HP Spectre x360 15 Review: A Versatile, Attractive, Premium Ultraportable

Name: HP Spectre x360 15
Brand: HP

by Paul Lilly — Thursday, April 20, 2017, 10:19 AM EDT

Spectre x360 15: 3DMark And Far Cry 2 Benchmarks

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Next, we'll evaluate the graphics horsepower of NVIDIA's GeForce 940MX in gaming. The 3DMark Cloudgate test is aimed at entry-level PCs and laptops, and has two subtests: a processor-intensive physics test and two graphics tests. We run the test suite at its default 1280 x 720 resolution and at default rendering quality settings. Keep in mind that 3DMark Cloud Gate scores aren’t comparable to scores from say, 3DMark Fire Strike (for gaming PCs) or Ice Storm (for smartphones and tablets).

Futuremark 3DMark Cloud Gate And Sky Diver

GPU Benchmark

While not a gaming laptop, the Spectre x360 15 leaves other ultraportables in the dust in 3DMark. That is because these types of systems typically lean on integrated graphics, which have not caught up to discrete GPUs in performance. This is something that is on full display here, with the Spectre x360 15 scoring more than 2,000 points higher than the next closest competitor.

3DMark Sky Diver is the next step up from Cloud Gate with more emphasis on DX11 gaming performance, but still at the workload limitation of integrated graphics or entry level discrete GPUs.

We have less data points to compared in Sky Diver, but the result is the same—the Spectre x360 15's discrete GPU makes all the difference in the world here.

FarCry 2

DirectX Game Benchmark

Sure, Far Cry 2 has been around the block a few times and is many years old, but it is still a good test for entry-level PCs and ultrabooks alike. It features high quality textures, complex shaders, and dynamic lighting to create a rich and immersive environment. More importantly, it includes an exceptional benchmarking tool. We run the benchmark at 720p and 60Hz on the "High" detail preset with DirectX 10. It is actually still a great yardstick to see just how far integrated graphics solutions have come.

We're used to seeing gaming laptops top 100 frames per second in Far Cry 2, not ultraportables. Nevertheless, the Spectre x360 15 shows it has some gaming chops by averaging over 110fps. The takeaway here is that if you need to blow off some steam after grinding out the work day, the Spectre x360 15 has the graphics muscle for a casual gaming experience. You won't be able to play games at its native 4K resolution, but depending on the title, scaling back to 1080p and adjusting the visual quality settings can result in playable framerates.