HP SPECTRE XT: HP's Ultra Portable With Bells and Whistles of Its Look and Feel

It's quite short after I'd been playing with the HP ENVY 14 SPECTRE, then I couldn't hold myself to get my hands on the HP SPECTRE XT. Smaller, but the one I have my hands on it, has more power compares to the ENVY 14 I have. I will talk about the technical side right after I'm sharing my personal impression.

Opening the Box
Since I'd opened my ENVY 14 SPECTRE days earlier, I'm not that surprised with the same look box of the HP SPECTRE XT. Blackbox as usual with an exclusive look and packaging. That makes a different compares to a consumer notebooks since it's actually one of HP Premium's.

The Box

Unboxing

Its all metal design with fine brushed silver finish on the main surface, gives the bold look and differs than the competition.

Windows System Information

Configurations

• Intel Core i7-3517 1.9GHz 4MB cache, 2 core
  
• 4GB DDR3 Memory
  
• Intel HD 4000 Integrated Graphics
  
• 13" SuperFine LED Display with 1,366x768 native resolution
  
• Aluminium finished
  
• 256GB mSSD
  
• Gigabit NIC, WLAN 802.11 b/g/n
  
• 1x SS USB 3.0, 1x USB 2.0, HDMI
  
• Beats Audio integrated speaker

Refinements
This SPECTRE XT Ultrabook shows that HP is moving towards to refine its premium products. Compares to my ENVY 14 SPECTRE, it excels on some refinements:

• More Responsive and Convenient TouchPad. The feel when I put my finger on it, is much better than the ENVY 14 SPECTRE. More comfortable when gliding over it. Also, it has a clickable feature on top of the main gliding area for those who demands more than just double taps on the surface, along with left and right clickable area as usual.
• Aluminium Chassis. This SPECTRE XT expresses its look through it fine brushed metallic aluminium chassis. You can't go wrong with it realizing that some people may be watching while you put it on top of the table, working in a cozy environment with some black coffee side by side with the SPECTRE XT.
• More Power. This SPECTRE XT is driven by Intel Core i7 Ivy Bridge and Intel HD4000 integrated graphics, which is much more than suitable to complete everyday spreadsheets, presentations and documents creation.
• More Space. 256GB of SSD. Enough said.
• Rubber Trim. HP put a rubber trim, circling the display screen to prevent the screen of touching the deck and keyboard. So, it secures the display screen as well. I like the idea and the implementation.

Windows Startup Screen

Successful Windows Installation

Rubber Trim Around the Display Screen

Compared to my smartphone

I'm quite amazed when it's being compared to my secondary smartphone. Not much of a difference with its thinkness. It looks shiny as well.

Frankly speaking, I'm starting to dream about having the same thickness for  my other HP Mobile Workstation. I wish someday, HP will come with it so I would feel like carrying nothing in my backpack when having one.

The Benchmarks
Again, I'm using Dassault Systemes' DRAFTSIGHT and Open Source 3D modeling & animation BLENDER 3D to conduct some test. DRAFTSIGHT showed some slight improvements, thanks to its higher CPU and Graphics Processor.

Following is the Windows Performance Benchmark Score.

But in Blender, the increasing performance number is quite significant compares to the ENVY 14 SPECTRE. Intel HD4000 integrated graphics supports OpenCL as well, and that's why I'm giving you both numbers of CPU and OpenCL for your reference.

CPU Rendering

OpenCL Rendering

The numbers are only slightly different. So, it won't matter if you are relying on CPU or OpenCL if you use SPECTRE XT to render a BLENDER scene.


Conclusion
HP SPECTRE XT, an ultrabook concept, refined by HP. Not just slim and light, but quite powerful indeed. As for battery lifetime, I feel it on par with my ENVY 14 SPECTRE. This HP SPECTRE XT, gives a next level of confidence when giving presentation, mobile computing and even during a meeting for travelling business persons, executives and enthusiasts. I would say, this HP Ultrabook model, is the state-of-the-art of an Ultrabook  in its class.