*HP Envy 15 Owners Lounge! PART 1*

I got the i7, and its only time before software catches up plus i don't play many games. if im not 100% satisfied i'll return it in a heartbeat in 21 days for the kind of money I'm paying.

 

I actually may do this, but I have to wait for the funds from the i5 to be returned and another $300 coupon and *proof* the i7 has USB 3.0 (in someone's hands)

N

 

The i7 has its own set of problems. it gets hot and the battery life is terrible.

Im actually thinking about getting a netbook or something and then buying that new Dell 27" IPS panel for my dekstop with the money left over. 1440p sure sounds amazing, and it is something that I know will last me a good ten years or so.

 

I'm not getting folks who have issues with BOTH battery life and the X7 multiplier. Won't the battery last longer at X7?

 

I don't know, but even if it did, I'd rather not pay for a premium notebook that runs as well as a netbook when unplugged.

 

yeah and you take a huge performance hit. and the battery life even at x7 isn't that great

 

Sorry, should have introduced my self.

I ordered the i7 Envy 15 last Friday. Same Jan. 18 ship date as folks. I'll post what I get. I got the -$300 deal which sealed the deal. I was thinking about changing to the i5 based upon the comments here but I'm never far away from an outlet. When I travel, I'll have an excuse not to use my new work laptop on the plane and either get it crushed when the guy infront of me decides to recline his backrest or the flight attendent decides to spill a drink on my new baby. I figure the i7 will be good for 3-4 years or at least I hope.

I got the 320GB HD. I couldn't get work to swing for the $500 premium on the SSDs.

That brings up a point though, what SSDs have folks put into their Envys? I'm thinking of a single 2.5 SSD. What do folks recommend? I'm thinking of a future upgrade when we've got more cash.

Thanks for all the great info.

 

This is the same thing Lenovo is doing with their new T410 and T510. I think it's a huge waste, but I'll reserve judgement about keeping it until after I give a chance hands-on. I'll also compare the battery life to notebooks that have i5s and switchable graphics before making a decision.

I have a feeling HP purposefully delayed giving out this info.

For those of you cancelling, I hope it just means I'll get mine sooner!

 

Im conflicted. Should I try to get my order canceled or should I let them ship it, play around with it to see what the battery is like, and then return it later?

 

BTW, the $300 off was honored yesterday by a CSR over the phone.

 

Keep on cancelling your orders people! Music to my ears!

Mine will be built quicker without the order queue all backed up

 

HP's lack of clarification is pretty pathetic for such a large company. USB 3.0's not a big deal but if the i5 does in fact lack switchable graphics, I'll be canceling my order too.

 

You remind me of Dwight Schrute from the Office. Just Saying lol .

 

^^ lol

Well, with the IGP disabled that just means the CPU will be alotted the maximum headroom for Turbo

 

Im looking at this http://www.amazon.com/UL30Vt-A1-Lig...5?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1263434049&sr=8-5

$832 shipped from amazon(on backorder now, but you can get it for 850 as well)

 

High 5 to that

 

Disabling the IGP won't get you any benefits, it's only to your disadvantage.

 

SU7300 and 210m are weak sauce....

 

Not a big deal I think. The Envy cooling setup was already built around the i7, so there is no reason why the i5 would ever hit a thermal ceiling. Besides, you only get a measly 133mhz boost in multithreaded apps.

 

I had the 80, which is less than a cm thicker.

After playing with a Envy for a minute, I was sold.

Like alot of people here, i'll have 21 days to play.

 

Go read the whitpapers on the new arrandales.

Then we'll talk

Just to let you know, the Turbo feature is limited to the entire packaging TDP and power (CPU and IGP).

So, by disabling the GPU, you are allowing the CPU to take full advantage of the maximum TDP and power (minus the NB, mem controller, etc).

Anyway, the IGP would be the biggest detractor from the CPU with regards to TDP and power.

Thanks for playing and come again!! lol

 

Yes, they are, but it weighs 1/3rd less, costs 1/3rd less and the battery lasts 600% longer. You also get double the warranty.

The SU7300 in there can overclock to 1.7ghz, which is nothing to sneeze at.

 

Whatever you say

 

Well, I am just trying to stay positive. lol

The non switchable GPU's isn't a deal breaker for me - it would have been nice.

 

But wait, it comes with a .3 Megapixel web cam, that is the deal breaker... You can take HD video with it.

On a serious note, comparing the Envy 15 and this is like comparing apples and oranges. The closest HP model you can compare it to is the HP Envy 13, and from other companies you got the MB Air, MSI X-Slim series, and Dell's Adamo. I am very surprised you are going from the Envy to this. The only perk is Ultra-portability, other than that, has got nothing on the Envy...

 

I will wait for mine to ship, test it out with the i5 and I'll compare to what people are getting with their new i7 setups. The deal breaker is poor battery life. I wouldn't mind getting ~2hrs of battery life if the AC adapter wasnt such a huge brick. On my old laptop I didn't even had a battery, but the charger was very much portable.

 

think of it this way, since the i5 has IGP, and its not activated, it could be in the future with a BIOS and/or driver update. simple as that. I doubt that intel would launch their i5 with IGP disabled on the hardware level just for HP.

either way the 5830 is probably gonna be so sick that you wouldn't want to switch back to IGP anyway, I have a Macbook pro 15 and I rarely use the 9400M only, I always stick with the 9600..

just my thoughts.

I'm keeping my order, and yea you guys keep cancelling so I can get mine faster..

 

See this is what I was looking at originally, but I went for the Envy because I figured it was only slightly more expensive and only slightly heavier, but you get a significantly better multimedia experience.

The problem though is that without USB 3 or ExpressCard it is going to be obsolete before too long, and the battery life means the low weight has very little advantages, especially considering that giant power adapter.

 

I'm still not convinced about non-switchable graphics. JJB posted this waaaay back on page 381 (emphasis mine):

I'm content to wait until I receive mine and see what the real story is with my own eyes and hands. And happy to report back here with facts. There is too much conflicting information amongst all of us to come to any conclusions right now, even if the report seems to be official from HP, because I don't think even THEY know all the facts.

 

This being a premium notebook why no i7-6xxx series cpus. Makes one kinda wonder.

Maybe by the time it ships all the quad i7 faults will be fixed.

 

There should be a litany of arrandale (i5) laptops with switchable graphics in the coming months. That's not to say that this Envy doesn't fill a niche - I wouldn't have bought one if that wasn't the case (I'm getting an i7, I don't care about switchable graphics).

I totally can see that people are looking for different things in a laptop. I'm looking for high end GPU, quad core, 1080p and sleek / light in a 15" form factor. Others just want a nice general purpose surf the web experience with light weight and good battery life, others want something that's easy to travel with, not necessarily quad core - there will be lots of other options for the latter category from other manufacturers, and probably from HP as well.

 

So..... I received my Envy 15 around the second week of December, and am loving it very much. However I am bummed that the new version is out with the updated 5830. Has anyone gone through the process of getting it switched out for the updated one? If so, how much did it cost to get it switched? How would I go about doing the switch? Is it possible to get it all sorted out and back before February 20th?

 

This being a premium notebook why no i7-6xxx series cpus. Makes one kinda wonder.

Maybe by the time it ships all the quad i7 faults will be fixed.

 

yuppppp.

 

More bad news from TheNextBench. HP now claims the locked multipliers (x7 and x9) when running on battery is the expected behavior and working as designed. He claims the batteries on these systems are unable to power these processors to run at anything other than the low frequency mode. which is way way below the advertised speed.

http://www.thenextbench.com/t5/HP-Envy-Notebooks/Multiplier-locked-at-x7-on-battery/td-p/51661

 

Can anyone else confirm that this is possible?

This is a potential deal-breaker here. That just is not acceptable.

 

Fred Frenzy is going to get fired before the weekend.

 

No, it is not possible. This is a big feature and not something you can activate by just flipping a switch.

 

It is not possible if they are using the same chipset as the Envy did at launch. It would be my guess that if the Envy doesn't support switchable graphics now then it won't ever.

lol, thought the same thing.

 

Call HP @ 888.999.4747

Right NOW!

Times a'wasting. Say that you are having issues with it such as heat, horizontal lines, bad keys, etc(It does not matter whether you are experiencing them or not). Tell them you want a replacement. They will do a return, then exchange. If you order the same specs expect for the 5830 and USB3.0, you will actually save money since the price dropped. Also remember to apply the 300 dollar coupon to your order. So you will save between 300 to 400 dollars, plus have a laptop with USB 3.0 and DirectX 11 5830 graphics....at no cost. They provide a free FedEx ship label to make things easier for you. I hope this helps .

 

If they don't fix that multiplier issue soon, they lost my purchase. The issue is, I have no idea what could replace it. I suppose I can wait to see if Apple refreshes the MBP line soon with something decent for a GPU.

 

Ive got I7 720qm, 6gb's DDR 3, ATi 4830m, 500gb, 1080p LED backlit CD. Basically everything it normally came with. Except I added on a three year warranty and Win 7 Pro.
So....I am going to call, and do the bs'ing thing and say something is wrong. Then I ship it in (For Free?) and then they simply send me a new one? Or will they refund my card and then I order again?

 

They provide a FREE FedEx shipping label which is emailed to you at the moment of your return. You print it off and tape it to the box your Envy came in. Once the Envy is scanned into FedEx's system, they begin building your replacement if that is the path you desire. I opted for the replacement, but you can get your card credited if you want. Also, a heads up: the 2gb Ram upgrade from 4 to 6 GB costs 150 bucks. 2GB of Ram is like 50 bucks max if you buy it separately and do the install yourself. Saves a hundred dollars. Call soon before the return period and coupon expire.

 

I suspect that the i5 might be faster than the i7 when on battery because of the i7 forced multiplier. However, how that results to actual work done might be unknown until we have CPU benchmarks.

Big unanswered questions:
* Battery life difference between i5 and i7.
* CPU Benchmarks between i5 and i7 when on and off battery.
* Heat difference between i5 and i7 when on and off battery.

There will be some kind of difference for each of these, but what matters is the magnitude. Forget about trying to get any answers from HP - it's ridiculous. Let's just wait for the honest real world results.

I'm still glad that I ordered the i5 because my biggest issue is heat - I hate a hot laptop (but I want incredibly high graphics performance when it's plugged in).

 

Sorry for all the questions, but after you determine you want a refund. You tell them what parts you want right? Also where is this coupon?

 

If you want a refund, they will just credit back your credit card or whatever you used to pay. Say you want a replacement, and you configure the replacement over the phone. The coupon is only valid over the phone and the code for it is "AC3478." You have to might have to push for the coupon, so don't take a rejection as an answer.

 

Ha, kinda humorous reading all of the recent flood of posts....Everyone seems to be expecting the world from this Envy refresh. I'd say about 90%+ of those who recently bought the i5 envy's purchased with 1. no knowledge or expectation of USB 3.0 and about 70%+ with no knowledge/concern about switchable graphics...That said, I hate to be an apologist for a giant corporation like HP, but what comparable model is out and available for order that comes close to offering the same features as the "hypothetical i5 Envy" that you aren't going to have to wait several months for? And by that time, I guarantee the next "new" thing will already be right around the corner

Haha, gotta love the internet rumor mill.

 

Does anybody know what speed with i5-540M machines will run at while on battery power with this multiplier BS?

 

actually you should realize the following:

most envy users are advanced computer users. i5 arrendale with the IGP has been on my radar *as well as many other's* for a while. to cripple it and not actually get the most out of it really shocked me. at first I was just going to cancel.

but I feel like dual ssd's + arrendale + 5830 is a very compelling setup that I should at least test drive. it hurts me to have to return a 2nd laptop to hp, but i guess they have it coming to them if they keep their specs and capabilities so hidden from us.

 

xvivecuervox,

I see that you have/had a beats edition and are replacing it with another beats edition one. How do you compare the look of it to the original envy? Does it look cheaper than it? What about fingerprints smudging...do they ruin its appearance?

Thanks in advance,