HP Envy 15-3XXX questions

Hi, I've had my Envy 15 for a little over a month and a half now, and it's freakin sweet. Quiet, cool, powerful, sexy, you name it. But over this period of time, I've had a few questions that I haven't seem to been able to resolve.

1. I can't manage to open the battery cover using the sliding lock. It seems to get stuck and I can't slide it all the way to the right where the cover would come off. This is a big problem as I want to upgrade to an SSD soon. Has anyone had this problem?

2. Is fixed or dynamic graphics better? Do games perform better in AMD fixed mode? Does the laptop use less power in Intel fixed mode?

3. My Beats Audio button does not work. Pressing it does not result in the opening of the Beats control panel. Reinstalling the driver does not work. Maybe I installed the wrong driver, but which driver is responsible for that function? The volume dial also does not work 100% of the time. Clicking the volume icon and adjusting it manually fixes the problem, but not long after it will come back. How can I fix this?

If you only have the patience to answer one question, #1 is the most important one. Thanks so much!

 

1. Try to push it real hard. It's a little stiff that one.

2. Fixed mode is better. You get better performance for the same software even if you set it to high performance in dynamic mode. Worse battery life though.

 

I know that some Envy 14's shipped with a similar problem on the battery cover. In those cases, the typical response given was to send in the laptop and have the battery cover assembly replaced, though that's a serious pain.

Dynamic graphics automatically switches to the more powerful discrete GPU when necessary for the current tasks being performed by the computer, while fixed graphics is a manual switching mode where you choose whether to use the discrete GPU or the integrated graphics at any given time. Dynamic graphics switching is notorious for not switching when it should sometimes, so you might be better off with Fixed if you can keep up with switching the graphics yourself when necessary.

 

Absolutely true, especially with AMD cards.

 

keep it on FIXED. you get a drastic battery life difference. i get around 5 hours with brightness around 40% and web browsing. with music too.

and when you want to game, just make sure you are on the dedicated card.

 

Thanks everyone who has responded so far! You guys are a such a great help.

I've tried many times, but it gets to the point where it hurts my finger a lot to continue sliding the latch any further cause it gets stuck. I'll keep trying

 

Weird, I slide mine half way and it takes the battery cover off. Then there are 6 screws to take off to get to the memory DIMMs. If I need to take that part off I slide it all the way over.

 

After hurting my fingers and using a shirt as a buffer, I finally managed to take off the cover! Thanks guys! Now I just have to justify spending $300+ on a Crucial M4 256 GB SSD D:

Anyone have any idea about the 3rd question?

 

Did you do a clean install or did it never work from the moment you got it?

 

The control panel worked for the first couple times, then stopped working. I didn't do a clean install, but I did uninstall a few things I didn't need. Though I can't imagine the things I uninstalled were related to the actual Beats software.