2-in-1 convertible laptops are devices that I have always wanted,
like, the idea of it is really cool: to have a
laptop that can turn into a tablet just by folding the screen back-
but there's always been issues with usability. It's just something that
comes with the nature of a screen that folds back
and then, you're now holding a keyboard that's at the bottom of a laptop.
It's… a lot of companies attempt to do it but
a lot of companies don't do a good job at it.
And that's why I don't cover them very often on this channel, because I feel like
a lot of companies produce them, it's just they're not really noteworthy.
This one is the HP Specter x360 and of all
the 2-in-1 devices that I've been able to use, I think
this is the best one, in terms of just usability for the average person
So, there is a 13" and 15" version to this.
This is the 13" and my honest opinion if you are kinda deciding
between a screen size for 13 or 15 inch for 2-in-1's
there is very few people that will be able to comfortably use a 15" 2-in-1
…as a tablet. As a laptop thats great, but,
if you're looking for a 2-in-1 and you plan on using it as a tablet
relatively frequently, I would go for the 13 inch
Okay, let's first start with the keyboard. It's a good keyboard, can't complain.
It's backlit, very good layout, good spacing.
It's a little bit slick because the keys don't have any texture:
It's just like a smooth plastic,
but it's a very comfortable typing experience
and the trackpad is also good
It uses a synaptic driver.
I would have loved to have seen a Windows precision driver
but it's actually a very good touchpad.
It's got good tracking and good button mechanics
There is pen support, and it's included in the box, but the pen itself
isn't amazing or anything. I mean, it works, it does everything that a
kind of average stylus would do. But it
feels like an older generation Surface Pen to me.
Ports on this thing are pretty standard for an ultrabook.
There's two USB C's, one USB A, a
micro SD slot and a fingerprint sensor. The USB C
supports ThunderBolt 3 AND it's 4 lanes
PCIe for the people that want to plug this thing up to an external GPU.
Inside, the RAM and the WiFi are soldered on.
The SSD is replaceable if you need
but that's basically it: everything else is soldered on. The battery down here
is a nice size: 60 Watt-hour slab and
battery-life is very good: it's pulling a comfortable 9.5 hours
with the screen at around 250 nits. It's relatively
long for a 2-in-1 device. I mean there are devices that
have longer battery-lives than this, but it's very good.
The performance on the 13 inch x360 is actually quite good. A lot of
2-in-1 devices are using "Y" processors, which I don't love.
This is using the regular "U" processor: quad-core,
8th-gen Kaby Lake-R, and it's awesome for multi-core stuff.
You do need the right type of application for
the CPU to really flex, but these are really fast processors.
Gaming performance is pretty limited: light games will play at
reasonable frame-rates, but nothing amazing. The Intel
UHD-620 is not a gaming GPU
so you kinda expect that.
Now, one of the more interesting things about this laptop are the fan noise
and the thermal performance. So, this thing
has two fans, which, at first I thought would
give it some amazing thermal performance. And it does, but not
in the way that I expected. So this laptop is quiet,
one of the quietest laptops that I've ever used, even under load.
It can get a little warm, nothing too bad though
because you can comfortably use this laptop on your lap.
Now, because this thing had two fans, I was under the
assumption that this would have the ability to increase the wattage
in XTU to sustain boost clock, but
I wasn't able to. I was getting throttling
even with under-volting. And it's not a weak AC adaptor:
it's a very comfortable 65 watt one, but it's just that this laptop
was not designed to run above the
original thermal specifications. So fans
on this laptop are great if you just want to keep things adequately cooled
while being quiet, but you can't push out
crazy performance them. The usability as
a tablet is where this device excels, and I think this is where a lot
of manufacturers just, kind of fail. So,
here's the thing, if you're going to buy a 2-in-1 device, if you're going to spend the
money and pay a little bit of a premium to get a 2-in-1 device, you
have to be someone who's actually going to use it as a 2-in-1
device. Like like, it, I know it sounds really obvious,
but a lot of people will buy something like this, and just use it as
a laptop, and rarely use it as a 2-in-1, and it
just doesn't make any sense. If you're going to use it as a laptop, just
purchase a dedicated laptop.But if you're gonna
pick up something like this, you'd gotta be damn sure you're going to be using it as
tent mode, presentation mode, tablet mode, and
this thing is very comfortable to use in all of those positions.
It's weird because visually there's a lot of angles and
edges on the Spectre, but it's actually really comfortable to hold.
Now there's four speakers on this device, there's two on the top and
then two on the bottom, and they've positioned them in a way so that you get clean
audio in laptop mode, tablet mode, presentation mode,
it doesn't even matter. The audio itself is
not amazing, I'm not gonna say that this is the best speakers ever; it's an
ultrabook, but they sound good. The most important thing: you have
access to clean audio, regardless of the position you
have this thing set up in.
Alright, lastly, I want to talk about the screen. This panel is a 1080p
panel. It's bright, it's got a good color gamut, and the viewing
angles are good. Now the side bezels are thin, they look nice,
but the top and bottom panels are thick, right? Well,
they look a lot thicker than you want them to. But
I think they do this on purpose. A lot of 2-in-1 devices have thinner
bezels, and it looks nice. But in terms of usability, these thicker bezels
on the top and bottom are really nice in tablet mode. There's
just way fewer accidental clicks and taps when you're handling the device, which is something
that I think a lot of Windows 10 tablets have an issue with,
but I just don't get that with this thing, and I really like that.
The webcam looks pretty clean, and it's located in the normal position up-top
so it doesn't look up your nose or anything like that. The overall device
is very comfortable to use and it's just something that
a lot of manufacturers overlook, or just straight-up don't care about.
2-in-1 devices should be comfortable as a laptop
and as a tablet, and this guy does both well.
Okay, hope you guys enjoyed this video. Thumbs if you liked it; subs if you love it.
See you guys next time!