Case
The ZBook 15u G3 is clad in a magnesium-reinforced casing that feels both comfortable and relatively solid, while remaining lightweight (at just 2.166 kg). It doesn't seem to be as heavy-duty as, say, an Apple MacBook or Dell Precision, but there's very little yield in the base unit nevertheless. The display lid features a soft-touch paint around the perimeter, which is a nice touch (and nice to touch!), with a stylish yet still rather subdued aluminum insert in the middle. Only the larger-than-average shiny metallic HP logo belies somewhat the typical styling of a business notebook.

Display
The HP ZBook 15u G3 is configurable with a few different display options. Among them are three 1080p displays - a standard TN LED anti-glare display, an anti-glare IPS panel with Panel Self-Refresh, and a touch panel with a glossy finish - and a 3840x2160 high-end IPS display as the priciest choice. Our review machine featured the 1080p (1920x1080) touchscreen, which is unfortunately merely a standard TN LED panel and which also is inhibited by the typical reflective finish common with touchscreens. Subjectively, colors appear merely decent, and contrast seems hobbled by a high black value. Brightness at least appears to be good.

Gaming Performance
Although gaming benchmarks portray a different breed of performance, it's still worth exploring how the GPUs stack up accordingly. Here, the ZBook 15u G3's score in 3DMark Fire Strike Standard of 1517 points is far below both the HP ZBook 15 G2's FirePro M5100 (49% faster) and the Precision M5510's NVIDIA Quadro M1000M (120% faster). Still, it's around twice as fast as the integrated graphics, so it's a worthwhile upgrade.