HP OmniBook 5 assessment: A surprisingly premium MacBook Neo rival
At $699.99, the OmniBook 5 has rather a lot going for it, together with an all-metal chassis and excellent battery life. It’s not with out its compromises, although. The bottom configuration simply comes with 8GB of non-upgradeable RAM and 256GB of storage. So my principal query is… is that this one of many higher inexpensive laptops you should buy proper now?
It relies upon!
HP OmniBook 5: Specs
The assessment unit I examined prices $699.99 and it comes with an Intel Core 5 320 processor, 8GB of RAM, and 256GB of SSD storage. There’s a higher-tier configuration that includes an Intel Core 7 350, 16GB of RAM, and 512GB of SSD storage–this one is pricier at $1,069.99.
Since we’re dwelling within the age of AI, I’d want to see 16GB of RAM as a substitute of 8GB (doubly so as a result of you’ll be able to’t improve it on this machine). That’s one in every of my (only a few) nitpicks right here, however I feel it’s an vital one. 8GB is ok for day-to-day workloads, however I fear it gained’t be sufficient as functions and working programs turn out to be extra demanding over time. I might’ve appreciated to have seen extra storage, too — however RAM and storage are each at insane value premiums in these AI-crazed instances.
- CPU: Intel Core 5 320 (6 cores, 6 threads, as much as 4.6GHz)
- GPU: Intel built-in graphics
- Show: 14-inch 1920×1200 OLED panel, 300 nits, 100% DCI-P3
- RAM: 8GB LPDDR5-6400 (onboard)
- Storage: 256GB PCIe Gen4 NVMe M.2 SSD
- Webcam: 1080p FHD IR digicam
- Weight: 2.56 kilos
- Ports: 2 USB-C, HDMI
- Worth: $699.99
HP OmniBook 5: Design, construct high quality
Foundry / Ashley Biancuzzo
The OmniBook 5 makes a rattling positive first impression. I completely adore the inexperienced colorway, which HP calls “Mushy Honeydew.” You don’t see many laptops on this colour, so it actually stands out. My iPhone digicam doesn’t actually do the colorway justice, although. It appears to be like rather a lot lighter in pictures than it does in individual. It’s additionally out there in Peony Pink, Smoke Silver, and Starlit Blue. HP’s redesigned brand appears to be like nice, too.
The construct high quality is equally spectacular, particularly for a laptop computer nicely underneath $1,000. The entire thing is manufactured from metallic, not plastic. There’s hardly any flex within the keyboard deck and the display doesn’t twist a lot when making use of strain to it. The show additionally has a layer of Corning Gorilla Glass on it, which is a pleasant added contact.

