Skip to main content

Asus ZenScreen is a portable 15.6-inch monitor you prop up with a pencil

asus zenscreen
Asus has unveiled the ZenScreen monitor at IFA 2016. The device is a portable display that’s intended to offer extra screen space to users working on a laptop or a hybrid device.

“When computers get smaller, sometimes we feel restricted by the screen size,” said Asus Design Center Director, Jen Chuang. “ZenScreen is designed to enlarge your workspace, so you can multitask with an extended view anywhere you want.”

Related Videos

The ZenScreen is being pitched as the world’s lightest and thinnest 15.6-inch portable display. It weighs 800 grams and is just under 8-millimeters thick, with an ultra-thin 6.5-millimeter bezel to ensure that as much usable space as possible is dedicated to the screen itself.

The device features a hybrid USB port that supports both Type-A and Type-C connections. This will be used for charging its battery and hooking up the display to other hardware — any laptop with USB Type-A or Type-C ports will apparently be compatible with the ZenScreen.

A foldable smart case is set to be released alongside the device, offering extra protection as well as a means to prop it up in both portrait and landscape orientations. However, there’s another way to keep the display at a usable angle that’s pleasingly low-tech: inserting a pen into the hole at the bottom-right corner of the screen will perform the same function.

While the ZenScreen can be used with all manner of hardware, Asus does hope that people buy into its ecosystem and pair the monitor with one of their systems. The company’s ZenBook 3 and the new iterations of its Transformer range of 2-in-1 devices — which were unveiled at Computex back in May — seem like prime candidates.

No pricing information or a release window was announced at this time.

Editors' Recommendations

6 years later, the iPhone X still does one thing better than the iPhone 14 Pro
iPhone X.

I’ve been an iPhone user since the very beginning, starting with the original iPhone. You know, the one with the 3.5-inch display that was perfect at the time, making it super easy to use a phone with one hand? As the years go by, the iPhone — and every other smartphone out there — just get bigger and bigger. We now have phones that with almost 7-inch displays, and honestly, I don’t understand how anyone can comfortably use these giant phones — especially if you have smaller hands!

With the iPhone, we’ve gone from 3.5-inch to 4-inches, then 4.7-inches to 5.8-inches, and now the standard 6.1-inch and 6.7-inch of the iPhone 14/iPhone 14 Pro and iPhone 14 Plus/iPhone 14 Pro Max, respectively. I personally use an iPhone 14 Pro as my primary device, and while I have gotten used to the 6.1-inch size over the past few years, I still think it’s too big. In fact, the last perfect size iPhone was the iPhone XS with the 5.8-inch display ... and I really wish Apple would bring it back.
5.8 inches was a perfect middle ground

Read more
Dell’s first Windows 11 ARM laptop is priced like a Chromebook
A woman using a Dell Inspiron 14 laptop.

Dell just launched a new Inspiron 14 laptop with a Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2, and it's priced like a Chromebook, costing only $500. The advantage of using a Qualcomm chip is the long battery life, and Dell claims the Inspiron 14 can last for 16 hours on a single charge.

The budget laptop includes a respectable 8GB of memory and 256GB of SSD storage, which should be sufficient for productivity and browsing. A 14-inch antiglare screen has an LED backlight and offers 1080p resolution.

Read more
5 things we’d love to see at Google I/O 2023 (but probably won’t)
Google Pixel Watch on a wrist.

Google's annual developer conference, Google I/O, kicks off on May 10. Don't let the words "developer conference" put you off, though, as Google I/O is one of the biggest and most exciting shows of the year.

We've already covered what we expect to see at Google I/O 2023, and that list includes the Pixel 7a, Android 14, and even a Google Pixel Fold. But although those are all things we're really looking forward to and expecting to see, there are a number of reveals we'd also love to happen ... but are extremely unlikely to appear on the grand stage.

Read more