HP is giving its Spectre x360 line of convertible notebooks a makeover — both in terms of design and performance.

The company says the 13 and 15.6 inch models offer longer battery life and better performance than their predecessors, optional support for 4G LTE with Gigabit speeds, and a new design that comes in a choice of “dark ash silver with copper luxe accents” or “poseiden blue with pale brass accents.”

The new laptops should be available in November.

Prices start at $1150 for the new HP Spectre x360 13 with a 13.3 inch display.

The convertible notebook measures 12.2″ x 8.6″ x 0.6″ and weighs about 2.9 pounds, features a 1080p touchscreen display, and sports two Thunderbolt 3/USB-C ports, two USB 3.1 Type-C ports, and a USB 3.1 Type-A port plus a headphone jack and microSD card reader.

It’s available with up to a Core i7-8565U processor, 16GB of DDR4-2400 RAM, and 512GB of PCIe NVMe solid state storage. And the notebook features quad speakers, a backlit keyboard, a fingerprint scanner, and a Windows-hello compatible IR camera.

HP says you should be able to get up to 22 hours of battery life from the laptop’s 61 Wh battery. It’d take that claim with a few dozens grains of salt, since PC makers have a habit of quoting the most generous battery tests they can. But HP claims the notebook has the “world’s longest battery life in a quad core convertible,” so it seems the company is pretty confident that you’ll at least get reasonably good battery life.

The company says the 2018 model of the HP Spectre x360 13 gets up to 37 percent longer battery life than last year’s model, and offers up to 13 percent better graphics performance.

HP has also added a physical kill switch for the camera, allowing you to disconnect it when it’s not in use. And the laptop has HP SureView technology which lets you limit the viewing angles for the display with the press of a button in order to keep people from reading private items over your shoulder.

The new HP Spectre x360 15 is priced at $1390 and up and it has a larger display, a numeric keypad on the right side of the keyboard, discrete graphics, and a few other features that aren’t available in the smaller model.

HP offers the Spectre x360 15 with up to a 6-core Intel Coffee Lake-H processor, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050Ti Max-Q graphics, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of PCIe NVMe storae — although the $1390 starting price will only get you a Core i7-8565U quad-core Whiskey Lake processor, NVIDIA GeForce MX150 graphics, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of storage.

The notebook features an HDMI 2.0 ports along with USB 3.1 Type-A, USB 3.1 Type-C, and Thunderbolt 3 ports and a headset jack and microSD card reader.

The 15.6 inch model  has an 84 Wh battery and the computer measures 14.2″ x 9.8″ x 0.8″ and weighs about 4.8 pounds.

HP says the new model is thinner than last year’s Spectre x360 15 while offering significantly better performance.

Both the 13 inch and 15 inch Spectre x360 laptops feature touchscreen displays, 360 degree hinges, and support for a Windows Ink-compatible, pressure-sensitive pen.

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4 replies on “HP updates its Spectre x360 premium convertible lineup”

  1. Looks great except the downgrade from SD slot to microSD, lack of HDMI 2.0 port, and an Ethernet port.

    These are three things professionals actually rely on to transfer photos, connect to a secure network, and show presentations at work.

    Adding “docks” or “dongles” means these so called Ultrabooks are actually much heavier, bulkier, and larger than the spec sheet implies. In fact, it would mean the 2015 Ultrabooks are actually the better machine for professionals; you know the target audience of Ultrabooks.

    If they called these things something else like “Slimbooks” and had a different target audience, then it wouldn’t matter to me. But to follow any another company (Apple) blindly is a recipe for disaster.

    1. The evolution and correct utilization of the usb-c port by ultrabook manufacturers should solve the problem. These docks are not heavy or bulky as they used to be and much cheaper than the old “traditional” docks. One slim cable delivers power, ehternet, HDMI and full SD slot so you can have one in the office, one in your travel bag and one at home. The link below is just an example, I am not affiliated with it by any means:
      https://www.ebay.com/itm/Thunderbolt-3-Dock-USB-C-HDMI-Ethernet-4-Ports-HUB-TF-SD-Charger-Card-Reader-/253491864000?ef_id=Cj0KCQjwsMDeBRDMARIsAKrOP7EdjIfrtZCa1HInwtNL520WQfI6_2Epg2ObwRTEcRJ37-qGF3qBR0AaAqErEALw_wcB:G:s

      1. Dodging it.
        You shouldn’t have to go out of your way to spend more money, more time (especially researching), to increase the bulk, increase the weight, and decrease the elegance…..just to get the functionality which is expected out of the box.

        I already bought one of these solutions for a sibling, and its definitely not ideal.

        My gripe is that, yes sure, we should be advancing towards a better future where one cable and one card and one protocol that serves all. But we are very far from it, since almost: no modem comes with USB-C connectivity, since high-end cameras still support full-sized SD cards, and no TV’s/monitors come with USB-C video. Not to mention the plethora of accessories that haven’t even transitioned to the new form. And even then, you’ll need a laptop with at least x4 USB-C (3.2/TB3) ports and x1 microSD slot…. unlike Apple’s monstrosities.

        The usual counterargument to this is “Bluetooth is the future”… well, we’ve tried that and found it to be slower, lower quality, less efficient, and cause problems of charging more device batteries. And we’ve tried it for years. The fact is the future isn’t wireless… its a hybrid of wired and wireless, of hardware and software.

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