HP Spectre x2 is a Surface-like tablet, keyboard included

[SOUND] I like Microsoft's Surface tablet as much as the next guy. Slim full display, cool detachable keyboard cover. That's great. But the thing starts at $899 and no matter which version you buy, the keyboard cover is an extra $130. Really adds up fast. Why can't somebody have something that's kinda like this, but maybe costs a little less, makes a little more sense? That's why we have the HP Spectre x2. This is HP's take on the same concept again. Fairly slim, fairly upscale looking Windows tablet. Keyboard cover detaches, attaches magnetically. Pop it on pop it off. Here's a real kicker they throw the keyboard cover in with it and it starts at $799. so no matter which way you go you're still saving some money compared to a roughly comparable Surface Product. Now there are some differences here. This guy runs Intel's core M series processor, this is the second generation of those. Most Surface, you know, standard core i3, core i5, core i7. So it's going to be quite as fast, but the new second generation of core M processors, much much better than last year's generation. I frankly found using this is in, you know, every day Competing web surfing, social media, video streaming, totally fine, didn't run into any problems at all. I have the upgraded version here, this has got the core M7, so it's about 1150, and again, they threw the keyboard cover in with it. It's actually a metal cover, so it feels stiffer than the Surface version. And of course it's got a kickstand for when you want to set it back kind of like a laptop. The difference here is the Surface version has this flat panel that comes out, but this guy king of metal U-shape right here. It's a little bit stiff and here's the one time we ran into, when you fold it down like this Every single person who came into the C/NET labs to check this out was mystified about how you get the kickstand out and once they discovered the button over here it was kinda stiff and hard to use. You go like that and then you gotta reach out here and wrench the kickstand out. So that's sort of the only sour design point in this otherwise. You have a fairly nice system that does almost everything you want from a Surface and costs less, and they give you the keyboard. Smart idea, Microsoft. I'm Dan Ackerman. That is the HP Specter X2. [MUSIC]