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  • - Hey guys, this is Austin.

  • This is the Google Pixel 2,

  • one of the most advanced smartphones on sale today

  • and it's powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 processor.

  • Now this laptop beside me is also powered by

  • that same mobile processor.

  • And that actually is kind of a big deal.

  • You guys might remember the original Microsoft Surface.

  • Now, it was powered by Windows RT,

  • a specific version of Windows 8 that was meant

  • to run on ARM processors,

  • which are typically found in your phone.

  • Now, there are some advantages here,

  • mostly with battery life,

  • but also some smaller things like being able

  • to have quicker standby time.

  • However, the biggest issue was,

  • was that it didn't run normal Windows apps.

  • Which, as you guys might know,

  • is kind of important for a Windows computer.

  • Now, yes, you could run stuff from the Windows store,

  • but, well, no one wants to do that.

  • However, on the Surface,

  • this looks to be a much better execution

  • of that whole idea.

  • And yes, I said Surface.

  • That was a bad joke, wasn't it?

  • This is the HP Envy X2, the very first

  • in the next generation of Window's PC's.

  • They're gonna be powered by Snapdragon processors.

  • Now, what makes these interesting is,

  • they actually do run Windows apps,

  • which is very important, although it is with some caveats.

  • But with promises of 20 plus hours

  • of battery life, it might be worth the trade off.

  • Take a look at the specs

  • and it's gonna look a little bit different.

  • So it's powered by that Snapdragon 835,

  • and it's backed up with four gigs

  • of ram and 128 gigs of storage.

  • You know, the almost identical specs that you

  • would find on a smartphone.

  • What makes this kind of interesting is

  • that even though it is in a tablet form factor,

  • a lot of these Snapdragon PC's are going

  • to be full fledged laptops.

  • But because it's being powered by a phone processor,

  • as you can imagine, it's going to be a little bit thinner

  • and a little bit quieter, or, well,

  • a lot quieter than pretty much any other laptop out there.

  • And so we see how to navigate the Windows start screen

  • which is useful, as well as a bit of foam.

  • But the real star of the show is the laptop,

  • and, wow, that's super, super thin.

  • Wow.

  • That actually looks pretty cool.

  • So this is very similar to something like the Surface

  • and the idea that pretty much everything is going

  • to be in the tablet section but it does come

  • with a keyboard which should be right here.

  • So this is a little bit of a different design.

  • So it's almost more like a case for the laptop

  • which just happens to have your keyboard

  • as well as the track pad.

  • But when you actually put the whole thing together,

  • it snaps on here, and then I think we can just fold it back?

  • Ya.

  • So we get an adjustable kickstand,

  • and, ya, that kinda looks like a Surface.

  • Also included is going to be a stylus.

  • Again, kinda similar to the Surface,

  • although the Surface actually I don't even think comes

  • with a stylus anymore.

  • But, as you expect with something like this it is going

  • to be a full touch screen device.

  • And that looks, again, exactly like the Surface.

  • Last but not least, you're also going

  • to be getting the power cable which,

  • thankfully, is going to be USPC.

  • Sorry, not last but not least,

  • there's also a USBC to USBA dongle.

  • Does this actually have any USB ports?

  • That would be a no.

  • Uh, okay.

  • So, this PC is going to be a little bit different from most.

  • Now again, the Snapdragon PC's will be available

  • in normal sort of laptop form factors.

  • And once you actually get into Windows you'll find

  • that, well, it looks exactly like Windows 10.

  • Now it does have some limitations

  • because it is using a Snapdragon processor,

  • but, on the other hand, one of the big advantages here is

  • that we actually do have built in LTE.

  • So, if a slide a sim card in here,

  • what we're getting here is essentially, well,

  • exactly what you'd expect with your smartphone.

  • The idea is because the Snapdragon 835 has LTE

  • and all the radios and stuff built in,

  • it's as simple as adding a couple antenna,

  • putting a sim card slot, and you have a PC,

  • that in theory, can be completely connected all the time.

  • At least when it comes to initial impressions,

  • the performance is pretty good on this guy.

  • Just normal day to day stuff feels snappy.

  • This guy ships running Windows 10S.

  • Now that's fine, but I think pretty much everyone's going

  • to want to upgrade to Windows 10 Pro,

  • which is going to allow you to run third party apps

  • that are from outside the Windows store.

  • Now the issue here is that while this will run most apps,

  • it's not going to run everything.

  • It's needs to be at the very least an X86 app,

  • so no 64 bit stuff, and as far as driver support,

  • this actually doesn't support standard Windows drivers.

  • You do need to get specific RM drivers which,

  • at this point, are basically non existent.

  • However, for most games, most apps,

  • most programs, they're at least going

  • to work somewhat on here out of the box.

  • Benchmarking the MV is going to be a little bit difficult.

  • So while it will run standard Windows apps

  • that are X86 based such as Gatebench 4,

  • the issue is that it's running it in a compatibility mode.

  • Now it means that it will work but your not going

  • to be getting that full performance.

  • And you can see that in the numbers.

  • So take a look at the scores compared

  • to a Snapdragon 835 phone which is running on native code.

  • You're seeing that you're getting a little bit less

  • than half the standard performance.

  • It's fine, but you do notice a slowdown.

  • But, keep in mind that

  • that's running in the X86 compatibility mode,

  • basically the lowest performance option

  • that you can get on this computer.

  • If an app such as Gatebench is recompiled

  • with Snapdragon in mind, you're probably going

  • to be getting much similar performance

  • to that what you actually get on android.

  • However, all that being said, you have to keep in mind,

  • that while it's not going to be crazy high end,

  • you're getting pretty decent specs here.

  • I mean, that Snapdragon 835 is going

  • to give you eight cores, four gigs of ram.

  • It's no slouch.

  • One area of this is really newsable is

  • when it comes to browsers.

  • So Microsoft's Edge is natively compiled

  • to work specifically on Snapdragon processors.

  • So when you're on the web, everything feels snappy,

  • it feels pretty much one to one like it would on your phone

  • or pretty much any other laptop.

  • However, download a third party browser,

  • such as Chrome or Opera, and things are noticeably slower.

  • Run a quick Java script benchmark like Octane 2.0

  • and you can see that Edge

  • absolutely destroys Opera's performance.

  • Now part of that is, of course, due to the fact

  • that there's some slight differences between

  • how Edge and Opera perform,

  • but running in that compatibility mode,

  • while it will get an app to actually run on this guy,

  • really does mean it's going

  • to take a big hit to the performance.

  • For me, the difference is enough

  • that I would rather use Edge over any kind

  • of third party browser.

  • I think even beyond the benchmarks,

  • you're really going to get something

  • that is going to be noticeably slower

  • when you do install something like Chrome or Opera

  • that just wasn't designed with this in mind.

  • It works, but just not very fast.

  • But we do have the compatibility mode for a reason,

  • and in theory, games will work.

  • Although, the idea of how well they work

  • is probably a little bit questionable

  • when you consider that this is a phone processor

  • running an emulator for Windows apps that is, ya,

  • let's just try it.

  • First up, I wanna give CS Go a try.

  • As a slightly older game, it has the best chance

  • of actually being able to run on such a low end processor.

  • Like, and I say low end, I mean obviously you can play

  • some pretty nice looking games on a android,

  • but Windows is a little bit more challenging.

  • Your graphics hardware does not support

  • all the features needed to run this game.

  • Okay.

  • Not a great start.

  • Let's try something else.

  • Hey, okay, so now we have Rocket League.

  • Now this is a game that, again, should in theory

  • be able to be run on some sort of Snapdragon class hardware.

  • Now the main question though is

  • how the actual GP drivers are going to work,

  • because this looks like normal, oh, wow, that's slow.

  • It's like slow Rocket League.

  • It might work though.

  • I'm not really entirely clear on

  • how Microsoft is getting an X86 Windows app

  • to run natively on an RM processor,

  • so it seems like they're doing something

  • to be able to actually maybe emulate it,

  • Or I don't know if it's some kind of hypervisor

  • or something but this actually looks like it might work.

  • Now what's interesting to me is the idea that...

  • That's totally going to go in, great.

  • Good job guys.

  • What's really interesting to me is the idea

  • that this is definitely something

  • that can be improved with software.

  • Obviously there's going to be a limit on

  • what a processor like the Snapdragon is capable of,

  • but the idea that I'm actually playing

  • a proper PC game here,

  • fully through emulation or whatever they're doing

  • to actually make it work, is impressive.

  • Although, maybe not the greatest experience in the world.

  • Next, I wanna try a game that actually

  • should run on Snapdragon.

  • The Windows 10 edition of Minecraft.

  • Now the big difference between this

  • and the Steam games I was trying earlier is the idea

  • that the Steam games, well, the just were never meant

  • to run on this kind of hardware,

  • whereas this is something that actually I believe

  • has actually been optimized to run on an RM processor.

  • If it hasn't, I can't tell

  • cause the performance is pretty much on point.

  • To be fair, I don't think anyone is going

  • to pick up a Snapdragon powered PC

  • with the intent of turning it into a gaming computer.

  • Now, there are a few things to keep in mind.

  • First of all, this is the very first system

  • that's shipping, so there's almost certainly going

  • to be some more optimization and the idea

  • that this is going to be a pretty small

  • and lightweight system that is able

  • to actually do all this emulation is impressive.

  • However, that being said,

  • even in standard apps, the performance just isn't

  • as good as it should be.

  • You can definitely tell the difference between a native app

  • and something that's going to be emulated.

  • It's good, but there's more work to be done.

  • There are definitely some advantages

  • with going with a Snapdragon PC though.

  • One of the easiest ones to spot is going into sleep.

  • So with an Intel system, usually it takes a few seconds

  • between when you close the lid,

  • wait for it to go to sleep, open it up.

  • Whereas with this, it's like a phone.

  • You hit the power button, it goes to sleep.

  • Hit it again, it wakes up.

  • It's much, much faster.

  • Having built in LTE is nice as well.

  • I think that's going to be a huge selling point

  • for a ton of people.

  • And all Snapdragon PC's, this as well as some

  • of the laptops, are going to have it ready.

  • So all you do is drop a sim card in

  • and it's going to be up and running.

  • And it's nice to be able to always be connected

  • between LTE and wifi.

  • Now that being said, I'm actually not a huge fan

  • of the MVX 2's design in particular.

  • For me, the tablet stuff, it's nice,

  • but it's not that much smaller

  • than just a normal 13 inch laptop.

  • But thankfully, there are going

  • to be Snapdragon laptops as well.

  • Probably the biggest selling point is going

  • to be the battery life.

  • So HP claims up to 22 hours of use on a charge,

  • or 1000 hours of connected standby,

  • which for a PC is totally crazy.

  • Now that's mostly thanks to the idea

  • that the Snapdragon processor is usually found in phones

  • and I mean, even something that's going

  • to be this small is going to give you much,

  • much larger battery than any phone will.

  • However, all that being said,

  • I haven't tested it yet so I don't know exactly

  • how long it's going to last,

  • but, if it gets anywhere close

  • to those numbers it is going to be a game changer.

  • A Snapdragon PC makes a lot of sense

  • for someone who wants an always connected computer

  • that can run Windows apps, albeit a little bit slowly,

  • and has solid battery life.

  • Now with the HPMVX 2, it's a good system,

  • but for me, it's hard to justify the 1000 dollar price tag.

  • If it was somewhere in the neighborhood

  • of 700 or 800 dollars I think I would be fine with it.

  • But considering that it's going

  • to be a little bit unoptimized right now,

  • it's very expensive, and it doesn't even

  • have the Snapdragon 845 yet,

  • which I'm sure is going to be coming soon,

  • it's kind of hard to recommend.

  • That being said, I think there's a lot

  • of potential in Snapdragon PC's.

  • So, what do you guys think?

  • Let me know in the comments below

  • and I will catch you in the next one.

- Hey guys, this is Austin.

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