HP Spectre, the world's thinnest laptop, is so much more than just looks

There are a lot of MacBook Air clones out there, i.e. silver laptops with black keyboards. Coming up with a new twist on that design isn't easy. 

The Spectre is part CNC'd aluminum (screen and body) and part carbon fiber (underbelly) and all sexy. Mashable senior tech correspondent Christina Warren called the Spectre the Kate Moss of laptops when we unboxed it, and I agree.

HP's made a remarkably beautiful machine here. At 0.41 inches thick, it's thinner than the 11- and 13-inch MacBook Air's thickest point (0.68 inches). And at 2.45 pounds, it's also lighter than the 13-inch MacBook Air, which weighs 2.96 pounds. It's also thinner than the newer, ultra-thin MacBook, which is 0.52 inch at it's thickest point.

Then there's the Spectre's one-of-a-kind polished hinge. To get the computer so thin, HP had to look beyond regular laptops for inspiration. HP settled on piston hinges inspired by those found in high-end furniture. The end result is a display that opens in one smooth motion. When open, the display appears to float above the hinge. The polished-copper finish radiates luxury, evoking high-end jewelry and handbags, although it's macho enough to appeal to guys. 

n each side of the keyboard are grilles for the Bang & Olufsen-tuned speakers. They're not particularly loud and the sound is middling, but at least the speakers project sound up at you; the MacBook Air's speakers are more muffled since they're underneath the keyboard.

Balancing act

There are always tradeoffs between design and performance. In most cases, a thinner, lighter and smaller laptop comes at the expense of power and battery life. A thicker laptop is, well, chunkier, heavier and has more power and more room for a bigger battery.

Apple's 13-inch MacBook Air is the champion when it comes to long battery life. The Air also has solid performance, but the screen is pretty low-res by today's standards.

The Spectre, thin as it is, comes with either a sixth-gen Intel Core i5 ($1,699.99) or i7 ($1,249.99; the model I tested). All models come with 8GB of RAM and 256GB of PCIe solid-state drive storage. A third model with the i7, 8GB of RAM and 512GB of PCIe SSD costs $1,499.99.

That's performance on-par with the 13-inch MacBook Air and far more power than the 12-inch MacBook, which uses a puny Intel Core M processor.