HP Victus 16 Review (2022) – RYZEN gaming laptop to consider

In this HP Victus 16 review, we’ll take a look at the latest addition to HP’s gaming line up that aims to provide a satisfying gaming experience at a lower price point than their flagship Omen series. This 16.1″-inch gaming laptop that we are testing comes with a decent set of specs that will allow gamers to have an enjoyable experience on-the-go with its Ryzen 7 5800H CPU, GeForce RTX 3050 GPU, 16GB of 3200mhz RAM, and a 1080p 144hz IPS-level display.

CPU	AMD Ryzen 7 5800H
GPU	NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3050
OS	Windows 11
RAM	16GB DDR4, 3200MHz
Display	16.1-inch IPS, 1920 x 1080, 144Hz, 300 nits, 7ms
Storage	1TB PCIe NVMe SSD
I/O Ports	1x USB 3.2 Gen1 Type-C, 3x USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-A, 1x HDMI 2.1, 1x RJ-45 Ethernet, 1x AC Smart pin, 1x SD Card Reader, 1x 3.5mm  Combo Jack, 1x Dci-In
Connectivity	WiFi  802.11ax, Bluetooth 5.2
Battery	70Whr, 4-cell Li-Polymer, 200W Power Adapter
Audio	B&O Dual Speakers, HP Audio Boost, Dual Array Microphones
Others	720p Webcam
Dimensions	370 x 260 x 23.5mm
Weight	Starts at 2.46kg
Colors	Mica Silver, Dark Chrome Logo

A Closer Look | HP Victus 16

The HP Victus 16 comes with an all-plastic body in a dark blue finish with subtle designs elements and a mirror chrome-finish “V” logo on the back. HP managed to fit a keyboard with a numpad on its right-hand side which is very useful for those who likes to crunch numbers for their work, or those who just needs additional num-keys for gaming.

The keyboard’s font is overall clean and sophisticated and doesn’t give much of a “gamer” vibe making this laptop suitable in awork environment where you need to look professional. Overall weight is also decent weighing in at only 2.46kg making it pretty portable for a hefty 16″ sized laptop.

The trackpad is decently large giving you lots of surface area for Windows precision trackpad gestures and it has a lighter shade of blue compared to the rest of the chassis.

Port selection is decent too as you have your DC-input jack, RJ-45 LAN, full-size HDMI 2.1 USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-A and USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-C port, and a full-sized SD Card Reader on the left, while the right side has two additional USB 3.1 Gen1 Type-A Ports. No Thunderbolt, PD-Charging, or DisplayPort Alt for the USB Type-C port though.

Software Features

On the software side, gaming laptop comes with Windows 11 Home and some essential apps like it’s OMEN Gaming hub where you can control your laptop’s performance modes: Default, Performance, and Quiet. Knowing how each settings work is essential for any laptop gamer to maximize their overall experience in both gaming and work applications. Some other pre-installed software that you can totally forget and uninstall are likes of the McAffee Anti-virus, as they are not essential for anything practical…so you can freely remove them. Just don’t uninstall the OMEN Gaming Hub or else you lose the ability to change performance modes on the fly.

Benchmarks

3DMark Timespy

To kick off our performance testing suite, we are going to test with the popular benchmark from 3DMark, Time Spy. This is a DX12 focused test that simulates a gaming workload that will saturate both our Ryzen CPU and RTX GPU through their respective benchmark runs. We use this test to see the frequency response and temperatures of each hardware being evaluated. This will provide us comparison data with other hardware that’s been tested with Time Spy to validate our results.

We ran this synthetic benchmark using the Performance Mode on the OMEN Gaming Hub. The HP Victus 16 was able to achieve an average score expected with this class of hardware, putting it in the same league as other entry level spec gaming laptops. With a closer look of each result, we are able to see how each hardware responds to each simulated test.

Clock Speeds and Temperature

The Ryzen 7 5800H clock ad at around 4.2ghz and topped of at 80°C. Generally, laptops produce more heat than their desktop counterparts but here we see a good result thanks to the cooler and large chassis of the HP Victus 16.

The GeForce RTX 3050GPU on the other hand was able to maintain its 1762mhz clock speeds while maintaining 62°C. These by far a good result as the Ampere architecture is pretty efficient in power consumption.

In our gaming tests, as you can see on the image above, the gaming performance of the HP Victus 16 makes it a very capable machine to play your esports titles averaging above 200FPS in both CS:GO and Rainbow Six: Siege. This gives us a very smooth and fluid performance without screen tearing thanks to adaptive sync and its 144hz screen.

In triple-A game titles like Sniper Elite 4, Doom Eternal, and Dirt 5, we are able to play them right above the 60FPS (the minimum acceptable performance in my opinion) in decent graphical settings without hitch. With these results you can confidently run pretty much any game you want with managed expectations and managed graphics settings.

Next, we tested the games in different power modes to emphasize the importance of understanding built-in performance control software like the OMEN Gaming Hub. The software offers three different performance modes: Default, Performance, and Quiet. The FPS difference between Performance and Default modes are almost negligible and offers a smooth gaming performance. With quiet mode, however, we see a dip in game FPS performance because of its lower power settings to both the CPU and GPU but is still able to run these games with acceptable performance.

Battery Life

When it comes to the battery life, it is very typical for gaming laptops to drain faster because of their higher wattage components like the CPU and GPU. With the OMEN Gaming Hub set to performance, maximum screen brightness at 144hz, the battery lasted around 1 hour and 30 minutes with our tests. But the battery lasted significantly longer at around 4 hours when we set it to Quiet Mode, lowered the screen brightness and refresh rate to 60hz.

Final Thoughts on the HP Victus 16

On the gaming performance side, there is a lot of potential for the HP Victus 16 thanks to its decent Ryzen 7 5800H and RTX 3050 hardware combo. The laptop’s size maybe a little bit wide for carrying around at 16″ inches but the weight of the laptop is not that offensive to our backs. The only thing I didn’t like about this laptop is its wobbly screen, which is kind of annoying. It’s not a total deal breaker and we can definitely live with it, but we hope HP will fix that in future iterations of the Victus series as we are not the only ones complaining about this.

The HP Victus 16 is marketed as an entry level gaming laptop, and I actually went to AMD’s concept store in SM North EDSA to check the price but was really surprised that the Ryzen 7 5800H + RTX3050 config isn’t anywhere to be found. What I saw is the Ryzen 7 5800H + RTX 3050 Ti config that’s right above ₱75,990 SRP. If we can have the RTX 3050 version for a much cheaper price ₱50-60k SRP, that would be such a deal.

Overall, gamers can expect good performance with this laptop within managed expectations. HP is doing something right with the entry level series as shown on the gaming performance and thermal tests done.

PROS

• Fast Ryzen CPU and Decent RTX GPU
• Decent thermal system, no thermal throttling introduced even in gaming workloads
• Decent Battery life
• Fairly portable despite its wide 16″ laptop form factor

CONS

• Wobbly Screen
• Plastic chassis is a fingerprint magnet

If you liked this AMD Ryzen laptop article, do check out another AMD powered laptop we checked out, the MSI DELTA 15.