Quotethe lack of any HDMI ports or an integrated SD reader on the HP Spectre can be a deal breaker to some.
Agreed these omissions are unfortunate. But the dealbreaker for me is HP's unfathomable decision to remove active stylus support in this generation. There are tons of "2-in-1" choices, many from HP itself, with OUT stylus support. A big part of what made the previous Spectre x360s unique was their stylus support. In my opinion, it's a tragedy that "2-in-1"s with stylus support get lumped into the same "2-in-1" category as those that don't support stylus. Thus encouraging comparisons like this one, where the stylus-supporting VAIO is somehow considered to be in the same category as two run-of-the-mill foldovers with no stylus input.
It's time for a new category name for computers that have notebook + tablet modes + active stylus. "Note" would make sense except that it's already so abused it's mostly meaningless. Maybe something more explicit would discourage such marketing abuse: "AP2-in-1"? ("Active Pen 2-in1")?