Technologies

HP Envy x360 15 Review: A Good 2-in-1 Hampered by an Outdated Display

Why buy a convertible laptop with a 15.6-inch, 16:9 panel when 16-inch, 16:10 models exist?

HP’s Envy line of laptops and two-in-one convertibles is the middle child between the mainstream Pavilion series and the premium Spectre line. The Envy x360 15 is a 15.6-inch two-in-one that delivers the best of both worlds: a premium design that’s closer to that of a Spectre at a price that’s more meat-and-potatoes Pavilion. The Envy x360 15 boasts an attractive, rigid all-metal body, but the design is no different than last year’s model. And while we don’t mind last year’s looks, we are less enthused with HP sticking with a widescreen 16:9 display when the increasingly popular 16:10 panels found in such convertibles as the Dell Inspiron 16 two-in-one and Lenovo Yoga 7i 16 are roomier and more useful, while hardly adding to the system’s overall footprint.

The Envy x360 15’s component lineup is solidly midrange with a Ryzen 7 5825U CPU that’s now a year old and a generation behind AMD’s current 6000 series. It’s paired with 12GB of RAM that’s more than the 8GB you get with typical budget models but less than the 16GB you can usually find at this price. The biggest change from last year’s model is HP having doubled the webcam resolution from a grainy 720p to a crisp 1440p camera. In the era of video conferences, a bump in webcam fidelity is greatly appreciated. Then again, if the webcam is the headliner, it’s not much of an update overall.

7.0

HP Envy x360 15

$750 at Best Buy

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Like

Premium looks at mainstream price
1440p webcam
Long battery life

Don’t Like

16:9 display feels cramped and outdated
Dim display

HP offers the Envy x360 15 in a host of configurations with both Intel and AMD CPUs. Our test system is available at Best Buy (model 15-ey0023dx) for $1,050 and is regularly discounted to only $750. Best Buy’s sales constantly fluctuate, so if it’s not on sale there, you can find a similar model at HP with 16GB of RAM that lists for $1,130. It’s currently out of stock, but its price was reduced to $930 recently. In the UK, the Envy x360 15 starts at 750, and in Australia it’s AU$1,999.

With its octa-core Ryzen 7 5825U and 12GB of RAM, the Envy x360 offers strong application performance and some capacity for basic photo editing. Its integrated Radeon GPU isn’t as powerful as Intel’s integrated graphics processor, however, and Intel’s isn’t all that powerful to begin with. Content creators will want to look elsewhere. With the efficient Ryzen 7 U-series chip, the system is able to operate in silence the majority of the time. And when the cooling fans are required, they spin quietly. The efficient CPU also allows for long battery life — nearly 12 hours on our battery drain test.

Envious looks

The Envy x360 15 features an all-metal chassis in what HP calls Nightfall Black. The matte-black finish has a hint of brown to it and lends a luxurious look similar to that of the Spectre x360 16 — minus the gem-cut edges, gold accents and ports located in the back corners. The Envy x360 15 won’t look out of place in the boardroom or executive suite and also offers a contrast to the common sight of silver aluminum laptops in coffee shops and shared workspaces.

At 4.2 pounds (1.9 kilograms), the Envy x360 15 feels heavier than it should, likely a result of the extra layers needed for the touch display found on all two-in-ones. The 3-pound Lenovo Yoga 7i makes a better option for daily commutes with its 14-inch, 16:10 display. A smaller, lighter two-in-one also has a more natural feel in tablet mode. The Envy x360 15 looks comically tall and narrow when held in portrait mode as a tablet. It’s also too heavy to hold with one hand and tap, swipe or sketch with the other hand. One last note on the Envy x360 15 as a tablet: A pen is not included.

The aluminum chassis offers a firm feel with little to no flex — even on the lid protecting the display. The keyboard deck provides a solid foundation on which to type. The keys themselves are widely spaced, firm and flat. They offer snappy feedback and a pleasant typing experience. I was immediately comfortable typing on the Envy x360 15. The touchpad, too, is excellent. It felt roomy and responsive. Both the keys and touchpad click offer the perfect amount of travel and are quiet when engaged. No loud, clacky keys or touchpad clicks to be heard.

The 15.6-inch, widescreen 16:9 display looks outdated and cramped when you are scrolling through a long document or web page. Microsoft Word, for instance, with its fat menu bar running across the top doesn’t leave as much room as you might like to read the actual document without constantly scrolling. There’s a reason the 16:10 aspect ratio is so popular among laptops. A 16:10 display feels roomier for the simple fact that it is. A 16:9 display may be better for watching movies, but 16:10 is better for everything else.

The other drawback with the display is its dimness. I measured it at 250 nits at maximum brightness. A 250-nit panel is budget territory. I wouldn’t be surprised to see such a display on a lower-end configuration in HP’s mainstream Pavilion line, but I expect better when stepping up to the Envy series. While the matte-black chassis might be worthy of boardroom inclusion, you had better hope your boardroom isn’t drenched in natural sunlight. I had the display dialed up to max brightness in a north-facing room on a cloudy day in winter in northern New England, and there were still times I hit the brightness-up hoping for more.

In contrast to the dim, 16:9 display, the webcam received an upgrade in this year’s model. Gone is the grainy 720p webcam of yore, and in its place is a 5-megapixel camera that can capture 1440p, 30fps video. It produced a crisp, well-balanced picture with accurate color and skin tones. The webcam is also an IR cam, so you can sign in to Windows simply by placing your face in front of the laptop.

The Envy x360 15 offers a strong selection of ports, but you miss out on Thunderbolt 4 support because of the AMD chipset. The two USB-C ports support a display and high-speed data, however, and there’s also an HDMI port for connecting to an external display. With a pair of USB Type-A ports in addition to the USB-C ports, you won’t need to hassle with an adapter to connect your devices. You also get an SD card slot, which is not usually found on a mainstream laptop.

Despite its good looks, stellar webcam and comfortable keyboard, the Envy x360 15 is hard to recommend because of its dim, 16:9 display. If the display isn’t an issue for you, just be sure to wait for a good sale price. Otherwise, a more modern two-in-one with a 16:10 display such as the Dell Inspiron 16 2-in-1 or Lenovo Yoga 7i 16 provides a larger workspace without adding much to the size and weight of the system.

Technologies

Social Media and AI Want Your Attention at All Times. This New Documentary Says That’s Bad

Your Attention Please, a documentary premiering this week at SXSW in Austin, Texas, explores how we live in the attention economy.

«Do you remember the world before cellphones?»

The question comes early in Your Attention Please, a documentary premiering this week at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas. And it hit me harder than I expected. As a 27-year-old tech reporter, I realized I don’t have too many clear memories of life before smartphones. My adolescence unfolded alongside the rise of smartphones, social media, push notifications and the routine of endless scrolling. Like many people my age, I’ve spent most of my life inside the attention economy — without ever really stepping outside it.

That’s the uneasy territory the documentary explores.

CNET was given exclusive early access to the film’s trailer, embedded below.

Exploring how tech shapes our behavior

Director Sara Robin said she originally set out to make something smaller: a documentary about people trying to reclaim their attention by breaking unhealthy phone habits. In an interview with CNET, Robin described the idea as a personal story about focus and self-control in an age of constant distraction.

As Robin interviewed researchers, technologists and families affected by social media and cyberbullying, the film’s scope widened. What started as a question about individual habits quickly became a larger investigation into how modern technology systems are designed to shape human behavior. The story stretches from the rise of social media to the emerging influence of AI.

Along the way, Robin and her collaborators kept hearing the same observation from different corners of the digital world: Social media didn’t just change how people communicate; it quietly rewired what we value. Experiences that were once private or emotional — friendship, affection, belonging — began to acquire numerical equivalents. Followers, likes, comments, views and shares began to be how we saw our own self-worth. In the architecture of social platforms, those numbers function as a kind of social currency.

Trisha Prabhu, a digital-safety advocate and inventor of the anti-cyberbullying technology ReThink, argues that social platforms did more than create new online spaces. She says they fundamentally reshaped how social validation works. The metrics that define popularity often reward attention-seeking behavior and amplify conflict, while genuine connection is now harder to quantify and, therefore, easier to overlook.

Prabhu warns that the same dynamics already driving problems like cyberbullying could accelerate as automated systems become more capable. AI tools can generate abusive messages at scale, produce convincing impersonations or create deepfakes that spread rapidly online. In some cases, the technology may even blur the line between human interaction and machine-generated communication, which could deepen loneliness or encourage harmful behavior.

«There’s AI exacerbating existing harms [like automating cyberbullying], but then I also think that there’s AI creating completely new harms,» Prabhu told CNET. «There are reports of AI tools encouraging users, including minor users, to commit self-harm… Even for the everyday user who’s not experiencing the extreme outcome, I think we have to ask ourselves how much of our time and connection we want spent with an AI tool as opposed to a fellow human being.»

Bringing attention to attention

What struck Robin during filming the documentary was how universal these anxieties felt. Across conversations with families, educators and advocates around the world, the themes were remarkably consistent: overstimulated attention, declining focus in classrooms, rising anxiety among young people and a persistent sense of dread that comes from always being plugged in.

Those shared concerns have helped spark a coordinated moment around the film’s release.

On March 11, more than 25 organizations focused on digital well-being will simultaneously release the trailer for Your Attention Please as part of an initiative called Stand for Their Attention. What began as a small collaboration among five groups quickly grew as word spread through advocacy networks. The coalition now includes organizations such as Common Sense Media, Protect Young Eyes, Mothers Against Media Addiction, the Center for Humane Technology, Smartphone Free Childhood and Scrolling to Death.

The idea behind the synchronized launch is simple: Use the attention surrounding the documentary to highlight the growing movement that’s already working to reshape digital culture.

Many people feel overwhelmed by the scale of the problem, Robin says, but behind the scenes, a widening ecosystem of advocates is experimenting with ways to build healthier digital environments, from redesigning products to changing norms around screen use.

The campaign also arrives at a moment of growing scrutiny around the attention economy. Lawmakers in the US and abroad are increasingly debating how social platforms affect youth mental health and childhood development. Boycotts around AI use are taking off. Researchers are studying how these algorithms and chatbots influence behavior. Individuals are trying to figure out how much technology belongs in everyday life.

What can we do about it?

Despite the weight of those conversations, Robin says the goal of the film isn’t to leave audiences feeling powerless. In fact, the rapid rise of public awareness around AI has made her more optimistic than she was during the early days of social media. The systems shaping digital life, she argues, are built by people, which means they can also be rebuilt.

«We have more power than we think,» Robin said. «And there are a lot of different ways to get involved in this, from changing individual habits to changing the culture in your own family and in your community, designing technology differently, getting engaged in these conversations, all the way to pushing for legislative change.»

The film intentionally avoids presenting a single solution.

Instead, Your Attention Please asks a broader question: What happens when attention, one of the most human parts of our lives, becomes one of the most valuable commodities in the global economy? And perhaps more importantly, what kind of digital world do we want to build next?

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections: Sports Edition Hints and Answers for March 12, #535

Here are hints and the answers for the NYT Connections: Sports Edition puzzle for March 12, No. 535.

Looking for the most recent regular Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Connections: Sports Edition is a tough one, with some very unusual categories. The blue one is pretty fun, actually. If you’re struggling with today’s puzzle but still want to solve it, read on for hints and the answers.

Connections: Sports Edition is published by The Athletic, the subscription-based sports journalism site owned by The Times. It doesn’t appear in the NYT Games app, but it does in The Athletic’s own app. Or you can play it for free online.

Read more: NYT Connections: Sports Edition Puzzle Comes Out of Beta

Hints for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections: Sports Edition puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: City of Brotherly Love.

Green group hint: NBA star.

Blue group hint: Grr! Meow! Roar!

Purple group hint: Think alphabet.

Answers for today’s Connections: Sports Edition groups

Yellow group: Philadelphia teams.

Green group: Associated with Larry Bird.

Blue group: Sports figures with animal names.

Purple group: Sports figures whose first names sound like two letters.

Read more: Wordle Cheat Sheet: Here Are the Most Popular Letters Used in English Words

What are today’s Connections: Sports Edition answers?

The yellow words in today’s Connections

The theme is Philadelphia teams. The four answers are 76ers, Flyers, Penn and Temple.

The green words in today’s Connections

The theme is associated with Larry Bird. The four answers are Celtics, French Lick, Pacers and Sycamores.

The blue words in today’s Connections

The theme is sports figures with animal names. The four answers are Bear Bryant, Cat Osterman, Catfish Hunter and Tiger Woods.

The purple words in today’s Connections

The theme is sports figures whose first names sound like two letters. The four answers are Casey Stengel (KC), CeeDee Lamb (CD), Katie Ledecky (KT) and Vijay Singh (VJ).

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Thursday, March 12

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for March 12.

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? I found 7-Across tricky. Read on for all the answers. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.