
HP made a laptop slightly thicker to add 3 hours of battery life - slantyyz
http://www.theverge.com/ces/2017/1/3/14126382/new-hp-spectre-x360-laptop-2017-announced-price-release-date-ces
======
rayiner
To put that into context, it will be 18 mm and 4.4 pounds, versus 15.5 mm and
4 pounds for the new 15" MBP. Apparently the new battery is 79 watt-hours (the
old one was 64 watt-hours), versus the 76 watt-hours on the 2016 rMBP. With
the power-guzzling 4K screen, it'll almost certainly get _less battery life_
than the new MBP.

Which confirms the consternation over the 2016 rMBP. It's a huge regression
compared to the 99 watt-hour battery in the 2015 rMBP 15", but with few
exceptions PC manufacturers were shipping 50-60 watt batteries in similar
configurations. And going with power-guzzling 4K displays instead of the much
more efficient 3K model in the MBP.

~~~
vacri
> 18 mm ... versus 15.5 mm

On a tangent, weight I can understand, as folks physically haul around a
laptop, but I've never understood shaving a millimeter or two from the
thickness of a laptop. I've heard genuine complaints about heavy laptops, or
too-large form-factor (big screen or overly large bezel), but thinness seems
to be just bragging rights. I've known people who bought a laptop to fit in a
leather bag they already liked (rather than the other way around!), but I've
never heard anyone complain that laptops are just too thick.

Am I missing something here?

~~~
ssalazar
In addition to what others have said here and elsewhere, I think some of it is
also internal competition gone too far among mechanical designers to make the
thinnest edge or the most subtle bezel. When I worked with product designers
in the past, there was always a lot of oohing and ahhing whenever they'd come
across a competing product with tighter tolerances than they'd seen before.
Its like the product design version of needing to use the latest pre-alpha
NodeJS framework or transpiled front-end language; it doesn't necessarily have
a direct effect on the end user experience, but it satiates its creators own
need for new and shiny.

~~~
6nf
This is like what Philippe Starck calls 'narcissistic design' \- design to
impress other designers.

~~~
digi_owl
And I get the impression that Apple has been doing a shit ton of that over the
years...

~~~
Fnoord
I agree, but I just bought a 15" MBP 2015 and 15,4-inch (2880 x 1800), ~2 kg,
plus the battery life feels just right _to me_ (YMMV). Its ~2/3 of my previous
15" MBP 2010, the battery life is ~25% better, and the screen is noticeably
brighter and crispier (partly due to the old screen being matte and 6 years
old).

I didn't have to go to extremely low weight device. I didn't have to go to
small battery. I didn't have to go to low or high resolution extremes. Sure,
the GPU isn't great, but I decided to not play games on it from the get go. I
wouldn't have my gaming equipment for it anyway (mechanical keyboard with
binds, Naga mouse, headset, etc).

------
proee
Wouldn't it be great if laptops had a "dewalt" powertool style bottom plate.
You could decide if you want the "thin" or "thick" baseplate to balance
between all-day battery life vs. ultra-thin portable 3-4 hour life.

This would give the option to create a solid "3-inch thick" battery that lasts
a week. It would weigh a ton, but for some situations like remote fieldwork it
could be a really great solution.

~~~
dekhn
thinkpads have this. I use "the tumor" (a 9-cell battery) and it's amazing.
Also, you can hibernate the computer, remove the tumor, and replace it with
another tumor (or the 6-cell battery), and restart- no reboot required to
switch batteries.

~~~
trynewideas
Not only the tumor (which also made a decent carrying handle), but also the
dream bottom plate battery OP is describing: [https://www.amazon.com/Thinkpad-
Battery-19-Cell-Slice/dp/B00...](https://www.amazon.com/Thinkpad-
Battery-19-Cell-Slice/dp/B004UC59Q4)

~~~
dekhn
I didn't know that existed....

------
hackuser
Why don't HP desktops and laptops get more attention in 'hacker' communities?
I hardly ever see them discussed.

IME with large numbers of HP corporate (not consumer) machines, they have by
far the best quality of any Windows options. They run for so long that users
get frustrated, wanting shiny new equipment but having no reason to replace
their old ones. An EliteBook not far away from where I'm sitting even has a
tool-less case - you can pop off the cover and service it by moving one lever,
no screwdriver required - on a laptop!

However, I don't have data on quality; that is hard to come by.

(I have no relationship w/ HP.)

~~~
bsder
> Why don't HP desktops and laptops get more attention in 'hacker'
> communities? I hardly ever see them discussed.

Because HP did a _LOT_ of crappy things and produced a lot of crappy hardware
and provided a really crappy customer experience.

I know a lot of people who are in the "I will _NEVER_ buy another HP" camp.

That reputation takes time to undo, and you have to stick with it and not
screw up during that time or you are back to square one.

~~~
thrillgore
I can count on two hands the number of printers and consumer-level laptops
from HP that have died on me. I'm sure its different in EliteBook land but I
am still trying to find out what Windows laptop vendor offers the best build
quality and performance.

~~~
hackuser
Buy the corporate line laptops from whatever vendor you use. Speaking
generally,

* Consumer products are sold based on cost; when consumers shop, that's all they look at. Corners are cut to keep costs down - that's what consumers demand.

* Corporate products are sold based on availability (reliability), serviceability, and support; that's what IT departments shop for because those line items cost businesses far more than the extra couple hundred in up front cost. Imagine the cost of just a a few hours of downtime over the entire lifetime of the computer - lost productivity, skilled labor to for repairs, parts, distraction and disruption.

Yes, corporate products cost more; if you insist on lower up front cost, the
manufacturer is going to give it to you. You get what you pay for. The same
goes for support; pay for premium support.

My impression of HP's consumer-level stuff is that it's cheap in every way,
but I never use it. I do have a ~12 year old heavily used HP corporate line
laptop not far from where I'm sitting; it works perfectly except for the
trackpoint (touchpad is fine), and the finish is a bit worn where the user's
palms rest.

------
MR4D
TL:DR - 4K screen sucks regular batteries dry - needed bigger battery for same
battery life. :(

I got excited that this might be a good trend until I read this paragraph:

"Unfortunately, the claimed three hours of additional battery life aren’t
meant to make this laptop into some long-lasting wonder — they’re really just
meant to normalize its battery life. HP will only be selling the 15.6-inch
x360 with a 4K display this year, and that requires a lot more power."

~~~
slantyyz
The paragraph following yours is quite important:

"By increasing the laptop’s battery capacity, HP is able to push the machine’s
battery life from the 9.5 hours it estimated for the 4K version of its 2016
model to about 12 hours and 45 minutes for this model. So it is adding three
hours of battery life, but in doing so, it’s merely matching the battery life
of last year’s 1080p model."

It is still a net gain over the previous year's 4K model's battery life.

~~~
mulmen
I believe Apple is already making the argument but how much battery life do
you really need? 8 hours seems like an easy figure to throw out because its a
"work day" although most people can just plug in their laptops.

What use case needs 12+? That seems "good enough" to me for most applications.
Is it building in more life so that as the battery degrades there is still
acceptable battery life?

Are there more applications than I think where the laptop is actually not
plugged in all day? When does that happen? Manufacturing? Some kind of in-the-
field work?

I have no experience with it so honestly curious how people use laptops as
more than a mobile terminal in an office setting.

~~~
developer2
The problem with Apple is that extra battery is thrown out the window for the
sake of thinness above all else. Can you _imagine_ how much battery life a
MacBook Pro could have if they just added back 3mm of height to the mold?
Throwing away 4-6+ hours of battery life in the supposedly _professional_
models for the sake of shaving off a couple of millimetres... it's a joke.

The latest MacBook "Pro" is no longer a professional machine... it's nothing
more than the new generation of MacBook Air. There is no longer a Pro line,
only upgrades for the least common denominator of consumer.

Source: desperately not wanting to give up OS X (it's the only operating
system I can stand), but I'm stuck in a position where I flat out refuse to
shell out $4200 CAD on a new laptop, when 3 years ago the same level of
upgrades cost $1000 less. Their pricing has reached unacceptable levels of
greed. That, and no fucking escape key... on a "professional" machine. Give me
a break.

~~~
krrrh
I hope you're taking into consideration that over roughly the last 3 years the
Canadian dollar depreciation has added around $1000CAD to the same levels of
upgrades by itself.

------
mcculley
How much more work would it be to put in more RAM that could only be used when
plugged into AC power? My understanding of the MacBook Pro design constraint
is that they had to hit <100 watt-hours while using LPDDR3. Could a laptop
easily have another 16 or 32 GB of RAM that consumes more power but is only
available when plugged into AC power?

I would be happy to have such a constraint. I love my MacBook Pro. I love
being able to carry it around and deal with things like email when on battery.
When I'm doing serious development work, I'm sitting down somewhere plugged in
anyhow.

The OS could gracefully page out to swap and power down the less efficient
memory when switched to battery.

~~~
pimlottc
Are there any existing operating systems that can handle a dynamically-
changing amount of RAM?

> The OS could gracefully page out to swap and power down the less efficient
> memory when switched to battery.

According to benchmarks, the SSD on the latest MacBook Pro hit 1.4GB/s. Even
at this speed, it would take at least 10 seconds to flush 16GB of RAM to disk.
I doubt your computer could do much while that was happening. I wouldn't call
that very graceful.

~~~
rrdharan
Solaris on SPARC had the ability to dynamically add or remove RAM as I
understand it. I believe IBM AIX (+ POWER maybe?) can do this too.

Modern Linux kernels will let you hot-add memory but won't let you hot remove
it.

~~~
scurvy
Yep, CPU's too. On the E4500's the CPU's and memory were on the same boards.
You could remove the board after sending the right ASR commands.

Then again, you were constantly swapping boards to find the ones not affected
by EDP (ecache data parity) errors.

------
Animats
Panasonic makes a rugged laptop with 27 hours of battery life.[1]

[1] [http://business.panasonic.com/toughbook/fully-rugged-
laptop-...](http://business.panasonic.com/toughbook/fully-rugged-laptop-
toughbook-31.html)

~~~
noonespecial
_8.2 lbs. with optional media bay 2nd battery_

I'm not sure it counts when it weighs so much you could just bring a second
laptop along!

~~~
StRoy
Most of the weight is due to the toughened design, not the battery, actually.
We are talking about laptops you can use as a weapon to bludgeon someone, then
take with you to swim, and they'd still be in a working state.

Actually you can run over them with an SUV and they still work!

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41lXVKSTOGQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41lXVKSTOGQ)

Of course, unlike common laptops, they don't need a case or anything. Just
carry them as is with their built-in handle.

If they didn't cost so much I would consider buying one. The added weight may
make them slightly less comfortable in one way, but in another way, if you
think about it, they're not flimsy pieces of denting aluminum you always have
to treat with care, put in protective bags during transport and the like.
Using a laptop like this must feel.. liberating.

------
walrus01
I want something that's identical in size/weight to a 2009/2010 Macbook Pro
17" (huge in comparison to today's stuff), but with all of the internal volume
that was occupied by the DVD-RW drive full of battery... I bet you could fit
100Wh of battery.

~~~
stuckagain
I used to use (and still own) one of those PowerBook G3 laptops where you
could swap the media bay for a CD-RW, a floppy, or a Zip drive, or just more
batteries. With modern Li-ion battery technology in both the main battery and
the media bay, that thing ran for 20+ hours. It was amazing.

~~~
seanp2k2
Many Dell Latitudes can also accommodate a media bay battery. I had a D830
with a 1920x1200 screen and loved having the 9-cell + LiPo combo.

------
combatentropy
When batteries surpass 72 hours, then laptop bodies can shrink below 20 mm.

~~~
shpx
You have to cap either battery life or weight/size. They capped battery life
at ~10 hours and decrease size every year. Maybe one day laptops get light and
thin enough and that changes.

The 2016 13" macbook pro with 70 hours of battery life would weigh ~3kg [0].
Have you ever used a light laptop (new macbook, macbook airs or ms surface to
some extent)? The (lack of) weight feels really nice. The macbook would imo be
the best laptop if it weren't for the keyboard. In fairness I've never owned a
laptop with day long battery life so can't compare. Actually if I could buy a
100gram laptop with 1hour battery life I'd do that, the battery is less than
20% of the weight of a laptop though.

Portable 700gram 100Wh (the 13" pros are 55Wh and 50Wh) battery packs are less
than $100 on amazon.

Ultimately, if you _really_ believe in battery life, line the back of your
laptop with 18650's (one cell is 10Wh for less than $10), all you need is like
2 circuit boards, some solder and a bunch of electric tape. You can
theoretically fit 47 on the bottom of a 13" macbook pro (you need ~35 cells
for 72 hours[1]). Or get someone to manufacture a portable laptop battery
case, macbook pros vent through the hinge, so heat should be less of a
problem.

[0] [https://www.apple.com/ca/macbook-
pro/specs/](https://www.apple.com/ca/macbook-pro/specs/) and
[https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Touch+Ba...](https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/MacBook+Pro+13-Inch+Touch+Bar+Teardown/73480#s148072)
means 1370grams+235grams\ _6

[1] [http://www.batteryspace.com/ProductImages/li-
ion/specLI2400....](http://www.batteryspace.com/ProductImages/li-
ion/specLI2400.gif) and
[https://www.apple.com/ca/macbook/specs/](https://www.apple.com/ca/macbook/specs/)
(281mm\_197mm)/(65mm\\*18mm) = 47

~~~
seanp2k2
Or spend $700 on a pair of Hypermac 100wh battery packs
[https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperjuice-external-
batte...](https://www.hypershop.com/products/hyperjuice-external-battery-pack-
for-macbook?variant=11044791238)

------
yani205
I wish they start doing this with phones more often

~~~
rm_-rf_slash
That's the "eat your vegetables" line of smartphone marketing. Good for you
but a hard sell. Besides if battery life really matters to you then you would
get much more utility from an external battery that can store far more than a
single smartphone charge.

~~~
mulmen
Why is it hard to sell people vegetables? I agree with you but I don't
actually know why. Is it just because there's no industry group running a "got
carrots" campaign?

~~~
WildUtah
I sell people vegetables professionally. It's not difficult at all. People
will pay a fair price for quality organically grown tomatoes, cucumbers, kale,
chiles, peas and snow peas, and various Southern and Asian vegetables. There's
too much hand work involved in root vegetables to pay easily for first world
labor, but you can make it work.

The problem being invoked is that the junk food market is much bigger.

------
RodericDay
I have a 13' Air and a 13' Retina Pro.

I do not care even a little bit for the Retina screen. Makes me sad that so
much energy is wasted on it.

~~~
CoolGuySteve
This was the biggest factor to my switching to Ubuntu when deciding to upgrade
from my 2010 MacBook Pro.

I can't stand glossy displays and I want battery life. High res displays tend
to be glossy because at some point the grain on the matte coating is larger
than the pixels.

On the PC side, it's easy to pick a matte 1080p display on the XPS13 and Asus
UX305 and it greatly increases battery life. The 1080p XPS13 gets 14 hours!
And it's matte! Win-win.

Whereas it's Tough Shit For You on a MacBook. Don't know why though, my old
MacBook Pro has a matte display as a configurable option.

~~~
WildUtah
1080p? Why not just go back to individual blinking LEDs? A non-retina screen
is a throwback to previous centuries and should be tolerated only by the
visually impaired.

------
21
I see a parallel trend for big laptops.

Like this ridiculous one (which I would love if not the price):
[https://gizmodo.com/acers-absurd-curved-display-laptop-
has-a...](https://gizmodo.com/acers-absurd-curved-display-laptop-has-a-
predictably-hu-1790521279)

------
thoughtsimple
Who cares how thick it is, what matters it what does it weigh? Not seeing that
information.

~~~
cwbrandsma
As an alternative point of view (as to say, I'm not calling you wrong at all,
just that there are other opinions on the matter): I don't care about weight
at all, or how thin the thing is. I want battery life, bigger screen size, and
horse power. (Apple about lost me when they killed the 17 MBP). I call my
laptops "luggable".

~~~
thoughtsimple
The good thing about bringing back the 17" MBP would be all the objections
over battery life and low power GPUs would be moot. Even a thin 17" is going
to be huge. The last one looked like 4 cafeteria trays stacked up.

I'm just not sure that there is much of a market for it. It's fun to imagine
though. Mobile Xeon, ECC memory, 32 or 64 GB DDR4-2400 RAM, RAID NVMe SSDs.
Priced like a Mac Pro :)

~~~
lj3
> The last one looked like 4 cafeteria trays stacked up.

It's funny you mention that. The nickname for the 17" MBP was 'the lunch
tray'.

~~~
seanp2k2
The 17" allow me to fit a dinner plate, side dish, and drink on top of it
(closed), then carry it back to my desk or to the next meeting. The 15" won't
fit the side dish anymore. I miss my Silicon Valley Lunch Tray.

------
randyrand
It's annoying that most manufactures are only giving you 1080p or 4k options.
WHY NOT SOMETHING IN BETWEEN!

Apple has the right approach IMO, 2880-by-1800 15", 2560-by-1600 13". ~48 -
67% more than 1080p.

~~~
seanp2k2
Windows and Linux have issues with HiDPI when scaling is not just 2x. 1080p is
conveniently ~1/4 of 4K, so 2X scaling for H and W makes it look normal.

Also, panel manufacturers want to pitch 4K, not 2.5k or whatever would make
sense. It's the same reason we have 16:9 instead of 16:10 which many people
(including me) liked much more: panel manufacturers and companies selling
these to consumers care more about marketing (and selling) than how good they
are to use. 100% srgb coverage is easier to sell than e.g. Backlight
uniformity or low backlight bleed.

------
sullyj3
On a side note, why is it that I see battery capacity measured in both mAh and
wH? One is charge, the other is energy. Which is more relevant?

------
jaxn
This is the same thing Microsoft did with the Surface Book a couple of months
ago. I bought one and love the battery.

------
bencollier49
I misread that as "He made a laptop slightly thicker to add 3 hours of battery
life". I was waiting for the subtitle "Apple hates him" or something.

