HP Star Wars Special Edition 15-an001na review – the Force is strong with this one

Star Wars pre-installed content

Besides the obvious emblazoning of Star Wars art on the chassis, the system also comes pre-installed with a whole host pre-installed Star Wars content. This includes various wallpapers, which you can obviously change if you want, and Star Wars sound effects. There are also Star Wars digital comics, trailers and galleries.

There’s an R2-D2 desktop companion, too, which loads up maps and blueprints if you click on his main body or projects a holographic Leia when you click his head. Admittedly, it’s a novelty at best, and there probably isn’t anything here that hardcore Star Wars fans won’t have seen before.

Display

The 15.6in display has a 1,920×1,080 resolution and a matt coating, which means reflections aren’t an issue. The quality of the panel is underwhelming, however. Black levels of 0.33cd/m2 are distinctly average and maximum brightness of 219.8cd/m2 is also lacklustre. Contrast ratio, too, was poor at 650:1. 

This leaves images looking washed out, which is a shame if you want to better appreciate the bundled digital Star Wars comics. Colour accuracy at 57.1% of the sRGB colour gamut is also disappointing, but it’s still about par for the course for a mid-range laptop.

Connections and Speakers

Along the left, you get two USB ports, one of which is USB3, a Fast Ethernet port, and an SD card reader. The right-hand side houses another USB3 port, an HDMI output, and a headset jack. There’s also Bluetooth 4.0 and 802.11ac Wi-Fi built-in, and, as is typical with HP laptops, the speakers are tuned by Bang & Olufsen. They’re not particularly impressive when blaring out The Imperial March, sounding a little tinny as most laptop speakers do, but they’re reasonably loud.

Conclusion

Whether or not the Star Wars Special Edition is the right laptop for you will likely depend on how enamoured you are with the design and the additional content. The 15-an000na model (which doesn’t come with dedicated graphics) is available for £439, which might be more enticing if you’re not interested in light gaming. The Nvidia GeForce GTX 940M is far from the best dedicated graphics chip around, so it’s not necessarily worth an extra £100 if you’re not into gaming. 

Comparing HP’s similarly-specced models, you’re not actually paying a premium for the Star Wars Special Edition. As paying extra for ‘special edition’ products is pretty much the norm, this is particularly welcome. It’s also not particularly bad value when you compare it to the competition, either, such as the Dell Inspiron 15 5000 Series, as the HP’s performance levels come out on top. Its touchpad and display let it down slightly, but overall it’s still a very respectable mid-range laptop, and one that Star Wars fans will particularly enjoy.