The HP Elite x3 is the most powerful Windows smartphone to date… but it’s also the most expensive, thanks to a $799 price tag. That price includes a desktop docking station though. So how much would you save if you bought the phone without the dock? About $100.
Windows Central notes that the HP Elite x3 sells for $699 if you just want the phone.
It doesn’t currently seem to be available at HP.com for that price, but a web search for “HP Elite x3 X5V50AA#ABA” shows that other stores including CDW and PC Nation are listing the phone for prices ranging from about $700 to $720.
Of course, the main reason to buy this phone is probably because you want to use one of its key features: Continuum for phone. The desktop dock allows you to connect an external monitor, keyboard, and mouse to use the phone like a pseudo-desktop computer. The Start Screen becomes a Start Menu; a taskbar appears; and Universal Windows Platform apps can run in full screen, taking advantage of the extra real estate available on a monitor.
HP is also positioning the phone primarily as a business device: while there’s not native support for running Win32 software on the phone, companies can license HP’s cloud-based virtualization software to let users remotely login to legacy Windows software to use mission-critical utilities in the field.
But you don’t necessarily need the official desktop dock to do those things. You can also connect the phone to a display using a USB Type-C to HDMI adapter or wireless display features. And you can use a Bluetooth mouse and keyboard if you like.
If you just want the phone itself, what you get is a device with a 6 inch, 2560 x 1440 pixel display, a Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 processor, 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage, a microSDXC card slot, and dual SIM card slots.
But if you don’t plan to use the Continuum feature, $699 is a lot of money to spend on a device that runs one of the least popular smartphone operating systems.
