HP Pavilion x360 14-cd0008na Lenovo ThinkPad X1
A fast 14in convertible with a pretty design, but it’s held back by the screen and keyboard
SCORE PRICE £583 (£699 inc VAT) from pcpro.link/290hp
Whisper it, but budget laptops are getting better. Where you used to make a sacrifice on build quality, style and spec if you were spending less than a grand, it’s now reasonable to demand all three. HP is at the forefront of this charge, with its latest addition to the Pavilion lineup an excellent exemplar.
To look at it, you might think the Pavilion x360 costs well over £1,000, with a sandblasted, metallic keyboard frame: it’s not overstated, as HP’s Spectre range can be, but subtle. The high-gloss black bezel and occasional chrome accents give it a premium look, even if the grey lid is a trifle dull. HP provides a literal twist, too, as that lid swivels back 360 degrees to turn the x360 into a tablet.
A big tablet, mind you. This machine weighs 1.59kg, so if you’re scrawling on the screen – and note HP’s Active Pen costs another £58 ( pcpro.link/290pen) – you’ll want to rest it on your lap or a table. That weight is manageable for a laptop, though, especially one like this that is mainly going to move from room to room rather than accompany a businessperson on their commute.
It’s why I can forgive the mediocre battery life of 5hrs 27mins in our video rundown tests, which is with the screen set to what I would normally consider a low 170cd/m2. The reason I caveat the brightness level is because, for this 14in display, that translates to around 85%: as with the HP Envy 13 ( see issue 289, p84), HP compromises the maximum brightness.
Which is a shame, because otherwise this is a perfectly acceptable screen: sure, it can only cover 62% of the sRGB gamut and its average Delta E is 4.69, so anyone looking for colour accuracy should run for the hills, but thanks to a glossy finish, colours looks vivid. Again, though, you may not like it in an office situation: there’s no evidence of clever anti-reflective coating here.
Then there’s the keyboard, which clacks along in a way that your nearest and dearest won’t fall in love with. I’m not a big fan of the way keys press down without any cushioning either, but at this price I don’t want to be too critical. As long as you aren’t typing away at a hundred words per minute, it’s fine, and all the keys are sensibly laid out. I like the touchpad, too, which has a “widescreen” aspect to match the 16:9 of the 1,920 x 1,080 resolution screen.
HP makes no compromises at all to the components, with a Core i5-8250U processor, 8GB of RAM and a souped-up 256GB PCIe M.2 SSD (its sequential write speeds were 711MB/sec in AS SSD, while read speeds hit 1,240MB/sec). These pushed it to a commendable 84 in our own benchmarks, which are as fast as most people will ever need. It’s less convincing for gamers, as reflected in a 10.5fps score in Dirt: Showdown at 720p Low settings.
There are nice design touches, too. Not just the contoured grille above the keyboard, which also contains the powerful-if-not-subtle speakers, but the fingerprint reader tucked onto the right-hand edge. There’s a handy
“HP makes no compromises to the components, with a Core i5-8250U processor, 8GB of RAM and a soupedup 256GB PCIe M.2 SSD”
volume rocker switch there too, along with an HDMI output, SD card reader, old-style USB-A port and new-fangled USB-C port. Note that the latter can’t be used to power the HP (you’ll need to pack the 292g power supply) or output video, with HP stating that it’s for data only. A second USB-A port is kept company by a 3.5mm combo headphone/mic jack on the left, with the only other physical inclusion of note being the basic HD webcam above the bezel. This doesn’t support Windows Hello, so logging in will require the fingerprint reader or the stalwarts of PIN and password. If you live in a house with flaky Wi-Fi reception then also beware the 1x1 wireless chipset, which means the HP doesn’t have the range or maximum download speeds of more expensive laptops with their 2x2 chips. This pattern of “it’s good, but” characterises the Pavilion x360. Overall, I do like it. However, I keep finding myself being drawn to the compromises. The truth is that I can live with them all, even the not-so-bright screen, and as long as you buy the Pavilion knowing about its shortcomings you should be happy. If you don’t need its convertible trick, though, take a look at the Asus ZenBook UX410UA ( see issue 280, p68) before you commit.
SPECIFICATIONS Quad-core 1.6GHz Core i5-8250U processor Intel UHD Graphics 620 8GB RAM 14in IPS touchscreen display, 1,920 x 1,080 resolution 256GB M.2 PCIe SSD 1x1 802.11ac Wi-Fi Bluetooth 4.2 USB-C 3.1 (data only) 2 x Type-A USB 3.1 HDMI 1.4 SD card reader HD webcam 41Wh battery Windows 10 Home 324 x 224 x 19.7mm (WDH) 1.59kg 1yr limited warranty