The 1040 G2's 14-inch full-HD (1920 x 1080) screen wowed me with rich, lush colours. The pageantry of the early scenes of The Hunger Games: Catching Fire looked great, from the greens of the grassy estate lawns to the orange sparks of Katniss' costume at the start of the games. With a display that averages 264 nits of brightness, the 1040 G2 is brighter than the thin-and-light laptop category with average for brightness (238 nits). It also boasts an ultrawide-viewing-angle screen. 

Impressive Design

Thin, dark gray and curved at the corners, the sleek HP EliteBook 1040 G2 was designed to fit easily into your travels. Its aluminum-alloy lid prominently features HP's logo, also seen on the bezel below the display. When you open the 1040 G2, you see a wide speaker on the deck, with the webcam and microphones above.
 

Keyboard

With only 1.44 mm of travel and keys that are on the softer and less-clicky side, typing wasn't that enjoyable on the 1040 G2. Using the 10 FastFingers typing test, I averaged only 60 words per minute, which is well short of my desktop average score of 67 wpm. The 1040 G2 has three keys - Power, Airplane Mode and Mute - separated from the rest of the keyboard, and they're very easy to spot and access. When the Airplane Mode button or the Mute button is enabled, the button's backlighting changes from white to orange, clearly indicating the current state of the notebook.
 

Immersive Audio

The 1040 G2 comes with a DTS Studio Sound software package that turns on Audio Enhancement by default. With that setting enabled, the low-level bass on Jay Z & Kanye West's "No Church in The Wild" was sturdy, and highs and lows of the synthesizers on Kool & The Gang's "Summer Madness" were spacious. When you turn off Audio Enhancement, the bass becomes muddy and congested, and the synths become irritating.
 

Convenient Connectivity 

The left side of the 1040 G2 features one USB 3.0 port, a microSD card slot and a Kensington lock slot. On the right side is a second USB 3.0 port, a DisplayPort 1.2 port and a headphone/microphone combo jack. Connectors for HP's docking station are found on the underside of the 1040 G2. The 1040's 720p HD webcam enables you to make video chats with friends and relatives wherever they are. 

Graphics

With its integrated Intel HD Graphics 5500 chip, the 1040 G2 is good for some moderate gaming between business projects. The Intel HD Graphics 5500 (GT2) is an integrated Broadwell graphics card revealed in Q1 2015. It is found in several ULV SoCs (15 W TDP) such as the HP EliteBook Folio 1040 G2 Core i5-5600U​. The maximum GPU frequency is clocked at 950 MHz.

General Specifications

• Core i5-5200U-2.30GHz
• 4GB RAM,  256GB SSD
• Intel HD Graphics 5500
• DTS Studio Sound
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