HP Elitebook Revolve 810 review – if there’s one thing HP does right, it’s swivel hinge convertibles

HP was at the forefront of the laptops market for the better part of the past decade – and their newest mobile workstations and laptops are still among the best despite the large number of competitors. One niche where the company excelled particularly well was laptop convertibles – that is, laptops that could swivel their touch-enabled display around and work as a tablet (albeit a large, unwieldy one). If that sounds a lot like the Ultrabook Convertible design, well that’s because it is – HP pioneered it well before anyone else.

Interestingly, they haven’t been able to crack the tablet and Ultrabook niches themselves, but it seems to be a general problem with lack of innovation at the company rather than their lack of interest in the market.

One of HP’s latest products should pique the interest of corporate and professional users alike – the Elitebook Revolve 810 is a traditional swivel hinge convertible laptop that is built like a tank, is rather small and light and has all the hardware you need to get up and running in no time.

Design

The Revolve 810 may not be as tough looking as its larger Elitebook brethren (which are pretty much the most durable mobile workstations at the moment), but it’s still a very sturdy and well-built machine. The bottom is made of a magnesium alloy and painted in black, while the rest of the chassis is made out of aluminum – the device also has a soft touch coating that feels nice and should keep the whole device from sliding out of your hands.

The convertible design hasn’t changed much since the days of the Elitebook 2730 (or even TX1000 for that matter) – it’s still a large metal hinge that rotates 180 degrees in one direction and can also go 180 degrees from fully closed to fully open in laptop and tablet mode. The hinge feels sturdy and doesn’t wobble much – you can even use the touch screen while in laptop mode without much trouble. Pretty much all of the ports are located on the back, with only the power, volume and auto rotate buttons, as well as the micro SD card slot, 3.5 mm audio jack and docking port on the right side.

The touch pad isn’t as large as those on some of the other Ultrabooks, but it feels nice and works pretty well. The keyboard has the traditional for slim devices island style keys, and is water proof, which will undoubtedly come in handy if you spill something on it.

Hardware features and performance

The hardware of the Elitebook Revolve 810 isn’t top of the line, which is a rather unfortunate tradition in the business world (just like Lenovo’s ThinkPads, they’re one step behind the latest hardware), but it’s definitely good enough for any applications.

The only weak link is the display – in a day and age where even cheap smartphones have Full HD IPS displays, the Revolve 810 uses a good old 11.6 inch TFT LCD panel with a 1366×768 resolution that makes even me uncomfortable – HP could’ve at least gone with a 1600:900 resolution. While the screen isn’t visibly pixelated, it’s not the best at image clarity, nor is it great at color reproduction and viewing angles (and the glossy surface makes things worse). Given the price, you’d really expect more in this department.

Processing power is adequate, with the laptop featuring Intel’s Core i processors – a Core i3-3227U, a Core i5-3437U or a Core i7-3687U, depending on your desired configuration. There’s also 4 GB of DDR3-1600 RAM soldered onboard plus a slot that lets you expand that by up to 8 GB more (so you can have a total of 12 GB – more than enough for this platform).

Storage space is provided by an mSATA SSD – either 128 or 256 GB in size, and I’d really recommend the latter seeing as Windows 8 itself takes up quite a large chunk of that space. The tablet also has a micro SD card slot, which is rather weird seeing as a full size SD card slot would fit, but you can use it to store any extra files – a 32 or 64 GB micro SD card can work well for that purpose.

The Revolve 810 has a standard 2.0 Megapixels camera on the top of the display, which supports 720p video recording. Connectivity wise, you get everything you may need with Wifi N, Bluetooth 3.0, 1x Gigabit Ethernet jack, 2x USB 3.0 ports, a DisplayPort, NFC radio and an optional HSPA+/GPS combo card.

The battery is a rather large 6 cell 44WHr unit that is said to last up to 6 hours of continuous use – not bad for a laptop but not that good for a tablet, either. There’s no option for an expanded battery, so you might want to charge often or carry a second battery with you.

Technical specifications

Specifications	HP Elitebook Revolve 810
Display	Display 11.6 inches, 1366×768 pixels, TFT LCD, 135 PPI pixel density
Processor	Intel Core i3, i5 or i7 ULV processor
RAM	Up to 12 GB DDR3L 1600 MHz RAM (4GB soldered onboard + single slot)
Graphics Adapter	Intel HD Graphics 4000 IGP
Storage Space	Up to 256 Gb mSATA SSD; micro SD card slot
Camera(s)	Front facing – 2.0 Megapixels camera with support for 720p video recording
Connectivity Options	Wifi N, Bluetooth 4.0, optional HSPA+ modem, optional GPS radio, 2x USB 3.0 ports, 1x Gigabit Ethernet port, 1x DisplayPort, NFC, 1x 3.5mm headphones/microphone combo jack
Sensors	Light, magnetometer, gyroscope and accelerometer sensors
Battery	Li-Po, 44 WHr, up to 6 hours of continuous use
Dimensions and weight	212 x 285 x 22.2 mm, 1.4 kg
Operating System and Software	Windows 8 Professional

 

Software

The Elitebook Revolve 810 comes with Windows 8 Professional pre-installed and there’s an option to downgrade to Windows 7 – at least HP understands that business users don’t need the new interface. There’s no bloatware to speak of – HP puts none of that on their business machines, so you can customize your software installation however you want without any hindrances.

Price and Availability

The Elitebook Revolve 810 is a very solid machine for those who aren’t really sold on the whole tablet fad and prefer the old ways while still being able to test new waters, but for the price you could find better options. The base Revolve 810 model is $1449, with the top configuration going for a whopping $1799 – that’s the price of a good MacBook Air, Asus Ultrabook or even a 14 inch Elitebook workstation – but if you need portability and a touch screen, the Revolve 810 can offer that while the others can’t.

image source: testlab