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

Ordered mine =)

My specs:
• Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
• Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-430M Dual Core processor (2.26GHz, 3MB L2 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 2.53GHz
• 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
• 6 Cell Lithium Ion Polymer Battery


I'm coming from a Dell Studio 15:
• Windows 7 Home Premium 32-bit
• Intel Core 2 Duo T5850 @ 2.16GHz
• 3GB DDR2 RAM
• 320GB 5400RPM Hard Drive
• 512 MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3400 Series
• 15 inch 1200x800)
• Slot loaded DVDR/CDR

I'm hoping the Envy won't be as much of a pain to edit 1080p video from my camera. I'm thinking I probably should of upgraded the processor up a notch though..

 

If it's already in the build process I think you won't be able to upgrade, you'll have to wait until it's delivered and then return it, and then you might have to go through the hassle of having them honor the coupon when you reorder. If they had an easier process for upgrading I probably would have upgraded to the i5 520m (also got the 430m.. and I forgot about the external drive ), but after looking at the benchmarks that particular upgrade wasn't worth $100. In your case you probably should have gone with the i7 quad core for video editing. But either way, it'll be a great upgrade from your current machine..

 

Congratulations and welcome to the forum. Unless you contact them quickly after placing an order, it'll be too late. They'll tell you that you can place a new order, and they can attempt to cancel the original, or reroute it back to the warehouse after the build has been completed. I've had this happen before--it's no big deal.

Additional, there's a thread about external HP Blu-Ray drives--you may want to check into it if you decide the original DVD external isn't cutting it for you.

 

Yeah, it's too late.. But I'll probably just save the extra dough and enjoy a little less heat and a little more battery ;-)

after reading through a ton of pages on this thread I'm a little disappointed that the i5 doesn't have the extra RAM slots. Is that because HP is just trying to cut costs?

 

ordered one:
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Intel(R) Core(TM) i5-430M Dual Core processor (2.26GHz, 3MB L2 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 2.53GHz
4GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
320GB 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)
Webcam Only
Intel Wireless-N Card with Bluetooth
HP QuickWeb, Corel VideoStudio Pro X2, Corel Paintshop Pro X2, Stardock My Colors
HP Color Matching Keyboard
Extra 6 Cell Lithium Ion Polymer Battery
No Productivity Software
HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope


plus got 1 year completecare.

Hello Lounge!

 

Congrats and welcome to the new owners.

FYI, most of us know all the Envy configuration options. If you simply had stated got a '430M with 1080P glossy' we would know all the rest. You can also make a signature like you see below so when you post something your specs are already there.

There is also no real need to quote something like the entire list again to respond, you can just delete the stuff that is not pertitnent to your reply.

I keep reading complaints about how long this thread is and if we all use a little common sense we can reduce the number of pages quite a bit

 

From a longtime lurker, now a new Envy15 owner...

After playing around with the factory OS load, I proceeded with a wipe and install of Windows 7 Ultimate. I copied the swsetup folder prior to formatting, and using a mix of drivers from swsetup and the latest drivers thread I got everything working except for the OSD. I followed the instructions from QuadAllegory to install Silverlight, with MSMenu and one other MS application (MSWebcam in my case), but no go. I tried the installers in swsetup and the latest downloaded versions with the same failure. BTW how are the packages in swsetup supposed to be installed? When I run the setupISPBits.exe in each package's folder, I get an error about the extraction directory and the install quits. So I extract the installer manually from the self-extracting archive, but that doesn't seem to work consistently either. Am I doing something wrong?

In addition, not all of the QuickLaunch buttons work, specifically the MediaSmart menu key (I think that's the key - it's the one with the square root looking symbol). Do all of the MediaSmart apps need to be installed before it works?

Any help is appreciated. Thanks in advance!

 

@eliu01

For the on screen volume contol I would recommend this great little app: http://matt.malensek.net/software/ Just view the read me for some cool skins and features not readily apparent when you install it. (can't remember who originally posted this to give credit to...)

I hated the HP on screen volume as it always drops you out of full screen mode when doing any media playback or playing most games. Can't help you with the quick launch buttons other than to say that the file in SWsetup drivers for it has QLB in the name. I disabled them at startup because like most HP software it is useless with Win 7.

 

1. @ JJB - How are you running 1333 on the i5? I thought it doesnt run that fast on i5

2. So, if I ordered and my ship date is april 12 (it's already in production) then there is a decent chance I get g2s instead of g1s on my envy?

 

I think the most recent person who reported getting one within the last few days got G2s. Don't think we've heard from anyone else yet.

 

@stefen
considering the processor you're coming from, the i5 even in it's 430 form will seem blazing fast.
besides, unless you do video editing most of your time, you'll enjoy less heat and more battery life more than the increase in speed, I think

 

Mine came with G2 drives!! Yippie!!

My complaining paid off. Squeaky wheel gets the G2 disks.

 

Don't buy the worthless restore disks... I naively thought I was getting a Windows 7 disk. Instead it just restores more HP crap.

There was 23 gigs for the "restore" drive... really? Windows 7 comes on a 3.1 gig DVD. What is HP injecting that adds 20 more gigs?? I blew all that away and loaded my retail copy on a single new partition.

Also the inside of the machine was filthy. Grease and glue from fingerprints was all over anything... especially the heatsink pipes which has oxidized fingerprints permanently etched. Cleaning up it with Goo Gone fixed all that.

No crashing or GPU glitches -- even running OCCT and Furmark. I'm quite pleased so far.

 

Those "restore discs" which you can buy are what they used to physically include with laptops up until about 5 years ago. Now, you pretty much burn your own copy from the start--it's been that way for years.

There's no such thing as a restore drive--HP has it labeled as a RECOVERY partition, and mine is 12gb. No idea what you're talking about. More than likely you're saying you loaded the restore disc and got a factory install with 23gb on your OS partition? If so, that sounds about standard--20gb worth of that is base Win7, so what's to complain about?

OR, are you saying that the disc you got has only HP applications on it and no OS? If that was the case, then that sucks.

 

It was just over 23 gigs... with only a few hundred megs free. It is gone now, but I remember it clearly (because I was so disgusted (as a software engineer)).

Again you are incorrect -- a fresh install of Win7 loaded on an Intel 160gb SSD uses 7.2 gigs. Of course I disable hibernation (powercfg -h off) and turn down the size of the swap file. But even with those it is under 12 gigs.

HP's bloatware consumes >50 gigs of SSD space on a factory machine. My efforts cut that down by 43 gigs.

When all you have is 160 gigs you find ways to save space.

And never mind the hundreds of megs consumed by HP background processes --- also quite ridiculous.

I love a nice clean install on a new machine. So nice!

 

I feel like a tool but I'm returning my Envy and ordering a new one. The $450 off is slightly better than the 20% Bing cashback; the free third year on the warranty they gave me will apply to a new one since I haven't registered the warranty yet; I don't love the Matte enough to be Matte Cheerleader Guy so am going to defect and be Glossy Follower Guy; and the chances of G2s seem to be pretty good.

I'm at 20 of 21 days tomorrow so will call then. D'oh!

 

HP factory recovery partition (Win7 pro) is 14GB and expands out to 26.2 with all factory bloatware reinstalled. It does not consume 50GB of disc space. Don't know what you installed, unless it's all loaded twice.

Win 7 Pro takes a minimum of 14.2GB with Hibernation disabled (-5.xGB), minimum virtual memory, restore point memory to minimum (1.4GB)and all foriegn language support removed. Without these adjustments a fresh install (MS factory Windows 7 Pro disc) takes up 20.2GB.

So please explain to me how you possibly got it down 7.2GB ??

 

Not sure what you guys do wrong...



Up from 7.2 gig... loaded a few programs.

All I did was the following:

- get a windows 7 retail disc
- install
- disable hibernate
- lower swap size to start at 256 megs... and grow to 8 gigs

I think I'm allowed to count HP's bloat twice. The Recovery + Main partitions are packed with bloat --- one set of bloat restores the other set of bloat. On the first boot I added up 50+ gigs in use on the RAID0 (to great disgust).

I should have saved filesystem path/size dumps; didn't know there was an inquisition!

 

Confused here, your image shows only 63GB of total disc space? Where is the rest of your C: drive ?? Thought you had the 160GB SSD's did you do some custom partions in the RAID0 config ?

And the recovery partition only takes 14 GB since it is compressed, not the full 26.2 expanded size, plus it has full Win7 and the HP bloat.

First post was not an inquisition , I just would like to save another 7GB or so but I don't see how it is possible. The swap file is all I have not messed with....

EDIT: I have a fully restored factory machine here (same specs as my sig but matte) that I am returning monday. It has 26.2GB on C and the recovery partition is actually 12GB (not 14) plus a 100MB HP partition. Raid0 total capacity 298GB Used: 38.3 Available 259.7GB.

 

I split the drive... I haven't created the D: partition yet, but I put all my work on it (using version control). Making the whole drive one partition does not affect the "in use" storage metric.

If you say so dude... still not any excuse. Microsoft Windows 7 in "compressed" form on the DVD installer is 3.1 gigs. So you admit that HP adds 11 gigs of bloat. This is inexcusable; HP should stick to hardware and avoid customizing Windows with their crap.

 

Agreed about the bloat, It's ridiculous and useless, just pointing out it is not 50GB from factory.

I edited my above post. What I am really trying to figure out is how to get that extra 7GB of storage that you have. I have done all the same tweaks you mention except the swap file.....

PS: I assume you are aware that if you want to use TRIM on your G2 drives you will need to undo RAID... or is that what you did when you said you "split" the drive? and did not create D: yet.

 

It's all good... just use a "Microsoft" build of the Windows 7 disc. That's how I get the best installation.

Before I reloaded the fans would cycle on/off continuously... now they stay off. The fans running was a side effect of crap running in the background and waking up the CPU. HP could claim longer battery life and sell more laptops by just turning off the crap.

And yes I broke the RAID0 array. I like having separate data/backup drives (and TRIM).

 

Ordered one. i5 430M with the 1080P glossy display. 320 GB HDD and just the 6 cell.

I read most of this thread (from page 1!) but I still have few quick questions:

- Does the 9 cell slice battery fit well and stay firmly attached? 2-3 hours of battery life is going to be quite a difference coming from my UL30A with ~8 hours of real life use, but I read that the slice battery has major latch / disconnecting issues...

- How hard is it to replace the HDD? I have an X-25M G2 160GB in hand that I'd like to drop in, but I'm not a fan of voiding warranties. If it's easy enough and there aren't any "zomg your warranty r teh fuxxor'd!" stickers I might just do it.

- Overall, how do you rate the fit and finish? I like the fact that it's an all-metal case, but is it flimsy or solid? Do you feel like it would break easy if you put pressure on it or dropped it lightly, or are you confident about the build quality?

- Seeing how the right click is built into the trackpad, how do you right click on something? It seems like if I used two fingers, the trackpad would jump or stutter. If I used one finger and lifted it to click the right button, the cursor would move off of my target.

Thanks.

 

@lepton

I did use a factory MS disc, and with the same tweaks you did I have 7+GB more space used by Win 7 Pro. Which version of win 7 do you have?

Fans: The power plan 'processor cooling policy' options change with the clean install from active to passive (or vice versa). And there is a BIOS setting for 'fans always on'. Disabling the fans and using the 'passive' option on battery will gain you ~20 min from factory version.

Power Plan tweaks:

You can also reduce the battery 'reserve capacity' to 0 to gain an extra 5%. Another 7% is available by adjusting the 'critical battery action' to 'do nothing' with powercfg command tweaks (win7 won't let you set it below 7%). Here is a link to the post with the 'commands' : http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5943846&postcount=468

Note you need to run the commands in all three power plan settings for it to actually change the critical battery action to 'do nothing', and if you change any 'critical action' settings later it will lose the 'do nothing' setting for all plans.

 

If it starts clean without the pagefile and hibernation file I can see the minimum at < 8 GB but as the system gets used and updated with Windows update and restore points it'll grow much larger.

Here's a good explanation http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd744590(WS.10).aspx

 

OK. But I did that except the page and swap files. My last clean install was; hibernation disabled (-6GB normally allocated w/ 300GB storage), set system restore to keep only the most recent restore point ( 1.x GB is smallest size allowed), reduced virtual memory size to minimum (forget size), removed all foriegn language and help files and a lot of the extra font files. All those tweaks plus the base drivers still took up 14.2GB on clean install. I just don't see what else I could have changed to get it down to 7.2 GB, pagefiles can't be near that large.

Unfortunatley, as you stated, it grows over time so it's really difficult to figure out what size win7 actually is now after evrything else is loaded and updated.

 

Oops, double post NM

 

You're a better human being than I am.

It's fairly secure. It has a 'lock' that pushes the little teeth to one side so they stay in place, though if you push the laptop laterally on a flat surface I guess it could come undone. It's not going to just fall off though. It IS quite heavy - JJB corrected me, it's 2.8 lbs or so and it makes the Envy a beast, but I really like it. I'd only bring it for really extended demos or meetings or else long flights, but I find that, the rest of the time, I have a plug anyway or else only need an hour or two and so the regular 6-cell is fine.

Search for 'service manual' and you'll find links that I think JJB posted. I haven't done it myself but judging from what's involved, if you're comfortable doing things like removing the keyboard and keeping careful track of a couple dozen little screws, it's not too bad.

I'd rate it at least on par with the other laptops I've seen and worked with (mostly Dell). It won't break from putting some pressure on it - I'd never encourage anybody to drop their hardware lightly or otherwise so I wouldn't want to make any promises, but it seems no less durable than other consumer-grade metal-case laptops. </no_scientific_data>

It works pretty well. I was very skeptical at first but it's easy to 'learn' where the right click is and where the left click is, and the Synaptics control panel with the updated driver makes just about everything configurable, though I had to disable the 'turn off trackpad by clicking the top left corner twice' feature as I couldn't get it to come back on again the way it's supposed to. Not a tremendously useful feature anyway.

You definitely want to clear out the driver the Envy ships with and install the latest one from the driver's thread and then visit your mouse-->Synaptics control panel and tweak the settings -- but once you've done that, you're in good shape.

Welcome to the club.

 

left and right click pretty much works just like the single clickbar on asus netbooks, except it's hidden under the trackpad..they click nicely without doing much noise, but you can't click left and right at the same time.

also, to solve the turn off trackpad issue, I simply installed the second-newest drivers.

 

I have a question about ENVY 15.

my new notebook has a ATI 5830 which does support PCI 16x, but I found the card acutally work at 8 Xspeed.

 

Windows File Shadow Copy/Driver rollback. So yes possibly it creates multiple copies of the same file or program.

 

I am wondering if the wireless key (between f12 and prt sc) can be configured to kill wifi only and leave BT alone. I know windows mobility center can be used for individual control, but requires a few clicks.

 

I don't think that any Intel notebook motherboards actually use 16 lanes for the GPU.

 

Glad to hear it. Mine doesn't come with one, so I'm on the fence about whether or not I'm going to buy one separate. I think the problem is coming from a notebook with 8+ hours of battery life, I'm afraid I'll be in for a shock. I'm tempted to pick up a second 6 cell instead (to save weight) but I have a feeling I won't be happy with turning it off, opening it up, swapping the battery in, and then starting it back up. Decisions, decisions.

Doesn't bother me much, I just want to make sure I won't be voiding the warranty (or at least that it won't be obvious that it was opened / tampered with). They keyboard has to come out? That's odd... guess I'll have to do some reading. Forgive my laziness, but do you happen to have the link you're talking about? I can't see to find it, or perhaps I'm not sure if I'm looking at the right thing.

Cool.

A fresh install of Windows 7 will be going on probably the day after I open the thing up - just have to make sure all the hardware is in good working order first. I loathe bloatware and outdated drivers.

Thanks!

 

@Curse The Sky

Here is the link to the service manual. It is from the original gen 1 envy 15 but everything you need it for should be identical. Note: you do not need to remove the keyboard (and it's 60+ screws) I don't know what they're talking about.

To open it up it takes removing the 4 rubber feet (re-usable), 17 screws and 3 cable connectors, then the whole top panel of the chassy lifts off (with keyboard still attached). You will not void the warranty by opening the machine but HP will not do warranty repair unless you send it in with factory configuration and hardware. Make sure to burn the set of HP recovery disks so if you need to send it in you can restore factory configs. Also make sure you copy the SWsetup folder to an external drive as it contains several unique drivers you'll need that are not available to download.

http://h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c01911053.pdf (large 130 page .pdf)

 

Sorry, I meant the keyboard panel ... not the keyboard itself. As in 'it's underneath the keyboard.'

 

It seems the 2nd gen comes with many problems.

Have these been resolved yet?

I'd hate to drop so much, and find so many problems within.

Is it worth getting still?

 

I don't know how to answer your question. What problems are you talking about?

This thread is full of people who have not had any problems, people who have had some minor ones and resolved them, and people who had bigger ones (and mostly resolved them, too).

The summary from this thread is:

- i5 Envy has much better battery life and is recommended unless you have a real need for a quad core, more than 8 gigs of RAM, or USB3;
- i7s get hot; i5s are warm and silent
- GPU bottleneck is the memory clock but they are usually quite receptive to being overclocked
- Glossy screen is sharper than the Matte screen but both are very good and much better than the lower resolution option
- Stock Envy is overpriced; buy it with a coupon (particularly now, before the $450 one expires, if it hasn't already)
- Fist 2nd Gen Envys with SSDs had G2s, then they were G1s for a while, but now they seem to be G2s again (tentatively) and the price can't be beat if you buy one or two of them with your Envy.

Most other 'issues' were related to software drivers and have software driver solutions.

 

You forgot to mention the 21 say no cost rerurn policy, don't like it send it back no charge and they pay shipping

Also IMO the i7's run just warm and the i5 run very cool.

 

You see I was basing my assumptions on these thoughts:

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5885925&postcount=1980
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5812096&postcount=1146
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5841305&postcount=1702

 

Half of the stuff mentioned in those posts is disappointment in things that simply don't come with the Envy. 'No switchable graphics!' 'No backlit keyboard!' 'No USB3 on the i5!' 'No edge-to-edge glass!' 'My 15.6" notebook doesn't fit in my 15.4" notebook case!"

There's also no pony. I really like ponies, and the Envy lets me down there.

Disappointment comes from two places: one is if you wanted a panacea but all you got was a laptop; the second is if you didn't get what you legitimately bought (like it's broke).

The only non-resolved issues that I can think of aren't really issues to everybody (I don't care about them).

- The LCD doesn't tilt back more than about 110 degrees
- Getting the webcam white levels adjusted correctly takes some patience
- Might still end up with G1 SSDs

Pretty much everything else is right there on the specs page.

 

Sorry but this doesn't affect the fan behavior. I tested all the options you mentioned when I first started the machine (because having the fan cycle while you are just reading a web page is annoying).

No combination of power control panel or BIOS options would cause the fan to just stay off. Of course it would go off, but there was enough background activity that it would come back on every few minutes.

Get a program like Sysinternals Process Explorer and expose the columns for "Context Switches" and "Page Faults". You'll see a large number of crappy programs (usually named like HpBlah.exe) which wake up and use the CPU at least once a second. They are not indexing or "one time" services that eventually cool down... they are idle but still running timers.

Microsoft is a little smarter and their default services don't do this... they use events instead of timers for polling. So now the fan stays off during light usage.

Disclamer: I live in Redmond, WA and write Windows software for a living... this stuff is trivial and I hate HP for ignoring it.

 

Well you have to make your own decision. Just keep in mind that forums like this are primarily sought out by people who are having problems that they need to resolve so your going to see a very high percentage of problems compared to all the thousands who have no issues.

Screen actually opens to 120 degrees not 110 and I have no problem with that, it has very good vertical viewing angles.

If the the $450 coupon is still good you are not going to find a better deal on anything this thin and light with exceptional performance. And you can return it without cost within the 1st 21 days after reciept.

 

@Lepton

I never said the fans would stay off. If you disable them in BIOS then they cycle, as you found out, based on the CPU and GPU temps. The set point when they activate has been chaging with each new BIOS update since the original gen1 F.04. If you have f.18 then the fans make a lot more noise when they cycle on than with f.19. When you disable them in BIOS you do get about 20 min additional battery life.

Fan behavior did change with my clean install but it may have been an older BIOS than you are running, again they keep tweaking the cooling parameters.

The only hp programs / services I have left are the webcam and the QL buttons, which are both currently disabled. I agree 100% HP should not be providing any software of there own, it is all outdated, slow and IMO useless.

 

There are notebooks with an SLI config which I would assume use 2x8 PCIe lanes or could it be just 2x4 lanes?

 

I'm not really familiar with SLI notebooks. I know there used to be some notebooks that just crammed desktop motherboards into laptop cases.

My point is that, at least as far as I know, most notebooks aren't going to have 16 lanes just for the GPU. If there was an exception, I expect it'd be in the gaming powerhouse line.

 

Do you guys feel HP did a good job of addressing the major heating issues with Envy in their 2nd gen release? It seems like that was a major issue many reviews brought up for the 1st gen.

 

Ok, thanks, I went to INTEL homepage last night and I found that none of the chipset has PCI 16X design.

 

I did.... mine now stay off all the time until I peg the CPU/GPU for several consecutive seconds.

The machine runs super cool. If it sits idle while I use my main PC there aren't even any warm surfaces... and the machine remains perfectly silent.

HP has a reasonably good hardware design. Unfortunately it's no where near the billet unibody design like Apple; it uses the same low end ribbons and motherboard components you'd find on an Acer laptop (for instance).

 

Yes they have, as several people have stated recently to similar questions. Are you reading the threads?

i5's 0 heat issues, barely gets warm under heavy load.
i7's run warm but well controlled, under heavy loads it runs warmer but not to 'hot', may be uncomfortable on lap.

The Envy has the best cooling systems I have ever seen on a notebook. Take a look:

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