Asus

Asus is updating its thin 15.6-inch laptop made for creative professionals with one of the most high-performance mobile processors, Intel's eighth-generation hexa-core Core i9-8950HQ.

The new ZenBook Pro 15 UX550G uses the same body as the current UX550VE version, so if that pic above looks familiar, that's why. Replacing the UX550VE's seventh-gen quad-core i7-7700HQ chip is that new hexa-core processor. It's joined by a 4GB Nvidia GTX 1050Ti graphics card, up to 16GB of 2,400MHz DDR4 RAM and up to 1TB PCIe 3.0 x4 SSD. That should make this a screamer, for both CPU- and GPU-intensive tasks and a competent thin-and-light gaming laptop.

To attract creatives, Asus updated the ZenBook Pro 15's 15.6-inch 4K UHD-resolution display to a Pantone-validated one that's capable of 100 percent Adobe RGB and 132 percent sRGB color gamut with a Delta-E color difference of less than 2.0.

The rest of the laptop seems unchanged from earlier models, but that's a good thing. Despite the new processor, the body remains thin at 18.9 millimeters (0.7-inch) and weighs 1.86 kilograms (4.1 pounds). The body is just thick enough to have room for a full-size HDMI output and two USB-A ports, but you get two Thunderbolt 3 USB-C ports, too. Apparently getting an SD card slot on here was a no-go, though there is a microSD slot. Asus also says the laptop's dual-band 802.11ac Wi-Fi will deliver faster-than-wired speeds.

Asus didn't announce pricing or availability for the updated model, but if the timing is the same as the UX550VE, you can expect it this summer.