Laptop manufacturers have stepped back to cater to creative professionals, people who do demanding tasks like complex photo editing and 4K video editing. HP is a case in point, introducing its new Envy 15 with a laser focus on creators.
Still, the HP Envy 15 faces some stiff competition, most notably from Dell’s XPS 15, a laptop we’ve long considered the best 15-inch machine you can buy. This distinction is reinforced by its new design, which is simply spectacular. Does the rookie HP Envy 15 have a chance against the longtime king?
Price
We’ll start with price because it’s an important thing to consider when comparing these two 15-inch laptops. Simply put, the Envy 15 is significantly a less expensive laptop, going for $1600 for a Core i7-10750H CPU, 16GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, a 4K AMOLED display, and an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 with a Max Q GPU. An XPS 15 equipped similarly, with just the GeForce 1650 Ti GPU, it costs $2,260 (on sale $2,050).
We don’t have full pricing yet, but you can outfit the Envy 15 with up to 32GB of RAM (the XPS 15 maxes out at 64GB) and a Core i9 CPU. We’re sure the price difference will remain as you increase the specs, which means you can get a lot of performance out of the Envy 15 for a lot less money.
The simplest thing to say is that the Envy 15 is indeed one of HP’s mid-range laptops, and it competes with the very high-end XPS 15 and stands out in some ways, at least when you consider the internals. . We’ll talk a bit about the performance impact.
Shape
The XPS 15 is one of the most impressively designed laptops you’ll find, in part because its design is the result of constant tweaks to a form factor that was already great a few generations ago. That’s not to say the latest XPS 15 isn’t vastly different from previous iterations, it just has some excellent pedigree to build on. One thing that remains the same is the use of carbon fiber on the bottom of the case and aluminum on the lid, which makes the laptop very solid. The overall form factor has changed a bit with the move to a 16:10 aspect ratio display that uses almost all of the available space on the lid – the XPS 15 has miniature bezels and a rather modern look because of it. .
The Envy 15 is a completely different beast. It’s made of stamped aluminum, so while it looks solid, it’s not. Enough in the same class as the XPS 15. It’s also all-silver with subtly beveled edges and other design cues that give it a cool look without quite quite on the level of recent HP Specter gem laptops. The Envy 15 looks quite different from the XPS 15, but it’s a wonderful laptop in its own right.
As for its dimensions, the XPS 15 is slightly less wide and deep than the Envy 15, at most half an inch wider and a fraction less deep. The XPS 15 is a bit thinner, too, at 0.71 inches at its thickest point compared to 0.73 inches for the Envy 15. And the Envy 15 is slightly heavier at 4.74 pounds compared to the XPS 15. 4.5 pounds (with an 86-watt-hour battery, which you’ll want). All this takes into account the taller screen of the XPS 15.
The entry is a tie between two notebooks. The Envy 15 has an excellent keyboard borrowed from the HP Spectre: it has plenty of travel, a light touch, and plenty of precision, making it a typist’s dream. The XPS 15’s keyboard is also pretty good with enough travel and a comfortable feel, but it can’t quite match the Envy 15’s keyboard.
However, the XPS 15’s touchpad is huge for a Windows 10 laptop, much larger than the Envy 15’s (which is by no means small), so it’s much more comfortable to use. Both are compatible with Microsoft Precision touchpad drivers and are fast and reliable. If you opt for the screen on the right, you’ll get a touch-sensitive panel on both laptops, though the Envy 15 version also supports HP Active Pen.
Connectivity is the real difference between these two laptops. Dell has gone all out for USB-C ports – that’s all the XPS 15 offers, specifically two with Thunderbolt 3 support and one USB-C 3.1. These are connected to a full-size SD card reader (which is a real bonus) along with a 3.5mm audio jack.
The Envy 15, on the other hand, has two Thunderbolt 3-compatible USB-C ports, a full-size HDMI 2.0a port, two USB-A 3.1 ports, and a mini SD card reader (a disappointment for photo professionals). ). You’ll worry less about carrying around hardware devices with the Envy 15, though Dell does include a USB-C hub with HDMI and USB-A in the box. Both laptops use Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0 for wireless connectivity.
Performance
We reviewed the XPS 15 with the octa-core Core i7-10875H CPU and the Envy 15 with the 6-core Core i7-10750H. Therefore, we cannot directly compare CPU performance. In all the CPU-specific benchmarks we ran, the XPS 15 was the best. You can’t upgrade the Envy 15 to the XPS 15’s CPU, so we’d have to get both laptops with Core i9 processors to make an accurate direct comparison.
Even so, the Envy 15 performed exceptionally well against other laptops with the same CPU in both our synthetic benchmarks and our real-world tests. Turn on performance mode in the HP Command Center utility, something you’ll want to do when you’re forcing the system, as HP tunes the Envy 15 very conservatively in default mode, and the Envy 15 beat the XPS 15 in our performance test. hand brake. which converts a 420MB video to H.265. The Envy 15 took exactly two minutes, while the XPS 15 took two seconds longer. Not a huge difference, of course. But it’s remarkable to see such an attractively priced laptop with a slower CPU, as well as a laptop that costs hundreds of dollars more and has two extra cores and four extra threads.
However, the GPU is what we have to pay attention to. As mentioned above, the Envy 15 is equipped with an Nvidia GeForce RTX 2060 Max-Q, compared to the GeForce GTX 1650 TI in the XPS 15. That extra GPU power pays real dividends in more than just gaming, where the Envy 15 it was much faster since the XPS 15, but also in creative applications that can take advantage of the GPU. We ran the Envy 15 through our Premiere Pro rendering test, and it finished in three minutes and 53 seconds in performance mode (it took five minutes and one second in default mode). This compares favorably with the Dell XPS 17, which also uses a GTX 2060 Max-Q GPU and finished in three minutes and 38 seconds. The XPS 15, on the other hand, took four minutes and 50 seconds to complete the same test.
Speaking of gaming, the Envy 15 was naturally much faster. IN Assassin’s Creed OdysseyFor example, the Envy 15 managed 45 frames per second in ultra 1080p mode compared to the XPS 15 at 26 fps. IN civilization VI, Envy 15 managed 100 fps in 1080p ultra mode, while XPS 15 managed just 64 fps. This performance difference topped all of our gaming tests, which means that if you want a creative workstation that can also play some games with reasonable fps and graphical detail, the Envy 15 is a much better choice. Not bad for a laptop that will save you $500 or more.
We’ll quickly mention battery life here because there isn’t much of a difference (we’re talking minutes here) between the Envy 15 and the XPS 15 when it comes to longevity. Simply put, neither of these laptops is likely to get you through a full day of real work without turning it on. Both also use fairly large power supplies, which means it’s not trivial to carry around.
Show
Dell and HP went in slightly different directions with their display options, but ended up in pretty much the same place. We tested both laptops with their 4K options, which in the case of the Envy 15 meant a 16:9 4K AMOLED display, and in the case of the XPS 15 a 16:10 4K IPS display. Both screens have a lot going for them. Dell’s panel is taller and better for productivity, and that alone might appeal to many. HP would do well to switch to the same aspect ratio (or better yet, follow Microsoft’s lead and go straight to 3:2).
Both displays enjoyed a wide color gamut, the Dell with 100% AdobeRGB and sRGB and the HP with 97% AdobeRGB and 100% sRGB. The XPS 15 was slightly more accurate at 0.65 compared to the Envy 15 at 0.73, but both are well below the 1.0 threshold that defines the most accurate displays.
Also, the XPS 15 was slightly brighter at 442 nits compared to the Envy 15 at 404 nits. But contrast is where the Envy 15’s AMOLED screen really shines—or well, it doesn’t, at least when it comes to the deepest blacks you’ll find in a laptop. The XPS 15’s contrast ratio was 1480:1, which is excellent for an IPS display. But the Envy 15 came in at 404,410:1, clearly in a different league entirely.
You can’t go wrong with any of these displays. If you like a taller aspect ratio and a slightly brighter screen, then the XPS 15 is for you. But if you want unparalleled contrast and deep, deep blacks, then the Envy 15 will fit the bill.
The XPS 15 is a better laptop, but the Envy 15 is a better value
There’s no question that the XPS 15 is the sleekest, most refined laptop around, and the best in its class when it comes to all the factors that go into rating a machine. At the same time, the Envy 15 performs so well and costs so much less that it’s not fair to hand the award over to the XPS 15. You can save quite a bit of money with the Envy 15 and, in many ways, get a better experience than the XPS 15.
If you have deep pockets and don’t really need fast GPU performance, then go for the XPS 15. But if you’re on a budget and will get significantly faster graphics, then the Envy 15 is the option for you.
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Categories: GAMING
Source: newstars.edu.vn