HP ENVY 14 vs. Macbook Pro 13 for music production?

Even as a PC user I was strongly leaning towards the Macbook Pro 13" for a music production laptop choice (running Ableton, Logic, Protools, VST's etc) and live DJing (Traktor or Final Scratch).

The main reason for why I was leaning to MBP was the stability and sound quality (the electrical grounding and lack of noise on the audio line).

Then recently I find out that HP just released the ENVY 14, which has many features I like, (power, expandability, graphics and Beats Audio) at a considerably better value, especially because it's a PC and software/OS-wise that is more appealling to me.

So now I am questioning what I should do...should I go for the music industry standard of Mac, or is the ENVY 14 a machine that will meet my picky music production requirements (mainly power/memory and audio quality i.e. no noise, hiss, interference)

Anyone have a professional opinion on the HP ENVY 14 as a choice for music production vs. the Macbook Pro??

 

I would love to hear from music producers or club djs, owners of ENVY 14 that are music producer/club djs that are currently using the ENVY 14 or BEATS audio or anyone who can compare the differences between the ENVY with BEATS series vs. Macbook Pro series.

Thanks!

 

The jury it still out on the envy 14's capabilities as not many people have received their 14's yet. But the first of the big shipments are set to arrive in the next couple of days, so give it about a week or so and you'll definitely have a more definitive answer cuz I;m sure the nbr community will put their machines through vigorous testing.

 

Thanks for the replies. I am pretty familiar with the side by side specs. What I hope to receive as info is more on the sound output and stability of the Envy 14 vs. the Macbook pro. as it relates to music production and live music performance and DJing.

Macbook pro is pretty widely accepted as being well grounded (no noise on the audio line in/out) and a stable system (less chance of crashing while performing live). These are the most attractive features to me for music production.

I can tell from the specs that the Envy 14 will have more than enough processing power, memory, storage, graphics and general mobility features for my purposes.

What I need is some reviews or feedback on specifically how it sounds/performs for music production and live music performance and DJing.

Thank you!

 

A lot of music producers and engineers use PC. If you want to just use the line out then neither. Get a external sound card and go from there.

 

I too produce my music. I use Virtual DJ Pro, Ableton Live, and Waves along with 2 CDJ - 400's as controllers. I have run Virtual DJ Pro on a Mac Book Pro and the plus was that the CDJ's didnt require drivers. I run the rest on my old Dell Inspiron E1505 and they run really well but my Dell has much better speakers than what the Macbook Pro's have. I highly doubt that the Envy 14 will be anything less than my Dell.

As a DJ, I hope to God the Envy will not be a let down. I love mixing Deadmau5 non-stop.

Oh BTW, Deadmau5 (If you know who that is) uses 2 laptops to create music and 2 macbook pros during shows because they have a better program for lighting or something or other... In an interview i watched of him (i'll try and find it), he said that he would much prefer to use him PC's during shows because he can do a lot more improv.

I dunno if that helps you or not but I just thought you should know

 

The main reason people use macintosh for audio are that in the old old old days, before PC as we know it existed, people were using macintosh and atari for music... atari is gone now, mac still exists, the old timers are still using their macs so yeah its "industry standard", but so is PC now... they are both used in the industry. Mac has been used *longer* than PC is what you really meant to say, but I say so what, that doesn't make it better or more suitable. Some people are still using 20yr old atari systems to make music, so its really just a personal preference thing in the end

Another reason people use mac is because those who used logic now have no choice, because apple bought the emagic company and killed logic on the PC platform, all the logic users had to go out and buy a mac weather they liked it or not! Sounddiver used to link up with old versions of logic, it was a really valuable feature for people with hardware synths, apple killed that too. They really have neglected musicians by killing off sounddiver.

 

Ok but he didn't ask for this and probably he already knows. He's a producer.

He asked about info about the HP envy and cited particulary one important thing to him, that makes the mac stands out: no noise over the out line. We now of maaaany pc laptops with terrible noises from the line out. He just wants to know if the HP envy 14 is good or not good in this area.

We will have to wait about a week or so to get more reviews and know about this =) patience my friend.

Edit: edited bc of grammar errors. English's not my native language.

 

To be honest, none of us are going to be able to tell you until we get our computer. I dont get mine until early august due to shipping delays but the first programs I plan on installing are DJing software. I'll be sure to post what I think here

 

I realize that most people haven't event received their computers yet...but I am patiently awaiting reviews from those who have or will soon.

I have been reading other posts and one topic was interesting but I'm unsure on the answer:

Is it better to use firewire and/or usb to get your sound signal as a digital out (lets say to an external sound card or other music equipment) to minimize noise/latencey vs. using the analog line out?

 

He mentioned stability, software, OS, and industry standards as his concerns also, so yes he did ask about the things I addressed. Nobody knows yet how the sound quality will be because there are no musicians or DJs with one yet, but we know it is surely going to be better than the average laptop with realtek audio components. An envy14 engineer has mentioned that the sound system is identical to the one in the envy15.

 

Well... To get a stereo output, you'll need an external sound card I'm afraid.

 

no, you need the headphone jack you putz

 

Since he is a DJ, he will be connecting it to a mixer, a mixer needs two outputs... a headphone jack is just one output, therefore producing mono-sound.

 

you can use a Y-splitter, which yields both channels as separate outs, a lot cheaper and more convenient to carry around.

 

That just produces two mono sounds. I used to do that but then the person I DJ with got an external sound card and its amazing how much better it sounds. It might just be me, but I prefer the external sound card. Yes, A Y splitter works, but its still not the proper way. Just sayin...

 

Apparently the envy 14 has two analog audio outs.


YouTube - HP ENVY 14 and ENVY 17 hands-on


One a straight output, the other a combo audio out/in so you can choose to output from two sources.


As to options (like, do those two outs send identical signals only, or can you send different audio streams out of each individually), not sure, ask one of the guys who already got their 14s.

 

I recorded several musicians including myself on my Envy 13, and the recordings were extremely clean. One of the recordings I did was through a USB mic, and when I played the recording back for friends, they couldn't believe the quality (although that mainly has to do with the mic, not line noise).

What I'm trying to say is, I never heard any line noise from my Envy 13. Granted, this is the 14 we're talking about, but I predict that the systems will be very similar.

Oh, and hey, what do you know. I got my Envy 14 in the mail today. Guess it's testing time. I'll reply back with my experience as soon as I get the software installed.

Some other things about my experiences recording with the Envy 13:

- Windows 7 is very stable. I don't normally use cnet as a viable source, but they did a side by side test of OSX and W7, and W7 actually came out on top as the more stable one. They got the spinning balloon on the mac fairly often compared to W7, which didn't freeze at all.
- Like you stated, the hardware is definitely not an issue. It's way more powerful than it needs to be.
- Software really isn't much of an issue anymore. Apple is well known for Logic because it's their main recording software. On PC, you don't have that one universal program, but you have access to so many different choices. This has its positives and negatives, but in the end, I've never come across anything that my software couldn't do that a macbook would have been able to.

Hope this helps. I'll be sure to update when I have my 14 running.

 

Yeah I was gonna say if you plan on using it for any serious mixing/recording/performing, an external sound card would be optimal. I plan on getting an Envy 14 as my portable DAW using an external USB audio interface.

That being said, I still like clean audio on mah headphone jack, so I'll be eyeing this thread very carefully. I won't be able to order mine till the 25th

 

a headphone jack outputs in stereo....

 

IS anyone experiencing hissing with headphones, because I am not.

 

Maybe wait for the Beats Edition E14?

 

Youre not understanding what im saying.... A mixer which connects to DJ turntables needs to have two inputs. Splitting the connection of one headphone jack will not work the same as having two separate outputs. I do not know how the two headphone jacks that are already pre-installed will work but i know from first hand experience that you cannot simply split the connection and get the sound that you want.

 

Most DJs use USB or Firewire based audio soundcards to bypass any builtin audio. The idea is to reduce latency as much as possible. Professional DJs work with lossless files and may require bit-perfect output, which is sometimes extremely hard to do with builtin soundcards.

What IIM3 means by DJ turntables requiring 2 inputs is that turntables mix multiple inputs based on your DJing.

However, the Envy 14 should be able to provide 2 outputs. If I am not mistaken, the internal audio is based on Intel's Azalea. It is supposed to be able to output 2 separate streams to whichever jack you choose. Though it may seem that both jacks on the Envy 14 output the same stream, that is the default behavior. You should be able to change this.

I am stating this based on my experience with the Envy 17, which has the same IDT.

 

Well metril, I hope you're right. I run 2 CDJ-400's and a Denon 120 through my computer and i just have two mono-sounds coming out. But I hope my E14 will be better than my current Dell Inspiron E1505

 

Or the better solution would be to get 2 usb sound cards and use them.

 

Thats what I am one step away from doing... Just a lot of money...

 

splitting a stereo output into 2 separate channels, magically gives "2 seperate outputs" wow! seriously man, why do you think its any different? they are just channels, you don't even have to use them as L and R if you don't want to.

 

Kind of bummed about the lack of pro-audio knowledge in this thread. As a working audio engineer and dj, here's the deal:
-Nobody in their right minds would use built-in audio for anything remotely serious, they use usb or firewire audio interfaces.
-DJ's need AT LEAST 2 stereo outputs, that means all this y-splitting nonsense is just that: nonsense
-The quality of a laptop in the field of pro-audio or live music performance is based almost entirely on its firewire chipset (Texas Instruments chipsets are a must) and its irq/buss setup.
-If there is no firewire port, then the issue becomes the expresscard slot...is there anything sharing the expresscard buss?
-I've been a pc user all my life but that last point has been the bane of my existence...most pc manufacturers don't give a rat's about the firewire chipset, which means that we get stuck with some ty chipset that simply doesn't cut it for pro-audio....AND laptop mfgs often put 9000 things on the usb busses making the possibility for an interrupt very high (interrupts will give you dropouts or glitches.

I would love to hear the review of any of the envy series by someone who is using it to run some heavy ableton live sessions or by someone who is running a dj program like serato or Traktor. Can anyone tell me how they're doing with those programs?

 

I plan on running Ableton and Waves once I get mine (august 3rd... been delayed 3 times)

 

I will say that Me and my friend had my ENVY and his MACBOOK PRO 13 inch 2009 and his definetly had a better base. Mine had much better depth in the sound and was crisper for sure but when a song played with alot of base mine fell short of his sadly

 

you talking speakers or headphones?

 

Lulz!

We're all producers, right?!

And then we woke up, and realized, we'd never be famous.

 

I hope you all realize, the Envy "beats" edition is nothing more than a marketing ploy. What makes the beats sound "better"? From the HP website, it's software, NOT hardware. Plus real musicians would never use the onboard audio anyways, they'd plug it in to via usb to an external soundcard: 1) for latency 2) because internal sound cards are notoriously bad with regards to shielding from magnetic and electrical interference.

You also realize that no true musician/producer/dj would ever listen to the sound from the cheezy onboard speakers. We all plug in via HDMI or headphone to RCA to a real amp/receiver.

 

Both speakerwise and headphone wise, the Envy has better sound quality than a MBP 13, especially if you use JJB's tweak (link on first page of owners lounge). I would know, I have both.

 

This guy put up a video comparison between the mbp 15 and the envy 14.


YouTube - envy 14 vs macbook pro comparision part 1 of 2


He seems the think the speakers sound better on the mbp, which they probably do, but then so does a Toshiba for half the price. No one so far has done a similar comparison of headphone jack out quality compared to others. Though I guess that would be hard to demo in a video to show others. But no one has commented on it in that format as far as I can tell.

 

Honestly comparing laptop speakers is like comparing which rotten fruit tastes better.

 

SO true, the last good speakers I ever heard in a laptop was the OLD HP DV5000 ( roughly 6 year pld tech with the Altec speakers )
and the integrated IDT, Realtek and Cirrus logic Audio is kind of pathetic

 

I heard that there's an amplifier in the Envy and that's the only thing of substance that the "beats" thing adds.

 

What? You mean just knowing that Dr. Dre personally rocks out with each Envy coming off the assembly line at the factory with a robot assistant isn't enough to make you buy it? Why do you think there were so many shipping delays?

I mean, I saw on TV there is a robot that magically inserts Dr. Dre's beats power into every envy.

 

Well I don't know about the MBP 15 sound quality. I haven't toyed enough with one of those.

 

I was talking speakers...no headphones just sond off the computer speakers

 

Does ayone know how to configure the audio settings on the control panel for maximum quality?? like if you ha db levels for each spot that would be great

 

Did anyone run Protools on Envy 14 ?

I plan on running USB Audio Interface M-Audio Fast Track Pro, to record vocals, and instruments.
My current HP DV4-1117nr struggles with this, giving me a weird blip noise every 20-30 seconds.. and occasionally I will have to change the H/W Buffer because everything would be so distorted. also a few DAE errors due to 5400rpm hdd.

Has anyone tried it with protools ? (7.4, cause it works on win7)

Will the i5 520 will be enough for Pro Tools or should I consider going for the i7?

 

a month +... and no one tried protools on ENVY ?!!?

 

I use ProTools on the Envy15, but I don't do any recording, just things like replacing dialogue in D/M/E tracks, etc.

I don't have a pro mic, or any USB audio hardware. do you want me to try something specific? my CPU is the i7-820QM.

 

I'm a music producer (Deep House / Nu Jazz ) and use a PC. I'd say half my DJ/composer friends use Macbooks and the other half use Envy's/other PC's.

The Envy is a better deal over all. If you got money growing on trees, then grab the MBP. Keep in mind they're 2500$ after student discount USD for all the futureproof specs you'll need (my trip hop music producer friend just bought it for that much).

 

I have a home studio, nothing fancy but it's cool. For some time, I couldn't decide whether to buy a mac or a pc. At the end of the day it really comes down to buying a machine that runs the software that you want to use to produce your music. Hence, if you plan to use logic, then buy a mac. Otherwise, it does not really matter whether you get a mac or a PC. I would recommend that you keep your machine as a dedicated machine to music. In other words, don't use your laptop for anything other than music. I myself use cubase so I ended up buying a pc to save some extra $$$. I used the extra money to buy a firewire recording interface and a mic.

 

I DJ house music on CDJ-1000Mk3's and DJM-800 without Traktor/Serato etc, but I have tried them (playing around). I make music with Ableton, a Clavia Nord Modular G2, and some other stuff. So this is my opinion, coming from that background, on some comments in the thread as well as somethings you should think about:

1. Do you currently produce music? If so... do you use Logic? Logic doesn't work on Windows since version 5.5... so if you plan on using Logic or do use Logic this is kind of a big deal.

2. You need an external sound card. Splitting 1/8" out into master and cue is ridiculous, you can't DJ like that. I mean you can, but don't dream of being much more than a bed room DJ. You would be setting yourself up to lose.

3. You should be using a desktop to produce. If you are using any MIDI instuments it gets old real quick plugging and unplugging your audio interface, MIDI cables, RCA, 1/4", and SPDIF, etc etc. I built a killer quad core desktop for $600, you could build something even less if you like. I use dual 1080p monitors and a Fast Track Ultra. When you are making music pixel count is a MUST. If you insist on a notebook for production you should be looking at Envy 15 with the 1920x1080. Additionally you need a lot of hard drive space and expandability... you need a dedicated machine that isn't getting filled with your other crap. It makes for a much more stable setup, you don't want your computer crashing off some virus, having to reinstall 40+ VST, 100GB's of samples and libraries, etc. Long story short, just get a desktop to produce, really!

So to sum it up. If you use Logic and insist on using a laptop to produce get a MBP. If you don't use Logic, get an Envy 15 if you insist on producing with a laptop (again, really don't recommend it). Otherwise get yourself an Envy 14 and use the money you saved off the MBP to get a desktop. Thats my 2 cents.

EDIT: Oh also, I don't know how experienced you are, but if you are on your way up learning, I do advise learning how to use CD turntables or vinyl seperate from the computer. It is much more difficult at first (obviously because you don't see a picture... you need to beatmatch by ear)... this makes you a way better DJ in the long run because you get more hours in, you gain compatibility with 99.9% of the club world, you understand how the songs interact MUCH better, you will know how to beatmatch for real, etc etc. I played with Virtual DJ and some other programs before I went to learn and it just doesn't compare in regards to learning - I found I was just kind of doing "Okay" and not really getting "Good". If after you learn you decide you rather use the computer, do it, the computer is a very powerful tool! But I would suggest you first learn how to put the beats together with your ears only... after all, music is just sound.

 

I posted something similar in the Envy Owner's Lounge. Super interested in getting some clarity on this.

Ok so, there are two audio outs on the Envy 14. I swear, if they just split a single signal I'm gonna laugh my a$$ off at how ridiculous it is to be human. "The evolutionary HP Envy is built for audio professionals yadda yadda..." oh yeah, except these two ports are forrrrrrrr, hmmm, err, we have no idea sir. Hp support, I kid you not, 30min worth. They have no idea what the two audio outs are for. It's like putting an extra ice tray in the freezer that won't hold water.

So what's the verdict on this? Is the Intel Azalia configurable? Can each 1/8" audio output be assigned independently? Ie:

Output1/Port1(stereo 1&2) for example playing Daft Punk Tron Legacy
Output2/Port2(stereo 3&4) for example playing Beenie Man Miss Thing

For those who are still confused, witness:
http://dominicfallows.co.uk/wp-content/plugins/wp-o-matic/cache/c2109_22jul09_audio2djws.jpg

. l