HP's Latest Business Laptops: Elite x360 1040 G11 and ZBook Fury 16 G11 Impress with Performance and Versatility

Living With an HP Elite X360 1040 G11: A Solid 2-in-1 With Great Performance

For the past few weeks, I've been using an HP Elite X360 1040G11 as my primary laptop, and I've been impressed. It offers strong performance and battery life, as well as a premium design with a number of additional features. As the name implies, this is the 11th generation of HP's premium enterprise 2-in-1 convertible. You can use it as a traditional laptop, but it features a hinge that lets you rotate the screen completely flat on the back of the unit, so you can also use it as a tablet. It also comes with a pen for drawing or notetaking. While I typically find 2-in-1s to be too big as tablets, I do appreciate the flexibility such machines offer when it comes to giving presentations or watching media. And the pen worked very well. For folks who prefer a traditional "clamshell" laptop, HP makes the EliteBook 1040, which is essentially the same machine minus the hinge and the pen. I note that although the official name of the machine I tested is the Elite X360, the machine itself says EliteBook just below the keyboard. Measuring 12.36 by 8.6 by 0.41 to 0.58 inches (front to rear), with the version I tested weighing 3.28 pounds (3.91 pounds with the included 65-watt charger and 3.95 pounds if you include the HP Pen), the Elite 1040 is a bit thinner and heavier than the Lenovo ThinkPad X1 2-in-1 I tested earlier. It has an aluminum frame and cover, this year with a new "Glacier Silver" color that is a few shades lighter than the silver or gray colors I've seen on many machines. Compared with previous machines in the model, it has a slightly larger touchpad and larger keycaps, and it felt very solid. Other new features include an integrated power button and fingerprint sensor on the upper right-hand corner of the keyboard, and the now-standard Windows Copilot key. The model I used had a 14-inch IPS touch screen with 1,920-by-1,200 resolution and 400 nits of brightness, which is pretty standard for this class of machine; a 2,880-by-1,800 OLED display is also available, as are two options for privacy screens. I didn't test these, though in the past I've been impressed by HP's privacy screens. The included display looked good, though I'm sure the OLED would have been better. I was particularly impressed by the number and layout of the ports. The left side of the machine has an HDMI 2.1 port, two USB-C/Thunderbolt, and a 3.5mm audio jack, while the right side has a locking slot, 5Gbps USB-A, a 10Gbps USB-C, and an optional SIM card reader. (My model included the optional WWAN 5G modem.) I like having both USB-A and HDMI, which some enterprise laptops leave out, while still having USB-C on both sides, which makes for easier charging. For video conferencing, the Elite X360 comes with a 5MP IR camera that seemed okay -- far from the best I've seen, but also far from the worst -- and had a very large field of view. It supposedly had dynamic color tuning to correct your image, but I still didn't think it was nearly as good as the camera on HP's EliteBook Ultra G1q. As with most of the current Windows systems, it supports Studio Effects for things like background blur. There's also a separate Poly Camera Pro app (that you need to download from the Microsoft Store via the myHP app) that offers many more options for framing and zooming, as well as more scenes and watermarks -- if you want to always display your name, for example. The camera itself worked fine with features such as turning off the display when you leave and waking when you approach; and worked well with Windows Hello. As I prefer, the Elite 1040 includes a physical webcam shutter. For audio, it has two top and two bottom-firing speakers with discrete amplifiers and dual-array microphones. It had very good sound for a business laptop. The myHP application also includes ways to manage the programmable key, get to support, and a Smart Sense application that balances performance, fan noise, and cooling. This seemed to work pretty well. Other applications include a separate HP Audio Controls app, which worked fine, although I'm still not sure why this couldn't be combined into the main myHP app. It also comes with three years of HP's Wolf Pro Security, which includes malware prevention, threat containment, and HP's Sure Run technology to isolate specific applications. The model I had included an Intel Core Ultra 7 165H processor, a slightly higher-end version of the "Meteor Lake" processors I've seen on other similar laptops, along with 16GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. This is a 28-watt processor with six performance cores (each of which can do multithreading), eight efficient cores, and two low-power efficient cores, for a total of 16 cores and 22 threads. The performance cores have a base frequency of 1.4GHz, with a maximum turbo speed of 5.0GHz. It has Intel Graphics with 8 Xe cores at a maximum of 2.3GHz. The processor is vPro capable. Probably as a result, I got higher scores on most of my benchmark tests than I saw with the X1 2-in-1 (which ran a 15-watt Core Ultra 7 155U) or the X1 Carbon Gen 12 (which ran a 28-watt Core Ultra 7 155H) but somewhat lower than I saw with the Lenovo Yoga Pro 9i 16 (a larger machine that ran a 45-watt Core Ultra 7 185H). And, of course, the latter machine with its discrete graphics was significantly better at graphics. On my toughest tests, it transcoded a large video in Handbrake in 1 hour and 19 minutes, compared with 1 hour and 36 minutes on the X1 2-in-1 and 1:16 on the X1 Carbon Gen 12. Similarly, it ran a portfolio simulation in MATLAB in just under 32 minutes compared with a little over 34 minutes on the X1 2-in-1, but not as good as the 30 minutes on the X1 Carbon Gen 12. Running a large Excel data table model took 45 minutes compared with 47 for the X1 2-in-1 and 46 for the X1 Carbon Gen 12. But note that none of these numbers are anywhere as good as what I saw on last year's Core i7 (Raptor Lake)-based system, which could finish in as little as 35 minutes. On AI tests, scores were similar to the other Meteor Lake systems with integrated graphics I've tested. Machines with discrete graphics still seem to do much better, and while Meteor Lake has an NPU it doesn't seem strong enough to run most AI models well. Battery life was very strong. On PCMark 10's Modern Office battery test, I got 17 hours and 38 minutes at 100 nits, and 19 hours and 46 minutes at 40 nits, the best I've seen on an Intel-based laptop. It has a 68-watt-hour battery. Currently, on HP's site, a system similar to the one I tested sells for $2,299 including the Core Ultra 7 165H, 16GB of RAM, 512GB SSD, standard display, and a 5G modem. A system with a Core Ultra 5 125 H processor and without the WWAN modem starts at $1,499. Such systems aren't cheap, but they do seem competitive.

HP ZBook Fury 16 G11 Review

We refer to big-screen, full-powered laptops as desktop replacements, but that's far too mild a term for the HP ZBook Fury 16 G11 (starts at $1,558; $3,564 as tested). "Desktop destroyer" or "desktop annihilator," maybe. Or just "desk" -- picking up the Fury after a typical ultraportable, it seems to have two or three laptops' worth of beefy base under its thin lid. This ZBook isn't the very fastest mobile workstation we've tested, because our review unit has only Nvidia's third-quickest professional GPU, but it easily earns an Editors' Choice award as an ultra-expandable, cost-no-object choice for barreling through the biggest datasets and most demanding specialized applications. Configuration & Design: 11th Gen Workstation, 14th Gen CPU The 16-inch Fury G11 is a refresh of the ZBook Fury 16 G10 seen here in March 2024. The cheapest configuration is $1,558 with Intel's Core i5-13600HX vPro processor, 16GB of memory, a 512GB solid-state drive, and a 1,920-by-1,200-pixel display. With lowly Intel UHD integrated graphics instead of a discrete GPU, real workstations beat it up and take its lunch money. Our $3,564 test model raises the ante considerably with Intel's colossal Core i9-14900HX chip (eight Performance cores, 16 Efficient cores, 32 threads, max turbo 5.8GHz), 64GB of RAM, a 1TB NVMe SSD, and Nvidia's RTX 3500 Ada Generation graphics with 12GB of display memory and all the independent software vendor (ISV) certifications you could want. The non-touch IPS display is one of HP's dazzling DreamColor panels with 3,840-by-2,400 resolution and a 120Hz refresh rate. An OLED touch screen with the same 4K resolution and a fraction less brightness is an option, as is a 1200p panel with HP's SureView Reflect privacy filter to thwart snoopy seatmates on airplanes. The memory ceiling is 128GB, with error-correcting-code (ECC) DRAM available for to-the-penny precision, and a whopping four M.2 slots allow up to 16TB of solid-state storage if you don't mind pushing the price to five figures. At 1.13 by 14.3 by 9.8 inches and 5.3 pounds, the Fury G11 occupies the heavyweight class of mobile workstations, as opposed to middleweights with lower memory and storage limits like the Dell Precision 5690 (4.46 pounds) and HP's own ZBook Studio 16 G10 (3.81 pounds). The 16-inch Apple MacBook Pro splits the difference at 4.8 pounds. Unfashionably thick bezels surround the screen, which flexes a bit if you grasp the corners, but the keyboard deck resists even a strong press -- the ZBook has passed MIL-STD 810H torture tests for travel hazards such as shock, vibration, and extreme temperature and humidity. A fingerprint reader in the palm rest and IR face recognition in the webcam give you two ways to skip passwords with Windows Hello. A SmartCard slot on the right edge offers a third way. It's joined by two 5Gbps USB 3.2 Type-A ports, an audio jack, an Ethernet port, and a nano security lock. The laptop's left side has two USB4 Type-C ports, HDMI and mini DisplayPort monitor outputs, an SD card reader, and the AC adapter connector. Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth are standard, with 4G or 5G mobile broadband available at ordering. Features: An Ignominious Keyboard Tradition, But the Rest Rocks The Fury G11's keyboard makes us downright angry. Knowing that computer-aided design (CAD) and other demanding ISV apps often make use of a middle mouse button, HP provided three cushy, precise buttons below a large, responsive touchpad. But then the company stuck to its laptops' infamously awkward placement of the cursor arrow keys in a clumsy row instead of the correct inverted T, with half-height, hard-to-hit up and down arrows stacked between full-size left and right. It's ham-handed and aggravating. Otherwise, the keyboard scores points for a full numeric keypad and colorful RGB backlighting, with Z Light Space software that provides a literally dizzying array of animated effects. Typing feel is shallow and kind of rubbery, but comfortable for prolonged, rapid input. The system is new enough to have Microsoft's Copilot key on board, though we noticed Windows Camera did not have the new AI-enhanced Studio Effects options such as auto framing and background blur. That's the worst thing we can say about the 5-megapixel webcam, which captures videos and images that are well-lit and vividly colorful at up to 2,560-by-1,440 (16:9 aspect ratio) or 2,560-by-1,920 (4:3 ratio) resolution. Details are crisp and there's zero noise or static; you won't get away with not shaving or washing your hair the day of a conference call. They still use IPS technology in an increasingly OLED age, but we haven't changed our opinion of HP's DreamColor workstation displays as the finest screens in the PC biz. The Fury's is simply beautiful, with rich, vivid colors, faultless contrast, and ample brightness (though this one fell a fraction short of its rated 500 nits in our testing and never seemed too bright as some 600-nit-plus panels can). White backgrounds are pristine, and viewing angles are wide. High-res photos and videos -- hell, even Sticky Notes -- looked stunning. Stereo speakers at the bottom front pump out not particularly loud but nice and clean sound; there's minimal bass, but highs and midtones are quite clear, and it's easy to make out overlapping tracks. HP Audio Control software provides auto, music, movie, and voice presets and an equalizer, as well as intelligent noise reduction for conference calls. The Fury also comes with HP's Wolf Security suite, which leads the business laptop segment with features ranging from OS restoration to a sandboxed secure browser and hardware-enforced containment or isolation of malware apps detected by deep learning AI. Testing the HP ZBook Fury 16 G11: Fast? Yeah, We're Thinkin' It's Fast Besides its predecessor the ZBook Fury 16 G10, we compared the G11's benchmark numbers to those of another (if slightly dated) unlimited-class workstation, the Lenovo ThinkPad P16 Gen 1, and a slimmer Editors' Choice honoree, the Dell Precision 5690. The 16-inch Apple MacBook Pro and its mighty M3 Max processor round out our test set. Productivity Tests We run the same general productivity benchmarks across both mobile and desktop systems. Our first test is UL's PCMark 10, which simulates a variety of real-world productivity and office workflows to measure overall system performance and also includes a storage subtest for the primary drive. Three other benchmarks focus on the CPU, using all available cores and threads, to rate a PC's suitability for processor-intensive workloads. Maxon's Cinebench R23 uses that company's Cinema 4D engine to render a complex scene, while Geekbench 5.5 Pro from Primate Labs simulates popular apps ranging from PDF rendering and speech recognition to machine learning. We also use the open-source video transcoder HandBrake 1.4 to convert a 12-minute video clip from 4K to 1080p resolution (lower times are better). Finally, we run PugetBench for Photoshop by workstation maker Puget Systems, which uses the Creative Cloud version 22 of Adobe's famous image editor to rate a PC's performance for content creation and multimedia applications. It's an automated extension that executes a variety of general and GPU-accelerated Photoshop tasks ranging from opening, rotating, resizing, and saving an image to applying masks, gradient fills, and filters. Apple's M3 Max is a thermonuclear CPU, but the ZBook's Intel Core i9-14900HX is no slouch either. The Fury 16 G11 squeaked to a win in PCMark 10 (though using any of these machines for Word and Excel is like using a Caterpillar bulldozer to pick up after your dog) and shone in our processing and Photoshop tests. Graphics Tests We test Windows PCs' graphics with two DirectX 12 gaming simulations from UL's 3DMark, Night Raid (more modest, suitable for laptops with integrated graphics) and Time Spy (more demanding, suitable for gaming rigs with discrete GPUs). We also run two tests from the cross-platform GPU benchmark GFXBench 5, which stresses both low-level routines like texturing and high-level, game-like image rendering. The 1440p Aztec Ruins and 1080p Car Chase tests, rendered offscreen to accommodate different display resolutions, exercise graphics and compute shaders using the OpenGL programming interface and hardware tessellation respectively. The more frames per second (fps), the better. Seven hundred frames per second is a bit much even for the Fury's 120Hz display. Little game excerpts like these are silly tests for workstations like these. It's true that the G11 didn't sweep the field, but upgrading from Nvidia's RTX 3500 Ada to the top-of-the-line RTX 5000 would have likely fixed that (and added $1,849 to its cost). Workstation-Specific Tests Turning to more appropriate benchmarks, Blender 2.93 is a popular open-source 3D suite for modeling, animation, simulation, and compositing. We record the time it takes for its built-in Cycles path tracer to render two photorealistic scenes of BMW cars, one using the system's CPU and one the GPU (lower times are better). BMW artist Mike Pan has said he considers the renders too brief for rigorous testing, but they're a popular benchmark. Perhaps our most important workstation test, SPECviewperf 2020, renders, rotates, and zooms in and out of solid and wireframe models using viewsets from popular ISV apps. We run the 1080p resolution tests based on PTC's Creo CAD platform; Autodesk's Maya modeling and simulation software for film, TV, and games; and Dassault Systemes' SolidWorks 3D rendering package. Results are in frames per second. The G11 won Blender's CPU contest and trailed only the MacBook Pro in the GPU event (again, with Nvidia's third best professional silicon), and was more than competitive in SPECviewperf. Massive overkill for everyday jobs, it's an invaluable partner for the toughest engineering, design, and data science tasks. Battery and Display Tests We test laptops' battery life by playing a locally stored 720p video file (the open-source Blender movie Tears of Steel) with display brightness at 50% and audio volume at 100%. We make sure the battery is fully charged before the test, with Wi-Fi and keyboard backlighting turned off. We also use a Datacolor SpyderX Elite monitor calibration sensor and software to measure a laptop screen's color saturation -- what percentage of the sRGB, Adobe RGB, and DCI-P3 color gamuts or palettes the display can show -- and its 50% and peak brightness in nits (candelas per square meter). The Fury G11 greatly improved on the poor battery life of the G10 model, but its runtime remained a rounding error of the Apple's. No biggie; workstations are unplugged only for occasional showings of CAD or CGI renderings at a client's office. The DreamColor screen delivered impeccable color and brightness. Verdict: When Only King Ghidorah Will Do We admire Dell's Precision 5690 as a potent but relatively portable mobile workstation, but when even that machine's extreme power isn't enough, the ZBook Fury 16 G11 stands alone. If you need the raw horsepower, memory, and storage to justify its cost -- or more likely, make its cost the smallest part of a project's payables -- it's a simply awesome Editors' Choice award winner.