*HP Envy 15 Owners Lounge! PART 2*

Glossy is sounding MUCH better by your numbers

 

I don't have an esata device, or a combo usb/esata cable... so plugging into that port wasn't an option.

What I did come up with, though was a 2-step process. 1.) I loaded the Intel Rapid storage Technology driver. After that loaded, I loaded the NEC 64-bit USB driver. Once those two were in there, the Windows install went through just as expected.

So the moral of the story is: If you're trying to do it from a USB flash drive, you'll need the Intel RST & NEC USB drivers.

 

You can plug a regular usb cable into the combo esata port. lol

 

thanks running recal now.

Those numbers look really good for single drives. i think i'll do the same. have you confirmed that Trim and toolbox features work?

 

i'm now wondering if I should keep the drives in a raid 0 or use them as individual drives... decisions, decisions...

 

teh orange light means taht the trackpad is locked, Or, more likely, that you installed non-HP drivers which don't support the light.

 

Argh, I installed the drivers on the first page...

 

Maybe you guys should post your Hardware ID's from device manager for your panels and see if the matte and glossy screens are even made by the same manufacturer. My guess, given the substantial differences, is that they are not.

Ya shoulda gone glossy!

 

the esata/usb combo port can be used as either an esata port OR a usb port... you can plug any usb 2.0 or 1.1 device into that port and it will fit and work. I had the same problem but it is good to see you found another way around that.

 

just installed toolbox and it is optimizing... it sees them as G2 drives with full support for trim and GC.

I will let you know if i run into any issues.

 

It's the same vendor, lancorp.

Seems LG is the only mfr that HP uses for the Envy 15. Not a bad thing as I prefer LG displays

 

Subjectively I can't really tell much of a difference between the 1st gen glossy and the matte I have right now. Maybe that's just due to acclimation, but both feel sufficiently bright. The edges are softer though, but that also adds that "film-grain" look for movies vs. the harsh sharp edges you see with cartoons.

 

Same here. I had the glossy and now the matte, I don't know about you guys, but I don't ever have my screen at 100% brightness unless the surrounding lighting is really bright already (never happens much). The matte seems plenty bright for inside conditions to me.

The only thing the glossy does for me is add a slight saturation or pop. Kinda nice, but the glare and reflection you get is kinda annoying too.

 

Even better, if you buy the correct enclosure you can plug a drive in that uses the eSATA of the port for data transfer and the USB to power the drive. Single cable SATA speeds FTW (it comes with all the cables you need)

 

Ok hope this works;

The following is the matte display icm file in zip format (thats only choice i could find to upload here) . it is calibrated for max brightness and color temp of 6500K and 2.2 gamma (standard for photography). I chose max brightness to make it more 'universal' foe most of you, it looks good when the screen is dimmed , but i will refine this or recalibrate for lower brightness later (for editing). Should be 1000% improvement from factory profile, if you can get it to load.

File location mine is loaded in;

C: > Windows > System32 > spool > drivers > color

File name: MATTE DISPLAY 100% BRT 6500K 2.2

Type: ICC profile

'properties' says it opens with 'Microsoft Color Control panel'

EDIT: MAKE SURE TO SET ALL DISPLAY CONTROLS IN CCC TO DEFAULT AND MAKE SURE MICROSOFT COLOR CONTROL PANEL HAS THE DEFAULT 'GENERIC PNP...ICM' LOADED before loading this profile

View attachment MATTE DISPLAY 100% BRT 6500K 2.2.zip

 

I just loaded it and man I got to get used to it.

It is MUCH warmer now.

 

Ok after doing the intel ssd optimizer in the toolbox I get just about 2MB/s speed bump from my last crystal mark scores all the way accross the board.

Also it looks like these drives have just a slightly older bios on them the 02HA as opposed to the 02HD which is the current bios. i downloaded the iso but wont be able to do the update tonight.

As for the matte vs Glossy I have both of these screens in front of me right now and have be switching between them after calibrating the gamma the matte is much better than factory also in a dark room they both seem to be near the same brightness (I can not tell a big difference).

I will give this new laptop a week if it stays as good as it is right now I may keep it and sell the Gen1. I can live with this matte screen especially since i won't see my 3 year old son's fingerprints as bad on it.

this laptop seems to stay cooler than the gen one also I don't know why..

 

I was one of the early adopters that bought the original Envy 15 with the ATI4830.
Is it possible to upgrade the 4830 to the 5830?
Would it be worth it?

Cheers for your replies.

P.S. There are a lot of complaints about quality on this forum. Just like to say that so far, touch wood, my Envy has been excellent.

 

Colors got worse I believe with that profile.

Goes to show that one profile doesn't fit all. I might pony up the dough and just buy a colorimeter.

 

yep it looked way to warm for me at first. but looked ad some good quality photos and it looks pretty good. think a lot of it is the shock on the eyes from the ultra blue factory settings.

One cool thing is the HP dark desktop screen looks really good now. it is actually a dark brown that matches the palmrest color.

 

Does anyone know where I can get a splice battery for the envy in Australia?

Thanks

 

So I did get a chance to play around on the laptop a bit today. I played Kings Bounty: Armored Princess on battery power to test two things, one how noticeable the processor speed hit would be in a moderately taxing environment and also to see how long the battery would hold up.

I ran it with all settings maxed and playing at native resolution (1920x1080) with screen at 80% brightness. Wifi and bluetooth were both on and I had digsby and firefox with 4-5 tabs open in the background as well. I went from 100% battery to 8% in about 48 minutes. The computer auto hibernated at the 8% battery mark.

The game did run at noticeably lower framerate under battery power, I don't know how to display FPS in that game but it was under 30, probably high teens to low 20s. It was playable since it is a turn based game of course.

I have a battery slice but it was not connected.

My system is an i5-540, dual SSD in RAID 0, matte FHD screen, 4gb RAM (intend to upgrade this myself but have not yet).

This means you will probably get just under 2 hrs in similar conditions with the slice attached. I intend to use it tomorrow under office conditions (database and wifi, no gfx) with the slice to see how it performs and for how long.

I know someone was asking for some battery reports so thats what I got from my first run on the battery.

 

Huh. Maybe you do have a screen issue. or did you have any setting changed in CCCor MS color panel?? Forgot to tell everyone to reset all color adjustments to defualt before loading, also make sure that the original
'generic PNP etc' icc is running

 

I'll post whatever I got up as soon as I can. Btw JJB how did you set yours up when letting it calibrate? The manual always tells me to leave it in complete darkness or controlled ambient light conditions.

I think it definitely changes based on how it's done. But sleey0 the calibrator has been something I've used very often and has proven to be well worth the money. There are sometimes special deals on one so look out. Also some of the newer versions don't offer much improvement over older ones which can be had on the cheap if you get lucky.

 

I was just refering to the fact that if you needed to use a usb drive to install the OS you would need to use the usb 2.0 port...
but yes for all other times using an eSataP device would be the best bet since you get power from the usb and data transfer from the sata.

Yes this is much warmer... wow I will work on a few photos tomorrow and see if I can make this work.... thanks for posting it.... +rep for sure...

 

Yeah, I ordered one of these the other day after you first posted about it, and also the cable off of Amazon. Not sure if the additional cable was needed or not. Have you got yours yet to confirm the cable that comes with it is a dual cable?

Mine shipped already and should have it early next week. I bought another setup off of ebay that was only $12 shipped, but the case is just a silicon cover. Fine if it's just going to sit on a desk and never be transported, but not something you would stick in a laptop bag and carry with you.

 

Yeah, I got mine, and it does come with the right cable. I ordered one off Amazon too, so I guess I'll just have an extra. Not a huge deal... one of my other drives has eSATA, just no power. I can't wait until I get my Envy (I'm outta town this week, won't get it until I get home at about 11pm on Friday )

Edit: I just posted a micro-review of it in a thread on the accessories forum: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5808485&postcount=13

 

After looking at some RAW, properly white balenced, portrait work I just did I can say yes that this is the calibration needed. now I need to do a few prints to mach up and I will be happy with the color.

genyu I would like to try your calibration when finished too ... thanks again guys for working on this...

 

I set it up in dim room but for maximum screen brightness. for editing i normally use 90nit brightness but thatwould be way to dim for realworld use, plus ive noticed increasin brightness from a properly calibrated 90nit setting looks very 'washed out' when at max bright levels. The opposite seems to be true to going from bright to dim.

Also please note I updated the post with the profile regarding how to set up display before loading profile....

 

Very nice. Thanks!

 

Thanks JJB!

When thing though, can you please make a little guide to installing this properly, cause I put the file in the correct folder and under color management, I clicked add and then under advanced, I set it as device profile default and changed viewing conditions profile to the ICC one. Yet I don't notice a difference in firefox or desktop.

 

I think this laptop won me over, I just played 45 minutes of Supreme Commander on 1280 x 720 on high settings, and the fan never ramped up.

It's stayed completely cool, my temperature says the palm rest and the exhaust is around 33-34 degrees C.

Friggen awesome, was never able to game on the Macbook Pro June 2009 without headphones cause the fans were so damn loud.

Kudos to HP for a well engineered piece of high performing machinery.

 

I will eventually be doing a properly calibrated profile for photo editing on one or both of the screen choices. i normally do one for 3 different brightness levels so I can adapt to different enviromental conditions (airplane, outdoors etc...) will update these once I get them to my standards

With regards to printing, spyder elite comes with a print calibrater which ties into your display calibration and even different type of paper with custom print icc's. Basically you print what you see on the screen most of the time.

 

Ok I think I got it to work by going under change system defaults and advanced then selecting use windows display calibration.

Wow, seems way too warm. I'm in low lighting atm and everything looks really warm lol.

 

Yeah, quite a shock for me too when the calibration cut in.

Much different from the bright blueish hue from the factory.

 

I might not be the best one to that as I never have to do it manually, that's all done by my calibration software, I just right click desktop and select profile.

Very good idea, if someone could give me a 'user friendly' step by step guide to loading and switching profiles in win7, I could put together a list of profiles (from myself and others) for each display type, that all could use. maybe add it to the O.P.

 

I will add a profile for the glossy display tomorrow, need to redo it with fresh eyes in the morning. Been looking at to many computer screens all day

i may redo the matte display also, it looks good on some things but not others....

 

If you could make it just a little less warm, for me, it would be perfect.

 

What brightness level do you normally use??

Since I cal'd this one at full brt. it will seem more saturated when you lower the brightness level (therefore warmer looking). maybe I should do one at 80% and a little higher color temp (cooler). I will play around with it and try to find a good balance for everyday use.

 

Instructions on how to activate the calibration.

Start -> Control Panel -> Appearance and Personalization -> Display -> Change Display Settings -> Advance Settings -> Color Management Tab -> Color Management -> Check mark next to "Use my settings for this device" -> Add the .ICC file by clicking Add -> Advance Tab -> Click on "Change System Defaults on the bottom -> Put a check next to "Use Window Display Calibration" -> ENJOY! =D

 

You're right. It seems much better at max brightness. ATM, since it's late and I have little lighting, I'm using around 60% to 70%. That would be so nice if you could make some profiles for guys that use lower screen brightness like me. + Rep

 

Thanks! Glad I have software that does all that for me

I'll post that when i get some more profiles together (if you don't mind). Once you have it loaded in can you just use microsoft color control panel to select profiles from a list?

+ REP

 

Yes sir, after you do all that stuff the first time, all you have to do is specify which profile you want to use.

 

For the people that have owned both the original and the refresh of the Envy...does the new version run cooler?

 

Well I had the previous i7 1st gen envy, and the i5 I have now runs a good deal cooler.

 

I've never had the Envy gen1, but the i7-720 I have runs cool, the fans never ramp up even during heavy game play.

Probably important to note I have this sitting on a cooling pad with dual fans.

 

How do you re-map the quick launch keys ?

 

Anyone running Dual Monitors with their HP Envy 15?

 

JJ,
Here's a little trick when profiling laptop LCDs: Set the gamma to 2.5 instead of 2.2.

This will yield higher density in non-colormanaged rendering while keeping colormanaged rendering correct. Great for displays with less than optimal viewing angles. You get some more punch in non-black text which improves readability against a light background.

 

Damn, this laptop is definately growing on me.

Wasn't very impressive when I first boot it up, so used to the fit and finish of the Macbook Pro that I had before this.

The mac looked good on the outside, but damn was it loud and hot, definately not as enjoyable to use.