HP Dragonfly G4 specs
Value: $2,279 (as examined)
CPU: Intel Core i7-1365U vPRo
GPU: Intel Iris Xe graphics
RAM: 16GB
Storage: 512GB SSD
Show: 13.5-inch, 1920 x 1280-pixel show
Battery: 12:44
Dimension: 11.7 x 8.67 x 0.64 inches
Weight: 2.2 kilos
The HP Dragonfly G4, the fourth-generation entry of the beloved Dragonfly line, is diving into 2023 with its crosshairs set on one rival: the brand new Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11.
Lenovo has satisfied the lots that the ThinkPad X1 Carbon is likely one of the greatest enterprise laptops you will get. Nevertheless, in the event you learn my evaluation, you’ll see that I haven’t drunk the Kool-Help. The Lenovo laptop computer’s lengthy listing of imperfections depart sufficient room for HP to swoop in and snatch the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s crown. However the query is, did it handle to do it with its new-gen G4 mannequin?
Stick round to seek out out whether or not the Dragonfly G4 earned a spot on our greatest HP laptops and greatest enterprise laptops pages.
HP Dragonfly G4 worth and configuration choices
The evaluation unit I’ve has an MSRP of $2,279 and you should purchase it at HP’s official web site (test to see if it’s on sale — it often is!). It comes with an Intel Core i7-1365U CPU, Intel Iris Xe graphics, 16GB of RAM, 512GB of SSD storage, and a 13.5-inch, 1920 x 1280-pixel touchscreen show.
The most affordable configuration is $1,769. It retains the 16GB of RAM, 512GB of SSD storage, and 13.5-inch, 1280p display screen, however your processor will get downgraded to an Intel Core i5-1335U.
HP Dragonfly G4 design
The Dragonfly G4 continues the standard design language of its forefathers, sporting a futuristic, lustrous HP insignia on the lid. The Slate Blue hue that wraps across the HP pocket book is wealthy, urbane and slick — it’s the kind of colour you’d see on any well-dressed, dapper younger skilled.
The G4 is a sustainability queen. The lid, in addition to the palm relaxation and underside, is manufactured from 90% recycled magnesium. (Curiously, the keycaps include recycled plastic from DVDs.)
After opening the lid, I needed that the highest cowl featured a lip to make it simpler to elevate, nevertheless it’s a negligible, miniscule shortcoming. On the deck, you’ll see extra of that lustrous element subtly framing the big touchpad. The distinction on the keys is simple on the eyes, due to the white letters and symbols stamped onto the Slate Blue keys.
Above the operate keys, you’ll discover an up-firing speaker that runs the size of the keyboard (we’ll focus on how nicely they sound later). The 13.5-inch show is wrapped in skinny bezels, save for the highest body that homes the 5MP webcam and two microphones.
The Dragonfly G4 is a 2.2-pound pocket book with dimensions of 11.7 x 8.67 x 0.64 inches. The HP laptop computer is lighter, however thicker than its rivals: the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11 (2.48 kilos, 12.4 x 8.8 x 0.6 inches) and the Acer Swift Go 14 (2.87 kilos, 12.3 x 8.6 x 0.59 inches).
HP Dragonfly G4 ports
The HP Dragonfly G4 has a candy mélange of contemporary and legacy ports. On the left facet, you’ll discover an HDMI 2.1 port, a nano SIM slot, and a Thunderbolt 4 port. The proper facet options one other Thunderbolt 4 port, a 3.5mm headphone jack, a drop-jaw USB Kind-A port, and a Kensington lock slot.
Must squeeze out some extra I/O ports to fit your workflow? Take a look at our greatest USB Kind-C hubs web page.
HP Dragonfly G4 show
The HP Dragonfly G4 comes with a 13.5-inch, 1920 x 1280-pixel touchscreen. Like its predecessor, it sports activities that 3:2 side ratio, permitting you to make the most of extra vertical display screen actual property whereas studying long-form articles and content-heavy web sites. Nevertheless, it’s not as helpful for watching YouTube, Netlfix and different streaming websites (they work greatest with 16:9 shows). Black letterboxing will flank your movies to fill out the surplus house, however this isn’t one thing that bothers me personally.
I watched the 5 Nights at Freddy’s trailer on YouTube. I used to be significantly stunned by a scene with Matthew Lillard sitting in an workplace. As he held a cellphone to his ear, I used to be stunned that I may spot refined, barely perceptible options on his face, from his faint brow wrinkles to the ultra-tiny papules close to his salt-and-pepper beard.
No, it’s not probably the most vivid shows I’ve seen, nevertheless it’s not designed to be. Its colour rendering is excellent. It’s not washed out, nevertheless it’s not oversaturated, both. That is confirmed by the bright-red eviction discover that appeared on the door of Josh Hutcherson’s character — it’s putting sufficient to catch your eye, nevertheless it manages to not be garishly vivid.
Now, let’s check out the precise show check outcomes to see in the event that they match my anecdotal expertise.
In accordance with our colorimeter, the Dragonfly G4 coated 80.2% of the DCI-P3 colour gamut (the identical precise determine we acquired for the G3 final yr). That is higher than the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11 (69.8%), however slips behind the common premium laptop computer (93.7%) and the spectacular Acer Swift Go 14 (175.7%).
The Dragonfly G4 is elite relating to colour accuracy. With a Delta-E rating of 0.14 (nearer to 0 is best), the HP laptop computer demolished all rivals in its path, together with the common premium laptop computer (0.22), the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (0.22), and the extremely inaccurate Swift Go 14 (0.32).
HP says that the Dragonfly G4 can output 400 nits of brightness, and in response to our testing, its luminance will get fairly near that — 391 nits to be precise. That is barely dimmer than the common premium laptop computer (394 nits) and the Swift Go 14 (395 nits), however beats the ThinkPad X1 Carbon 11 (327 nits).
HP Dragonfly G4 audio
The Dragonfly G4 is filled with 4 Bang & Olufsen-tuned audio system: two are top-firing whereas one other two are bottom-firing. I launched the Scorching Hits USA playlist on Spotify, which performed “Mojabi Ghost” by Tainy and Unhealthy Bunny.
The futuristic-sounding track, due to the funky synthesizers, sounded wealthy and full on the G4’s audio system. The drums have been punchy and driving, however by no means overpowered Unhealthy Bunny’s {smooth}, vibey vocals. As a cherry on high, these audio system can get tremendous loud at max quantity — you can host a small occasion with this laptop computer in the event you wished to.
I opened the HP Audio Management app to see if it may sound higher (despite the fact that it sounds completely fantastic). There are 4 presets: Auto, Music, Film and Voice. My favourite, after all, is Music, offering an ideal steadiness between the vocals, baseline, and funky synthesizers.
HP Dragonfly G4 keyboard and touchpad
Cue the marriage bells! I’m a keyboard snob, and man, I like the Dragonfly G4’s keyboard a lot I may marry it. HP has all the time been masterful at delivering satisfying keyboard experiences (I like the keyboard on the HP Envy 13, for instance), and this 13.5-inch pocket book proves that its experience hasn’t wavered.
The island-style keyboard has a white backlight that delivers three ranges of brightness, and also you’ll discover a fingerprint reader between the ALT key and the left arrow. (That is one thing I admire as a result of I’m not an enormous fan of the present development of OEMs integrating fingerprint sensors into energy buttons).
On the 10FastFingers.com typing check, I reached an 89 word-per-minute common, which aligns with my typical typing velocity. It’s tactile, delivers nice journey, and tremendous clicky — it’s as if the keys intuitively know once I’m about to the touch them and instantly launch me onto the subsequent letter in nanoseconds.
The Dragonfly G4’s 4.7 x 3.1-inch touchpad is spacious and, on high of that, it has a smooth-as-silk texture that’s damn-near addicting. On the identical time, it’s not too slick that it appears like you’ll want to exert lots of effort to maneuver the cursor — it has the right steadiness of friction and gloss. Plus, Home windows 11 gestures, together with three-finger tabbing and two-finger scrolling, labored like a appeal.
HP Dragonfly G4 efficiency
Below the hood, the Dragonfly G4 sports activities an Intel Core i7-1365U vPro CPU and 16GB of RAM. I attempted to overwhelm RAM-hungry Google Chrome with 50 tabs, three of which have been taking part in YouTube movies concurrently, however the HP laptop computer, if it have been personified, giggled and mentioned, “That’s all you’ve acquired?” I skilled zero slowdowns nor lag.
On the Geekbench 6 general efficiency benchmark, Dragonfly G4 achieved a multi-core rating of seven,408. Sadly, this lags behind the common premium laptop computer (7,877) and the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 11 (8,979), which shares the identical processor because the HP laptop computer. The unstoppable Acer Swift Go 14, filled with an Intel Core i7-13700H CPU, delivered a jaw-dropping rating of 11,815. (Curiously, the Go 14 is cheaper than the G4 and the X1 Carbon, however blows its pricier opponents out of the water with its H-series chip, nevertheless, the battery life part reveals that this energy comes with a worth.)
The Dragonfly G4 took 12 minutes and 41 seconds to transcode a 4K video to 1080p, which is slower than the common premium laptop computer (8 minutes and 33 seconds). It’s additionally extra sluggish than the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (9 minutes and 5 seconds) and the Swift Go 14 (5 minutes and 35 seconds).
On the file switch check, the Dragonfly G4’s 512GB SSD took 37 seconds to repeat 25GB of knowledge, which interprets to a price of 735.7 megabytes per second (MBps). Sadly, that is slower than the common premium laptop computer (1,306.2 MBps), the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s 512 SSD (1,703.8 MBps), and the Swift Go 14’s 512GB SSD (1,481.1 MBps).
HP Dragonfly G4 graphics and gaming
The HP Dragonfly G4, like its rivals, is outfitted with built-in graphics (Intel Iris Xe). No, it’s not best for gaming, however let’s see how nicely it could possibly deal with informal titles like Sid Meier’s Civilization VI: Gathering Storm. On this check (Medium, 1080p), it produced 25 frames per second. This didn’t surpass the common premium laptop computer’s 50-fps common, however to be truthful, laptops with discrete GPUs skew this determine. The HP managed to outdo the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (19 fps), however not the Go 14 (27 fps).
On the 3DMark Time Spy benchmark, which exams for DirectX 12 prowess, the Dragonfly G4 delivered a measly rating of 1,590, which is worse than the common premium laptop computer (3,176), the ThinkPad X1 Carbon (1,684) and the Swift Go 14 (2,025).
HP Dragonfly G4 battery life
In comparison with the G3, it appears just like the Dragonfly G4 took a two-hour hit in battery life. The final technology lasted a wonderful 14 hours and 20 minutes. The present technology, nevertheless, in response to the Laptop computer Magazine battery life check (which entails browsing the net over Wi-Fi at 150 nits of brightness), has a runtime of 12 hours and 44 minutes.
Don’t get me unsuitable. Contemplating that the common premium laptop computer lasts 10 hours and 39 minutes, that is nonetheless nice — the G4’s U-series chip is displaying off its marvelous energy effectivity right here. Conversely, the Acer Swift Go 14, filled with a extra power-hungry chip, can solely final a measly 8 hours and 5 minutes. Nevertheless, the Dragonfly G4 couldn’t beat the ThinkPad X1 Carbon’s 14-hour runtime (13 hours and 45 minutes).
HP Dragonfly G4 webcam
HP will get it. This OEM seems to be one of many few laptop computer producers that’s conscious of customers’ want for respectable video conferencing tools. I imply, howdy, most of us both work remotely or do the entire hybrid factor, so why not pack the laptop computer with a good webcam?
HP’s Dragonfly Professional Chromebook, for instance, has one of many greatest laptop computer webcams I’ve ever seen with a stunning 8MP webcam. The last-gen Dragonfly had an incredible shooter, too, and the current-gen mannequin,, is not any totally different.
The G4’s 5MP webcam picked up on the tiny, barely there freckles on my cheeks that always get misplaced on different less-sharp webcams. Shade rendering is nice, too, precisely recreating the burgundy and rich-red hues emanating from my curtains and pillows.
However is it as nice as an exterior webcam? Probably not. You should definitely peruse our greatest webcams web page to snag one thing even higher for video calls.
HP Dragonfly G4 warmth
HP may have finished a greater job at discovering a method to dissipate warmth that retains sizzling air away out of your fingers. Whereas diving into intensive workflows, I felt some heat air blowing from the upper-right quadrant of the keyboard. It’s not a dealbreaker — only a nuisance.
We streamed a 15-minute, 1080p video on the HP pocket book, and the touchpad and keyboard climbed to 81 and 91 levels Fahrenheit, respectively, which is beneath our 95-degree consolation threshold. The underside couldn’t hold its cool, nevertheless, climbing to 100 levels.
HP Dragonfly G4 software program and guarantee
The Dragonfly G4 runs on Home windows 11 Professional and comes with a slew of HP-branded apps, together with HP Straightforward Clear (allows you to quickly disable your keyboard so you possibly can clear it), HP Energy Supervisor (provides data relating to your battery standing, temperature and capability), and HP Help Methods (runs system diagnostics and supplies guided troubleshooting).
You gained’t discover the G4 fattened with bloatware, thankfully. You’ll discover your commonplace fare of Microsoft apps, together with Solitaire Assortment, Climate, Cellphone Hyperlink, Paint, Sticky Notes, and extra.
The HP Dragonfly G4 comes with a one-year restricted guarantee. See how HP carried out on our Tech Help Showdown and Greatest and Worst Laptop computer Manufacturers rating.
Backside line
The Dragonfly G4 will get the next proper:
- Wonderful keyboard
- Practically 13 hours on a cost
- Nice webcam
- Compact and transportable
- First rate audio system
- Good show
The Dragonfly G4 is good for each employee bees and college students, significantly those that continuously commute and hate the considered being shackled to an outlet for hours on finish.
Nevertheless, the HP laptop computer struggled to outpace its rivals relating to efficiency. In different phrases, there are cheaper laptops (e.g., the Acer Swift Go 14) that provide higher efficiency, however you will have to compromise battery runtime.
Total, the G4 continues to be a superb 13.5-inch laptop computer for on-the-go professionals and pupils who don’t essentially want a powerhouse, however will thrive with a clicky, tactile keyboard, a candy 5MP shooter for videoconferencing, and an incredible show and audio system for late-night leisure.
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