Review: HP Omen 15 (2020) Gaming Laptop

Over the past few years, HP has made quite a name for itself in the gaming market with its Omen range of devices. We’ve reviewed a few of them before, and they were quite impressive to say the least. Recently, the Omen series was refreshed with the latest models for 2020, and do they hold up? Let’s find out with the HP Omen 15 that we’re reviewing today.

Tech Specs and Design

The 2020 Omen 15 comes with a 6 Core/12 Thread Intel Core i7-10750H CPU along with 16 gigs of DDR4 RAM and an NVIDIA RTX 2070 Super MaxQ graphics card. There’s a whopping 1TB super fast SSD for storage space, and the display is a sharp, crisp 15-inch Full HD IPS panel with a 300 Hz refresh rate. Yes, you read that right, it has a screen with a refresh rate of 300Hz.

Ditching the aggressive, angular look that is generally associated with gaming laptops, the Omen 15 comes in a slim and compact rectangular form factor, which looks clean, classy and professional. If you’re someone who also uses their gaming laptop as a work device, you can open this up in a meeting easily, without worrying about drawing too much attention. Talking about carrying it, the laptop is pretty lightweight as well, weighing about 2.36kg, which means you can carry it easily just about anywhere.

The first thing you’ll notice about the laptop is how the Omen logo is no longer that red tribal design, instead a glossy, reflective diamond square will greet you on the lid, keeping in tune with the minimalistic design. The device feels nothing short of premium with it’s sturdy metallic body, covered entirely in black. That said, the lid does feel a little flimsy as it can wobble often, and quite easily. Apart from that, when it comes to gaming laptops, this is definitely one of the best designs we’ve seen – simple, elegant and high quality.

On the connectivity side of things, we have all the options you will need. On the left, there’s an HDMI port, the LAN port, one USB 3.0 port,  one 3.5 mm audio port and an SD card reader, while on the right you can find two more USB 3.0 ports, a USB Type-C Thunderbolt along with a MiniDP. Now, I’ve been saying for a long time that gaming laptops should have at least four USB Type-A ports, because a lot of people tend to use external keyboards and USB headsets, but it seems like three USB ports is the new standard for gaming laptops.

Lifting up the lid, you can see the super smooth display screen with minimal bezels on three sides, along with a full-sized QWERTY keyboard sitting amidst a metallic finish. The power button is right there next to the F12 key, so be careful because it is possible to accidentally hit that while you’re trying to reach for the delete button. The keys themselves are quite comfortable to use even during longer sessions, and feature customizable RGB lighting that you can play around with all day. The trackpad is responsive and comfortable to use as well, though for gaming you’ll obviously be sticking with a mouse.

Performance and Benchmarks

The Omen 15 packs some of the most powerful specs inside, so obviously, when it came to performance, expectations were high. And the laptop did not disappoint one bit. Take a look at the benchmarks below:

As you can see, this laptop can breeze through pretty much any kind of workload with ease. In addition to gaming performance, we also tested out video editing on Adobe Premiere and were impressed by the render times too. One cause for concern for us, however, was the CPU temperature, which shot up to 99 C while testing, so you’d be wise to invest in a decent cooling dock for this laptop. But on the plus side, most of the hot air vents out from the right side, so you can still keep using the laptop for extended sessions as the left side of the keyboard doesn’t heat up as much. The GPU, on the other hand, runs relatively cooler, reaching a max of about 76 C during our testing.

Though the Omen 15 is an impressive device by all standards, what took our gaming experience to the next level on it was the crisp, ultra-smooth 300Hz IPS display. It does an astounding job of bringing your games to life, and every single one of them feels simply amazing, irrespective of the kind of game you’re playing. Even though I’ve always been in the favour of resolution over refresh rate, this might just being me around. I mean, it’s hard to deny how responsive and immersive it feels, jumping around the map and taking slick headshots on the new Omen’s screen. The colour and contrast settings make the environments pop out vividly, which perfectly complements the tech that powers the laptop.

The battery life on this laptop is fairly average, as the case is with gaming laptops, lasting a little under 3.5 hours of normal usage. Considering that all the gaming will be happening with a charger plugged in, I gather it’s more than enough. After all, the laptop does pack some pretty powerful hardware inside.

The Verdict

At a price point of about INR 1,70,999/-, the Omen 15 (2020) may just be right in the sweet spot for performance and price tag. It’s sleek, sexy and carries more than enough power to handle any kind of application you’d wanna throw at it. For gamers and content creators, this packs an all-in-one solution in a compact chassis that you can take anywhere with you. As of now, this is definitely the best laptop we’ve reviewed on this website in terms of overall experience, and recommending it to anyone who has the budget for such a device isn’t a hard job at all.