HP Pavilion Aero 13 review: A powerful and lightweight laptop

The HP Pavilion Aero 13 is available in Natural Silver (from €779) and Pale Rose Gold (for an additional cost of €20). Under the hood you’ll find an AMD Ryzen 5 5600U processor (6 cores / 12 threads), as well as 8GB of RAM and a 512GB SSD. For about 100 euros more, there is a configuration available with a better processor, the AMD Ryzen 7 5800U (8 cores / 16 threads). RAM and storage remain the same with the other options.

The Aero 13 is much cheaper than many other 13 models from the manufacturer HP, such as the Envy 13 (from 999 euros) or ghost x360 13 (at least 1299 euros) to name a few. This makes the price of the HP Pavilion Aero 13 very attractive, although it should be noted that the laptops just mentioned have their own prices. Unique selling points to have.

the design

The HP Pavilion Aero 13 features a sleek, slim and streamlined design. The housing is made of a lightweight magnesium frame. The device weighs less than one kilogram. So it is a very compact laptop that you can easily take with you everywhere. Moreover, thanks to the timeless design, you can go to work or lectures in style.

In Belgium and the Netherlands, the laptop is available in Natural Silver and Pale Rose Gold colours. In this review, we’re starting with the rose gold formula. The pale gold color gives the laptop a unique look, without compromising the solid material look and feel† The rose gold finish may not appeal to everyone, but it is a good choice for anyone who wants to stand out. On top of that, a silver model is also available, in case you prefer to play it safe. Although the Aero 13 came at a lower price than the HP Envy and Specter series at launch, the build quality is very good. The device looks solid and well thought out.

There are fairly thin bezels on the sides around the screen, which enhances the elegant design. The plastic bezels around the screen were chosen, which in our opinion is always a sad choice (especially since you’ll look at this often). It takes away from the premium look and makes the whole look a little cheaper. However, given the relatively low price of the Pavilion Aero 13, we can understand the choice of HP.

The HP Pavilion Aero 13 has a slim body and makes smart use of ports. In addition to a full HDMI port and a USB-C port, there are two USB-A ports with a reversible tab to keep the chassis as slim as possible. The laptop also has a 3.5mm headphone jack and of course a port for the power cable. The only thing missing in our opinion is the (small) SD card reader.

When you open the screen, you notice that the laptop is resting on the lid. The bottom of the laptop is raised in the back, as it were. This makes it possible to use USB-A ports. It also provides more breathing space, which is beneficial for cooling.

The keyboard (backlit) of the HP Pavilion Aero 13 uses the entire horizontal space of the laptop. Although it’s a compact laptop, the keys are nice and big and all the obvious shortcuts are there, including those for managing volume and playing media. The keys click away well, make little noise while typing and provide a nice touch to your fingers. There is also little to notice. The space between the keys is large enough to ensure that the wrong key is not accidentally pressed.

The trackpad is large and responsive. Our fingers stick to the housing relatively quickly, which makes operating the virtual mouse somewhat more difficult. Sometimes scrolling with your fingers on the trackpad can be a bit harsh, although you won’t notice it after a while. A fingerprint scanner is integrated under the arrow keys, so you can quickly log into your laptop. Our fingerprint recognition happens relatively quickly, so you can dive back into your favorite series or get your business started in no time.

Show

The HP Pavilion Aero 13 is a 13.3-inch IPS display. The 16:10 aspect ratio is something we see more and more often in laptops. We think this is a fun side effect, as it ensures that you get a little extra screen space; The screen is actually somewhat wider than the 16:9 variant that was previously used primarily. The 16:10 aspect ratio allows for more content to fit on your screen, be it multimedia or documents.

The screen resolution is 1,920 x 1,080 pixels (Full HD). For a 13-inch laptop, that’s more than fine. Provides sharp results. Texts are clear to read and audiovisual content jumps off the screen. The colors are vibrant. The monitor also has an image refresh rate of 60Hz. With a brightness of up to 400 nits, the Aero 13 can certainly be used in highly lit environments. For a laptop in this price range, this high brightness is pretty amazing. Outdoors, you notice a few reflections here and there, but even then, the screen is fairly easy to read.

There is no touch screen nor can this option be added in a configuration. To be able to keep the price down, it makes sense that this functionality is missing. We can’t consider that a downside, but if you want a touchscreen laptop, the HP Specter x360 is a great (albeit at a higher price) alternative.

Determine

This is the HP Pavilion Aero 13 (be0125nd) configuration we tested:

• Healer: AMD Ryzen 5 5600U (up to 4.2GHz, 16MB L3 cache, 6 cores, 12 threads) or AMD Ryzen 7 5800U (up to 4.4GHz, 16MB L3 cache, 8 cores, 16 threads)
• Photographers card: AMD Radeon (integrated)
• RAM: 8 GB DDR4 (3.200MHz) or 16 GB DDR4 3200 DIMM
• Monitor: 13.3 inch Full HD (1920 x 1080)
• storage: 512GB/1TB SSD (PCIe, NVMe, M.2)
• ports: 2x SuperSpeed ​​USB-A, 1x SuperSpeed ​​USB-C, 1x HDMI 2.0, headphone/microphone combo connection
• Connection: Realtek Wi-Fi 6, Bluetooth 5.2
• camera: HP Wide Vision 720p HD Camera
• Dimensions: 29.7 x 20.9 x 1.69 cm
• The operating system: Windows 11 Home

performance

On board the Pavilion Aero 13 you’ll find an AMD Ryzen 5 5600U or Ryzen 7 5800U processor, depending on which configuration you choose, complemented by an ADM Radeon graphics card. These processors are very fast and can be compared to the 11th generation Intel Core i5 and Intel Core i7 CPU. Additionally, 8GB of RAM is available, as well as 512GB of storage in the form of a PCIe NVMe SSD. The 8GB of RAM provides enough RAM for most daily activities and standard multimedia use. For heavier tasks, it’s a bit on the low side. The Pavilion Aero 13 is not necessarily designed for gaming, although the device can handle casual games well.

The Aero 13 also performs very well in “normal” everyday use. That is, surfing the Internet, working in Word files, video calls, watching movies and series, etc. You can easily open multiple tabs in your browser while watching a YouTube video. In terms of standard productivity, you don’t have much to complain about with the Aero 13.

Loudspeakers (in collaboration with Bang & Olufsen) can produce a lot of sound, so you can keep up with your favorite movies and series (or that important meeting) if a family member is constantly talking through them. However, the audio itself sounds very minimal (which often happens on a laptop this size). Movie sound effects are missing something because of this body And the music sounds a bit flat due to the lack of bass tones. While the Aero 13 is a great multimedia device in terms of image quality, external speakers are recommended when watching videos or listening to music.

HP likes to pack some bloatware into its new laptops, and the Pavilion Aero 13 is no exception. When you start your laptop for the first time, you are immediately annoyed by the pop-ups from McAfee And the ExpressVPN† We can somewhat imagine that with an absolute budget laptop, but this one still costs at least €779.

Battery life

The HP Pavilion Aero 13 has a 43Whr lithium-polymer battery. HP claims that the laptop should last ten hours and thirty minutes with a full battery. In practice, this turns out to be rather accurate. During our weeks with the device, the Aero 13 lasted about ten hours on average, depending on how many videos you watch on the device. Our battery settings are set to “perform better” at about 80 percent screen brightness.

If you’re looking for a laptop that should last an entire day at work or school, the HP Pavilion Aero 13 is a very good choice. The battery also gets fully charged in no time, so you won’t have to wait long to start using the Aero 13 again.

Final verdict

HP Pavilion Aero 13 is a compact and lightweight laptop. It weighs less than a kilo so you hardly notice it when you carry the device in a bag. The cover is very thin and has an elegant appearance. With a battery life of around ten hours, you won’t run out of battery soon. Perfect if you often work long days at school or work, or if you simply don’t want to put your laptop on the charger every now and then.

The Aero 13 is much cheaper than many other 13-inch laptops. Fortunately, no savings are made on the performance and quality of the laptop, which makes this a good buy if you don’t want to spend a lot of money. Laptops don’t usually offer the best audio experience, but the sound quality on the HP Pavilion Aero 13 is quite poor. Of course you can always choose to connect the boxes to your laptop.

Last update on 07/01/2022.