HP G72 review

£538
Price when reviewed

HP’s G72 laptop boasts a generous screen size, stylish design and decent specifications, but surprisingly it’s also a budget desktop replacement without a steep price tag to match.

It’s encased in an elephant grey chassis, and the subtle geometric pattern etched onto the surface adds visual charm, a luxury often missing from budget desktop replacements. It’s only when you touch the surface of the G72 that it becomes clear the chassis is plastic rather than aluminium.

Despite the plastic casing, overall build quality feels reassuring, and although the screen displays more flex than we’d like, we’re confident it would survive in a bag during transit. Tipping the scales at just shy of 3kg and with fairly chunky dimensions, it’s certainly not dainty, but that’s not overly heavy for the size.

HP G72

Under the hood the line-up looks good too: HP has employed a low-voltage 2.27GHz Core i3-350M, at the less powerful end of the i3 line but still capable of handling most tasks with ease. In our application benchmarks it gained a score of 1.3, which is respectable, and it’s backed up with 4GB of DDR3 RAM – a healthy helping that should enable you to run as many apps as you need simultaneously without impinging on responsiveness.

There’s no dedicated graphics chip, and a result of just 13fps in the Low quality Crysis test shows intensive titles will be beyond the HP G72, but HD video is well within its reach. It tackled both 720p and 1080p HD video files well and we also found both YouTube HD and the demanding BBC iPlayer HD channel played smoothly on the 1,600 x 900, 17in display.

Physical specifications

Dimensions412 x 269 x 32.4mm (WDH)
Weight2.880kg
Travelling weight3.3kg

Processor and memory

ProcessorIntel Core i3-350
RAM capacity4.00GB
Memory typeDDR3

Screen and video

Screen size17.3in
Resolution screen horizontal1,600
Resolution screen vertical900
Resolution1600 x 900
Graphics chipsetIntel HD graphics
VGA (D-SUB) outputs1
HDMI outputs1
S-Video outputs0
DVI-I outputs0
DVI-D outputs0
DisplayPort outputs0

Drives

Capacity500GB
Hard diskSeagate ST9500325AS
Optical disc technologyDVD writer
Optical driveHP
Replacement battery price inc VAT£0

Networking

802.11a supportno
802.11b supportyes
802.11g supportyes
802.11 draft-n supportyes
Integrated 3G adapterno
Bluetooth supportyes

Other Features

Wireless hardware on/off switchno
Wireless key-combination switchyes
USB ports (downstream)3
3.5mm audio jacks2
SD card readeryes
MMC (multimedia card) readeryes
Pointing device typeTouchpad
Audio chipsetRealtek HD Audio
Speaker locationAbove keyboard/Front edge
Hardware volume control?no
Integrated microphone?yes
Integrated webcam?yes
Camera megapixel rating1.3mp
Fingerprint readerno

Battery and performance tests

Battery life, light use5hr 6min
Battery life, heavy use1hr 30min
Overall application benchmark score1.30
Office application benchmark score1.02
2D graphics application benchmark score1.34
Encoding application benchmark score1.42
Multitasking application benchmark score1.46
3D performance (crysis) low settings13fps

Operating system and software

Operating systemWindows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
OS familyWindows 7

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