*HP Envy 15 (11XX / 12XX series) Owners Lounge!*

I would suggest leaving the Fan always on unless you like hot palms (not burning but hot). This coming from an i5-430M owner.

 

Hmm.. it didn't get warm at all yesturday after 3 hours of use but then again, all I did was fresh install windows 7 and a bunch of other stuff I use. I intend to use this in class so I was hoping it wouldn't make a sound if I'm not doing anything cpu intensive and this fan turning on every few minutes is kinda annoying. Are there any solutions to this? I noticed the fan that's turning in is on the right hand side so maybe a way to underclock the video card when it's on battery?

 

The video card already underclocks itself on battery, down to 100/200 (from 500/800 max).

 

Is it normal for the Envy not to wake up properly from sleep? I noticed I would leave it plugged in overnight lid closed (set to stay on) for antivirus scanning. But I accidently left sleep mode on to activate after 1 hr idle. I open the lid and it would power up the fans but the screen would be blank. I would have to manually power down again with the power button (which puts it back into sleep mode for me) and turn it on again to resume my work. Is this a bug?

 

Doesn't happen to me, do you have all your drivers updated?

 

Yep a clean reinstall of win7 with all drivers.

 

I have had the GPU clocked down as low as 50/100 which is only stable with non graphic intensive applications open (basic Word files etc), at this setting at idle the GPU fan almost never kicked on. Your ambient temps also make a big difference in how often the fans work, with the new f 26 BIOS it seems that the GPU fan runs when temps are above 52C. If you are going to use any large apps I would go with a minimum of 65/130 speeds which should help the fans cycle less while still allowing most functionality (except video). You basically need to figure out at what temp your GPU fans cycle on and then see if you can find a underclock setting that keeps it below that temp (keeping in mind that the room temp will impact it).

Edit: All of the above is when running on battery power...

 

Prospective buyer here.

Is there any store out there that has a display model for the Envy line? and maybe the dv6 as well?

 

It happens to me also. Never figured out the root of the problem yet. Clean installs/latest drivers and still same sporadic problem. Hopefully its not a hardware issue.

 

Same thing happens when i hibernate it... Usually its at the login screen so if I blindly type my password it then logs in and works...its the only thing that pisses me off about my envy

 

What program do you use to clock the gpu down? amd gpu clock tool?

 

I just got my envy 15 yesterday. I really like the form factor and the anti glare screen. I have 21 days to try it out and then either keep it or return it for envy 14. How much better is the Radiance screen compared to the anti-glare on the envy 15 ? So far I like the screen size of the 15. (I am coming from gateway p6860 w/ T9300 CPU).

Also is it easy to upgrade the internal hdd to OCZ Vertex 2 SSD ?

 

"Better" is subjective. The Radiance screen is going to be brighter, but it will have sharp reflections on it. It depends entirely on where you use your Envy. If you prefer glossy screens, get the Radiance. If you don't, the anti-glare is one of the few matte options in laptops any more.

It's not "easy" to upgrade the internal hard drive. There are a lot of screws, and a pressure fit tiny ribbon cable for the mouse that can be quite finicky. But if you're pretty mechanically apt, you can probably manage it. That is one benefit of the Envy 14... they made the hard drive much easier to access, from what I was hearing.

 

for who wants a cheap envy 15, here it is

NX369AAR#ABA-CRM7 Refurbished HP ENVY 15t W7HP-64 i5 430M 2.26GHz 300GB 4GB 15.6HD(1366x768) BV 1GB Cam NIC WLAN BT 2-in-1 Rmkt NB PC $1,039.00 $779.25

 

Thanks for the info on the radiance screen. I am not a fan of glossy screens as one of my uses is for photo editing using Photoshop. I have opened up and done upgrades to few laptop, so I should be able to upgrade this one, but I hope I don't have to remove or go through any warranty stickers. I really want to get my hands on the Vertex 2 drive. My only other concern is the heat issue. I will have to just wait and see how it works out over next couple of weeks. I ended up getting the thin underside battery for it too, that should get me about 7 hrs of runtime.

 

There are no stickers to remove to remove the keyboard, but you still should only do it after you decided to keep the laptop. I recommend downloading the manual because it will tell which screws you need to remove, because when I did it, i unscrewed some that were not required.

Also, did you try the slice battery yet, because I am experiencing a problem with it where the laptop does not recognize it and you have to keep taking it off and putting it back (sometimes several times before it finally recognizes it).

 

Awesome thanks. Found one off ebay brand new sealed for $55 bucks...free shipping.

I would still want to use a slim 90W from Kensington if somoeone gotten it to work

 

Oh yeah, I will only do the upgrade if I keep the laptop. No point in going through the hassle of upgrading only to return it.

I plugged the slice battery in yesterday, and it recognized it right away. I just did a quick test, and plugged in and removed the slice battery, while the computer was on, and it detected it right away. I had to unplug and replug my charger for the battery notification to go from (Plugged in, Not Charging) to (Plugged in, Charging). Take a look at the pins on the slice battery and see if any are bent, or not pressed in

 

I think it is a common slice battery problem (at least older models). Do you know what bios version you have, because i have an older version but I am afraid to update it because of reports of bricking the laptop. It is quite annoying actually. Like i put it to charge only to find out that it didnt recognize the battery thus didnt charge it. So first i have to turn on the laptop to make sure the battery is detected and than start charging.

 

My bios is at F.24. The latest on hp.com is F.26

 

Alright thanks. I believe the f.24 is the bios that people had problems with.
I'll do some research on F.26 and see if it is safe to upgrade, and then will report back.

 

I am going to get a used envy 15 2nd gen from NBR marketplace... Any major issues about the laptop which i should know about and anything which i should check when purchasing this laptop... Temp... driver issues... How is 5830 compared to GTX260m in M15x... or 5870m...

 

I had an M15X with a 260M, the 5830 is not as powerful, but its pretty darn close in actual gaming. the 5870 blows both of those cards out of the water (as does the 5850)

 

I had problems with f18 or something a while back. f.24 has been great for me, much lower temps, I won't be updating again unless the temps are lower (f.26 runs hotter)

 

I have noticed the same higher temps ever since i moved to F.26. Do you have the F.24 Bios file by any chance?

 

FYI, F .24 is the one that was bricking i5 CPU machines and HP pulled it off their website the day after mine was bricked. Johnnobts has an i7. I would like to revert back to f .18 from F .26 due to the slightly higher temps I'm getting, but I will not try F .24 again not worth the risk for me...

 

This is the only one that works with the 5830: HERE

 

This is what I heard, thus I am a bit hesitant. I want to update bios only because of hoping it will solve the annoying slice battery problem.
Also was anyone able to fix the battery slice problem with bios updates or is it something that is completely different?

 

hmmmmm. The i5 Envy I bought last week came with F.24. Is it just a problem with flashing to F.24 or does F.24 cause problems once you have it?

 

I believe it is when flashing, if it comes preflashed, you are fine.

 

I have an i7, but my motherboard was for the i5 model (non-usb 3.0)

 

@OhDima

I believe the slice connection issue is due to the actual contacts on the envy not making complete contact with the corresponding contacts on the battery. IIRC the fix on the original envy's was to gentle pry up the contacts on the bottom of the envy so they protrude out a bit more, then they made complete contact with the battery. This seemed to have gone away after the gen 2 was released though... I don't recall it ever being an issue with the BIOS.

@seayeo

My computer bricked while flashing to F 24 from F 18 (or F 1BA), they returned it with F 24 which seemed to be working fine, I had no trouble flashing to F 26 but now I wish I hadn't done so since my temps are a bit warmer at idle than before and I see no other benefits of F 26... It would be good if you could post your temps at idle with F 24 to compare differences with F 26. Also what CPU do you have?

Here is what I'm getting with F 26 during light browsing and 68f room temp:

 

@OhDima

i had a slice battery connection issue the day after i received it. the trick, for me, is to make sure the slice is positioned correctly. by that i mean exactly centered on the bottom of the laptop. the locks should slide easily - with little to no resistance. i called hp and this was the result of our discussions. i've had no other problems with it since then.

 

Just installed a major screen calibration update for my Spyder3 system and got some very interesting results. Below are screens showing color gamut, contrast / brightness specs and color temp curves etc... These results were taken from my Envy 15 Glossy 1080P display after creating a new photo editing .icc color calibration profile.

Bottom line is this display is quite accurate with almost 100% sRGB gamut and ~70% full RGB gamut. Contrast at 100% brightness is ~ 470:1 with a brightness level of 220 nits. Very respectable for a notebook TN screen and equal to (or better) specs than the MBP 15 (late '09 model).

Screen shots below and I will add 2 new icc profiles in next post;

 

2 New color profiles for the Glossy 1080P display;

This one is an update to my previous icc profile (90% bright...) that many of you are using. It is a general use calibration at 2.4 Gamma and 7500K color temp. It appears close to the previous one but a bit warmer and maintains color accuracy;

View attachment ENVY 15 NEW CAL 7500K 2.4G 5-26-2010 .zip

This one is a new Spyder3 (update version 4.0) Photo editing default calibration profile (2.2 gamma and 6500K) at 100% brightness. This is the icc profile used for the screen shots in my last post. Have not really tried to actually use it for photo editing yet but it looks quite good so far on most screens I have looked at. It is quite a bit warmer than the above profile but after 2 hours of using it for general work I think I like it better. When I just switched back to the above profile it looks very cold now...

View attachment NEW PHOTO DEFAULT 100% BRT.zip

Note: These may not look the same on all Envy 15's 1080P Glossy screens as HP now has 5 different display versions (P/N's) listed as replacement parts, so I have no idea what the differences are. It should work with the Anti-glare screen as well but have no idea how it will look since it is not nearly as bright as the glossy.

Installing these has been tricky in the past. Try just right clicking on the .zip file and select 'load profile'. Beyond that somebody else will have to post instructions as I use my Spyder software profile 'chooser' utility and not Win7 to change profiles.... IIRC there is a free app that will do a similar function from Xrite in the UK, maybe someone can post the link to the app if it works.

 

Hi, this is my first time ati graphic card laptop. Not sure if that is the problem but I have never had much problem with games, except with this laptop. Mostly sc2 is the problem (others have it as well as I found out on forums, including nvidia owners) and crysis warhead. Only other games I tried is eve, grid and mass effect 2 which all worked well.
Have others had problem with crashing due to graphics? since the laptop remains qite cool under gaming that is probably not the problem. I am not overclocking, which I would like to try but seems that I cannot, using ATI tool the clocking options are greyed out....
Which drivers are the best? That seems to be the most important part of this problem, right?

 

I play SC2 for hours at a time and I had it crash once or twice on the Envy. I reformatted win7 and reinstalled the drivers from this thread:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-drivers-software-forum/426181-drivers-hp-envy-15-intel.html

Hope that helps.

 

I assume you are a photographer and you've calibrate it as such, not for gaming?

 

I'm having problems with watching a 1080p movie on my Envy 15 while on battery, it is fine when plugged in. It lags every 5 seconds or so. I've set the battery profile to high performance. Are there other settings that I can change so I can watch 1080p movies fluently?

 

Weird.. I can watch movies just fine on battery using a variety of codecs.... Try using media player classic to watch items on the go...just run directx web update before using it... I can get about 2:45-3:20 of movie watching time

 

Thanks a lot for your work on calibrating these profiles. I am using your photo profile and it looks fantastic-it adds just the right amount of warmth to the picture. Going back to your other profiles (and windows default) looks too cold after using this one, so you're spot on about that. Overall it looks great looking at photos, HD content, and gaming.

 

Is there another place to buy the 9 cell slim fit battery? hp.com doesn't sell to canadians (boo!) and the hpshopping.ca site just times out..

 

Hmm you're right, works fine with media player classic. I was using vlc before, don't see why that would fail me when I'm on battery.. oh well, thanks a lot.

 

vlc does not have hardware acceleration.... so its using n oughting but CPU to play the video

 

The first profile is a good general purpose one and the second one is the calibration progams default for photo editing but I calibrated it at full brightness (220 nits) instead of 90 nits, this makes it color accurate at full brighness and its a bit warmer than the first one. Either should work fine for gaming.

When on battery the CCC 'power play' is enabled by default which throttles the GPU to 299/299 Mhz maximum. You can turn it off and regain full clock speeds of 500/800 but it will reduce battery life. I have never had any trouble watching 1080p material with power play enabled with WMP or iTunes, I think that maybe you are using a source or player that is trying to use the CPU instead of the GPU which means you are throttled to x9 clock speeds (1.3Ghz) on battery with the i5's. You can look at task manager during playback and see what percent the CPU is running at, WMP with 1080p uses about 3 - 7% CPU and itunes uses about 8 - 13%, so both of these are using mainly the GPU. Adobe media player chokes on 720p material while on battery and uses 50 -100% of the CPU....

 

Wow, never knew about that. Always thought the different players are about the same. Thanks for the info.

 

Cool thanks. I need that one since I do a lot of Photoshop / lightroom on this laptop. It rocks with CS5!

 

W00t, so I just ordered my Envy 2nd Gen. With the following specs . I'm so excited! Hurrah for $300 dollar coupons.

• Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
• Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-540M Dual Core processor (2.53GHz, 3MB L2 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.06GHz
• 4GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
• 500GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
• 1GB ATI Mobility Radeon(TM) HD 5830 Graphics - For i5 and i7-620M Processors
• 15.6" diagonal Full High Definition LED HP Ultra Brightview Widescreen Display (1920x1080)
• External Tray Super Multi 8X DVD+/-R/RW w/Double Layer Support with 2 USB Ports
• Webcam Only
• Intel Wireless-N Card with Bluetooth
• HP QuickWeb, Corel VideoStudio Pro X2, Corel Paintshop Pro X2, Stardock My Colors
• HP Keyboard
• One 6 Cell Lithium Ion Polymer Battery + One 9 Cell HP Envy Slim Fit Extended-Life Notebook Battery

How long does the slim fit battery last with the core i5?

 

Yes it does

 

One of the comments says he can not get it it work...hummmm Plus I recently tried it anyways because that is what I used to use as my media player... My cpu would hit around 20-30% watching a 1080p mkv but using wmp or classic it only hits 5-8%