Upgrading envy 14 cpu from dual to quad

I'm curious if anyone with an envy 14 that originally came with a dual core has successfully replaced the cpu with a quad core. I noticed that there's a different video option required when you buy the machine depending on whether you go for a dual or quad, presumably related to gfx switching. I wonder what's actually going on with that-- would a quad-upgraded system simply ignore the gfx-switching option on the dual-type video card, or would it constantly crash while attempting to change to the nonexistent integrated gpu? anyone know?

 

The dual-processor has the integrated GPU. The quad-core does not. So, when you change to the quad-core, your system wouldn't even detect an integrated GPU and simply not even load the drivers for it. Hence, you couldn't even switch to integrated graphics even if you wanted to. Your system would not crash because you would not even have the graphics switching option enabled.

 

you can't swap form dual to quad core without swapping the motherboard too.


the way the envy14 is setup, it has two motherboard options. one with switchable turned on, one with switchable turned off.

i3/i5 has switchable turned on and won't accept quad core cpus.

i7 board has switchable turned off and won't accept dual core cpus

 

that's the official word from HP, but I wonder if anyone's given it a try. it'd make sense that if you installed a dual-core into the quad model it would still be missing the option to switch to the intel gpu, and in the opposite case it might try to switch to intel and crash since it's not there, but no one knows for sure?

if I get an envy 14 with a dual core now, I'll be sad if I'm stuck with dual forever ;_;

 

And by 'forever' you mean 'for the next couple years until I upgrade.'

Though I would be interested to hear if anybody has tried making the swap. I've heard someone say that the dual cores use a different socket than the quads, but I'm not sure if there was anything to it.

 

Socket-wise the Arrandales share the same socket, so they will fit. It is more on the controllers regarding switchable graphics that you hit the problem. For the Envy 15, going from Dual to Quad works flawlessly 95% of the time.

 

it's a motherboard thing.

it wouldn't accept it.

this is how it is with all switchable graphics laptops.

I mean the i7 620m (and probably 640m) would work but those are dual core i7s

 

Yep - the dual core i7 has integrated GPU. I'm assuming that fitting say a i7-640M in place of an i5 would be a straight swap with no graphics swithing options - right?

 

putting an i7 620m (which has worked for someone on the i5 envies) and hopefully i7 640m shoudl work fine.


depends on if the bios says "no, bad" or not. It didn't protest when some guy put in a 620m so, should work with the 640m but you'd have to be a guinea pig and try it yourself.

 

Any update on this? I've got the arrandale motherboard with a core i3 in it and thinking of buying myself a core i5??

 

i3 to i5 is fine.

i5 to i7 or i3 to i7 is untested and speculated to be impossible. However, my i7 mobo is marked as an arrandale (i3/i5) board. So I dunno.

 

Is your Board number 1437?

Quad models -1437
Dual models -1436

 

Is there some way I can find out?

The reason why I know it's meant for i5's is because there's a little grid with different options marked off with a sharpie on the mobo itself. My "arrandale" box is checked.

 

Use HWMonitor to check

 

Ah, it's marked 1437.

Wonder why the arrandale box is checked on the mobo o_o