HP is adding a dual screen laptop to its Omen X line of gaming computers.
No, the new HP Omen X 2S doesn’t have two side-by-side screens like a desktop gaming rig, and it doesn’t have a screen-instead-of-keyboard like a Lenovo Yoga Book. But it has a 15.6 inch primary display and a 6 inch secondary screen above the keyboard.
HP says you can use that second screen to run independent apps such as chat or video apps to keep track of communications or streaming while you play. You can also use it to view a portion of a game window, such as a map. Or you can turn the second screen into a virtual number pad.
The HP Omen X 2S should be available later this month for $2100 and up.
The laptop’s primary screen supports NVIDIA G-Sync technology, and HP will offer three display options:
- 1080p 144 Hz
- 1080p 240 Hz
- 4K HDR 60 Hz
HP says the smaller secondary display is a 6 inch, 1080p touchscreen.
The keyboard features RGB per-key lighting and there’s a touchpad to the right of the QWERTY keys instead of below it (to help make room for the screen above the keyboard).
The laptop has a metal chassis and measures just 20mm (0.8 inches) thick.
While the $2100 starting price is rather steep, you do get a lot of laptop for the money. The entry-level price covers a dual-screen notebook with an Intel Core i7-9750H processor, NVIDIA RTX 2070 Max-Q graphics, 16GB of DDR4-3200 RAM, a 256GB SSD, a 144 Hz 1080p display, and Windows 10 Home.
HP will also offer higher-priced configurations with up to a Core i9-9980H processor, up to NVIDIA RTX 2080 Max-Q graphics, up to 32GB of RAM, up to 1TB of storage and up to Windows 10 Pro.
Doesn’t look like it was designed by someone who plays non-mobile games.
If they desperately needed to fill that space with something, even knobs exposed as joystick axis would’ve been better.
I’ve got a single legit use for it: Elite Dangerous.
The game on the small screen, some video on the big screen.
Again…left-handers get no respect from HP.
Maybe HP finds you too… sinister?
If I remember correctly, previous devices like this (ones where the touchpad is a screen) would have the smaller screen run on a custom OS from the firmware instead of treating it like a second screen for Windows to handle. And that’s a serious problem.
A gimmick like this could only work well on an OS that can natively handle both screens in the ways that you want to use them. The secondary OS thing is a bad, terrible, no good idea.
Horrible ergonomics. They should call it the HP Gimmick.
My laptop has a forward-position keyboard and I find it much more comfortable than the traditional arrangement. That said, I can’t stand offset keyboards that aren’t right/left centered.