HP Folio 13 review

The touchpad is fine. The buttons are integrated into the pad itself, with the left- and right-click zones demarcated by a grey border, but it’s possible to left-click across most of the pad, either by pressing down or dabbing it with a light tap. Should you find your palms interfering with the cursor, a quick double-tap in the top-left corner disables the touchpad completely, with a small amber light above the touchpad letting you know.

Cursor control is responsive, and the usual two-fingered zooming and scrolling gestures work well. The three- and four-fingered gestures are a little more erratic, but they’re occasionally useful: horizontal swipes skip back and forth through web pages, and four-fingered gestures flick between applications or open up the Flip 3D interface. Thankfully, should you find yourself activating certain gestures by mistake, it’s possible to disable them in the Synaptics Control Panel.

If the Folio 13 has a notable weakness, it has to be the display. It looks acceptable enough in isolation, perhaps due to the glossy finish, but closer examination reveals it to be just as average as many of its Ultrabook peers. Brightness peaks at a modest 223cd/m2, and the low 193:1 contrast ratio leaves it struggling to reproduce fine detail in the brightest and darkest areas of our test photographs. The resolution is none too impressive, either, with HP settling for a bog-standard 1,366 x 768 panel. It’s perfectly usable, but those after a higher resolution and better image quality will need to look to Samsung’s Series 9 or Apple’s MacBook Air.

We didn’t expect HP’s latest Ultrabook to deliver a knockout blow for only £799, but the Folio 13 punches well above its weight. Great build and smart looks go hand in hand with all-day battery life; the ergonomics are good, if not quite great; and only the display leaves any major room for improvement. It still doesn’t quite get the heart pumping quite like an XPS 13 or a Zenbook UX31E, but if you’re looking for a fine all-rounder for less than most Ultrabooks, the Folio 13 is as good as they come.