Fingers-on: Asus’ new ROG Stream Z13 gaming pill with AMD built-in graphics

Asus has a brand new model of its Floor Professional-like gaming pill for CES, and it’s making some sizable modifications each in and out. The Asus ROG Stream Z13 for 2025 is as soon as once more a barely chunky, almost-half-inch-thick, 13-inch pill with a built-in kickstand, magnetic keyboard cowl, a bunch of ports, and a transparent window on its rear with RGB lighting to point out off its innards.

That enjoyable glass window is now bigger, with a direct view of the motherboard, however the largest change for the ROG Stream Z13 is its swap to built-in graphics. Which will look like a step backward for a gaming-focused pill since players covet devoted GPUs, however Asus is outfitting it with AMD’s highly effective new “Strix Halo” processor. The ROG Stream Z13 might be configured with the Ryzen AI Max 390 for $1,999.99 or the Ryzen AI Max Plus 395 for $2,199.99. The highest-end mannequin with the Max Plus 395 has 16 CPU cores and 40 graphics cores, whereas the base-model Ryzen AI Max Plus 390 (curse these names) has 12 CPU cores and 32 graphics cores. The Z13 makes use of a redesigned stainless-steel vapor chamber for cooling these graphics-heavy chips, that are able to 120W TDP.

All that energy within the Z13 is accountable for driving a 13-inch, 2560 x 1600 touchscreen show with a speedy 180Hz refresh price (up from 165Hz on the last-gen mannequin), which you don’t usually discover in laptops and tablets of this dimension. For ports, it’s bought two USB 4, one USB-A 3.2 Gen 2, HDMI 2.1, a microSD card slot able to UHS-II speeds, and a 3.5mm mixture headphone / mic jack. It’s additionally bought a 5-megapixel front-facing webcam and 13-megapixel rear-facing digicam — so you may flash your RGB as you awkwardly take pill images in public. It additionally has Wi-Fi 7.

The Z13 helps USB-C Energy Supply for charging, however that received’t be highly effective sufficient to permit its full efficiency below load. As a substitute, it comes with a 200W energy adapter that makes use of Asus’ proprietary and reversible slim energy jack — like on its latest laptops.

Different quality-of-life enhancements for the Z13 embody a brand new removable keyboard with bigger keycaps and a extra generously sized touchpad. And on its proper facet, beside the ability button and quantity rocker, is a brand new “ScreenXpert” button that summons a Command-Middle-like widget that features multiple-display window administration controls, fast entry to working modes like Turbo mode or Silent mode, and different settings like muting your mic. It’s primarily there to assist management issues whereas in pill mode because the keyboard incorporates shortcuts for many of those features.

I bought a fast glimpse of the brand new ROG Stream Z13 at a preview occasion, and Asus despatched me a preproduction mannequin proper earlier than CES to get a little bit little bit of hands-on time. It’s what I’m penning this submit on proper now, and boy do I admire the updates to this keyboard cowl. The 1.7mm key journey and larger touchpad go a great distance towards getting work accomplished. Whereas the Ryzen 395 chip has the potential to be power-hungry, the battery life on the Z13 exhibits some promise. Asus is barely claiming 10 hours of battery life, and I did handle to get by way of a full eight-plus-hour workday of Chrome tabs, streaming music (although the audio system appear sort of unhealthy at first hear), and writing throughout a number of digital desktops the day earlier than flying to CES — with just about no points.

I positively choose a correct laptop computer to a pill with a kickstand and keyboard cowl, however having the ability to take away the keyboard deck for a little bit extra flexibility and luxury when it’s time to fireplace up a recreation is fairly slick. I attempted out a little bit Helldivers 2 on the Stream Z13, and it carried out fairly effectively, particularly for a pill. Set to the Z13’s native 2.5K decision, in-game render scale on Extremely High quality, and texture particulars on medium, I noticed 60fps or simply slightly below, and it regarded very nice. If I bumped it down from Extremely High quality to High quality scaling, it jumped as much as a fair smoother 80fps. This was, after all, whereas the pill was plugged in and its followers had been blasting on Turbo mode. Diving in once more whereas unplugged dropped the Extremely High quality render scale efficiency all the way down to the 45 to 50fps vary since enjoying on battery limits you to Efficiency mode as a substitute of Turbo.

That is preproduction {hardware}, however to this point, it’s fairly spectacular for built-in graphics. AMD’s new chip might need one thing particular right here for skinny and lightweight units, however because it lacks Thunderbolt 5, meaning the Stream Z13 can’t use the total GPU bandwidth of Asus’ new XG Cell eGPU. (Earlier fashions might use the older XG Cell by way of its proprietary connector.) However after all, that may make this considerably transportable PC gaming resolution rather less transportable, and the brand new XG Cell prices about as a lot because the Stream Z13 itself.

However does a gaming pill make a lot sense in 2025 when transportable PC gaming is being so adequately served by the Steam Deck and a bunch of different devoted handhelds? We’ll must see how a manufacturing mannequin of the ROG Stream Z13 fares when it launches someday in February.

Images by Antonio G. Di Benedetto / The Verge