*HP Envy 15 Owners Lounge! PART 1*

why wouldn't they deliver it on Monday? if its already in the area they prob will send it out on a truck. unless of course they stretch the delivery to the max because they are lazy...

 

I posted a review of my monitor on 'the egg'

"When I first plugged it into my laptop (via HDMI), i was getting a 1" black border around everything when I was using 1920x1080. When I switched to 1680x1050, it looked normal...I wanted to experience FULL HD...not FULL HD - 1in...So, I looked everywhere within windows to try to find a fix...but couldnt find anything. I have an ATI Mobility Radeon 4830 running the Catalyst drivers without the Catalyst Control Center (CCC). I ended up having to install CCC because I found a setting referring to scaling. I just had to move the slider to 0% scaling and problem solved. ^^"

my monitor = Acer S243HL

 

Sorry for the double post :/

It is the same price now as what I got it for then. I was just wondering about the Radeon 5830...Is this just a flashed version of the 4830?

 

wow.

that's why I love this forum and the people on here.

<3

 

Okay a couple things:

1. For when I plan to use my system connected to my HD TV with a wireless keyboard is there a setting I can change so I can close the lid. without losing the HDTV signal to the TV?

2. Anyone else noticing a tiny bit of noise sort of like a really teeny tiny cybal type sound?

3. I was holding off on updating my system to Win7 x64 ultimate but am wondering is it the option "Recovery Disc Creation" what I want to run first so I have a complete back-up of the system. If not whats the app I want to run so that if I have to restore the system at a later date to factory condition I have all the needed stuff?

4. Can the Slim battery only go on one way or does it matter? Right now I have it installed so the little 3 dotd and a square are on the edge facing the SD slot. IS that the correct way or should the little artwork be towards the back where the monitor hindges?

5 Would prefer to avoid doing an entire format etc. if possible. Can I just, after I make a backup, add/remove all the crud like norton and the corel apps since I use Office/Avast and Corel Draw x4 and WinDVD10. Then do anytime upgrade and then simply install my copies of Office etc?

 

Yeah it'll probably be shipped Monday but if I can get held I can pick it up tomorrow which would be ideal but won't happen due to how convienent that would be.

 

Go to your power options (click battery on taskbar) open more power options.
Click "Change Plan Settings." Next, click "Change Advanced Power Settings" and navigate down to "Power Buttons and Lid" and change the lid close action to "do nothing"

 

so i've noticed that HWMonitor and GPU-Z isn't picking up on GPU heat.

am I the only one?

 

The higher spec ATI cards have weird sensors that the usual software don't pick up. You need either MSI Afterburner, or AMD GPU Clock Tool. I'm using the latter atm.

(EDIT: get the AMD clock tool for 5870)

 

Okay, trying to set things to look more like my destop system. How do I make it so my taskbar is transparent and so when I hower over icons like the IE button it shows the little pictures? I know their stupid things but cant figure out what I'm doing wrong

EDIT: NM, stupid my colors was stuck on. Ran it and selected Aero and now all is right

 

Edit: Never mind, the slice info I gave was wrong

 

I installed Scrybe and now the touchpad light stays on all the time and it doesn't lock anymore. Any ideas?

 

Okay I have nice toys but don't always know how to use em LOL. How can I test to see if things are throttled. Right now I have the Slim attached and will try things both ways with and without the battery if you can tell me what program to use and what to watch for?

 

1 hour away from seeing Martin Sheen. EXCITE!

 

Run CPUID
http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

 

Mass Effect 2?

 

You Know It.

 

I have the app on my system but how do I check on the throttling using it?

 

I was playing BattleField Bad Company 2 beta right now. It lagged a lot, but I think that was from their end. I want to try a single player game.

I would do Mass Effect, but I habe been playing it on my desktop and I see no reason to play it on this slower system... other than the fact that it ti s cool.

 

Whoops -- never mind, I was wrong. The slice doesn't keep it throttled back if you're plugged in.

 

Is that a typo on the 4k read speed? It's about 5 times slower than the write speed. Anandtech is showing 58.8 4k read and 34.5 for 4k write for a single x25-m G2 160 gb drive. Of course they are also showing 78.1 sequential write (this is where RAID 0 is giving a huge boost.)

 

How can I test to see if the system is being throttled using CPU-Z? I tried a program called i7 Turbo but I can't make heads or tales of it as its showing my multiplier at 9.0 for all threads

EDIT: Well duh, I went into the power saving options and it turned out minimum processor state was set to 5% for both plugged in and battery. Changed plugged in to 100% and now CPUZ say multiplier is x23 and if I run the i7 Turbo app it shows Multiplier as being 12, go figure.

 

Then it's throttling if it isn't going past 9x. lol

 

3. Yes run the program to create a set of recovery discs. I believe this creates a set of discs with the same info that is on the recovery partition of the hard drive. So, you can recover from either the discs or the hard drive partition. I already did a restore once, and used the hd partition, as I felt it would be faster.

4. yes it only goes on one way. the connector for power to the bottom of the laptop is not centered, so there is no way to install it incorrectly.

5. I did the anytime upgrade to Ultimate with the key of the copy I had a buddy get me from Microsoft. Works great, but I will eventually wipe it clean and do a fresh install.

 

Think it was because I had the pwr setting on HP recommended. When I went into the advanced power setting the min was set to 5% for moth battery and plug. Changed that and it seems like my numbers have changed. Just how to "test" though I am unclear on. See my previous posts edit.

 

Anyone can upgrade versions of windows using the Anytime Upgrade for free and there are legitimate OEM keys that can do the job. I was premium and uped it to Ultimate using those keys.

 

lol, gotta love this:

Date/Time Location Description
1/29/2010 9:23:00 PM NEWARK, NJ, US Left FedEx Sort Facility
1/29/2010 9:18:00 PM NEWARK, NJ, US Left FedEx Sort Facility
1/29/2010 9:18:00 PM NEWARK, NJ, US Left FedEx Sort Facility
1/29/2010 6:11:00 PM NEWARK, NJ, US Left FedEx Sort Facility
1/29/2010 6:11:00 PM NEWARK, NJ, US Left FedEx Sort Facility
1/29/2010 10:53:00 AM NEWARK, NJ, US Left FedEx Sort Facility
1/29/2010 2:01:00 AM NEWARK, NJ, US Arrived at Sort Facility

 

maybe it mated with someone else's envy and now you are getting 6 of them

 

didn't see that. lol

Download prime 95 and run that on battery.

 

I actually imagined the truck driver kept crashing his truck so they had to keep reloading the cargo into new trucks. Looks like Fedex is doing what it can to make sure I don't get the notebook before the 2nd lol.

 

Ok here are my crystalmark scores, used 500MB test size (not sure what is std.)

SEQ 352 215
512K 270 195
4K 14.2 110

4K read seems low but consistant with other posts I've seen here, is this normal?

Could someone please tell me how to confirm SSD P/N?

Device manager only show 'hard drives' > RAID0 with no way (properties tabs etc.) to show the part numbers...

 

Shouldn't need to change that 5% -- it's the minimum setting, remember... just make sure your max is 100%

 

I received both envy's, identical except for screens, 1 glossy and 1 anti glare. Initial observations while viewing side by side, no lines on either screen, glossy is significantly brighter (~20%), colors are very different between the 2 and the anti glare looks more 'diffused' on sharp edges. this is just out of box observations, will do full calibrations and test brightness, contrast etc.. this weekend and post results.

Both trackpads were installed at an angle, one was lower in the 'recess' on the left side, the other significantly lower on the right, tilted so much the left edge was above palmrest... Very poor quality control. I managed to use some force and get them almost level. When I open one up to add RAM I'll see if their is any way to adjust this from below...

Back to testing things out

 

Good info thanks

 

Yeah that 4k read is horrible, but the 4k write is really good oddly enough. Who has ever heard of an SSD write speed being 10 times faster than it's read speed? (random 4k speeds anyway)

 

I think intel ssd has supercapacitor backed cache.

 

there is a utility in the recovery test software when you boot into recovery partition that shows the system hardware including memory and drives.

the other person that posted them had already broken his raid apart so he was seeing both drives in the device manager.

 

I thought about that. I've been using ThinkPad for awhile. T20, T21, T22, T23, T40, T42, T43, and now T61. I think I am a bit tired of the Thinkpad look at the moment. ahahah

One tihng for sure, it is damn stable and rock solid. One draw back. 5400 RPM drive and LCD isn't the brightest out there.

 

sounds like a simular conclusion I had with the matte screen.

I am planning to open both of my envys tomorrow to move some stuff arround.

 

So initial impressions are that the glossy is better?

Thats good to hear.

 

I received the same response. "Too bad. you'll get your laptop on Tuesday" despite the CSR reps have lied about the shipping methods multiple times.

 

I already had the copy of Ultimate installed on my ASUS machine for a few months before I decided to buy a new laptop. I had put a new HDD in the ASUS when I did the install, so I just removed the old HDD with XP PRO and kept the disk intact. Now I put the original HDD back in that machine so I can have an XP machine as a spare machine if I need it. Putting the new HDD in a esata enclosure.

 

I was told iwould get my laptop the 28th...naturally what they meant was feb 2 it'll definitely be a fun toy for a month. Too many problems coming out of the forums for me to consider it something usable for business endevors. If I could afford it I'd keep it and tinker with it while using a business workstation notebook.

 

My laptop is sitting in a sorting facility about 30 miles away. Scheduled delivery is Tuesday.

I called HP so they would give Fedex permission to allow local pickup. I called Fedex and said I wanted to do local pickup tomorrow if at all possible. Fedex requested I call again tomorrow morning to confirm status.

I am hoping I'll be able to pickup tomorrow...if not, it should be available Monday first thing.

 

I have been using my envy for almost 5 hours now - mostly browsing and some random testing (vantage etc). It is not that hot compared to my old dv9000t.

One question which I had asked earlier - the left hand top corner of the touchpad seems to have little bit more flex than the other edges. Has anyone else noticed this?

 

Thanks, I look forward to reading your conclusions. I have the glossy version on order.

Keep the info coming...it's appreciated!

 

yes. I actually kept trying to push it in to lock the touchpad.

It really is hardly noticeable though.

 

I have no flex anywhere.

Solid as a rock

 

how do I access the BIOS settings (so I can fix this Fn thing) I tried f2 f6 and f10 and it gave me a boot order thing and a diagnosis thing but not really a setup page. Thanks!

 

ESC

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