AMD Laptops - Faster, Longer Battery, and CHEAPER!

the knowledge of how good the Zen 2 was on the desktop, I was shocked at how wellAMD's Ryzen 4000 series mobile series performed. Asus' Zephyrus G14 shreddedits Intel competitors in both performance and battery life, while also being considerably cheaper. Now it looks like HP hopesto recreate that success with the Envy x360.  

 And, spoiler alert, they did. This thing sips power,yet it has six cores and is $800 for a configuration that we can actually recommend. What? You know? Like, what? Like, what's a segue? GlassWire lets you keeptrack of the weird stuff that's connecting to your PC, even when you aren't using it. You can see if a strangedevice joins your Wi-Fi, and block it instantly.

 Get 25% off by using codeLINUS at the link below. (upbeat music) Our config of the HP Envyx360 sports a Ryzen 5 4500U, a 7-nanometer, 6-core, 6-thread processor that boosts up to 4 gigahertz. The last 6-core Ultrabook we looked at was the Dell XPS 13, a beast of a machine, except that it costs acasual 1,800 U.S. dollars, which is why we will not becomparing the Envy x360 to it. Instead, we'll be testing itagainst the HP Spectre x360 with an Intel Core i5-1035G4, a 4-core, 8-thread CPU onIntel's newish 10-nanometer node that you would hope would give the Ryzen 5 a run for its money, especiallysince it's in a machine that costs (clears throat) $250 more. 

But that maximum boostspeed of 3.7 gigahertz isn't a good first sign. A much worse sign is theperformance tests we ran. In multicore loads, the Ryzen 5 4500U is set to shred the i5 with a45% higher score in Cinebench. Like, I knew it was gonnawin, just not by that much.

 And remember, guys, this isn't even the top-spec 8-core model. Even more surprisingly, though, the 4500U managed to dominate thesingle-threaded test as well, thanks to that higher boost clock. Now, although I don't expect anyone to be doing much hardcore gaming on either of thesemachines, the Ryzen 5 4500U was also 20% faster in 3DMark Time Spy, and I'm never gonna complainabout a bit more GPU muscle. Thermals, unfortunately, didn't redeem the Core i5 version either. It immediately shot up to100 degrees and stayed there, managing clocks of onlyaround 2.3 gigahertz, something we might have accepted if Intel was the onlyoption in town because, I mean, in fairness,that is at least faster than the 1.5-gigahertz base clock. Thing is, Intel isn'tthe only option anymore, and our Ryzen 5 configavoided thermal throttling, albeit barely, at 91 degrees, while keeping all six of its cores at a whopping 3.3 gigahertz. Look how thin it is, guys! 3.3 gigahertz! It's worth noting that you'll have to enable performance mode toget these kind of speeds, but they're truly remarkable. Remember that Dell XPS 13 with a 6-core i7 that I mentioned at thestart of this video? Yeah. In performance mode, this Ryzen machine is faster than that too. 

The thing is, performancematters a lot less than longevity in a thin-and-light than it does in a gaming laptop, and HP already has some of the best battery life in the biz withtheir Intel Core i5 model, managing nearly 13 hourson a single charge. That is gonna be hard to... And the AMD Envy x360made it almost 14 hours. That's the kinda batterylife that not only gets you through the day,but maybe even the weekend. Like, you could just leavethe power brick at work, without worrying that yourlttstore.com browsing session is gonna get cut short. - This is my whole weekend. - But that raises the question:Is this the kinda machine that you'd wanna takehome with you anyway? One of AMD's big problems, for years now, has been not getting theirCPUs into the premium designs, and this is no exception. 

The Envy line does sit below the Spectre line in HP's lineups. So has HP given theirEnvy x360 enough love? Or should you just save up a bit longer for a Spectre x360 or an XPS 13? Actually, I am pleased to report that HP has committed nosuch crime against AMD here. The Envy x360 has a premium look about it, from the super small bezels to the metallic accents on the hinges. The chassis stiffnessmight not quite hold up to top-tier laptops that areconstructed out of carbon fiber or a solid milled piece of aluminum, but it's leagues better thana budget-focused machine like Lenovo Flex 14. So I think it's fair to say that HP really nailed the balance here. 

The only thing buildquality-wise that annoyed me was the screen, which wobblesa bit more than I'd like. But bearing in mind that, of course, I've got that tablet-convertibletrade-off, I can accept it. And the I/O is really good. The Envy x360 has two USB Type-A's with the little hingey pull-down bit. Oh, it turns out you can put aType-A in a superthin laptop. How nice! It's got a Type C with charging, and it's got an SD card reader. I do wish that, instead ofthe barrel power connector on the right side, we gotanother USB Type-C port with charging, but presumably, that would've brought up the price, and I think they founda great balance here. 

One place HP fortunately didn'tcheap out is the display. With 300 nits of brightnessand excellent colors, I think anyone short of aprofessional photo editor is gonna be pretty happy with it. My only complaint hereis the 16x9 aspect ratio. These days, many of HP's competitors are making the jump to 16x10 or even 3x2, and this is even inthe lower price ranges, with the Acer Swift 3 leading the way. Get subscribed, by the way,so you don't miss our video on that little number. Staying with 16x9 whilechasing small bezels has to be HP's most obvious error with both the Envy and Spectre x360s, because it means that some folks are actually gonna struggle touse the devices comfortably. - There's just no way for meto type comfortably on this. My hands are just simply toobig to rest on the palmrest, making it, unfortunately, justa straight-up no-go for me. And it's going to be ano-go for 68% of males, and half of females as well.

 I also constantly use myright thumb on the trackpad while writing in Word documents, and the fact thatkeyboard and the trackpad aren't centered on each other means that I'm only using asmall portion of a trackpad that's already very undersizedby today's standards. To be clear, the switches are good, but maybe try it out at aBest Buy or Costco first to make sure that theergonomics work for you. - If you are able toget comfortable, though, you'll have an excellenttime typing on the Envy x360. I personally didn't have anissue with my tiny hands, and the switches offer plenty of travel while delivering a satisfyingsnap when you press them.

 Key consistency and stabilization was also uncharacteristically good for a laptop in this price band, so I don't think you're gonna have trouble getting up to full speed. As for the trackpad,it's less of a highlight. The tracking is still pretty good despite the lack of a glass top, but the small size keepsit from being exceptional, or even very good. You will be able to get used to it, but I'd personally be much happier with a bigger bottom bezel, or better yet, a taller screen and a larger trackpad. Now, to be clear, thereare a number of areas where the Spectre x360is superior to the Envy.

 Windows Hello facial recognitionis a real-nice-to-have, although the fingerprintreader on the Envy is still quite snappy for logging in. And the Spectre alsocomes with a pen included, with the option for LTE,which could easily sway someone who is constantly on the go. But then again, if you'regonna be on the go, with how much better the core performance and battery life arehere, I feel like until HP puts an AMD processorinto a Spectre notebook they have unintentionally killed their flagship lineup right here. For the vast majority ofpeople, the HP Envy x360 is gonna check all of theimportant boxes for an ultrabook. 

It's super powerful,especially for the price, it feels excellent in the hand, and aside from the screen aspect ratio, I just have no real complaints about it. I can't even remember the last time that an ultrabook camethrough the studio here that was under $1,200 andmanaged to get a full-blown, no-caveats recommendation from me. But this one certainly does, and I hope that as more companies takeAMD's mobile chips seriously, we're gonna see more excellentperformers at great prices, like this one. Speaking of excellentperformance at a great price, our sponsor Drop.com is featuring the Koss GMR-54X-ISO gaming headset. It's audiophile-approved and based on a popular Koss headset, andthe custom-engineered acoustics for immersive 3D sound allowyou to get positional cues to hear where yourenemies are coming from. There are some changesmade from the original, including reduced tensionin the lightweight headband for extend comfort, and itincludes a cord splitter, inline microphone with remote,and a detachable boom mic. 

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