Want a dual-screen gaming laptop? HP’s bringing one to South Africa, sort of

HP recently unveiled the Omen X 2S, a dual-screen gaming laptop, and have since confirmed that it’ll come to South Africa. Like the Olsen twins, gaming laptops keep getting thinner and more powerful — but HP’s got a different strategy. A more… visual one. HP’s Omen X 2S features a small display on the base of the notebook, and not it is necessarily a second display. Except when it is.

The primary 15in panel is a 1080p, 144Hz G-Sync IPS (or optionally, a 240Hz G-Sync or 4K) display, which is pretty standard on high-end gaming laptops. However, this laptop has a secondary 6in, 1080p display fitted above the keyboard. Our initial response is… but why? Well, according to HP, you can use this tiny display to do other stuff while gaming. You know, like Twittering or Twitching. Whichever you choose. Someone’s going to choose to play Doom on it. Guaranteed. 

If you take away the second ‘display’

Other than that, the Omen X 2S is a pretty badass gaming machine that deserves a spot atop your desk. It packs up to a 9th-gen Intel Core-i9 8 core CPU (with up to 5GHz overclocking headroom) to power everything. An NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2080 Max-Q GPU takes care of your graphics needs, and the Omen X 2S includes 32GB of RAM.

It’s also fitted with HP’s new five-way airflow cooling system that consists of two inlets at the bottom and three outlets on the side. The CPU’s been pre-applied with Thermal Grizzly’s ‘liquid metal’ CPU thermal paste, which has “over 10 times” more thermal conductive capability than regular silicon grease, according to HP. Fine, whatever, as long as we don’t have to crack this one open and top up the paste, we’ll take it. 

Because of the secondary screen, you’ll have to make do with an awkward side-positioned right-hand touchpad. But all ‘real’ gamers have their own fit-for-purpose gaming mouse, right? Right. 

If the gimmicky second display, beefy hardware, and strange layout pique your interest, HP’s Omen X 2S will be available in South Africa from July 2019, starting at a base price of R53,000.