ASUS Vivobook Pro 15 15.6" N6506CU-PS97

The ASUS Vivobook Pro 15 packs a stunning 120Hz OLED display and a blazing Core Ultra 9 CPU into a relatively portable chassis, making it a killer value for photo and video editors who work plugged in. Battery life is its Achilles' heel, lasting only about an hour under heavy creative workloads. If you can find it near the $1,200 mark, it's a steal, but be prepared to stay close to a charger.

Let's talk about what's under the hood, because this is where the Vivobook Pro 15 gets interesting. The Intel Core Ultra 9 285H is a 16-core monster that lands in the 89th percentile for CPU performance in our database. That's seriously fast, putting it well above average for creative workloads. Paired with 24GB of DDR5 RAM, it chews through large RAW files in Lightroom and complex Photoshop layers without breaking a sweat. The RTX 4050, while not a top-tier gaming GPU, sits in the 77th percentile and provides a meaningful boost for GPU-accelerated tasks like rendering and video encoding. It's a well-balanced combo for a creator-focused machine.

The real star of the show, though, is that 15.6-inch 2880x1620 OLED display. It's in the 95th percentile for screen quality, which means it's one of the absolute best panels you can get on a laptop right now. With 100% DCI-P3 coverage, 500 nits of brightness, and a buttery 120Hz refresh rate, colors are accurate and motion is smooth. For photo and video editors who need to trust what they're seeing, this display is a legitimate reason to buy the laptop all on its own. The storage is also snappy, with the 1TB NVMe SSD landing in the 82nd percentile, so load times for large project files are nice and short.

The elephant in the room is always the Apple MacBook Pro M5. For pure video editing efficiency and battery life, the MacBook is in a different league. You'll get all-day battery and a slightly more polished build, but you'll also pay a hefty premium and lose the flexibility of Windows and that full-size SD card slot. The Vivobook fights back with raw CPU power and a significantly lower price, making it the better value for budget-conscious creators who don't mind staying plugged in.

On the Windows side, the Lenovo Legion Pro 7i Gen 10 is a different beast entirely. It's a thicker, heavier gaming laptop with a much more powerful GPU, so it'll smoke the Vivobook in 3D rendering and gaming. But its display won't be as color-accurate out of the box, and it's a pain to carry around. The HP OMEN Transcend 14 is a closer competitor, offering a similar blend of portability and power with a newer design, but you'll likely pay more for a comparable OLED panel. The Vivobook carves out a nice niche by prioritizing that creator-grade display and CPU performance above raw gaming chops.

Pricing on this Vivobook Pro 15 is a bit of a moving target, with a spread of $868 across different vendors, ranging from $1,200 to $2,068. At the lower end of that spectrum, this laptop is an absolute steal. You're getting a top-tier CPU, a dedicated GPU, and a best-in-class OLED display for not much more than a mid-range ultrabook. If you can snag it closer to $1,200, the value proposition is hard to beat for a creative workstation.

Even at the higher end, you're still undercutting a comparable MacBook Pro by a significant margin, though you do give up Apple's superior build quality and battery efficiency. The sweet spot is definitely finding a deal on the lower end of that price range. Keep an eye on vendor pricing, because the difference between paying $1,200 and $2,000 for the same machine is massive, and at the higher price, some of the build quality compromises start to feel a lot less forgivable.

The ASUS Vivobook Pro 15 N6506CU-PS97 is one of those laptops that looks like it's trying to do everything, and honestly, it mostly pulls it off. You've got a brand new Intel Core Ultra 9 285H, a discrete RTX 4050, and a stunning 15.6-inch OLED display crammed into a package that weighs under four pounds. It's clearly aimed at the creative crowd who need real horsepower for photo and video editing but don't want to lug around a bulky gaming laptop. The spec sheet reads like a wishlist for a mobile editing rig, especially with that full-size SD card slot and a port selection that's among the best we've seen.

But here's the thing about a laptop that tries to be this powerful and this portable: there are always trade-offs. The biggest one we can see right off the bat is battery life. With a 75Wh battery powering a high-res OLED panel and a hungry CPU, you're not going to be editing off the charger for long. Real-world feedback from owners confirms this, with heavy Adobe Creative Suite work draining the battery in about an hour. That's a tough pill to swallow if you were hoping to edit a batch of photos at a coffee shop without hunting for an outlet.

So who is this for? It's for the photographer or video editor who works mostly plugged in but needs the flexibility to move from desk to desk, or occasionally work on location with power available. The performance for the price is genuinely impressive, especially when you look at what a similarly specced MacBook Pro would cost you. It's not a perfect all-rounder, but as a portable creative workstation, it makes a very strong case for itself.

If you need to work unplugged for hours at a time, just walk away from this one. The battery life under any kind of creative load is simply not up to the task, and you'll be constantly hunting for outlets. Look at an Apple MacBook Pro M5 or a Snapdragon X Elite laptop instead, both of which will give you all-day battery, though you'll trade some raw CPU performance for that efficiency.

Gamers should also think twice. The RTX 4050 is a capable entry-level GPU, but it's going to struggle to push modern games at the native resolution of this beautiful display. If gaming is a priority, a Lenovo Legion Pro or ASUS's own ROG line will give you a much better experience with a higher-wattage GPU and a faster refresh rate display, though you'll lose the color-accurate OLED and gain some weight.

If you're a photographer or video editor who spends most of your time at a desk but needs a powerful machine you can easily take to a client's office or a shoot, the Vivobook Pro 15 is a fantastic choice. That OLED display is a genuine joy to work on, and the CPU chews through creative tasks without hesitation. Just make sure you're near a power outlet, because the battery won't last through a long editing session. For this use case, it's one of the best values on the market right now.

For anyone who needs true all-day portability or does a lot of work on battery, this is not your laptop. The hour-long battery life under load is a dealbreaker for coffee shop warriors. You'd be much better served by a MacBook Pro M5 or even a Snapdragon-powered Windows laptop, though you'll sacrifice some raw performance. Gamers should also look elsewhere, as the RTX 4050 is fine for light gaming but won't drive that high-res display at native resolution in demanding titles. This is a creator's tool first and foremost.