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

If someone finds this please repost link to it here.

 

Finally found it: http://forum.notebookreview.com/6468855-post6307.html
If that doesn't work, try messing around with the settings a little more.

There is also an Envy 14 trackpad discussion thread, but it's the same trackpad as on the Envy 15, so it might be helpful.

Here is a page that appears to have some useful stuff (scroll down): http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-envy-hdx/502589-e14-trackpad-discussion-only-3.html

 

What's the competition to the envy 15 like? I have the i7 version, 4GB ram, dual SSD's.. and I like it, except the left hand quick launch keys ANNOY the heck out of me. The touchpad as well.

I was looking at macbook pro's, but their specs don't match up to our Envy's. Are there any others out there with island keyboards?

 

The only thing that honestly is near the build quality and spec wise of our envy 15 is the dell studio xps 16 but its got 2 major flaws that prevent it from coming close...

1. vent and screen placement, the screen when tilted back blocks nearly half of the only vent the laptop has (only has one fan)

2. Throttle issue, apparently the dell engineers think the machine is too powerful so they need to have it clock down when it just starts to get hot

 

I would add to the list of tweaks Momentum Glide under the Pointer settings is quite important to improving the touchpad experience.

 

I realize this is old, but I need help. How the heck did you get 15wh out of yours? I did everything you did except the gpu underclock and mine has never been below 20. Does the underclock really make that much difference? How do I do it?
I want 3 hours so badly...

also my temps are around 50-55c when doing light browsing. That can't be good.

 

The quick launch keys can be disabled, do a search it is quite simple.

 

Anyone know how much battery life this can get with Wi-Fi off? i.e. for taking notes during class.

edit: Preferably with an i5 processor, but if you only know for an i7, I'll take it.

 

1:45 max with the i7 820qm. WiFi + Bluetooth off, brightness 35-40%.

I use a second 6 cell as well though, so I get 3:30 total.

 

With an i5, you're going to be approaching 3 hours. An SSD instead of a spinning drive will give you a few extra minutes as well.

 

I consistantly get at least 3:15 (+) with the i5 540M while web browsing with IE 8 & 6+ tabs open, (fans off, BT off, 80% brightness). You need to do a clean install and get rid of all unecessary backround processes and services, for example I have 48 processes running at startup and my 'battery bar' disharge rate averages about 16.5Wh. I have previously posted, in detail, several tips, tweaks and links toward reducing backround activity and extending battery life.

Sorry but I am on a slow mobile connection now and cannot search for the these posts.

PS; I have 5 identical spec'd (except SSD + HDD) Envy's for my photography business and they all get similar battery life while being used for mobile image editing with Adobe CS4 and wifi off...

PPS; There is absolutely no HP software (except BIOS and 'drive guard') on any of our machines.

EDIT: Forgot that the above numbers for battery life are with the 5830 underclocked at 75/150 with AMD clock tool. This underclock setting seems to be very stable for everything while on battery.

 

I have 52 at startup, but I use digsby and a couple other things. I only have a HDD, I assume that would take up more watt hours than a SSD.

I just went through my processes and found one called "hp service," which is weird because I did do a clean install.

Did the critical battery at 2% and screwed with all the battery settings.

Also my temps for the GPU are around 55 and processor around 50. I thought it was supposed to be like 35? There's definitely some energy being wasted here.

And I just downloaded the AMD clock tool, but it says there are no devices found?

Sorry I'm such a mess, but I really need that battery and I've searched this thread a lot for hints. I'm pretty close to returning it for a 14, probably should have just done that in the first place, before they shafted us with the $300 screen upgrade.

 

Thanks for this TIP. I have my processes down into the 50's and just underclocked the GPU. That finally pushed me down into the 15's (wH) for discharge rate. I may breach 3 hrs for the first time while surfing.

My trimmed list of running processes and services are great for basic machine use while on battery, but I also have times when I want to max battery life but need to run extra services for other types of work.

Is there some way to save some sort of services/processes profile so I can switch between different settings easily?

 

Nice, thanks for the battery life info, guys.

 

Does that have a big difference on the WH consumed? I suppose that's my next step. I'll bet you can set that up as a trigger somehow when you unplug your machine from the wall...

 

Has anyone had the problem where the Envy doesn't come out of sleep mode correctly? I open the case, the power light comes on, it seems to be running, but the screen is blank. I can't get it to do anything except by shutting it off by holding the power button for 5 seconds. Seems to happen about half the time.

 

Is it easy to replace the 500GB hard drive on the Envy 15 with a SSD later? I've never done anything like this before.

Also, I think I briefly read about problems the Envy 15 has with SSDs. Could anyone summarize for me what that was all about?

Thank you.

 

If anyone figures that out please do share . I guess someone with modest programming experience and lots of time can pull it off...

 

I'd look into it, but videos crash when I underclock my GPU. Something with the DXVA doesn't like the GPU being underclocked.

 

Is there anyone else that can't install the latest drivers for ATI 5830?

The latest working drivers for my Envy 15 are "ATI driver 8.670.5.1000" ( http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-drivers-software-forum/426181-drivers-hp-envy-15-intel.html). If I uppgrade beyond that, my external BenQ E2420HD won't work properly with 1920x1080 res. The picture gets smaller (so black lines appear on the top/bottom and in the corners), also when it's white background I can see some grey colored vertical/horisontal lines all over the screen.

When I try to install Catalyst 10.8 I just get an error message about something being wrong with the installation.

 

10.8's installed fine for me. Haven't tried it with an external monitor, though. Have you tried uninstalling the old drivers and then installing the new ones?

 

Odd, at those speeds (75/150) I have no issues even with 1080P video using WMP and/or iTunes HD video (720p I think), and Hi Def flash video plays just fine with Adobe media player....

Also I recall someone in the Envy 14 thread came up with a way to have selected OC clock speeds load on startup for gaming, I would assume there is a way to do the same when you switch to battery but I don't know how to set that up, it only takes me a few seconds to change it with the clock tool so really not a big deal for me .

 

I use MPC-HC, so I don't know. It just locks up hard when I try to play back my AVCHD files, but doesn't at standard clocks.

You can actually set up a shortcut to run the overclock/underclock automatically, you don't even have to type it in every time. I'll post the command line you put in your shortcut when I get home later tonight.

 

Thanks. Will there be a way to have it just change the clocks automatically when you unplug the AC cord? Or is that what your posting?

 

I have no idea about the power cord link, but it's a single command to change the clocks instead of having to open up the GUI and manually put in the values and apply them.

 

Someone asked about the best Envy competition out there at the moment.

Best competition i've seen is the MSI GX660-60us or something like that. Can get from CompuPlus for around 1550 incl ship and tax etc.
as the folks at Xoticpc remark, (they sell pretty much all the enthusiast/gamer lappies) bang for buck it kills everything else out there at the moment. Sound is best i've EVER heard out of a laptop. 1080 screen, up to 12gig ram, 2 HD's, I740, 5870, built in Oclock AND underclock buttons, AND, full on fan button (gets amazing low temps at full tilt). Thinking hard about buying one myself. It's a very well designed unit.

Seer

Oh, and Blueray , two 3.0 usb ports to boot

 

Edit: nevermind. Looked at the wrong 660. But the correct one still weighs 2.5lbs more than the default Envy 15 configuration, and is a bit thicker, not to mention not really having the clean look of the Envy, but more the "gamer" look.

 

JJB - thanks for responding.

I tried the critical battery at 0% and do nothing, but like it says, it does nothing. Instead of hibernating, it just shuts off and on restart it thinks it crashed and wants to go into safe mode. So I set it at 2% and hibernate.

My computer was doing the same thing approximately - on for an hour, light browsing, and yet it never fails to reach above 50. I played Left 4 Dead for not even 10 minutes and it got up to 68. I'm starting to think there's something wrong. There's a good chance it's going back to HP.

Also, thanks for that link for the clock tool, it worked and I'm at 75/150 right now, I'll have to wait to see how it affects my battery and temps.

 

Yes, I have tried to uninstall all ATI drivers and software, but everytime the same thing with the external screen. It's very annoying as I mainly use the laptop as a desktop.
I can install everything from the 10.8, except for the videocard driver. When I update the videodriver to newer than "8.670.5.1000", the external won't work as it should.

 

Looks like HDMI out works fine with the 10.8's on my machine. It's gotta be something with your configuration

 

Critical battery 'level' to 0% will not work, it just defaults back to 7% (IIRC), what I was talking about is an actual command line you run that changes the Critical Battery "Action" to 'Do Nothing', so it overrides the critical battery minimum of 7% thus gaining an additional 7% of battery life.

As for your temps, if you are seeing 50C+ with light browsing then you have something using the CPU in the backround (I don't even see near 50C with the fans always 'off' while browsing). As a test just turn off the machine for about 30 minutes, boot it up with no apps running (except temp monitor your using) also open Task Manager > Proccesses Tab and click the word 'CPU' at the top of that column (it will list the highest usage processes at the top). You should have 0% CPU usage 98+% of the time with the occassional flicker of 1 - 3% (mostly 'system idle process'). Are the temps still hitting 50C+ with no apps open ??

Once your temps stabilize they should be similar to the ones I posted earlier. Then open up your browser and do your normal surfing where you were seeing the 50C temps and whatch Task Manager to see what the CPU is doing. Note, if properly set up, after you complete any 'task' the CPU should drop 0% within 1 or 2 seconds

Edit: With the SSD's we do not use hibernate (actually disabled it to free up disc space) we only use 'sleep' mode and with the 'Battery Bar' app we get an 'idiot proof' low battery warning and critical battery warning popup so we know when to shut down or save data...

 

Okay - did all that - for about 10 minutes, the temps were pretty low compared to before. 43 for graphics card, 35-40 for processors. I then opened my browser, and within a few minutes all temps jumped about 5 degrees. I'm at 48 for the graphics card and 40-45 for the processors. (and yes, the processor stayed at 0% jumping up on rare occasion a couple %)

The thing I'm worried about though is that the bottom is uncomfortably hot - I definitely would not enjoy putting bare skin on this. The palm rests are just moderately warm. What happened to running cool to the touch? I thought I heard that somewhere. Maybe it was the 14...

By the way, as I finish typing this I'm back at 53 for the graphics card, processors upper 40s.

I think I just had bad judgment when I got this - I'm a student so portability and battery life SHOULD matter more to me than graphics power and screen size. I think I'm going to return it for the 14.

Thanks again JJB.

 

The command line you put into the shortcuts is something like this:

"C:\Program Files (x86)\AMD GPU Clock Tool\AMDGPUClockTool.exe" -eng=550 -mem=1050

And then you just run the shortcut, it pops up a window for a brief second and then you're running at the faster clocks. I haven't gotten it to actually restore the default voltages (run the normal frequency changing profile) without opening the actual GUI, though.

 

Thanks Pitabred. I put that command into a batch file that also uses the powercfg command to change power profiles and the tskill command to stop extra services.

Works great! Now, before i unplug I can just run the bat file and my video card underclocks, power config changes, and extra services I don't need stop.

Now to make a plugged in bat to restore full power settings and services when plugged back in.

If anyone knows a way to auto-trigger a bat/cmd file on plug and unplug of power, plz post it.

 

hey i recently played borderlands on my envy 15 and with in 15 min the temp of the cpu were as high as 85 C .....is this normal....? and the fans where at full speed.....the amount of sound the fans made me scared...i immediately quit the game.....?..what shd i do?? help me thks

 

@yashavi08

The issue is that v-syncs not enabled so the gpu is processing as many frames as it can... I can't remember off the top of my head if borderlands has a option for v-sync in game or not but it does not then the ati control panel should be able to force it on.... v-sync caps the frame rate at 60ish fps that way the gpu does not have to run more then it has too. When I play any game it usually takes about 2 hours before I hit the max temp my laptop gets at 78ish c

 

Any chance you could upload those .bats?

 

I'm still working on picking what processes I want to stop and creating each bat.

Here's the text in my test.bat. Note that the ID of your power profiles will differ from mine, and you'll need to figure out which processes you want on/off. Also note, if you kill dependent processes, try to do so in reverse order of dependence. This is very true for starting linked services as well (do so in regular order, not reverse). Check service dependencies in control panel/computer management.

REM ------------ begin bat file --------------
REM batch file to change powercfg profile, underclock video, and stop vmware services

REM the powercfg command loads profiles based on their GUID. To see the GUID's that corrospond
REM to your power plan names, open a command window and type 'powercfg -list'
powercfg -setactive a1841308-3541-4fab-bc81-f71556f20b4a

REM pitabred's cmd line to adjust gpu clocks - mod eng and mem as desired.
"C:\Program Files (x86)\AMD GPU Clock Tool\AMDGPUClockTool.exe" -eng=75 -mem=150

REM tskill stops processes. You can follow tskill with the process id or process name. Wildcards are excepted.
REM the line below kills all of my vmware processes in one shot.
tskill VM*

REM ------------- end bat file --------------

 

Hello guys, I received my envy 15 today and so far I'm loving it. One thing I noticed is that the palm rest area, especially the right side, is always warm no matter what I'm doing. I also played a full HD movie with Quicktime and it got so hot (the right area the most, I guess that's where the graphics card is) that i thought the computer would burst in flames
My Envy model is a 1100. Any suggestinons to solvethese issues? I already upgraded the BIOS and graphics card drivers and tried to lower the cpu voltage but wasn't able to find that option in the BIOS.

 

Actually the right of the palm rest is the hard-drive.... the drive hp uses tends to get hot. When I switched it out for my 640gb wd drive it never ever got hot again

 

And there is no adjustment for voltage in the BIOS.

 

Does anyone have any numbers on how the anti-glare screen compares the the glossy screen?

 

I had both side by side. Going from memory here..... Glossy brightness 220 nits vs 170 nits, Glossy contrast ~ 550:1 vs 400:1, Glossy is much sharper vs. the AG screen which difuses sharp lines and colors. As a photographer the AG was a no go and returned to HP but some people seem to love it for the AG coating, I personally thought the glossy was easier to see in bright daylight do to the higher brightness and contrast. The above numbers were after calibration with spyder3....

PS; The AG coating is no where near as high quality as the MBP

 

Could someone shoot a vid of their FHD anti-glare screen? Preferrably in shot in 720p or greater, and if you could compare it to a home PC LCD screen or another laptop all with the same image on it that would be awesome. The ONLY vid I saw of the anti-glare screen was a 4 second one on Youtube. There is also a review of an Envy with anti-glare but he shows the screen up close, so it really looks like any other screen at that point.

 

@Bhima

That is really a pointless request, there is no way viewing the two screens (or just the AG) on a video will in any way show you how the screen looks in real life. As a pro photographer I even attempted still shots of the glossy and AG side by side and there is just no way to get the differences to show with anything that would be close to what they actually look like in front of your own eyes, just to many variables to capture accurately. That's why no computer or display manufacturers (even Apple) attempt to show the display quality differences between various resolutions and types in brochures, websites or video. It just doesn't work.

 

Wonderful info, thank you very much. I was looking at the anti-glare display since I would like to use it outside, but it looks like it's not worth it. Especially if the glossy display is relatively easy to see in daylight like you said.

 

JJB is right about the screens, I have the anti glare and for my personal uses it's perfect for me, While I have seen my friends FHD glossy screen it does look brighter and more vivid, I still like mine anti glare

 

Thanks guys. Just thought of something else:

Is it possible to buy an extra battery for this separately (not when you order the Envy itself)? I don't see it on the HP website.

 

I totally disagree with the idea that a video would be useless. It would provide many representative points:

1) Viewing angles for each
2) a representative view of contrast between two different monitors
3) Shows how evenly lit each monitor is from top to bottom of the screen.

Of course, it won't show perfect color accuracy or contrast, but at least we can see them relative to each other. If Glossy is that much better with contrast, as long as the camera is decent that is shooting the vid, you would be able to see that the glossy screen has better contrast, and you would get a generally good sense for HOW much better its contrast is in real world useage. You just wouldn't be able to see its EXACT contrast range or color accuracy.

I know we all love numbers, nits, GBs etc... but at the end of the day, some type of visual representation is better than no visual representation at all.

 

For those of you with SSD's, I just found THIS thread on slow SSD performance with the PM55 and HM55 intel chipsets. In it I found some interesting posts of SSD 4K speed comparison while booted in safe mode vs. normal bootup.

I did some quick tests and was floored at the improvement on my 4K random R/W speeds (and overall speed improvements) while in safe mode. This to me seems to point to some driver, process or service causing the poor 4K R/W numbers with the computer booted normally and not the controller as previously thought.

Anyone have any ideas on how to determine what is loaded (or running) when booted normally that is causing the reduced R/W numbers?? It appears while in safe mode the 4K numbers are almost where they should be so what is causing the bottlerneck ??

Here are 4 crystal disc runs, first 2 booted normally with and without write cache on, the second 2 are when booted in Safe Mode, with and without write cache on. Look at the vast improvement overall in safe mode..... (I have the intel X18M G2 160Gb drives with the older 2CV102HA firmware)

normal boot write cache on

normal boot write cache off

safe mode boot write cache on

safe mode boot write cache off

Edit: It appears that the slowdown may be due to a CPU power state setting (CE1 ?) that we have no way to adjust in our BIOS. The thread (link at top) shows that if you run Crystal Disk while running Super Pi or prime 95 then the 4K (an other) numbers actually improve dramatically since the 'power state' is overidden due to the high CPU load demand. This appears to be true to an extent in the Envy 15, here is my results while running Super Pi in the backround (normal boot with write cache off) note the 4K numbers compared to the first two CDM runs above (normal boot):

View attachment 55122

Edit 2: This is crazy, just ran it again (normal boot) with the Everest 100% burn in test running (2.8 Ghz to all 4 threads @ 77C) and the results of CDM are even faster. It seems the harder you push the CPU the fatser your 4K R/W speeds get, just makes no sense to me See below:

View attachment 55125

Note: All CDM runs above were run with the 'High Performance' Power Plan setting