when they pick it up again).

Feature score: 3/5

Benchmark scores

We test every one of our laptops using the same benchmarking software suite to give you a thorough overview of its suitability for creatives of all disciplines and levels. This includes:

• Geekbench: Tests the CPU for single-core and multi-core power, and the GPU for the system's potential for gaming, image processing, or video editing. Geekbench AI tests the CPU and GPU on a variety of AI-powered and AI-boosted tasks.
• Cinebench: Tests the CPU and GPU's ability to run Cinema 4D and Redshift.
• UL Procyon: Uses UL Solutions' Procyon software suite to test the system's ability for AI image generation in Stable Diffusion, its Microsoft Office performance and its battery life in a looping video test.
• Topaz Video AI: We use Topaz Video AI to test the system's ability to upscale video and convert video to slow-motion.
• PugetBench for Creators: We use the PugetBench for Creators benchmarking suite to test the system's ability to run several key tasks in Photoshop and Adobe Premiere Pro, as well as its performance when encoding/transcoding video.
• ON1 Resize AI: Tests the system's ability to resize 5 photos to 200% in a batch process. We take the total time taken to resize the images and divide by 5.

Performance

• Decent performance
• All-day battery

The X2 Elite X2E-88-100 in the PZ14 is the second best of the new Snapdragon chips, a step down from the Elite Extreme in the ZenBook A16. With two fewer cores, performance will be slightly lower, and the thermal envelope of the 2-in-1 form factor may well be tighter too, putting a restriction on just how hard it can work.

The numbers never lie, and in benchmarks, the A16 is the faster machine. The Zenbook went into the top ten for both single- and multi-core CPU performance in our charts, while the PX14 is much more of a mid-table performer, sitting at around the same level as an Apple M4 chip in multi-core but not single-core, where the Mac chip pulls ahead. It’s a little bit behind the A16 and the M5 in graphics performance too, again producing a similar score to the M4, though the GPU in the second-gen Snapdragon chips still represents an improvement over the first-gen pixel-pushers and is doing pretty well for an integrated solution.

This means it does pretty well in creative apps, riding high in the charts for Photoshop performance with a result that’s only just behind the (cheaper) M5 MacBook Air (though the MacBook Pro, with its superior thermal management, pulls ahead), and beating the likes of even the AMD Ryzen AI Max+ Pro in the HP Z2 Mini G1a workstation.

Battery life is decent, though not exceptional, at 13h 20m, but it’ll certainly last you through a day’s work.

Performance score: 3/5

Price

At £1,999, or $1,899 for a US version with less storage and RAM, the PX14 is pricing itself as a premium product. It benefits from the fact it excels at being a touchscreen tablet, but regular typists might want to budget for an external keyboard to go alongside it. It’s more expensive than the 13in Microsoft Surface Pro, which has just had an upgrade to the Snapdragon X2, though ASUS’ machine comes with more RAM and is slightly larger, which makes it a more attractive creative option.

Value score: 3/5

Who is it for?

• Digital artists

The PZ14 wants to be a Windows tablet more than it does a laptop, and as such is ideal for those who like to paint and draw rather than type all day.

Buy it if...

• You like to paint on a touchscreen
• You don’t care about the keyboard
• Portability is important

Don't buy it if...

• Windows on a tablet doesn’t appeal
• You need to type all day

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