HP Elite Dragonfly G3 review: the C-suite laptop

HP Elite Dragonfly G3 review: the C-Suite laptop

MSRP $2,686.00

“The HP Elite Dragonfly G3 is quick sufficient for enterprise customers and gives superior battery life, together with a chic and largely stable construct.”

Professionals

• Skinny and lightweight chassis
• Elegant aesthetic
• Glorious battery life
• Excellent keyboard and touchpad
• Stable enterprise options
• Superior videoconferencing with 5MP webcam

Cons

• Efficiency is beneath common
• Costly

On the subject of enterprise laptops that don’t really feel like enterprise laptops, HP’s Elite Dragonfly laptops paved the way. The standard safety measures are in place, however these laptops aren’t afraid to face out in a crowd.

I reviewed the third era of the Elite Dragonfly, which has morphed from a convertible 2-in-1 into a standard clamshell laptop. It’s an extremely well-designed and enticing little laptop that hits the candy spot for businesspeople who need to keep stylish on the street.

Specs

What businesspeople need

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Earlier than a laptop can go off and be additional, it must deal with the fundamentals. The Elite Dragonfly G3 does simply that, providing an Intel vPro CPU to help enterprise-level safety and administration options and HP’s Wolf Safety suite to guard in opposition to malicious assaults in each {hardware} and software program. The Elite Dragonfly G3 matches different business-oriented laptops like Lenovo’s ThinkPad and Dell’s Latitude in terms of supporting giant companies.

With that fundamental threshold met, what else do enterprise customers need? Nicely, they need laptops designed for the lengthy haul, given that companies have a tendency to take advantage of each dime out of their investments — which suggests holding onto laptops for longer than many shoppers maintain onto theirs. So, a enterprise laptop wants a stable construct, even when it sports activities a skinny and lightweight design.

The Elite Dragonfly G3 is constructed of magnesium and aluminum, giving it each gentle weight and a largely sturdy construct. There’s a tiny little bit of bending within the lid and a few flexing within the keyboard deck, however nothing egregious.

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The design can be fairly comfy, with rounded edges alongside the aspect of the lid and chassis that make for comfy use, to not point out a chic appear and feel. The design is minimalist however fairly enticing, and the chassis is obtainable in both a Slate Blue (my review unit) or a Pure Silver shade scheme. The show bezels are lined in plastic, which detracts a bit of from the premium really feel, however they’re sufficiently small to allow a properly sized machine. The hinge opens with one hand, fairly the feat given the sunshine chassis backside, and it holds the show firmly in place.

General, the laptop offers the type of high quality aesthetic and cozy construct that any consumer would respect. The two.19-pound weight helps significantly, making the Elite Dragonfly G3 one of many lightest laptops we’ve reviewed, and its 0.64-inch thickness makes it a straightforward laptop to slip right into a bag.

Enterprise customers can even respect the connectivity, which is in depth for such a small laptop. Wi-fi connectivity meets the newest requirements, with elective 5G WWAN help for always-connected web.

A compelling compromise

The everyday businessperson will depend on working functions like Microsoft Workplace, Slack, Groups, Outlook — usually all on the similar time. In the present day’s commonest CPUs present greater than sufficient productiveness efficiency, whether or not we’re speaking about Intel’s Twelfth-gen Core processors or AMD’s Ryzen 6000 chips. The one exceptions are enterprise customers who run demanding scientific, engineering, or artistic functions like AutoCAD or Adobe’s Artistic Suite — however in these circumstances, they gained’t be selecting skinny and lightweight laptops just like the Elite Dragonfly G3.

It’s not a machine that’s tuned for top efficiency, particularly since its Core i7-1265U processor runs at solely 15 watts. However even comparable laptops with the identical chip rating a bit higher in benchmarks. The Dell Latitude 7330 UL is the perfect instance, which outperforms the HP Elite Dragonfly G3 in Geekbench 5 and Handbrake.

However, the Elite Dragonfly G3 nonetheless receives a bump in efficiency utilizing its Twelfth-gen Intel processor, which retains it greater than quick sufficient to maintain up with the type of workflows it’s designed for. So, whereas the Elite Dragonfly G3 is much from a performer, it’s a lot quick for its meant use.

With competent if not spectacular enterprise efficiency out of the best way, the subsequent query is how lengthy does the Elite Dragonfly G3 final on a single cost of the battery? That’s extremely vital to businesspeople, who’re extra apt to take their laptops on the street. When flying from one aspect of the nation to the opposite, you need a laptop that can make all of it the best way with out worrying about whether or not the airliner offers the facility you want.

Right here, the HP did significantly better. In reality, it’s a class-leading laptop in terms of battery life, demonstrating that HP created a stable compromise between efficiency and longevity. There are 68 watt-hours of battery capability tucked away contained in the laptop’s diminutive chassis, which is a good quantity for the 13.5-inch 3:2 WUXGA (1,920 x 1,280) low-power IPS show. The Elite Dragonfly G3 makes nice use of its battery capability and decrease efficiency tuning to show in some spectacular battery life scores.

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It’ll final just below 12.5 hours in gentle internet shopping and almost 19 hours in native video playback. For precise work, you’ll get much less, however there’s little question it can final a full enterprise day of labor on a single cost — after which some.

The ThinkPad X1 Yoga Gen 7 is the one of its rivals to come back near competing with it right here, and it’s nonetheless a few hours behind.

Creature comforts and conveniences abound

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HP paid nice consideration to making a laptop that’s extremely comfy to make use of. That features the keyboard, which has giant keycaps, glorious spacing, and lightweight, snappy switches that make for fatigue-free typing.

It’s one of many higher keyboards on a business-class machine. The touchpad is giant with loads of house on the palm relaxation because of the three:2 show, and its glass floor is easy and exact with assured but quiet button clicks. A contact show is elective and never included in my review unit.

Mark Coppock/Digital Traits

HP in-built some nifty privateness options, beginning with an digital shutter for the webcam that’scontrolled by a key on the keyboard. There’s additionally consumer presence detection, which may lock the laptop and put it to sleep when the consumer walks away and wake it again up when the consumer returns. It labored effectively throughout my testing and, in truth, I wanted to show off the function to conduct my battery assessments.

The show on my review unit was the low-power non-touch 13.5-inch 3:2 WUXGA+ (1,920 x 1,280) IPS show. I discovered it to be vibrant and colourful with loads of distinction, and my colorimeter agreed.

Colours have been proper on the premium common by way of sRGB and AdobeRGB gamma and accuracy, which ends up in a show that’s a lot colourful for productiveness work and media consumption. Brightness was effectively above our 300-nit threshold at 398 nits, and distinction was glorious at 1,610:1, smashing by our most popular 1,000:1. Whereas creators need wider colours, enterprise customers will discover this show fairly nice.

Two downward-firing and two upward-firing audio system present a shocking quantity of quantity for such a small laptop, with clear mids and highs and a contact of bass. The audio system is greater than adequate for videoconferencing, augmented by two-way AI-control noise discount, in addition to the occasional Netflix bingeing session.

Talking of videoconferencing, the webcam is a high-resolution 5MP mannequin with an infrared camera, and HP in-built a number of instruments to make for the highest-quality video and the perfect expertise throughout videoconferencing periods. There are the standard lighting adjustment and background blur capabilities, together with an Look Filter to easy out the tough edges and Autoframe to permit the consumer to maneuver round whereas nonetheless remaining centered within the video.

Lastly, Home windows 11 Good day passwordless login is offered by each facial recognition and a fingerprint reader. Each strategies labored rapidly and reliably.

A top-of-its-class enterprise laptop

The HP Elite Dragonfly G3 is a enterprise laptop masquerading as a chic, premium client laptop. It has every little thing a enterprise wants and every little thing a enterprise consumer desires. It’s not the quickest laptop, however it’s quick sufficient, and its battery life is stellar. The truth that it’s extremely skinny and lightweight is simply icing on the cake.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 10 is Lenovo’s personal try at a extra premium enterprise laptop, however it nonetheless holds onto the basic ThinkPad DNA. However the HP Dragonfly G3 has higher battery life and a extra fashionable design, with out the trimmings of an older period of enterprise.

The Elite Dragonfly G3 is without doubt one of the most elegant and cozy enterprise laptops you should buy, and it’s the perfect instance of the subsequent era of enterprise laptops.

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