HP OMEN 17-cb0050nr Review

It’s nice to see technological advancement transforming gaming laptops. Their casings are getting smaller, thinner and lighter. This is exactly what has happened to the latest version of the HP’s Omen laptop. The specifications of this device are respectable, while visually we have some concerns. Nevertheless, this is a fine gaming device, so keep reading if you have interest in getting one.

HP Omen 17-cb0050nr is definitely a very powerful laptop. It features an Intel Core i7-9750H processor running at clock speed of 4.5 GHz. The CPU has 6 cores and 12 threads. The total amount of system RAM is 16 GB, and its clock frequency is 2666 MHz with CL19 latency timing. The processor has an integrated Intel UHD 630 graphics card, but this is disabled by default – you won’t find it in the device manager. Instead of that, you have the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 graphics card, which should provide excellent gaming performance. The HP Omen 17-cb0050nr also has two drives: the first one is 256 GB NVMe solid state drive and the second is 1 TB 7.200 SATA3 drive. Unfortunately, we find the 256 GB disk to be a big disadvantage of this laptop, as it’s simply too small for modern games. It will get full very quickly and you won’t have enough space for other games and applications.

HP OMEN 17-cb0050nr Specifications

The HP Omen 17-cb0050nr features the same screen mounting system as the Lenovo Y700 laptop. This means you’ll find a hinge in the middle and the free space on the sides between the flap and the bottom of the housing. As we’ve mentioned before, the laptop is not physically too big. It measures 405 x 295 x 27 mm and weighs 2.97 kg. Not so long ago, laptops with such equipment would weigh twice as much.

The housing is solid, but also very thoughtfully made. The only flaw is the flap, which slightly bends under the pressure. Its surface made of metal somewhat tries to mitigates that issue, and you can find a nicely integrated Omen logo on it. The hinge is relatively stiff and tilts up to a maximum of about 120 degrees. The space around the keyboard is also made of metal, and the only plastic element is the frame around the screen. Like other gaming laptops, the HP Omen 17 also features a bit thicker screen bezels that are wider at the top and the bottom, while being more narrow at the sides. This symmetry makes the screen very pleasant to look at. There are large air outlets on the back of the chassis and in its bottom part. The outlets have very good air circulation, as quite high rubber feet are used here. Overall, visually and structurally, the new Omen 17 makes a very good impression.

HP decided to place the ports in a classic way on the sides of the housing. And there are quite a few of them. On the left side there is a charging socket, foldable LAN RJ-45, HDMI, two USB 3.1 ports, mini-DisplayPort, USB-C (Thunderbolt 3) and headphone jack. On the right side we have a third USB 3.1 port and an SD memory card reader.

Unlike HP Envy 13, which had an awkwardly placed touchpad, the Omen 17 doesn’t come with such a problem. The touchpad is located closer to the left side of the housing. It is large, suitably slippery, and underneath it are two physical buttons that imitate mouse buttons. The keyboard is full-sized and covers the entire surface of the bottom of the case. Thanks to this, no buttons are reduced or shortened compared to a typical keyboard. Another great thing is that WSAD buttons are visually highlighted. The keyboard buttons have quite a big stroke length, and the buttons are quite resistant. At the same time, they spring back nicely, so using them for hours while writing or playing games doesn’t tire your fingers. At the same time, they emit a soft and warm sound, so even at night they will not be very intrusive. As befits gaming equipment, the keyboard is fully illuminated, and it can be completely personalized by changing the backlight layout and colors in the full range of the RGB palette.

The HP Omen 17 is primarily a gaming device and in this respect it works perfectly. It can run practically any title on highest graphics settings, with 60 frames per seconds. The gaming experience on this device is also perfectly smooth, as this laptop features a G-Sync compatible display screen with 144 Hz refresh rate. The high refresh rate screen doesn’t work only well with games, but it is also great for watching movies and is also suitable for multimedia processing. As long as you calibrate it properly.

Like with any other gaming laptop, the HP Omen 17’s case gets hot, of course, but high above the keyboard. Due to this, you may not feel this warmth while playing. Especially since the main air outlets are on the back of the case, so holding the mouse next to the laptop will not irritate you by warm gusts. It must be admitted, however, that at maximum load, the laptop can make a lot of noise, but compared to the competition it is not too bad. The loudspeakers also make noise, emitting a relatively loud sound, but in terms of quality, they lack a lot. Mainly low tones. They will work well for the occasional movie watch, but you won’t get the best experience.

The laptop screen has a diagonal of 17.3 inches and a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels. It is an IPS panel, so you can expect good color reproduction. The important thing is its relatively high refresh rate (144 Hz), which we have already mentioned.

The color coverage of HP Omen 17’s screen is very good. The screen is able to cover 100% sRGB, 78% AdobeRGB color space. Gamma is 2.3, which is a bit off from the ideal. The contrast at 100% brightness is 940:1, which isn’t bad. The colors are fairly uniform across the matrix. However, the backlight uniformity is a bit off in the lower right corner. Overall the HP Omen 17 features a very good display screen. Players will surely appreciate the 144 Hz screen matrix. High refresh rates make a difference in eSports games and can affect your performance to some extent. This is another advantage of this laptop, which is why it might be very interesting for people who play eSports titles.

As expected, the gaming performance is great. In each of the tested games you can allow yourself to crank up the graphics settings to ultra. In almost all titles, the average frame rate exceeds 60 FPS, which is an excellent result. Only in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey the performance is a bit below 60 FPS mark, however, the gameplay felt extremely smooth thanks to the G-Sync compatible display screen.

Speaking of thermals, the laptop doesn’t feature an extremely hot thermal design. The graphics card is able to run cool, as are the disks. Only the CPU could be less hot under full load, but its performance isn’t too bad either. Thermal images show that the housing heats up the most at a considerable distance from the keyboard. Even so, part of the keyboard also comes under the hotter area. It is better not to hold the laptop under full load on your lap, as temperatures over 50°C may already be felt. The laptop is quiet at rest, while under load gets quite loud, although it is not so bad compared to its competitors.

Unfortunately, in games there is a strong throttling of the processor. The clock speed drops to 2.5 GHz, which is below the base frequency. More often, the CPU is able to run at frequencies of around 2.6 to 2.7 GHz. This is a disastrous result and shows that something is wrong here. Such a low clock speed negatively affects performance, especially after prolonged use. Throttling is certainly a major disadvantage of this laptop. Speaking of its battery, the laptop can run about 1 hour while playing games. In a typical office work, with active Wi-Fi and maximum screen backlight, the laptop’s battery lasts about 5 hours. These are good result in both cases.

The HP Omen 17-cb0050nr can certainly boast with very good chassis design. Having the air outlets on the back of the chassis, as well as rubber feet that significantly lift the laptop in the air means that even during prolonged gaming sessions you will not be disturbed by the heat coming from the chassis. In fact, you may not even feel it all. Unfortunately, despite this, the processor can lose timing and a heavy load can cause quite a lot of throttling.

However, this does not prevent you from getting very good results in games. Currently, there are only few titles that, with maximum details in Full HD resolution, will run below 60 frames per seconds. The advantages of this laptop also include a very comfortable keyboard, an eye-catching screen, and an efficient battery. Overall, the HP Omen 17 is a very good gaming laptop that is well worth the price.

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