HP 14s Core i3: Budget Laptop

• Posted By Amritesh
• On December 8th, 2020
• Comments: 2 responses

The need for a performance-oriented laptop has increased manifolds due to the pandemic situation. Many are looking for affordable laptops, in the price range of Rs 30,000/- to Rs 35,000/-. During my research, I came across the new HP Budget 14s Core i3 laptop. It is a budget laptop which comes with impressive hardware specifications, sufficient to meet the requirement of a normal user.

The laptop is priced at Rs 35,999/- but is available for around Rs 33,000/-, if one avails the bank discounts offered during the Sale Days. Currently the Laptop is available on Flipkart.

Previously, I had reviewed the Asus Ryzen 5 3500U laptop, an affordable yet powerful laptop. However, the laptop is little expensive than the HP 14s Intel laptop.

Design & Hardware: HP 14s Core i3

HP 14s Core i3 is a compact and light weight laptop, weighing just below the 1.5 kgs. The entire built is of plastic but the quality used is good. The laptop does feel sturdy and one would should not face any issue with the build. The compact design along with decent build makes it a strong contender in this price range. In terms of display, HP 14s Core comes with 14’ inch HD WLED display with brightness level of 220 nits. NTSC Colour gamut at 45% means it is not the best with colour reproduction. The display quality and viewing angles is average, considering the price range we cannot complain much.

HP has provided all the ports on this laptop including a type-C port. Even though the port cannot be used for charging the laptop. In terms of connectivity, Bluetooth 4.2 and WiFi 5 support is available on this laptop.

HP 14s Core i3 is powered by the Intel i3 10^th generation processor along with 8 GB Ram and 256 GB SSD storage. The laptop comes with Windows 10 & MS Office pre-installed. The MS Office 2019 comes with lifetime validity. Thus, one does not need to bother about the spending additional bucks for MS Office with this laptop.

Performance & Battery Life: HP 14s Core i3

The Laptop performs pretty well in normal day to day and does not exhibit any lag or heating issue. The Intel i3 10^th Gen processor coupled with 8 GB DDR4 Ram & SSD storage provides lag free experience even while multitasking. However, the laptop does struggle while performing graphic intensive tasks or even while gaming. One should note that this is not a gaming laptop and should not have very high expectation regarding the same. The laptop boots pretty fast, thanks to the faster SSD provided on this laptop. Even though the keyboard is not backlit. It is well spread out with decent key travel which makes typing a pleasure on this Laptop. Trackpad also works flawlessly on this laptop.

The battery life on HP 14s Core is average, one can expect around 4-5 hours of battery life for moderate use. The front firing speakers does a decent job in terms of sound output and quality.

In terms of price to performance ratio, HP 14s Core is a bang for the buck product. Even though HP has cut few corners to keep the price down.

As discussed earlier apart from average display, the SSD storage is restricted to 256 GB. However, one may use external drive if required. Furthermore, even the Ram on this laptop is not upgradeable.

Final Opinion: Who should Buy?

HP 14s Core is a decent product for Individuals looking for an affordable, fast & snappy laptop for office or academic related work. The laptop is just about perfect for normal use and multimedia consumption. But it is not designed for gamers or even for content creators involved in video editing related work. Ram on this laptop is not upgradeable and even the SSD storage is restricted to 256 GB. But for basic use this should not create any issue.

The price of the laptop is reasonable, more so as it comes from a top tier brand. The Intel i3 10^th Gen processor along with SSD storage and 8 GB DDR4 Ram makes it a fabulous budget end laptop. In my daily use, I did not face any issue with the laptop, MS Office 2019 life time version makes the deal even better for most of the users. If one can look past the average display along with other knit pickings, HP 14s Core is a decent laptop in my opinion.

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