I keep coming on this channel for the rare honesty you can get from a tech youtuber... Keep up!

'I LOVE it, but I also HATE it!' That basically sums up my relationship between me and my ex

for the lid closing issue, it can be easily solved by going into control panel , hardware and sound, power options and choosing what closing the lid does. It really is not a big issue, and is good for people who use an external monitor with the lid of the laptop closed

I had the same issue with volume, on vacation it was difficult to watch movies because of it, but just a few days ago I noticed that it's fixed. Now I listen to most things at 50% volume. I didn't explicitly update anything but it might have updated in the background.

I'll have a good look at this once it releases in Aus! Thanks for the reviews as usual Josh, much love.

@Josh, I have the HP Spectre x360 15 convertible w/15.6" diagonal 4K UHD screen. I have experienced the loud intermittent fan noise, but its an infrequent occurrence. Thankfully. So far, so good, but I have not hooked it up to a 4K monitor to check for the refresh rate issue. Thanks for this video, enjoy ur recommendations quite a bit.👍🏾🙂

Enough about the laptop, when are we getting the grape review?

Josh, nice crisp and informative review! Could you do a video on the Asus ZenBook 14/15 there are even 360 varients of those laptops and would love to hear your thoughts on them. Thank you.

Thanks Josh. This review is exactly what an everyday user needs.

The refreshed version of this laptop has fixed the fan noise 14-ea1000. Mine hardly comes on and when it does its very quiet and promptly shuts off. They also updated it with faster lpddr4x 4266mhz memory for anyone still interested in this machine...

Great summary of fan noise results - that's what I am most interested in and why I really appreciate your reviews!

Thank you! This is the best practical review for the HP Spectre 14 x360. Practical reviews matter.

The nightfall black colour is hotttttttttttt, according to literally everyone. Apart from that gr8 review

Had this same problem with my envy 15 2020 about the sound playing after you close it and found out I had sleep turned off when laptop is closed while being plugged in from settings

Just found your channel, keep up the good work! I especially loved the info about the 30Hz 4k output, really valuable to know and definitely a deal breaker for a lot of people!

Great review! Thank you! I was considering this laptop but these issues outlined are definitely a deal breaker.

Very informative and concise. Thank you!

thank you for the review. Is the 30Hz issue only when using cable connection, or also when you're using miracast?

I just ordered this one from best buy (14-ea1023dx) and this comment section has been SUPER helpful. 1. Someone said the ports are different for 4k video output. One is rated normally (back corner vs side) 2. Someone said they fixed the fan issue on newer version 14-ea1xxx 3. Someone also said there is a registry option to throttle it but if 2 is true then maybe this won't matter.

Had this one for a brief moment my god was the laptop good and also gorgeous, it cost a couple hundred more than laptops that are better but I was willing to part with that - just for the looks. However the god damn fan noise when I'm not even running anything is absolutely ridiculous. Imagine taking notes in class and all of a sudden your laptop goes bananas as if you're trying to run battlefield on ultra

Thanks for the review. I was considering updating my Surface Book 2, which I still love even though it's on the heavy side. I was impressed with the specs from this Hp, including the 3:2 aspect ratio and Amoled display, but the fan noise issue and the underwhelming battery life I don't believe I could endure, being used to a completely silent laptop. I'll wait for the next one

Great Review! when is the Yoga 6 one coming? can't wait!

Could you review the Lenovo yoga 9i

Best laptop reviewer u are sooo satisfying to watch!!! I love watching u and am subed to u :)

I really want this kind of review for the ideapad 5 15 But also great video btw. Appreciate your work👍👍

Wow! What a great video! I had to select the "slow" mode to make sure I understand everything ! loll I am French "Quebecoise"! :-) It is so interesting, you have made such a great job with all those descriptions. Thank you so much for your "efforts"! I am searching for the right laptop for my needs ans uses (typing a lot, making videos, listen to music, hand writing - taking notes for my studies, etc.), so I think for me it is the Spectre the best. By the way, I love the black color! ha ha ! It does not look "poopy" at all! At the contrairy, I think it looks elegant with the gold border, witch I like a lot! But I have to admit that the blue one is maybe the one I would choose if it was available! So thank you again for your excellent work, you helped me to make my mind. :-)

thank yyyou! excellent review!

you are my go to reviewer (you and mobiletechreview) when it comes to laptops. Keep up the good work

Hey Josh, thanks for all the great reviews. I was hoping you might do a "best 2-in-1" video at some point. For my purposes I need to find a good 2-in-1, but there are so many issues with cooling, build quality, screens etc. that I feel like maybe I should just give up and go with a normal touchscreen laptop. Help?

Hi Josh, will you review any of the Huawei matebooks? I was going to buy this HP Spectre but was put off by the price and went for the matebook 14 2020 instead. Will be good to see your reviews of that laptop in the future maybe....

Couple things I’d like to point out as I’ve owned (and subsequently returned) this laptop. 1) There is a registry edit you can make that opens a Windows power plan setting to disable turbo boost so you don’t need ThrottleStop if that’s all you plan to do. 2) DisplayPort 1.4 with support for monitors up to 4K/120 Hz is available but only through the USB-C port on the back corner of the laptop. The one on the right side has limited output as you noted.

Hi Josh- thx. I've had the HP x360 Envy 15-ed1008ca for a week and the fan comes on suddenly at full speed, sometimes for 5-10 sec sometimes for a minute and then off. I'm used to fans coming on slowly at first, gradually increasing as required. I've upadated Bios, graphics drivers and Windows. No change. Is it just problem with these? Thx for your gr8 vids and any thoughts. BT

Would love to see a review of the E13 Flip Evo and how it compares to this. It seams like it is an improved version of this laptop with 2x the ram and an easily replaceable SSD etc.

Useful info, thanks! 🙂👍🏻

Thank you for your honest (i assume!) opinions about this laptop. This really helps clarify my thoughts regarding envy x360 or spectre. Do you think it is worth buying laptops with wifi 6 or do you think wifi 5 users can still getaway using wifi 5 for a few years?

I like grapes too

Love your reviews. Really wish you would do on one the HP Elite Dragonfly

Can we have a comparison video specially for those 2-in-1 laptops? I am unsure to choose which.

I had the 30 hz issue with this laptop; but a different usb-c cable fixed it and now my external 4K monitor is running at 60 hz.

Could you make a video about the best laptops for programmers in 2021 as you did for 2020?

The Display output restricted to 4k@30Hz is really troublesome because Thunderbolt 4 or USB 4 supports DP 1.4 natively and that's also stated in HP's product page for this laptop. This probably a bug in their BIos of TB4 firmware. If this is a hardware limitation, they simply can't call it TB4 or USB 4.

Good to know 😊❤️, thank you.

THANKS JOSH, you're the only one who talks about issues that personally i found on my unit too( 2020 13 inch model) and actually i was astonished that literaly every single reviewer did not point out neither of them ( fan noise , fan kicking in too much even under basic load , extreme heat which makes impossible to use on my legs, very very poor sound quality, unconfortable and too much small palm rest and poor build quality).. I returned my unit because of this problems thanks again for be so sincere and professional , from an italian fan :)

Can you do a review on Lenovo yoga 9i and do a comparison with this laptop ?

Great review . Thanks

Hi Josh, I have the new Spectre 13 and the speakers suck on that model too. It's almost like some software component isn't working right, they sound really blown out. Not really an issue for me as almost always use headphones, but still disappointing. Can you double check your memory speed? I haveLPDDR4 clocked at 4267MT/s, I'm wondering if HP really put slower RAM chips in the 14 inch model or if it's a typo on their website. I'm really happy with how zippy the fast memory makes the machine. After downloading the latest graphics driver from Intel's website I'm able to drive both my 4k displays at 60hz. Something to note about replacing the SSD, HP locks the SATA controller in IDE mode (can't change it in BIOS) which will prevent one from using Samsung's drivers for their EVO brand. For whatever reason their drivers require AHCI mode. It works, but I'm stuck using a Microsoft driver from 2006 and the read/write speeds are not at all what the drive is capable of. If anyone has information on how to fix that please let me know. I assume a larger Western Digital drive would work better with the native Intel RST drivers. But like you said, the screws being under the foot is a HUGE problem. I'm not going to change the drive again because the foot is now super glued to the back panel. Initially, the foot came off just fine, but after a couple weeks of use and the chassis heating up the adhesive on the foot melts onto the panel. Long story short, don't recommend trying to save a buck by getting the 256gb drive and upgrading later. Otherwise, I really like this laptop, definitely a few more tweaks to be done in the next revision.

Can you please review the Dell Inspiron 7306 2 in 1. There are a few reviews of that online, but i want your opinion.

My 13" Spectre never has the issue of shutting the lid & laptop still playing. The 14" should have a In-Bag-Detection so it hibernates when it is inside a bag.

Update, two days of use: WOW, I AM EXTREMELY HAPPY and the Carbon X1 is going to be given away. I have ordered a USB C to HDMI adapter and I am yet to test whether it has the 30hz issue. I am getting to like the color and the lid function does indeed work... I am a developer who never games, has no need to watch moves on the go, who does some documentation and coding when on the go -- in Asia and Europa. I am extremely happy with it and it suits me perfectly. It is not loud, yet a bit hot. Concerns: This is my first HP and I don't know how this will last and how easy it is to break and take coffee spills on the keyboard. Also, this is my first OLED screen and I hope there will be no burn-ins. As of now, there are two enhancements that I would like on this: SIM card and LTE, and an HDMI port. The price paid as a graduate student (student discount) is EUR 1600 for OLED, 1TB SSD, 16GB RAM (including 25% tax). This is expensive considering that I may get an AMD 13 Envy x360 for half the price of EUR 800 with much better battery life and processing speed. With an OLED 14 inch screen, same aspect ratio 3:4, 512 GB RAM, and a Ryzen 5 4500U processor, I am ready to pay EUR 500 (800 plus 500) more for an AMD version. I also considered Lenovo Yoga 9i 14 inch, which costs as much as my Spectre, but the aspect ratio made me go for the Spectre and it has turned out to be a very good decision as there is much easier to code and edit on my Spectre than on my Carbon X1 (same kind of screen size as the Yoga).

You helped me. A lot! Choosing elite G7 instead.

I feel like these are things that could be fixed with updates but whether they are who knows. Love the 3:2 OLED display

For university students, which portable laptop would you suggest? Macbook pro, macbook air, xps 13 2 in 1 or xps 15 2 in 1?

Where would you want the home, end and delete keys to be on a laptop? I use ctrl + shift + home / end a lot while programming, so I am looking for a good layout for those keys.

Thanks for a great video. You told it like it was👍

Did you find any lag in applications? I returned my spectre 15 when it would get stuck while switching between a few hea y apps right in the beginning.

Thank you for this review! When it came out I was really interested, but many early UKposts reviews gave me a serious "sponsored by HP" vibe and I held off. Your first video on the Spectre 14 was the first one I trusted, but I felt like the other shoe hadn't dropped yet about negatives to this device. Sadly I was right, and it's not perfect. : (

Thank you. Can you review one of the samsung galaxy books. I notice you have not reviewed any of them. Galaxy Book S? Alpha? Ion? Flex? I myself am very interested in the flex. Thanks. :-)

I bought the Huawei matebook 14 and wanted a review as it is arriving from you because it has great potential to be recommended.

Hey Josh. I tested display models of the new 14 and new 13t in store recently. The 14 inch was noticeably louder than the 13t. I brought in my 10th gen to compare speakers, and the new 13t is a whopping 30-40% quieter than my 10th gen 13t, which has pretty shit speakers to be honest, but they ARE reasonably loud (for a tiny laptop). The 14 inch was actually about the same as my 10th gen 13t in volume, but noticeably better sounding. This makes me wonder if there is a fault with in their new line up causing some units to go out with abnormally quiet speakers. The new 13t had the quietest speakers I've come across in years, so quiet I would consider the unit fit for purpose. Also the display is noticeably less bright on the 14 compared to both versions of the 13t in 4k oled. One notch lower on the brightness scale. Not sure if that was just that unit, or how they all are. Re the colour, yes the brown is just awful. Even if the laptop was otherwise perfect that colour would drive me nuts. So far that is the only colour option for both the new 13 and 14 inch versions in NZ.... And only available in 512GB. P.S. Happy New Year Josh! Thanks for this honest and quality review! I value similar things to you in a laptop, so really enjoy and appreciate your reviews. :)

I agree with all that you said. This spectre of mine is definitely going back.

Had this laptop for a year now. There is nothing I would change about it. Love this thing. Maybe you guys bought a model which is slightly different or faulty? I see a bunch of negative reviews in the comment section and I am honestly surprised.

Hey good review. Is there a newer version of this out like with 60 hertz..? Or just a better overall version of this laptop as I love the color

Great review. Clear things a lot

hi, which should I choose? nvidia geforce gtx 1650 ti 4gb gddr6 (Acer Predator) VS nvidia geforce gtx 1660 ti 6gb gddr6 (Lenovo legion 5i) with same 10th gen cpu and ram. also laptap durability is important. Is Legion 5i durability good whit its plastic chassis? Please Help!!!!! I'm confused

Hey Josh I have a HP laptop that have screws under the rubber feet. In my experience those rubber feet sticks back to the laptop after ripping them off. If they don't you can use double sided tape

Hey guys! I hope you stay safe and have a nice day, God bless you!

I've seen many people talking about the m1 macs, but I wud just like to add. They may seem refined in performance, but various external display connections are giving big problems. I have nothing against Apple or anyone, and I am an intel fanboy (stull trying to be unbiased) . Just wanted to share it..

Great review of a great but flawed laptop. I’d have bought one in November if they’d been available in the UK but I believe they’re still a month or so away. Dodged a bullet it seems as we got the Dell Inspiron 7000 15” 2in1 Black Edition with the same chip but also the Iris Xe Max dGPU with Deep Link, 4K touchscreen, pen garage etc and this is definitely a better creative/productivity workhorse than this Spectre ultrabook. Now if HP bring out a 15” version also with a 16:10 or 3:2 screen and the Tiger Lake H chip plus a beefy dGPU....🤩

How do you feel about the HP Spectre 15 360

I am happy that I did't wait for this one and bout MBA with M1 16GB variant

Hopefully HP brings spectre series with the AMD Ryzen 5000 series cpu it will be🔥🔥🔥

Let's hope next revision fixes these issues!

I use my old HP laptop as my 2ndary laptop and the keyboard layout does cause some troubles lol Linus Tech Tips has a video reviewing the laptop on their short circuit channel. They said that HP had implemented some sensors to detect if the laptop is in a bag and stop the device from running, so I don't think it will drain the battery in the backpack. Nevertheless, I still found it ridiculous that by the year 2021, we still have laptops draining the battery with closed lips.

Please dont downplay the right key column (Home, End, Pg Up, Pg Dn). Everyone has preference. I rely on these keys so much!

Hi Josh, great review! Is the microsoft laptop go good for college students? and is it worth it?

I’ll wait for the Next Spectre then because I LOVE the Spectre’s Design. But those cons are pretty strong

In college my 2019 xps 13 wouldn't sleep properly either. As someone without funds to swap it out & it being my main computer this was aggravating. It eventually got patched into the Linux kernel and so I ran with that for a while and windows fixed it too eventually. That said, it literally made school more difficult sometimes.

hello josh ,great reviews! Do you know if the EVO spectra x360 14 hasbeen improved for fan noise and heat ? those 2 poi ts you mentioned do pose a problem for me too but still like the 3 2 screen and concept. Are you able to (re)test the EVO ? thank you.

This laptop vs lenovo thinkpad x1 carbon 9 for a student, which is better In your opinion?

I have a Spectre 14” with the exact specs and silver that I got for around 1100 USD. I’m coming from a 2015 MacBook Pro and I honestly love this little laptop. I do miss MacOS but I need Windows for my work applications

Plz help I m looking for budget laptop for casual use.. I choose Dell Inspiron 5409/5402 .. should I go ahead with it?

looking forward to your xiaomi Laptop pro 15 OLED review

Is the Dell XPS a 2-in-1? If not, then I don't consider that a fair comparison. Better to compare Spectre 14 to Yoga 9i, for example.

No one seems to be talking about the Asus UX393EA - this is a laptop with a 3:2 aspect ratio screen, 16GB ram, 11th Gen processor, 1TG SSD, and has a cracking screen.

I wonder if enough people complain about the "fan noise / kicking on at random intervals" issue, if HP will issue a firmware / BIOS update to resolve this. The low speaker volume and excessive heat at the bottom of the laptop were my two most major concerns and other reviewers said both shouldn't be of concern for me so I ordered mine on Cyber Monday directly from HP. It was (finally) shipped yesterday. But now I'm second guessing my purchase after watching your review... Damn.

Should I buy Asus zenbook flip S or Hp specter x360 14 for overall use and studies (For programming, researching, taking notes, drawing, reading, writing, watching movies) Any thoughts?

I love how your mother has an A9 tri pod ufo B&O Soundsystem at her house. That's an A class. I bet she likes it smooth.

I am a developer as you and need the aspect ration for that purpose when on the go. thank you for a very honest review, I have already ordered that one, but it hasn't arrived yet.... the 30hz problem must be a bug and if it has it I will return it. I wont watch any movies or doing any games on it, just do work, browse the web and code and for that I hope the fan wont get too noisy or what do you think?

Good review, but I felt you were being a bit negative. For example, in the sound setting using the equaliser should definitely make a difference. Also, you can get 60 Hz if you at least tried using a different cable :)

If you enable High Definition output on the BIOS, you do get a very stable 4k at 60Hz.

After just two days short of one year of owning my beautiful Spectre x360 14" the Left Hinge broke and I was barely able to close the lid. I open the lid in the morning and close it at night -- gently I might add. I never use it in tablet mode. This laptop has always been babied. I was initially disappointed when I realized the Left Hinge was wonky but I'm making my way to being pissed off as this problem is a known defect in many of HP laptop computers. I paid for the extended warranty and I was pretty sure I would never have to use it - at least not for something like this. I read of so many of HP laptops having this problem which goes back years. I'll see how this $1600 purchase does after the fix. I am pretty sure I won't be buying another HP laptop.

Josh, you are wrong on the external monitor. You need to change the USB hub on the monitor to USB 2.0 in order to dedicate enough bandwidth to the video to drive 4K @ 60Hz, I did it on mine. Now the worst part about this laptop is actually it does NOT receive power via USB-C (PD) from the monitor. at least for the 2x Philips monitors (different models) I tried it with.

🍇🍇 Grapes are delicious!! I like the Spectre laptop too. The 14 in 3 4 aspect ratio is perfect for me.

Maybe you can help me out. I love the clarity of the OLED display on my X360, but I haven't found a way to get the task bar and dialogue fonts big enough to read. it practically makes the computer unusable! I'm sure there's a fix, but I haven't been able to figure it out. If I zoom the screen size, I can't get a full size window onto the screen. So furstrating!!!

8:44 I'd tell him ti get a thinkpad T14 😳

Does an egpu work with this? I want to connect a 3070 and output to an oled 4k 120hz

Great info. Most times I'm ok with the "cons".. but these are deal killers.

Ive taken to reducing the max CPU % in my power settings in windows with my x360 to keep it from firing up the fan

I was just on the HP website and the online rep said that there is no longer a 3K OLED option - i don’t know if he is wrong.. but there is no 3k customization for the hp 14 now- weird

HP Spectre 360 vs Dell XPS Plus.... decisions decisions! 🤔