Something about this laptop stinks — In a good way?
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Laptops are getting increasingly complicated, with the focus on NPUs dominating much of the industry throughout the latest Apple, Intel, Qualcomm, and AMD processor launches.
Even GPU manufacturers like Nvidia are incorporating AI into present and future plans, with things like Nvidia Ace bringing the prospect of AI NPCs to the future of gaming.
But it's easy to miss the days when there wasn't such an intense focus on AI, and Asus' latest laptop reveal reminds us of how amusing the wilder notebook concepts can be.
Enter the Adol Book 14 (via Videocardz), a gorgeous laptop from a collaboration between manufacturer Asus and fashion company Anna Sui, which also features its own fragrance line.
The Asus Adol Book 14 is a new fragrant laptop
The result of Asus and Anna Sui's collaboration is a thin, sleek laptop with an admittedly wonderful lavender finish on its aluminum lid and chassis.
Otherwise, it's 14 inches at 2,880 x 1,800-pixel resolution with an OLED panel at 240Hz refresh rate. In other words, it's crisp, colorful, and swift, with its 100% DCI-P3 color gamut coverage rating making it a must-have if you remotely care about vividness.
Underneath the hood, it's built with an AMD Ryzen 8945H processor, 32GB of LPDDR5X-7500 RAM, and 1TB of SSD storage. Asus claims it's rated for 14 hours of 1080p video playback insofar as battery life goes.
But let's get down to business: The actual "stinky" part of this comes down to a dispenser that's located at the center of the laptop's lid. Simply turn the aluminum plate at the center to remove the cover and insert the "incense tablets" into the magnetic array and viola, you have a nice-smelling laptop.
The available fragrances are "Be a New Her," "Basil and Mandarin," and "Rose of Mans Land." I find the lack of consistency in naming amusing, as we go from abstract concepts to specific scents at the snap of a finger.
The bundle seems aesthetically-focused, as it comes with a computer bag that looks puffy and soft, a cute mouse that matches the laptop's color scheme, and a 50 millileter bottle of Anna Sui's Wishing Elf perfume.
My only question is: Why does it require a bizarre, fragrance-infused laptop concept for us to get a unique color on a laptop? My favorite thing about the Adol Book 14 is its soft, pastel purple hue.
The laptop will cost 6,999 RMB, which translates roughly to $969, although we're not entirely sure if it will be sold outside of China just yet.
This is also far from the first time Asus has made a laptop as bizarre as this one.
Weird, wild laptop concepts are always tripping us up
This isn't the first time Asus has gone above and beyond in presenting an idea that probably won't last long-term but is amusing to think about. We can look at last year's Asus ROG Flow Z13, which featured a strap connected to the top left and right portions of the lid, effectively turning it into a gaming laptop that you can wear.
It's also not the first time we've seen some wild laptop concepts this year, with the Sightful Spacetop G1, a laptop that doesn't have a display but simply comes with a pair of AR glasses and a deck, absolutely stunning us back in June.
Companies like Lenovo aren't above wild concepts like this either, with it unveiling its Lenovo ThinkBook Transparent Display concept, which presents a completely see- 17.3-inch through panel and a touchscreen for a deck.
All of these concepts share something in common: We cannot imagine them being much more than a short-lived gimmick, although admittedly, some have a greater chance of survival than others.
Wearable gaming laptops and transparent displays all seem a bit far-fetched, but who knows, maybe someday we'll all be wearing AR glasses instead of looking at a laptop screen.
But as far as a fragrance-infused laptop, it seems more like an amusing thing brought about by a clever collaboration than anything we can expect to be a permanent part of Asus' future line-up. However, we can just as easily be wrong about this, so let us see what happens.
