*HP Envy 15 Owners Lounge! PART 2*

Awsome. Thanks, it looks and works great. A bit more subtle than the skin I was using. +rep ( Edit: well I tried but I guess I need to 'spread it around' before I can give you another rep)

 

Are people still having problems with poor SSD performance on their Envy's? I want to get an SSD for my Envy soon, but remember reading previously that their performance (I think it was in 4k read/ writes) was crippled...

 

Does anyone use 7-Zip? Is it normal that my cpu would stay at 1.6Ghz when unzipping large files? I would of thought it would jump up and do its thing....

 

It SHOULD, it does for me at least. Try after reboot TurboBoost acts up sometimes.

 

I use 64-bits winrar... might as well use it since we got a 64bit OS

 

This problem still exists. No update from HP.

 

Liking it! Thanks for sharing!

 

My envy's bluray drive is my first bluray player. Does anyone know what tools are needed to backup some of my bluray disks to standard DVD so I can play them on the road on regular DVD players? I've done a ton of google searching but there is just too much trash to go thru. Some tools even appear to be viruses.

 

You will lose your BluRay magic if you don't know how to do it properly. Look at doom9.org they have lots of people to help you on this. If you use automated tools you will loose all the oomph of the BR.

 

JJB. Thanks a lot for your reply. I found the software on the HP website searching through google. I also have the swsetup files, and I have the factory re-installation dvd set.

Now here its the trick. supposedly quickweb ONLY works with the HP oem version of windows 7 and not with any other retail version of windows 7. I can get the quickweb installed again but I have to do a full recovery using the original windows 7 home that came with the envy. (interesting and weird at the same time). I tried installing the software on my new windows and it goes through without any problems but afterwards its just not there. only the help files.

I guess that I will be staying with my 7 ultimate version and no quickweb. everything else is working as it should. Ohh and Sleey0, your alienware wallpapers are awesome. thanks a lot for sharing them.


Ps: does anybody know if the shortcut buttons on the left side of the keyboard can be customized to different funtions ???

 

Alot of softwares in SwSetup folder won't install easily unless you know commandline but same softwares works fine when downloaded off of HP's website.

 

Does anyone know of a way to set the Envy 15 (gen2) display to 6500K rather than the default 9300K (or at least that's what it seems to be)? The cold blue-ish tint everything has is driving me a little mad. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

 

for anyone who elected not to get the SSDs when ordering and regretted it later (me), here is a fair alternative. intel X25m G2 160gb SSD (OEM) for $320 shipped:

http://hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1512206

private sale so buyer beware. i ordered 1, drew said he has a couple more. i'm going to put the 500gb drive from the Envy in a small enclosure with eSATA if i can find one. seems like a better combo than the 1 SSD + 250gb/4200rpm HD option at HP, though you got both packed in the chassis.

edit: woops wrong thread

 

I have a much dumber question, I'm sure --

Apart from getting rid of the HP bloatware, what is the benefit of reformating and doing a clean install out of the box? Since the drive is already relatively empty (and free of errors, especially with the SSD option), would it not be almost as good simply to uninstall the HP programs you don't want?

 

Hey guys i found a little bit of information on the thread already, but if i have a 5.1 surround system with multiple jacks is there any way that finding some kind of multiple audio port hub will allow me to run all channels properly? Cheers. (barring getting an external sound card).

 

You should get 5.1 if you run HDMI to your amp. If you don't have HDMI in on your amp, perhaps you can connect to another component with HDMI in, such as a blu-ray player or DVR.

 

Very good attempt.

 

Got delayed until April 28th, will it be able to run all current games? At a min of 22 fps.

 

It sure will but some games might drop fps at native res, specially latest titles.

 

What will a game like BattleField2 or Crysis run @

 

Crysis I have tested on my cousins notebook (Full HD) to run at 36fps and with mine it runs at 37.4fps (1336 width).

 

My Envy has been locking up and freezing on me randomly for the past couple of days. I'm not really sure what I should do since I probably can't return it for a refund and HP support are not very useful the last time I talked to them.

Any suggestions?

 

I actually have been having the same problem. What bios are you running?

 

I recommend to stick with F. 18 A as the later three BIOS Revisions has been very unstable in both installation and operation.

 

Does anybody know which driver controls the light on the "mute" (f11) key? The key still works for me, but sometime in the last few days, it has stopped turning the light on and off, leaving it always on. I tried reinstalling the drivers in "audio" in swsetup, but no luck.

This isn't the first time something like this has happened-- is Windows Update replacing the Envy drivers with generic ones? My touchpad had a similar issue-- double-tap in the upper-left corner still worked, but the light was always on until I reinstalled the touchpad drivers from the swsetup folder.

 

I'm running with the F.1BA BIOS and had this problem with all the other BIOS versions except haven't tried the latest. I suspect it has something to do with the gfx card, drivers, or BIOS or any combo of those. I am using the 10.3 ATI drivers. Everytime I get a lockup the fan speed seems to go up. I'm not running anyting load intensive either.

 

For anyone who's looking to make an HP purchase, Bing CashBack is currently at 25% right now--it only went to 25-30% 3 times last year. Ongoing thread with instructions here:
http://slickdeals.net/forums/showthread.php?threadid=1981882

Note that use of coupon codes have a 100% chance of canceling any CB!

 

Most certainly its video driver, for the sake of testing remove the ATI driver and stick with Standard VGA and see if it still freezes.

All BIOS have worked good for me so far on F.24 now and there has been no lockups or anything else that should be worry.

 

from as far as i have experienced (yes I have the blank screen problem) and have heard, either this problem exists right from the beginning or you never have it. BIOS update doesn't cause/solve this particular problem. That's why most people have been suspecting of hardware problem. Indeed some of the people seem to have motherboards replaced having turned their units in for repair.

 

I concur. Its hardware related and not software. I have never had a black screen on my ENVY. No matter what video driver I install all works perfect. before OEM and after format all works fine. I'm running F.18 and will not update it unless HP releases a stable BIOS version.

 

The video freezing/blank screen problem is relatively common, I had this problem on my first unit, but I returned it for refund and ordered another one with the same specs.

Here is the official thread on the HP forum:
http://h20435.www2.hp.com/t5/HP-Env...nvy-15-Blank-Screen-Issues-lets-do/td-p/54168

The facts that we have so far on this issue are:
(1) BIOS updates, graphics card driver updates, settings, temperature, running applications or games in lower resolution, etc., we have all tried these and as far as I'm aware no one who was experiencing this problem was able to resolve it this way, which suggests it is a hardware problem.

(2) It seems to be something that people experience soon after purchasing the unit. I haven't heard of anyone who had their Envy for several months with no problem and then suddenly started experiencing frequent blank screen/videofreezing/BSOD. So although there are a lot of folks who have had this problem, there are also quite a lot of people who purchased an Envy and never have this issue occur at all.

Accordingly, at this point, it seems the only solution is to either return your unit to HP for refund and order another one, or send it in for repair and hope that if they can't fix it they will replace the entire unit. I have no idea what the percentage could be in terms of the number of units with this problem, but I would imagine there must be many more units functioning properly than units with this blank screen/video freeze/BSOD problem. So, hopefully, your new unit will fall into the category of the majority of those Envy's that are functioning fine with no problem.

A few posters on the HP forum mentioned that HP replaced the motherboard for them and then the problem was resolved.

 

I had to send my envy back last week of a failed bios update. I have never had problems with my envy shutting down randomly before, but now it happens.

 

Is this after getting your Envy back?

 

I ahve the envy 15-1021tx model. I purchased it from Hsrvey norman in Australia but as usual, Australia does not get all the accessories and specials that are available in america. It was impossible to order this specific laptop with a Blu-Ray driv. Not only that I originally wanted the Beats edition of the envy 15 but once again its only available in the US. Overall im very happy. The best part is, I saved hundreds as my laptop came with corel video studio 12 ultimate and corel paitshop pro photo X2 ultimate

 

Is anyone else experiencing this?

 

Here is a link to a calibrated .icc color profile I made for the Envy 15 glossy 1080p screen.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showpost.php?p=5990480&postcount=2644

 

Got a new problem and its quite annoying. I purchased a Razer orochi bluetooth mouse which causes my bluetooth headphones to lose sound whenever I move the mouse around. The BT audiosink doesnt disconnect, it just cuts sound everytime I click or move the mouse; sound comes back as soon as I stop touching the mouse. Problem happens with 3 different BT wireless audiosink devices and its quite obvious that the mouse interferes with them. I replicated the problem with the following devices:

Motorola s9 headphones
plantronics 590 headphones
sony mh100 bluetooth headphones

Anyone observed this problem? Any fixes?

My bluetooth module in the laptop is the intel integrated module and driver ver. is 6.2.0.9414. I was under the impression that this module (like most modern BT modules) operates multiple channels in order to keep the interference problems under check.

[EDIT]

I also have a bunch of unnamed "Bluetooth peripheral devices" that I can't for the love of god figure out which driver is needed:

 

@Tayeule

FYI there are 3 newer Bllotooth drivers listed on the drivers thread, the latest one from last month being version 6.2.1.1100, don't know if it will solve your problem though.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=426181

 

Got those already but the widcomm driver's (which gets installed by this package) version number just happens to be very similar, those are the ones i installed already.

[EDIT] hmmm *scratches head* did a " let's try and redo a full uninstall..." same version after reinstall and reboot but no more problem... strange-itude. thanks JJB (i guess).

[RE-EDIT] spoke too soon problem still occurs... damn

 

If you do a re-install of Bluetooth drivers and peripherals, be sure to remove hidden devices as well. I had an issue with my Orochi where it would just stop working that I resolved by removing 3-4 hidden HID Bluetooth devices that I believe were causing a conflict.

CMD Prompt
set devmgr_show_nonpresent_devices=1
Select Show Hidden Devices in Device Manager

 

Does that CMD show any additional hidden devices compared to just choosing the 'view tab' > 'show hidden devices' in device manager ?

 

Yes. This KB is technically for XP but I find it also applies to Vista/Win7.

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315539

 

@ozu thanks for the input but no matter how deep I go so far it reinstalls automatically upoen reboot... Its a beech to get rid of...

[EDIT] Still chopping my music as soon as I click/scroll/move the move. That snake mouse can choke on itself if I may be so bold to say.

 

I have an Orochi too - great mouse (especially wired hehe) but it has a very high sampling rate so it's possible that it just drains the available bluetooth bandwidth too much. The obvious workaround (as I'm sure you have considered) is to use it in wired mode. As an upside I find it to be much more responsive and accurate in wired mode.

 

does the orochi work well on fabric or glossy surfaces?

 

Fabric - sure. Haven't tried a glass table yet. It samples at 2000 dpi wireless and 4000 dpi wired.

 

Yeah but since i replaced my logitech nano vx for the orochi in order to save a usb connector, that situation does not quite make me happy. It's going back to the store. Aside from this, great little mouse.

 

orochi user here as well (wireless mostly). works great on wood table.

 

You probably have to delete all versions in Device manager, just like AMD drivers. update driver > browse computer > 'check' include subfolders & click 'choose from list' -- That will show you all the drivers in your computer associated with the device, then you need to pick one, install it without rebooting, then uninstall it (and delete / remove from system if given the option) from device manager (again without rebooting)..... repeat untill all items in the 'list' are gone except the generic MS / windows driver.

Bottom line is Windows will try to install the most recent driver available from that list automatically when the current driver is uninstalled as soon as you reboot. So you need to remove them all (except default / generic version) before you reboot the system and install your new driver(s). Also, depending on your windows update settings, windows will even attempt to download and install a driver if they are all removed for a specific device, so I always turn off wifi just to prevent that from happening.

 

I had heard several people say that they were able to unraid their SSDs thru the BIO's, but I can not find the option any where in version F.24. Any help anyone can give me would be great.