HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000) review – an ordinary device for extraordinary people

Traditionally, the Pavilion series are some of the best value notebooks HP produces. However, from time to time they produce some flops. We really hope that this year’s device won’t be. Now, there are two iterations that HP currently offers – the Pavilion 15 (15-eh0000), and the (15-eg0000) which we have today. They differ in the chipset they use, as the former is built on an AMD base, while the latter features the Tiger Lake chips from Intel.

Now, this laptop should be a pretty decent catch for students, and people using their device for daily tasks, as sending mail, browsing the Web, and so on. However, it is no slouch, given the fact that the powerful Tiger Lake CPUs can be paired with up to a GeForce MX450. This will provide some gaming capability, and should keep the battery life in check.

Also, you get the likes of Wi-Fi 6, BlueTooth 5, and a decent 1080p IPS panel. Beware, that HP also offers the laptop with a 768p TN panel, and it will be in your best interest to avoid such configurations.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/hp-pavilion-15-15-eh0000/

Contents

Specs Sheet

What’s in the box?

Inside the package, there are the mandatory paper manuals, a 65W power brick, and the laptop, itself.

Design and construction

Generally, this year’s machine is a fresh upgrade over the Pavilion 15 (15-cs3000). It ditches the front-facing speakers, which in turn gives a sleeker base design. Ultimately, the notebook features aluminum on the lid and the base, but if we have to be honest, the structural integrity of the machine is not great. As soon as you twist the body you will notice some severe flexing going on, plus a bonus – a pop or two coming from the chassis. However, the laptop now weighs 1.75 kg, and has a profile of 17.8mm, which is fairly portable for a 15-incher, isn’t it?

Now, the lid cannot be opened with a single hand. In terms of rigidity, it flexes as much as the base. Thankfully, though, the bezels around the matte display are relatively thin, and the top one houses an HD camera.

Moving to the base, we see a keyboard, which employs a NumberPad. It also has a backlight, decent key travel, and clicky feedback, resulting in a comfortable typing experience. Once again, the “Up” and “Down” Arrow keys are half the size of a normal button, and this is pretty much our only drawback. We also observed some deck flex, when you press harder in the middle of the keyboard.

Next, we have the touchpad. While it has decent tracking, we can’t really describe the gliding as smooth. All in all, we find the unit to be pretty average. On the bright side, you will find an optional fingerprint reader on the right side of the palm rest area.

And if you turn the laptop upside down, you will see the speaker grills, as well as the cool air vent. On the other hand, the heat is exhausted from in between the lid and the base.

Ports

On the left side of the notebook, you will find an HDMI 2.0 connector, followed by a USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) port, a USB Type-C 3.2 (Gen. 2) port with DisplayPort and Power Delivery capabilities, as well as a MicroSD card slot, and an audio jack. Then, on the right, there is the power plug, another USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) port, and a wedge-shaped security slot.

Disassembly, upgrade options, and maintenance

As usual, HP is playing the find the screw game, this time trying to hide four Phillips-head screws under the two rubber feet. In addition to that, undo the other two, which are visible, and pry the bottom panel with a plastic tool.

Interestingly, this laptop is equipped with a 41Wh battery pack, which is smaller than that found on the 14-inch Pavilion.

Thankfully, there are two RAM SODIMM slots, which should be able to hold a total of 32GB of memory in dual-channel mode. Additionally, there is one M.2 PCIe x4 slot for storage upgrades.

As for the cooling, there are two heat pipes, cooling both the CPU and the GPU. Luckily, the heat spreader is huge, and there are two fans blowing at it, which should greatly improve the thermal efficiency of the solution.

Display quality

HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000) comes with a Full HD IPS panel, model number NCP0040. Its diagonal is 15.6″ (39.62 cm), and the resolution – 1920 х 1080p. Additionally, the screen ratio is 16:9, the pixel density – 142 ppi, their pitch – 0.18 x 0.18 mm. The screen can be considered Retina when viewed from at least 60 cm (from this distance, the average human eye can’t see the individual pixels).

The viewing angles are good. We offer images at different angles to evaluate the quality.

The maximum measured brightness is 311 nits (cd/m2) in the middle of the screen and 286 nits (cd/m2) average across the surface with a maximum deviation of 15%. The Correlated Color Temperature on a white screen and at maximum brightness is 6560K (average) – pretty much matching the 6500K optimum for sRGB.
In the illustration below you can see how the display performs from a uniformity perspective. The illustration below shows how matters are for operational brightness levels (approximately 140 nits) – in this particular case at 65% Brightness (White level = 140 cd/m2, Black level = 0.09 cd/m2).
Values of dE2000 over 4.0 should not occur, and this parameter is one of the first you should check if you intend to use the laptop for color-sensitive work (a maximum tolerance of 2.0 ). The contrast ratio is very good – 1620:1.

To make sure we are on the same page, we would like to give you a little introduction to the sRGB color gamut and the Adobe RGB. To start, there’s the CIE 1976 Uniform Chromaticity Diagram that represents the visible specter of colors by the human eye, giving you a better perception of the color gamut coverage and the color accuracy.

Inside the black triangle, you will see the standard color gamut (sRGB) that is being used by millions of people on HDTV and on the web. As for the Adobe RGB, this is used in professional cameras, monitors, etc for printing. Basically, colors inside the black triangle are used by everyone and this is the essential part of the color quality and color accuracy of a mainstream notebook.

Still, we’ve included other color spaces like the famous DCI-P3 standard used by movie studios, as well as the digital UHD Rec.2020 standard. Rec.2020, however, is still a thing of the future and it’s difficult for today’s displays to cover that well. We’ve also included the so-called Michael Pointer gamut, or Pointer’s gamut, which represents the colors that naturally occur around us every day.

The yellow dotted line shows HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)’s color gamut coverage.

Its display is limited just to 52% of the sRGB/ITU-R BT.709 (web/HDTV standard) in CIE1976.

Our “Design and Gaming” profile delivers optimal color temperature (6500K) at 140 cd/m2 luminance and sRGB gamma mode.

We tested the accuracy of the display with 24 commonly used colors like light and dark human skin, blue sky, green grass, orange, etc. You can check out the results at factory condition and also, with the “Design and Gaming” profile.

Below you can compare the scores of HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000) with the default settings (left), and with the “Gaming and Web design” profile (right).

The next figure shows how well the display is able to reproduce really dark parts of an image, which is essential when watching movies or playing games in low ambient light.

The left side of the image represents the display with stock settings, while the right one is with the “Gaming and Web Design” profile activated. On the horizontal axis, you will find the grayscale, and on the vertical axis – the luminance of the display. On the two graphs below you can easily check for yourself how your display handles the darkest nuances but keep in mind that this also depends on the settings of your current display, the calibration, the viewing angle, and the surrounding light conditions.

Response time (Gaming capabilities)

We test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “black-to-white” and “white-to-black” method from 10% to 90% and vice versa.

We recorded Fall Time + Rise Time = 31 ms.

After that, we test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “Gray-to-Gray” method from 50% White to 80% White and vice versa between 10% and 90% of the amplitude.

Health impact – PWM / Blue Light

PWM (Screen flickering)

Pulse-width modulation (PWM) is an easy way to control monitor brightness. When you lower the brightness, the light intensity of the backlight is not lowered, but instead turned off and on by the electronics with a frequency indistinguishable to the human eye. In these light impulses, the light/no-light time ratio varies, while brightness remains unchanged, which is harmful to your eyes. You can read more about that in our dedicated article on PWM.

HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)’s backlight is not PW-modulated above 80 nits of brightness. This makes it comfortable in general usage, but should you use it in dark environments, there will be a nasty 200Hz flickering (make sure you use to put the brightness above 43%, or get our Health-Guard profile, which eliminates the issue).

Blue light emissions

Installing our Health-Guard profile not only eliminates PWM but also reduces the harmful Blue Light emissions while keeping the colors of the screen perceptually accurate. If you’re not familiar with the Blue light, the TL;DR version is – emissions that negatively affect your eyes, skin, and your whole body. You can find more information about that in our dedicated article on Blue Light.

Conclusions

HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)’s IPS panel has a Full HD resolution, comfortable viewing angles, and a very good contrast ratio. Unfortunately, the display uses aggressive PWM below 80 nits of brightness, but this issue can be resolved either by using the laptop with a brightness setting of above 43% or by getting our Health-Guard profile. Additionally, the display uses a very narrow color space, covering only 52% of the sRGB gamut.

Buy our profiles

Since our profiles are tailored for each individual display model, this article and its respective profile package are meant for HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000) configurations with 15.6″ NCP0040 (FHD, 1920 × 1080) IPS.

*Should you have problems with downloading the purchased file, try using a different browser to open the link you’ll receive via e-mail. If the download target is a .php file instead of an archive, change the file extension to .zip or contact us at [email protected].

Read more about the profiles HERE.

Sound

HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)’s speakers produce a sound with somewhat decent quality. However, there are some deviations across the entire frequency spectrum.

Drivers

All of the drivers and utilities for this notebook can be found here: https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/selfservice/hp-pavilion-laptop-pc-15-eg0000/35719379

Battery

Now, we conduct the battery tests with Windows Better performance setting turned on, screen brightness adjusted to 120 nits, and all other programs turned off except for the one we are testing the notebook with. This device’s 41Wh battery pack lasts for 7 hours and 58 minutes of Web browsing, and 7 hours and 43 minutes of video playback.

CPU options

This particular unit comes in configurations, including one of four Intel processors – the Pentium Gold 7505, Core i3-1115G4, Core i5-1135G7, and Core i7-1165G7.

GPU options

As far as the graphics go, there are the integrated Intel UHD Graphics, Iris Xe Graphics G7 (80EU), and Iris Xe Graphics G7 (96EU). And if you need a dedicated GPU, you can pick from the GeForce MX350, and MX450.

HP Pavilion 15 (15-eh0000, eh1000, eh2000, eg0000, eg1000, eg2000) GPU-varianten

Hier ziet u bij benadering een vergelijking tussen de GPU's die in de [serie] modellen op de markt te vinden zijn. Op deze manier kunt u voor uzelf beslissen welk [serie] model het beste is voor uw geld.

Note: The chart shows the cheapest different GPU configurations so you should check what the other specifications of these laptops are by clicking on the laptop’s name / GPU.

Gaming tests

CS:GO	HD 1080p, Low (Check settings)	HD 1080p, Medium (Check settings)	HD 1080p, MAX (Check settings)
Average FPS	160 fps	132 fps	103 fps

DOTA 2	HD 1080p, Low (Check settings)	HD 1080p, Normal (Check settings)	HD 1080p, High (Check settings)
Average FPS	97 fps	75 fps	58 fps

Temperatures and comfort

Max CPU load

In this test we use 100% on the CPU cores, monitoring their frequencies and chip temperature. The first column shows a computer’s reaction to a short load (2-10 seconds), the second column simulates a serious task (between 15 and 30 seconds), and the third column is a good indicator of how good the laptop is for long loads such as video rendering.

Average core frequency (base frequency + X); CPU temp.

Intel Core i5-1135G7 (15W TDP)	0:02 – 0:10 sec	0:15 – 0:30 sec	10:00 – 15:00 min
HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)	3.35 GHz (B+40%) @ 95°C @ 40W	2.78 GHz (B+16%) @ 85°C @ 27W	2.39 GHz @ 76°C @ 22W
Dell Latitude 15 5520	3.62 GHz (B+51%) @ 98°C @ 46W	3.17 GHz (B+32%) @ 97°C @ 34W	2.27 GHz @ 77°C @ 17W
Lenovo ThinkBook 14 Gen 2	3.79 GHz (B+58%) @ 90°C @ 47W	3.47 GHz (B+45%) @ 90°C @ 39W	3.05 GHz (B+27%) @ 79°C @ 28W
Dell XPS 13 9310	3.15 GHz (B+31%) @ 100°C @ 40W	2.73 GHz (B+14%) @ 100°C @ 30W	1.65 GHz @ 73°C @ 15W
Dell Vostro 14 5402	3.02 GHz (B+26%) @ 99°C @ 29W	2.61 GHz (B+9%) @ 99°C @ 25W	2.00 GHz @ 76°C @ 15W
MSI Modern 15 (A11X)	3.59 GHz (B+50%) @ 94°C @ 44W	3.45 GHz (B+44%) @ 95°C @ 40W	3.18 GHz (B+33%) @ 91°C @ 34W
Lenovo ThinkBook 14s Yoga	3.52 GHz (B+47%) @ 94°C	3.24 GHz (B+35%) @ 94°C	2.63 GHz (B+10%) @ 75°C
Lenovo Yoga 7 (14)	3.34 GHz (B+39%) @ 94°C	2.97 GHz (B+24%) @ 94°C	2.39 GHz @ 75°C
Acer Aspire 5 (A514-54)	3.54 GHz (B+48%) @ 87°C	2.01 GHz @ 66°C	2.03 GHz @ 67°C

Here, we see a decent cooling solution, that almost manages to maintain the base clock of this CPU for about 15 minutes of stress testing. Also, the temperatures seem in check.

Real-life gaming

NVIDIA GeForce MX350	GPU frequency/ Core temp (after 2 min)	GPU frequency/ Core temp (after 30 min)
HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)	1105 MHz @ 67°C	1202 MHz @ 67°C
Acer Aspire 5 (A515-56G)	1155 MHz @ 67°C	1029 MHz @ 67°C
Acer Swift 5 Pro (SF514-55GT)	752 MHz @ 60°C	747 MHz @ 60°C
Acer Swift 5 Pro (SF514-55GT)	752 MHz @ 60°C	747 MHz @ 60°C
ASUS ZenBook 14 UM433	1050 MHz @ 67°C	1062 MHz @ 74°C
HP Envy 13 (13-ba0000)	584 MHz @ 63°C	528 MHz @ 63°C
Lenovo Ideapad 5 (15)	1493 MHz @ 66°C	1493 MHz @ 66°C

The GPU of this notebook doesn’t manage to reach the clock speeds that we saw on the Lenovo Ideapad 5 (15).

Comfort during combined load

Interestingly, the outer temperatures are quite low. Also, the noise levels from the dual fans are not too loud.

Verdict

So, we should start by saying that the Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000) is sold in a lot of different configurations. And your experience using the laptop may vary from setup to setup. But generally, this notebook is more than a decent daily driver. It has the performance, thanks to the Tiger Lake CPUs, and the GeForce MX350 in our case. In terms of comfortability, you get quite a decent experience, because the keyboard has a rather long key travel and clicky feedback, and the powerful internals is paired with a fast M.2 SSD.

Speaking of which, there are two RAM SODIMM slots, that allow for up to 32GB of DDR4 memory in dual-channel mode. And while we don’t see Thunderbolt 3 or 4, we are relatively happy with the I/O, since it packs a MicroSD card reader, and a USB Type-C 3.2 (Gen. 2), that can also output DisplayPort signal.

HP Pavilion 15 (15-eg0000)’s IPS panel (NCP0040) has a Full HD resolution, comfortable viewing angles, and a very good contrast ratio. Unfortunately, the display uses aggressive PWM below 80 nits of brightness, but this issue can be resolved either by using the laptop with a brightness setting of above 43% or by getting our Health-Guard profile. Additionally, the display uses a very narrow color space, covering only 52% of the sRGB gamut.

As for the battery life, while we were not really impressed by the nearly 8 hours of Web browsing, and 7 hours and 43 minutes of video playback, we have to say, that this is achieved with a pretty small 41Wh battery pack. So, the optimization game here is good.

At the end of the day, even a blind man can tell that there were compromises made with this one. And whether they are too much, or just enough, is your call.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/hp-pavilion-15-15-eh0000/