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HP 17-ca 17.3
HP 17-ca 17.3
HP 17-ca 17.3
HP 17-ca 17.3
HP 17-ca 17.3
HP

HP 17-ca 17.3" Touchscreen Laptop 20GB RAM 2TB HDD

★★★★★3.4 (4 reviews)
1600 x 90020GB RAM20GB DDR42TB HDDBluetooth 4.2

Twenty gigabytes of DDR4 RAM and a 2TB HDD in a 17.3-inch touchscreen chassis deliver wide-screen multitasking headroom at a budget price point.

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Overview

The HP 17-ca pairs an AMD A9-9425 dual-core APU (3.1GHz base, 3.7GHz Turbo, 28nm Bristol Ridge architecture) with 20GB DDR4-1866 SDRAM and a 2TB 5400RPM SATA HDD inside a 17.3-inch chassis. The 20GB RAM figure is the headline spec, but it comes with an asterisk: the non-standard capacity almost certainly produces an asymmetric single-channel configuration, which halves the available memory bandwidth and directly constrains the Radeon R5 integrated GPU, which relies on system RAM as its framebuffer. The 2TB HDD provides ample capacity, but at 5400RPM the throughput ceiling (~100MB/s sequential) means that storage I/O — not processor speed — will be the most felt bottleneck in daily use. The 1600x900 HD+ touchscreen at 17.3 inches is a budget display choice: the touch layer adds navigational convenience, but the resolution and pixel density are lower than what most full HD panels in the same size class deliver.

This machine is designed for users who prioritize screen size, storage volume, and RAM capacity over raw compute speed — a reasonable trade-off for students, home office users, or light media consumers who work with large local file collections. The touchscreen is a genuine convenience for Windows 10 navigation, especially for users transitioning from tablets. Connectivity is functional if not fast: 802.11b/g/n (1x1) limits wireless throughput, and the absence of USB 3.1 Gen 2 or Thunderbolt means external storage is capped at USB 3.1 Gen 1 speeds (~400MB/s real-world). The most impactful upgrade path for this system is a SATA SSD swap — it won't change the CPU ceiling, but it will transform the perceived responsiveness of every application launch and system boot.

Key Features

Powered by latest 7th Generation AMD Core A9-9425 Dual-Core Processor (3.1GHz Speed, turbo boost up to 3.7GHz),

17.3" diagonal HD+ SVA BrightView WLED-backlit touch screen (1600 x 900); AMD Radeon R5 with up to 4334 MB total graphics memory

20GB DDR4-1866 SDRAM Memory for full-power multitasking; 2TB 5400 rpm SATA HDD offers a compact warehouse for storing all your favourite movies, music, photos, and more in one convenient place

802.11b/g/n (1x1) Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 4.2 combo; 2 USB 3.1 Gen 1 (Data transfer only); 1 USB 2.0; 1 HDMI 1.4b; 1 RJ-45; 1 headphone/microphone combo

Windows 10 Home 64-Bit, Battery Life up to 7.25 Hours, Weight: 5.42 lbs, Thin 0.96-Inch, Color: Natural Silver

Specifications

Processor
AMD A9-9425 Dual-Core, 3.1GHz base / 3.7GHz Turbo
Memory
20GB DDR4-1866 SDRAM
Storage
2TB 5400RPM SATA HDD
Display
17.3-inch HD+ SVA BrightView WLED Touchscreen, 1600x900
Graphics
AMD Radeon R5, up to 4334MB total memory
Wi-Fi
802.11b/g/n (1x1)
Bluetooth
4.2
USB
2x USB 3.1 Gen 1, 1x USB 2.0
Video Output
HDMI 1.4b
Operating System
Windows 10 Home 64-bit
Battery Life
Up to 7.25 hours
Weight
5.42 lbs
Thickness
0.96 inches

Pros & Cons

👍 Pros

  • 20GB DDR4 provides substantial RAM headroom for keeping many browser tabs and applications open simultaneously, even if single-channel bandwidth limits raw throughput.
  • 2TB HDD storage capacity means local media libraries, large project files, and application installations are unlikely to fill the drive in normal use.
  • The 17.3-inch touchscreen at HD+ resolution offers a large work surface that suits users who prefer screen size over pixel density.
  • AMD Radeon R5 integrated graphics with up to 4334MB total memory (shared) handles HD video playback and casual 2D tasks without supplemental hardware.
  • The 7.25-hour rated battery life is competitive for a 17-inch laptop in this class, where large displays typically incur higher power consumption.

👎 Cons

  • The A9-9425's asymmetric 20GB RAM configuration forces single-channel memory operation, cutting DDR4-1866 bandwidth from a theoretical ~29.8GB/s (dual-channel) to approximately 14.9GB/s — directly limiting the integrated GPU and CPU performance.
  • 5400RPM HDD sequential read speeds of ~100MB/s mean Windows 10 cold boot can exceed 90 seconds; no NVMe or even SATA SSD option is included at this tier.
  • 1600x900 resolution on a 17.3-inch panel produces a pixel density of ~106 PPI, which is noticeably soft for text-heavy work compared to 1080p panels in the same size class.
  • 802.11n (1x1) Wi-Fi tops out at a theoretical 150Mbps on 2.4GHz only — this antenna configuration will not connect to 5GHz networks and will underperform on congested 2.4GHz channels.
  • The AMD A9-9425's Bristol Ridge architecture is a 28nm design from 2016, meaning it is significantly behind current-generation efficiency curves in both performance-per-watt and compute throughput.

Frequently Asked Questions

It runs an AMD A9-9425 dual-core at 3.1GHz base with Turbo up to 3.7GHz. The A9-9425 is a Bristol Ridge APU — a 28nm design that competes with Intel's older Celeron/Pentium tier. It handles office applications, streaming, and light multitasking without issue, but it will struggle with video encoding, modern AAA gaming, or running multiple resource-intensive apps simultaneously.
The 20GB configuration (typically 4GB soldered + 16GB SO-DIMM, or a non-standard 4GB+16GB pairing) is an unusual allocation. The AMD A9-9425 supports dual-channel DDR4 only when both channels are populated equally — a 20GB asymmetric configuration will run in single-channel mode, cutting effective memory bandwidth roughly in half compared to a matched 16GB dual-channel setup.
At 5400RPM over SATA, expect sequential reads around 80–110MB/s and random 4K read performance of roughly 0.5–1MB/s. Boot times will be measured in minutes, not seconds, and application launch times are proportionally slow. An SSD upgrade would be the single highest-impact performance modification for this machine.
No stylus support is listed for this model. The touch panel is finger-touch only, designed for Windows 10 touch navigation rather than precision input.
The panel runs at 1600x900 (HD+), which at 17.3 inches yields approximately 106 PPI. By comparison, a 1920x1080 panel at the same size delivers 127 PPI. Text and images will appear noticeably softer than a full HD display, which is a meaningful trade-off on a screen this large.

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