In brief: Asus built a laptop using a completely new material. The Ceraluminum PC developed by the Taiwanese company provides durability in an ultra-slim design. Of course, we can’t forget its “superior” AI capabilities that no PC can live without these days.
Asus introduced Ceraluminum during Computex 2024/It says the new material resulted from a four-year R&D effort to turn aluminum into high-tech ceramic. Despite the novelty and the seemingly superior qualities of the material, Ceraluminum is currently used in just a single laptop model, the Asus Zenbook S 16.
Ceraluminum is synthesized by soaking a sheet of aluminum in hot water, introducing a particular ceramic component into the mix, and bonding the two materials through a “complex” process. The resulting Ceraluminum panel feels like plastic but can provide exceptional hardness in a very thin sheet.
Ceraluminum is an industry-first innovation with applications in the aerospace and luxury watch industries and is available in different “natural” colors. The Zenbook S 16 laptop is an ultraportable for people working away from home. It has a thin 0.43-inch chassis hosting a 16-inch “3K” OLED display and immersive audio speakers.
The Zenbook S 16 also includes an advanced cooling system with dual fans and an “ultra-slim” vapor chamber designed to avoid thermal issues. Asus claims the system can consume up to 28W without throttling, even under heavy loads and AI-focused tasks. A novel “geometric grille” design also supposedly increases cooling performance.
Aside from the Ceraluminum chassis, the Zenbook S 16 system sports the recently introduced AMD Ryzen AI 9 HX 370 processor, 32GB of RAM, and a 1TB SSD. Ryzen’s AI engine delivers up to 50 TOPs of “power-efficient” AI performance, while its battery can seemingly last all-day.
The laptop’s 50 TOPs should be more than enough to satisfy Microsoft’s requirements for a Copilot AI PC. Asus boasts that the Zenbook S 16 includes Windows 11 and its “everyday AI companion” with the troublesome Windows Recall feature. The ultraportable also has several first-party ML-based applications to “empower” users’ daily lives through AI algorithms.
Despite being a consumer-oriented device, the Zenbook S 16 is certified for meeting the “ultra-demanding” military-grade standard (MIL-STD 810H) for superior reliability and durability. The first Ceraluminum PC ever costs $1,700, although Asus still has to provide a specific shipping date for the new system.
