 Even with the knowledge of how good Zen 2 was on the desktop, I was shocked at how well AMD's Ryzen 4000 series mobile series performed. Asus' Zephyrus G14 shredded its Intel competitors in both performance and battery life, while also being considerably cheaper. Now, it looks like HP hopes to 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 keep track of the weird stuff that's connecting to your PC, even when you aren't using it. You can see if a strange device joins your Wi-Fi and block it instantly. Get 25% off by using code LINUS at the link below. Our config of the HP Envy X360 sports a Ryzen 5 4500U, a 7nm, 6-core, 6-thread processor that boosts up to 4GHz. The last 6-core ultrabook we looked at was the Dell XPS 13, a beast of a machine, except that it costs a casual $1800 US dollars, which is why we will not be comparing the Envy X360 to it. Instead, we'll be testing it against the HP Spectre X360 with an Intel Core i5-1035G4, a 4-core, 8-thread CPU on Intel's newish 10nm node that you would hope would give the Ryzen 5 a run for its money, especially since it's in a machine that costs $250 more. But that maximum boost speed of 3.7GHz isn't a good first sign. A much worse sign is the performance tests we ran. In multi-core loads, the Ryzen 5 4500U is set to shred the i5 with a 45% higher score in Cinebench. Like I knew it was gonna win, 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 the single-threaded tests as well, thanks to that higher boost clock. Now, although I don't expect anyone to be doing much hardcore gaming on either of these machines, the Ryzen 5 4500U was also 20% faster in 3DMark TimeSpy, and I'm never gonna complain about a bit more GPU muscle. Thermals, unfortunately, didn't redeem the Core i5 version either. It immediately shot up to 100 degrees and stayed there, managing clocks of only around 2.3GHz. Something we might have accepted if Intel was the only option in town, because, I mean, in fairness, that is at least faster than the 1.5GHz base clock. Thing is, Intel isn't the only option anymore, and our Ryzen 5 config avoided thermal throttling, albeit barely, at 91 degrees, while keeping all six of its cores at a whopping 3.3GHz. Look how thin it is, guys! 3.3GHz! It's worth noting that you'll have to enable performance mode to get these kinds of speeds, but they're truly remarkable. Remember that Dell XPS 13 with a 6-core i7 that I mentioned at the start of this video? Yeah, in performance mode, this Ryzen machine is faster than that, too. The thing is, performance matters 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, with their Intel Core i5 model managing nearly 13 hours on a single charge. That is gonna be hard to beeeeeeand... the AMD NVX 360 made it to almost 14 hours! That's the kind of battery life that not only gets you through the day, but maybe even the weekend. Like, you could just leave the power brick at work without worrying that your lttstore.com browsing session is gonna get cut short. This is my whole weekend! But that raises the question, is this the kind of machine that you'd want to take home with you, anyway? One of AMD's big problems, for years now, has been not getting their CPUs into the premium designs. And this is no exception. The NV line does sit below the Spectre line in HP's lineup, so... has HP given their NVX 360 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 no such crime against AMD here. The NVX 360 has a premium look about it, from the super small bezels to the metallic accents on the hinges. The chassis stiffness might not quite hold up to top tier laptops that are constructed out of carbon fiber or a solid milled piece of aluminum, but it's leagues better than a budget-focused machine like the Lenovo Flex 14. So, I think it's fair to say that HP really nailed the balance here. The only thing build quality-wise that annoyed me was the screen, which wobbles a bit more than I'd like, but bearing in mind that, of course, I've got that tablet convertible trade-off, I can accept it. And the I.O. is really good. The NVX 360 has two USB Type A's with the little hingey pull-down bit. Oh, it turns out you can put a Type A in a super thin laptop, how nice! It's got a Type C with charging, and it's got an SD card reader. I do wish that instead of the barrel power connector on the right side, we got another USB Type C port with charging, but presumably that would have brought up the price, and I think they found a great balance here. One place HP fortunately didn't cheap out is the display. With 300 nits of brightness and excellent colors, I think anyone short of a professional photo editor is going to be pretty happy with it. My only complaint here is the 16 by 9 aspect ratio. These days, many of HP's competitors are making the jump to 16 by 10 or even 3 by 2, and this is even in the 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 16 by 9 while chasing small bezels has to be HP's most obvious error, with both the NV and Spectre X360s, because it means that some folks are actually going to struggle to use the devices comfortably. There's just no way for me to type comfortably on this. My hands are just simply too big to rest on the palm rest, making it unfortunately just a straight up no-go for me, and it's going to be a no-go for 68% of males and half of females as well. I also constantly use my right thumb on the trackpad while writing in Word documents, and the fact that the keyboard and the trackpad aren't centered on each other means that I'm only using a small portion of a trackpad that's already very undersized by today's standards. To be clear, the switches are good, but maybe try it out at a Best Buy or Costco first to make sure the ergonomics work for you. If you are able to get comfortable though, you will have an excellent time typing on the NVX360. I personally didn't have an issue with my tiny hands, and the switches offer plenty of travel while delivering a satisfying snap 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 going to 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 keeps it 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, there are a number of areas where the Spectre X360 is superior to the NV. Windows Hello facial recognition is a real nice to have, although the fingerprint reader on the NV is still quite snappy for logging in, and the Spectre also comes 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're going to be on the go, with how much better the core performance and battery life are here, I feel like until HP puts an AMD processor into a Spectre notebook, they have unintentionally killed their flagship lineup right here. For the vast majority of people, the HP NVX360 is going to check all the important 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 came through the studio here that was under $1,200, and managed to get a full-blown, no-caviets recommendation from me. But this one certainly does, and I hope that as more companies take AMD's mobile chips seriously, we're going to see more excellent performers at great prices like this one. Speaking of excellent performance at a great price, our sponsor, Drop.com, is featuring the Koss GMR54X ISO gaming headset. It's audiophile approved and based on a popular Koss headset, and the custom engineered acoustics for immersive 3D sound allow you to get positional cues to hear where your enemies are coming from. There are some changes made from the original, including reduced tension in the lightweight headband for extended comfort, and it includes a cord splitter, inline microphone with remote, and a detachable boom mic. The boom mic works with the PlayStation 4, Xbox, and Nintendo Switch, and more without hassle, and you can grab yours today with new users who sign up on Drop.com, getting $20 off this headset. If you guys enjoyed this video and you just can't get enough AMD domination, check out our full review of the Asus Zephyrus G14. It really is a lesson on how to build a compact, high-performance gaming notebook. Put AMD in it. Haha, got him.