HP Spectre x360 15t Review: A 4 Pound Convertible Beauty
Battery Performance And Acoustics
Updated 4/26/2016 - Editor's Note:
We have updated the battery metrics for the HP Spectre x360 15t in this review, to include our new test suite and methodology for notebook and device battery life. In recent months it has become increasingly obvious that battery life testing with notebooks needs to be more tightly controlled to set a level playing field for a number of aspects of the systems being tested. As such, we have gone back through a few recent prominent notebook reviews, like this one, to update them with our latest findings based on these new metrics. Almost every section of this page has been updated.
In the following benchmarks we employ two very different battery life tests--Battery Eater Pro and a custom 1080p HD video loop test--to prove out battery life with our test group of machines and the HP Spectre x360 15t. In all tests, Windows 10 Quiet Hours have been enabled and displays are calibrated with lux meters on pure white screens to 115 lux. For the average notebook this is somewhere between a 45 - 60% brightness setting. Since notebook displays significantly affect power consumption and battery life, it's important to ensure a level playing field with respect to brightness of the display for battery testing. However, since many notebook displays vary in brightness at each respective brightness setting in Windows, this calibration with the meter is also critical to ensure all displays are set to as near identical brightness as possible before testing.
The HP Spectre x360 handled our battery tests with ease and placed itself in the top quadrant of our test system database ranking for the more reasonably loaded video playback test. Clearly, this is a machine that will last through typical long flights across the country. Unfortunately, we didn't have the 1080p panel version in our possession long enough to retest, so the 4K version is represented here. If you go with the 4K option, you're going to lose some up time to lighting up all those extra pixels in the display. The 1080p display equipped machine would undoubtedly offer even longer life in both test workloads.
Regardless, if you’re looking for a travel-friendly system, the Spectre x360 is a good candidate. And as for noise, the system was nearly dead silent, only spinning up in our more strenuous benchmarks and then only with a dull whir audible.
We have updated the battery metrics for the HP Spectre x360 15t in this review, to include our new test suite and methodology for notebook and device battery life. In recent months it has become increasingly obvious that battery life testing with notebooks needs to be more tightly controlled to set a level playing field for a number of aspects of the systems being tested. As such, we have gone back through a few recent prominent notebook reviews, like this one, to update them with our latest findings based on these new metrics. Almost every section of this page has been updated.
In the following benchmarks we employ two very different battery life tests--Battery Eater Pro and a custom 1080p HD video loop test--to prove out battery life with our test group of machines and the HP Spectre x360 15t. In all tests, Windows 10 Quiet Hours have been enabled and displays are calibrated with lux meters on pure white screens to 115 lux. For the average notebook this is somewhere between a 45 - 60% brightness setting. Since notebook displays significantly affect power consumption and battery life, it's important to ensure a level playing field with respect to brightness of the display for battery testing. However, since many notebook displays vary in brightness at each respective brightness setting in Windows, this calibration with the meter is also critical to ensure all displays are set to as near identical brightness as possible before testing.
The HP Spectre x360 handled our battery tests with ease and placed itself in the top quadrant of our test system database ranking for the more reasonably loaded video playback test. Clearly, this is a machine that will last through typical long flights across the country. Unfortunately, we didn't have the 1080p panel version in our possession long enough to retest, so the 4K version is represented here. If you go with the 4K option, you're going to lose some up time to lighting up all those extra pixels in the display. The 1080p display equipped machine would undoubtedly offer even longer life in both test workloads.
Regardless, if you’re looking for a travel-friendly system, the Spectre x360 is a good candidate. And as for noise, the system was nearly dead silent, only spinning up in our more strenuous benchmarks and then only with a dull whir audible.
