ENVY 15-jXXX / ENVY 17-jXXX Notebooks (2013)

The speakers are just incredible.....

Running the 3DMark 11 tests.....will report back asap. What's the best way to show the results? Will it allow me to past an image or should I take a picture of the screen?

RE the power brick I'm shocked at how small and think it is for the Envy 17. I was expecting a huge brick...like never before seen sizes and instead its just a slim small rectangle thing....very impressed and frankly grateful....

EDIT: How long does this 3DMark 11 test take? It's on Combine Test now and still going on. Now is the first time I've heard the fan although its not ridiculously loud at the moment....

Do I need to stop the program?

 

nVidia 740M Results

3DMark 11 Score: P2072
Graphics Score: 1892
Physics Score: 8129
Combined Score: 1480
3DMark Score: 2072.0
Graphics: 1892.0
Physics: 8129
Combined: 1480.0
Graphics Test 1: 10.0
Graphics Test 2: 9.27
Graphics Test 3: 10.6
Graphics Test 4: 5.43
Physics Test: 25.8
Combined Test: 6.88

 

I'll put comparison pictures against my Asus laptop brick later in the weekend.

Compared against an HTC One. This power brick is in every way portable.



Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

Hi does anyone know when will the GT750M be available on the Envy 15? I'm still waiting for it :\

 

Hmmm that seems quite big . Now to see the 90w charger .

Thanks btw !

 

How is that quite big? It's barely bigger than that thin android phone!!!

Intel HD 4600 Results

3DMark 11 Score: P1380
Graphics Score: 1189
Physics Score: 6946
Combined Score: 1394
3DMark Score: 1380.0
Graphics: 1189.0
Physics: 6946.0
Combined: 1394.0
Graphics Test 1: 5.29
Graphics Test 2: 5.63
Graphics Test 3: 7.54
Graphics Test 4: 3.65
Physics Test: 22.1
Combined Test: 6.49

And just to provide details I downloaded the Basic Version of 3DMark 11. It was Version 1.0.5.0

And my HP Envy 17 has a the i7-4800!QM with 16GB of memory

 

It just seems bigger then what I'm used to, I've only had a core 2 duo dell

Could you play a game and record the FPS of the iGPU vs. the dGPU

I can't tell if the jump from the iGPU to the 740m is that significant due to having no idea what any of those numbers mean, can someone with more experience tell me if that is a large leap between performance ?

 

90w charger brick measures 1" tall x 1.75" wide x 4" long Laying down. Sorry can't post pics from phone through this website atm...so in comparison, it's narrower and taller based off the phone next to it as in above pictures....hope that helps...

 

It's definitely small. Here's an old HP dv model my other dj uses. It's a 90w I believe.


From running srtest it told me I could play SimCity and civ 5 on recommended settings. Even though that's not official haha

I'll try it out Sunday and post results. Overall this laptop is great from the 10-20 minutes I've used it.

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

Anyone tried installing an intel wireless card yet ? I'd like to eventually put a widi 2x2 card into this thing but don't know if it's whitelisted .

 

Here is a quick video showing the vertical and horizontal viewing angles on the Envy 15-j000 CTO. The vertical is really bad, one of the worst I've seen in a long while. Tilting the notebook back or forward causes a huge change in gamma which is very evident when using the laptop. Since this was a viewing angle test, it will obviously point out the flaws far worse than with everyday use, like browsing, coding, gaming, etc, but its definitely noticeable and very annoying. The brightness however is fantastic at its highest setting. I also have vertical banding, which drives me crazy and is the main reason why I am returning it and looking for a IPS panel on the 17, if it exists.

https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=9DE73495EB689936!34122&authkey=!AAubWSP6B3hnS0Y

 

This vertical banding I keep reading about here, is it evident in all the envys? I don't seem to have any stripes or bands when looking at different angles etc. Kinda unclear what to look for but then again maybe I shouldn't find it because it might annoy me lol. overall very pleased with the 17t-j000 quad laptop...

 

I think it is mostly on the 15's with the Chi Mei panel. The 17's are using a different panel, but I haven't been able to see one in person.

 

Is this for an Envy 15 or Envy 17?

I absolutely didnt see anything negative on the screen of my Envy 17.....

 

Got my Envy 17, creating recovery media at the moment... it says this can only be done one time, and you can choose what type of media to do it with. You can choose between a USB flash drive (it says it needs 24GB of space), 6 single layer dvds, or 3 dual layered dvds.

I got the anti-glare 1080p screen, and it is actually semi-matte. Well, not the most semi-matte I've seen, but I just mean the AG coating is not excessive, and there's no "sparkle" like what you get with a too heavy coating. As others have also stated, the viewing angles are actually decent for a TN. Contrast is also decent, though I did drop gamma down a few notches in the Intel options (I did not opt for a 740m).

Lookin' good so far, hoping the SSD swap out and re-install process goes well...

Edit: Oh, and can anyone tell me whether HP CoolSense actually does anything worthwhile? This is my first HP laptop.

 

Does anyone know the best way to remove bloatware? Will doing a system recovery and using the recovery image stored on the laptop only restore the main items and not the bloatware?

Sent from my HTC One using Tapatalk 4 Beta

 

That is for the 15". From what I've read the 17 has a great panel. I plan to check out Best Buy to see it in person.

 

Yes boot into the HP Recovery manager and choose the limited restore option. It will remove most of the bloat.

 

When you have a moment would you check what panel you have? I used HWiNFO HWiNFO, HWiNFO32 & HWiNFO64 - Hardware Information and Analysis Tools

 

Envy 17 with anti-glare 1080p screen here, it says: AU Optronics Model AUO219D

Edit: Ok I am having a problem getting a factory restore to install using the recovery media I created onto a SSD I swapped with the factory hard drive.

First of all I have to go into BIOS settings and enable legacy boot otherwise after loading the data from the recovery discs, it'll try to restart and then come back with a screen saying no hard drive found.

Then, after enabling legacy boot, it'll go through a "Software installation" phase, but then after that it goes into an endless rebooting cycle. It'll turn on, then it shows the Win8 logo, then it'll turn off, and then again over and over.

I tried this two times just to make sure it wasn't a fluke, same endless rebooting cycle both times.

I was able to re-install Win7 for giggles from a regular ISO, and that went swimmingly. Except for I don't wanna deal with all the yellow exclamations for things missing drivers in the device manager. I bought Windows 8 and I wanna use it, but so far it has been a frustrating thing.

Please if anyone was able to successfully re-install onto a different hard drive using their created recovery media, please tell me your exact steps.

Edit: n/m, I am an idiot. See my post below.

 

You can go HP youtube channel to see which option to use for recovery. As for no harddisk found, might be because you need to change your boot order. I intend to do the same as you too(still waiting for stock to come), let me know if you have any sucess.

 

When you say "enable legacy boot" what do you mean?

And my SSD should be arriving on Wednesday. I managed to have HP send me the official Windows 8 Pro Recovery Media and that arrived yesterday evening. So I'm hoping when it comes time for me to do the same thing I won't have any issues....

And it looks like we got the exact same screen on our Envy 17s which is really nice. Glad you concur that it is pretty good.

 

Have you guys that purchased the 17" from HP looked at the 17" touch from best buy? I'm wondering how they differ, besides the touch capability obviously. Is the best buy 17" more glossy? More vibrant colors?

The BB model looked great, and from the sounds of it, the non-touch 17" is also a winner.

 

Reading from all the post seems like the worst problem with the 15' is the screen and for some the fan noise . It has me worried .

Though, I think I'll probably keep the laptop, the specs for this price are unbeatable compared to other 15 inch with similar specs, it also seems to be significantly lighter and "slimmer" (Non-touch) .

 

the problems reported with the 15" screen... is it the HD or the FHD version?

 

Mine is the FHD version. Similar panel in the HD version though, will likely see some of the same issues. 17.3 doesn't sound like it has these issues.

 

In the BIOS description (mash F10 when you power on the laptop), it says that legacy boot support needs to be enabled in order to install any Windows older than 8. With that I was able to install Win7 from a bootable USB ISO just fine.

 

ok, thanks... I'm very curious to see live one of these. Here in Portugal, they are announcing the 15" with a brightview IPS screen... they are supposed to arrive at stores tomorrow.

 

Why don't you try to copy the whole system partition (using Parted magic...) to image, then we can recover the image to any partition (of any disk drive) we want.

 

Can someone take a picture of the FHD panel showing the banding for the 15"? I would really like to see how bad it is. On another note I was in Walmart earlier today and I checked out the keyboard looking for flex. They had one unit of the Envy Touchsmart 15 with a 1366x768 panel. It looked ok to me. I did notice some keyboard flex but I checked out the other laptops they had and almost all of them had a bit of flex as well so it seemed about the same on all of them.

 

Considering how poor the Chi Mei model FHD panel is, the standard HD panel is actually an ok substitute, even if is lower resolution, the panel if otherwise very clean horizontally and vertical, might even go as far to say the colour inversion is ever so slightly better.

Trust me, it is not until you get the thing at home, then you really notice the flex, especially if you like to type a lot. If I could fix this (HP can't, to late now, will have to done on the j1XX models, if they do it), then there is not much else I could fault it on.

I've taken 3 different Envy 15's home, all had flex, it just seem like my last unit has more, likely cause I have had this one longer.

 

Okay, I am a huge moron. I was finally able to use my created recovery media (I chose dvds) to do a factory restore onto a Samsung 840 Pro SSD that I swapped with the 5400rpm hard drive that came with my Envy 17. Please see attached photo. This is what you will see once you boot with the recovery media: Well I had previously tried the "Minimized Image Recovery" and the "Factory Reset" options, both of which resulted in a failed restore. I don't know why I ignored the "System Recovery" option before, but I tried it this time and it painlessly restored factory default installation.

 

ROFL remember to choose recover button when you want to recover something )

 

I too have unsuccessfully install using recovery dvds to my samsung 840 pro and i used factory reset options. I will try system recovery. Just to check , are the bloatwares installed too ?

For 15" the sad part is the panel and the keyboard. I got mine today from a shop but returned and replace one due to a dead pixel that didn't even light up. The keyboard is a no choice as HP die hard fan , to date this envy line offering is sort of the best we could get at this time . The flex is an eye sore ,when we expect something to be prefect

 

There's honestly not a whole lot of bloat on the system I received. Anyways my SSD will hopefully arrive on Wednesday and the. We'll see.

Did it ask you for the Windows 8 license that came with your Envy madmook?

 

Ok, kinda hit another snag. I went back to re-create what I did, just to make sure it worked, and I started back with a clean empty drive. Booted up with the recovery media and got to that screen I posted a couple posts up. Well this time, the "System Recovery" option was greyed out and not selectable. That is why I didn't think of trying that option before.

So to get that option to become available, I boot with a "recovery drive" that I made using this tutorial: Create a Recovery Drive in Windows 8 | TechRepublic

I choose to do a system reset, then it'll install some stuff, do some re-booting and eventually come back with a recovery incomplete message.

Then I turn off the machine and this time boot using the original recovery dvd I created. When it loads back to that menu now the "System Restore" option is selectable. Last time I did it, Win8 never asked for a key and when I booted into Windows it said that it was already activated. At least this part worked like it's supposed to. Bloatware was also re-installed, but like Hawk said it's not too much, and easy to get rid of.

I see someone else is having the same issues I hit with the same SSD swap and re-install of factory defaults. Hopefully my info helps.

Edit: Okay, back and successfully performed a factory system restore using the steps taken above. Convoluted and time-consuming, but it works. I'm sure an easier way would be to clean install using a Win8 ISO and then just manually re-install all the drivers and whatnot, but I don't have an OS disk and with a factory restore all the drivers are automatically installed as well as a couple useful programs.

Only one weird thing, however. I am using a 512GB Samsung 840 Pro, after using the method above here's how the disk was partitioned:

There's 401 MB of unallocated space as well as a 16 GB empty partition. Is it possible to consolidate them into my C: drive or are these somehow necessary?

 

Couple questions with the ENVY 17-jXXX Notebooks (2013)..
1. Is it better to get a SATA drive and then order a SSD in place of.the primary and then add the old primary as the secondary?
2. Is is better to order the laptop with out 24GB mSSD Hard Drive Acceleration Cache and then buy it later?
3. If you were to decide to get the laptop with only one hard drive can later add another dive so you can have 2?

It seems like the best way to order is to get the 1TB drive with no 24GB mSSD Hard Drive Acceleration Cache. And then get your own SSD and mSSD and re-install everything after you made the restore disks.
Do they make mSSD bigger then 24GB?
And also just want to confirm that the 1920x1080 is touch screen?

Is there any better coupons then this..CUSTOM15

Thanks

 

I did a thread search and couldn't find anyone with this issue - so I apologize if it's been covered, I'm clearly new here.

I received my laptop today and about 1-2" of the right side of the touchscreen is unresponsive/dead. I'm unable to swipe the charms menu, and I tested going into the Paint program and there is a definite "wall" where the dead part of the touchscreen begins. The green line is with the touchpad and the red lines are with the touchscreen.



I saw a post in a SlickDeals forum where another user had the same issue and returned his laptop. Edit: Spoke with HP and initiated a return/exchange. I have to ship this back before they'll begin production on a new model (though that will be "prioritized"), and then I'll get expedited 2-day shipping.

Here's the configuration I ordered from the HP site.
HP ENVY 15t Quad TouchSmart
• Windows 8 64
• 4th generation Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4700MQ Processor
• NVIDIA GeForce GT 740M Graphics with 2048MB of dedicated video memory
• 15.6-inch diagonal Full HD BrightView LED-backlit Display (1920x1080)
• 8GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
• 1TB 5400RPM Hybrid Hard Drive
• NO mSSD Hard Drive Acceleration Cache
• No Internal DVD or CD Drive
• Standard Keyboard
• HP TrueVision HD Webcam w/ integrated digital mic
• 802.11b/g/n WLAN and Bluetooth(R)

 

Well, finally decided to get a 15t TouchSmart Quad Edition CTO as I am tired of waiting for the 750m GPU option. :-/ Used coupon: CUSTOM20 (20% off), so not too bad. I hope I don't get one with dead pixels and/or the bad flex in the KB!
My Config:
HP ENVY 15t Quad TouchSmart
• Windows 8 64 (Will re-image with a clean install of Windows 8 Pro x64 )
• 4th generation Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4900MQ Processor
• NVIDIA GeForce GT 740M Graphics with 2048MB of dedicated video memory
• 15.6-inch diagonal Full HD BrightView LED-backlit Display (1920x1080)
• 8GB DDR3 System Memory (1 Dimm)
• 1TB 5400RPM Hybrid Hard Drive (Plan to use this for external storage and throw in my Crucial m500 960GB SSD)
• 24GB mSSD Hard Drive Acceleration Cache
• No Internal DVD or CD Drive
• Back Lit Keyboard
• HP TrueVision HD Webcam w/ integrated digital mic
• 802.11b/g/n WLAN and Bluetooth(R)

 

Since you got the 1080p screen, how does it look (besides your touch issue)? Does it have bad vertical banding or really bad viewing angles? Also does the keyboard seem fairly sturdy or is there a lot of flex in the keyboard? Also, I think these are supposed to have a metal lid and metal palm rests, is that the case in your model?

 

T - Are you going to keep your Envy 15?

 

Thanks for the info , i too have finally successfully restore on my samsung 840 pro 256 GB ssd. I think it the empty partition is used by the software to temporarily store the data copied from the DVDs for installation . You could use partition magic to merger them back. And storage space is precious on a SSD.

 

How did you do it? Did you have to do what I did or did your recovery discs work by themselves?

And I think I won't bother messing with the extra empty partitions. As I understand it, you're not supposed to fill up a SSD all the way anyways. So now I have some built-in buffer space lol.

 

What happened to the roughly 36GB on the SSD? The difference between 512 and the 476....

 

@lhanliang

Can you confirm whether did your 15-j006TX comes with 802.11ac wireless card? Cheers

 

That's just the difference between how hard drive manufacturers count memory space and how Windows counts it. It's like this for all hard drives, regardless of it being a SSD or platter type. A 1 TB hard drive when seen in Windows is only like 930 GB of space...

 

Hey guys,


Can someone explain whether the 740M specs listed above are decent and will perform well enough for modern gaming?

I just purchased a HP envy 15
4700QM
8gb DDR3
750gig HD
and the 740m GPU
no optical disk drive

Basically I'm feeling a bit cheated about the GPU. I looked it up on my cellphone instore and the stats for the 740M seemed reasonable and in line or slightly updated from the 650M, but now I see that it's DDR3, not DDR5, that the bus is 64 not 128, and that the bandwidth is thus massively compromised.

Well, that's what I'm reading here anyway if I understand it correctly.

Can someone tell me whether these figures support that statement? Or do those figures show pretty good performance?

I still have the option of returning or at least exchanging the laptop.

 

Oh, and one more question:

Is it possible to swap out the 740M for a 750M post-purchase? It seems to be that the 750M is significantly better, and if I'm finding that the 740M is not good enough would it be possible to buy the part and swap it myself?

 

Hi , no it does not , only N . but is an Intel 2 x 2

 

Yar, mine came with the Intel N-2230. Waiting for my HP sales advisor to follow-up as he had confirmed that the j006TX comes with wireless AC.