What's cheaper than a Chromebook these days? Apparently, HP hopes to have the answer with its Stream line of budget-priced, Windows-based laptops and tablets.
There are two of each device: an 11.6-inch and a 13.3-inch laptop, and a 7-inch Stream 7 and an 8-inch Stream 8 tablet. It's the 11.6-inch model that costs $200, which works out to £123 in UK terms, the problem of course is that by the time you add shipping and tax, it will jump up to £200.
In the US all four will come with 1TB of free cloud storage, courtesy of Microsoft's OneDrive, for a year. They will also be bundled with one year of Microsoft Office 365 Personal (including 60 minutes a month of Skype for free), as well as a $25 gift card to use in the Microsoft Store. It's not clear if those offers will make it to the UK if the range launches here.
The four devices also feature a slew of HP services, including HP Connected Music7, HP Connected Photo8, and HP Connected Drive.
The two new Stream laptops, which join the 14-inch Stream notebook first announced this summer, come with an HD display. The 13.3-inch model offering the option of a touch screen.
The laptops have an as-yet-unnamed Intel Celeron CPU and 32GB of onboard flash storage. Both have a fanless design, and the chassis for each comes in either Orchid Magenta or Horizon Blue. HP claims that the 11.6-inch model has a battery life of 8 hours 15 minutes for HD Video playback and about 7:45 for the 13.3-inch Stream laptop. The 11.6-inch model starts at $199.99, while the 13.3-inch laptop has a base price of $229.99.
Meanwhile, the Stream 7 and 8 tablets are a little less flashy in design compared with their laptop counterparts, but will also be powered by an Intel quad-core processor, the name of which was not available as of this writing. Both come with Windows 8.1. The HP Stream 8 adds an optional 200MB of free 4G data each month, with no annual contract, for the life of the tablet. The Stream 7 starts at $99.99, and the Stream 8's base configuration comes in at $149.99.
According to HP, the four Stream devices should be available in the U.S. at the start of November on HP's site and at select retailers.