HP EliteBook 8 G2i with 16GB RAM beats older 32GB models in PT tests

Principled Technologies found that an Intel-powered HP EliteBook 8 G2i with 16GB of RAM outperformed two earlier HP EliteBook laptops with 32GB of RAM across productivity, video, 3D, and encoding benchmarks. The results land as memory prices rise and IT teams look for ways to cut fleet costs without sacrificing performance.

Why it matters: - Rising memory prices and supply shortages are pushing IT teams to rethink how much RAM they need in laptop fleets. - The PT results suggest newer processor generations can offset smaller memory configurations on many common business workloads. - That could help organizations right-size memory by role instead of defaulting to 32GB systems.

What happened: - Principled Technologies tested three 14-inch HP EliteBook laptops across three generations of Intel Core processors. - The tested systems were an HP EliteBook 8 G2i with an Intel Core Ultra 7 355 processor and 16 GB of LPDDR5 RAM, an HP EliteBook 8 G1i with an Intel Core Ultra 7 255U processor and 32 GB of DDR5 SODIMM RAM, and an HP EliteBook 840 G10 with an Intel Core i7-1355U processor and 32 GB of DDR5 SODIMM RAM. - The newer EliteBook 8 G2i beat both older 32GB models across a range of productivity and content-creation workloads.

The details: - On the Procyon Essentials Benchmark, the EliteBook 8 G2i delivered up to 59.1% snappier performance when booting and switching apps. - On the Procyon Video Editing Benchmark, the EliteBook 8 G2i posted up to 111.6% better performance. - On the Blender Benchmark, the EliteBook 8 G2i delivered up to 59.9% more GPU samples per minute for 3D iteration. - The HP EliteBook 840 G10 could not run the Blender GPU rendering test. - On the HandBrake Benchmark, the EliteBook 8 G2i finished the heaviest 4K encoding workload up to 10 minutes and 1 second faster. - On Cinebench 2026, the EliteBook 8 G2i reached up to 55.6% more responsive performance on compute-heavy workloads, despite having fewer total cores than either comparison laptop. - PT also recorded up to 12.5% more responsive performance on the Procyon Office Productivity Benchmark. - WebXPRT 5 results showed up to 24.2% faster performance on everyday web workloads. - The Procyon Photo Editing Benchmark showed up to 11.0% better photo-editing performance. - HandBrake also showed up to 70.8% more frames per second on the heaviest encoding workload.

Between the lines: - The report challenges the assumption that more RAM or higher core counts automatically deliver better performance on common business tasks. - PT said what mattered more in the tests was generational advantage. - The findings also underscore how newer hardware can provide a cost-efficient alternative when memory prices are climbing.

What's next: - IT buyers planning fleet refreshes may look more closely at user-specific memory needs instead of standardizing on higher-capacity systems. - Organizations facing tighter memory supply may use newer processor platforms to preserve performance while reducing RAM per device. - PT directed readers to the full report for more details: the full report

The bottom line: - In PT’s testing, a 16GB HP EliteBook 8 G2i beat older 32GB EliteBook models often enough to make a simple point: newer silicon can matter more than bigger memory configs.