Like the larger ZBook 17, case quality is excellent all-around on the ZBook 15. The aluminum alloy lid and bottom plate are rigid and will only warp minimally under moderate pressure. Resistance to twisting and vibrations are also excellent on the lid, base and hinges, which is similar to the EliteBook predecessors. Since the ZBook does not utilize a unibody design, certain areas like the inner display bezel and palm rests can feel plastic, but are otherwise thick and just as tough to the touch.

The industrial design of the model is surprisingly attractive for a mobile workstation and compares favorably against Dell Precision models or the Lenovo ThinkPad W series, both of which incorporate boxier and generally more lackluster designs. HP advertises its wedge design of the ZBook as innovative and sleek, which isn’t saying much for a workstation, but is enough to stand out against its duller competitors. The rubberized perimeter and edges of the lid, for example, feel purely aesthetic, but notably adds to the appeal of the all-matte and jet black ZBook 15. HP has managed to build an aesthetically pleasing workstation while remaining relatively light (2.82 kg) and thinner (30.5 mm) than the ThinkPad W530 (2.81 kg,  36 mm) and Precision M4800 (3.18 kg, 40 mm).

A particular design choice carried over from the EliteBook is the removable screwless plate underneath for quick access to internals or HDD removal. According to HP, the screwless design was a hot request from users who may not always have the appropriate tools ready, so general upgrades are made much easier. It would have been great to have the optical drive be an easily accessible modular bay for even more expandability, though this is a minor complaint.

Keyboard

The backlit keyboard (35.25 cm x 11.5 cm) is identical to that of the ZBook 17 and performs similarly. The keys provide somewhat soft feedback with short travelwhen pressed, but are otherwise responsive and easy to use. More information on keyboard performance can be seen in our full review of the ZBook 17.

Touchpad

Despite the ZBook 15 being physically smaller than the ZBook 17, their touchpads are identical in size (103 x 59 mm) and feel. Both use the same Synaptics LuxPad V1.6 software and are smooth and precise for reliable use. Multi-touch gestures up to three fingers are configurable and tapping anywhere on the touchpad will register a left click by default. For general use, we found the touchpad to be a bit easier to control than the concave track button.

Meanwhile, the surrounding six buttons are all configurable with quiet-but-firm responses when clicked. They are useful as shortcut keys and feel much more uniform than the keys of the Precision M6800 or ThinkPad W530. These keys on the HP are a bit too easy to depress, however, so accidental inputs can occur.

Unfortunately, color space reproduction does not cover the majority of the AdobeRGB spectrum and is instead closer to sRGB. This is similar to the display of the Precision M6800, where about 90 percent of sRGB is covered compared to < 60 percent of budget notebooks with cheaper panels. This may be sufficient for certain digital graphics artists, but those in need of a wider gamut can consider the ZBook 17 where we measured coverage of about 93 percent of the AdobeRGB standard. Otherwise, users should upgrade to the DreamColor display on the ZBook 15 for better color reproduction.

Further display analyses were performed with an X-Rite i1Basic Pro spectrophotometer. The display will benefit from a calibration as it creates a flatter RGB balance with a gamma closer to the 2.2 ideal as defined by the sRGB standard. Color accuracy increases with increasing saturation levels, but it is still very good even at low saturation with a DeltaE 2000 of about 7 units at worst. Teal is represented less accurately than other colors.

The i7-4800MQ in our test model returns similar synthetic benchmarks results as other notebooks sporting the same CPU. For example, its multi-core performance in wPrime 1024m of 266 seconds and single-core performance in Super Pi 32Mof 578 seconds are similar to the Precision M6800. Compared to the previous Ivy Bridge generation, our Haswell processor is most similar to the i7-3740QM in specs and performance. The die size of the i7-4800MQ is slightly larger due to the upgraded integrated graphics core.

More information and benchmarks on the i7-4800MQ can be seen in our dedicated page here.

The high PCMark 7 score of 5798 points puts our ZBook 15 near the top of our benchmarks database and could have been even higher if it had been equipped with dedicated SSDs. The score nearly matches our Asus G750JH, which uses a slightly slower i7-4700HQ processor paired with a Lite-On SSD. PCMark 8 Home shows similar results as the HP is able to match or outperform many notebooks with the SSD and GPU advantage including the Gigabyte P34G and Razer Blade 14.

The Windows 7 Performance Index shows a system bottlenecked by its HDD, which is common for high-end notebooks equipped with mechanical drives. Even so, the system feels subjectively fast and almost as instantaneous as an SSD-based system. Since our system shipped with Windows 7, navigation is free from the animation-heavy UI that can feel slower on HDDs.