HP Victus 16 review: The Best Affordable Gaming Laptop?

HP Victus 16 Gaming Laptop review: Is this the best Budget option?

HP now has a wide portfolio of gaming laptops at its disposal and seeing the growing demand for these laptops in India, having a budget subbrand Victus is surely a great option for them. Already, the HP Victus 16 has been available in the Indian market for some years now with a lot of variants for gamers to explore, we here have the latest Ryzen 7000HS powered variant with RTX 3050 that retails for around ₹84,990.

Targeted towards, the value-for-money-seeking people, the new HP Victus 16 gives you the fundamentals that budget gamers need – no-nonsense performance, decent display with fast refresh rate, good GPU and if possible decent battery life. So, keeping in mind this the new HP Victus 16 with Ryzen 7 7840HS delivers what Indian gamers need, however, is it worth buying it? Let’s find out:

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HP Victus 16 Specifications

• Crafted for Gaming: Built with the powerful AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS, 16 GB DDR5-5600 MHz RAM (2 x 8 GB) and 1 TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe TLC M.2 SSD, The HP Victus Gaming Laptop comes with a Turbo Boost Technology, offering a seamless gaming experience that’s compatible with all your favourite games.
• Next-Gen Graphics – Experience incredible visuals to elevate all of your gameplay with NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050 Laptop GPU (6 GB GDDR6 dedicated)
• Immersive Display & Audio – Enjoy vibrant, crystal-clear images with a 16.1” diagonal FHD, micro-edge display with anti-glare technology and 1920 X 1080 screen resolution clubbed with dual speakers by B&O.
• Windows 11 Home – From a rejuvenated Start menu to new ways to connect, the Windows 11 OS is the place to think, express, and create naturally. Create better and explore more with pre-installed Microsoft Office Home & Student 2021.
• Lightning Fast Ports: 1 USB Type-A 5Gbps signaling rate (HP Sleep and Charge); 1 USB Type-C 5Gbps signaling rate (USB Power Delivery, DisplayPort 1.4a, HP Sleep and Charge); 2 USB Type-A 5Gbps signaling rate; 1 HDMI 2.1; 1 RJ-45; 1 AC smart pin; 1 headphone/microphone combo

Design & Build Quality

The HP Victus 16, despite being an entry-level laptop, doesn’t rely on flashy aesthetics or bold design decisions but still looks nice. It is available in three different colors: Mica Silver, Ceramic White, and Performance Blue. This laptop has a restrained design that prioritizes blending in rather than standing out.

Considering that gaming laptops within this price range are often used as the primary laptop, whether for studying or working in a café, opting for a laptop that seamlessly fits into the surroundings is a wise decision.

As HP aims to lower expenses, they have incorporated a plastic body into their design but feels solid. The main part and lid exhibit some flexibility, but there is no cause for concern regarding durability. The components fit together tightly, the design lines meet seamlessly, and overall, the laptop has a pleasant tactile feel. Even the display hinges demonstrate great robustness.

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Display

The display of this HP Victus 16 is uncomplicated in its design, featuring a traditional full HD resolution (1,920-by-1,080 pixels) and a brightness rating of 300 nits. These specifications are standard for most budget gaming laptops, except for the lowest-priced options. While the screen may not be exceptionally vibrant or sharp, it still provides a satisfactory image quality with adequate color and contrast for regular usage.

You will definitely enjoy both media consumption or even gaming on this HP Victus 16, while there is always room for complaint, for the price, as a gaming laptop, the quality of the panel is decent.

Obviously, the HP Victus 16’s display has a 16:9 aspect ratio, which could have been improved to 16:10, however, the quality of the display is pretty nice, tested with our SpyderX Pro, you are getting 96% sRGB and 75% AdobeRGB color space coverage. Also, the maximum 295 nits brightness as per our test, makes the gaming laptop adequate to play indoors, what I loved is having that anti-glare finish.

So, whether you use it for gaming or personal usage, you will enjoy work or play, I found the display good enough for the price HP is asking.

Performance & Thermals

Most gamers love to talk about the performance of a gaming laptop and this new HP Victus 16 will not disappoint you on this as well, having powered by the latest AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS processor. This is based on AMD’s new Zen 4 architecture which not only gives better performance per watt but also is good for gaming needs, paired with 16 GB DDR5 RAM and 1TB PCIe Gen 4 SSD, the overall daily performance is a strong reason to consider this laptop.

I like the fact that HP has brought forward the good things from its premium Omen brand to Victus as well like the “Tempest” cooling system and a heck of a lot of customization options from the HP Omen Gaming Hub software you get pre-installed. I also like the exhaust design at the rear end which has minimal impact when you game as the hot air gushes out at the rear side. Here are some of the performance benchmarks for your reference:

The overall numbers go to show good the overall performance of this HP Victus 16 is and is very reliable, especially at this price range, though the RTX 3050 is not the latest GPU but still for FHD gaming, this does a good job paired with newer processor.

Lastly, also talking about the SSD, I would indeed highlight how good the Gen4 SSD HP has used and at this price range, delivering up to 7071MB/s of read speeds as well as write speeds of 3656MB/s is quite good. This does help in faster game loading and installs, which gamers will really appreciate and even for productivity work as well.

So, overall, in terms of performance, anyone who also wants to use this gaming laptop for daily productivity needs can easily do so without any hiccups.

Gaming

As I told you previously, the new HP Victus 16 has a good combo of Ryzen 7 7840HS and RTX 3050 graphics to ensure a smooth 1080p gaming performance. From triple-A titles to eSports, you can enjoy good frame rates at Medium to High settings and with the high 144Hz refresh rate, enjoy games like Counter-Strike 2 or Valorant comfortably.

Here we have tried some of the most demanding triple-A titles to see how this gaming laptop performs in real-world tests:

As you see, you can enjoy games even at 1080p with good frame rates thanks to this powerful combo and for this price, the numbers are pretty good, DLSS the performance gets even better.

Keyboard and Trackpad

This HP Victus 16 has a 16-inch form factor, so you get a lot of headroom for the keyboard, however, the keys are spaced very close to each other which can be confusing at times when you are typing very fast. The quality of the keys and the key travel is standard but not the best I would say, also, the backlight keyboard has single light backlighting which does its basic job, nothing too fancy.

The trackpad area is a bigger one though but not the largest when you compare with the other 16-inch gaming laptops, the quality of it is decent, and pretty usable if you do not have a mouse at your disposal, anyways I would recommend users to have their own gaming mouse.

Ports, I/O and Connectivity

In terms of I/O, you have a lot of ports at your disposal, at the right you have: 1 AC smart pin, 1 USB Type-A 5Gbps signalling rate (HP Sleep and Charge); 1 HDMI 2.1; 1 USB Type-C® 5Gbps signalling rate (USB Power Delivery, DisplayPort™ 1.4a, HP Sleep and Charge); 1 USB Type-A 5Gbps signalling rate, other USB Type-A port as well as 1 RJ-45 and 1 headphone/microphone combo are on the left-hand side.

Coming to connectivity, you have both Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 which to be fair does the job pretty well, and you will have no issues connecting your HP Victus 16 to Wi-Fi or even multiple Bluetooth devices.

Audio & Webcam

The dual speakers by B&O are pretty loud and soothing as well, not the loudest I would say but the audio quality is quite good, you will enjoy listening to music on this one or even games on it without headphones. I do appreciate HP giving a 1080p FHD webcam which is rare at this price range and knowing everyone is going digital, having a quality webcam is a necessity anyway.

Battery Life

In terms of battery life, the new HP Victus 16 ensures a decent 4-5 hours of battery life which for a gaming laptop is quite good considering its 70Whr battery inside. It charges fast as well with a big adapter inside, overall, the usage experience is quite good and the battery life can further be extended during video playback.

Verdict

Now should you consider this new HP Victus 16 for ₹84,990? Yes, definitely, this is a nice deal considering the fact that HP has given everything to make this gaming laptop viable for everyday gaming as well as normal needs. The price at which it is coming and the value it offers is quite good, apart from minor cons, overall, HP Victus 16 is a nice gaming laptop which looks and performs really well.

Buy the HP Victus 16: https://amzn.to/3PZv9DP