Waiting for Envy 17 3D SB thread

That is a real good price, about half of the original, and an awesome combination of specs but I wonder why it is a pre-order?

Does that mean it might be free of some of the earlier build problems?

 

I would stay away from it....note they say NO RETURNS!!!! Well, if HP will honor the warranty ok, but is there a guarntee that HP will cover you for 2 years if you buy the Envy off of this guy?


KJ

 

The demo for the Envy 17 3D is now changed back to the old version with an ATI Radeon 5850M. No longer does it mention HP Cool Sense, HDMI 1.4, USB 3.0, and 2nd generation Intel processors... I'm going to be livid my Envy 17 3D comes without these hardware/features.

Edit: Per dlleno, new demo back up.

 

must have been a mistake -- hp is known to update content on weekends. maybe you caught things at just the wrong time. For me, 2:09 EST its back to the new details now (whew) and even the std Envy 17 describes what must be an imminant release of this one too -2nd gen processors, coolsense, WiDi, hdmi 1.4, 1600MHz front bus, and switchable graphics but (surprisingly) 5850 GP. apparently, only the 3D gets 6850. anyone want to venture why?

I'm starting to view the product demo as a piece of content that has been updated first, before any of the other elements are changed. It appears this is the case for the DV7, and evidence is very strong that this is the case for the Envy 17 3D, so I infer that the std Envy 17 is coming soon

on edit: just cleared cookies and temp internet files and restarted browser, to insure that i wasn't looking at a cached copy of the demo. still I get the new version

 

Wow, I just read at least 20 of the 61 pages of comments.

Killa Joe thanks for turning me onto this thread

I want to point out up front that I work for HP. I also want to point out that I am in no way an official spokes person for HP.

However there are a few things I can shed some light on…

Warranties: There has been a lot of discussion on after-market upgrades. Here are a few details. After market upgrades do not void your warranty with HP. We realize that you may upgrade your ram or change your hdd at some point and it would be a cop-out to just cancel your warranty at that point. The information that causes some confusion is that the upgrade itself is not covered. I am sure you all can imagine why, I have talked to people that thought a mouse was used like a sewing pedal. Needless to say not everyone should do their own PC work. Either way if you decide to it just needs to be realized that if your PC does have a problem/defect, and especially if it is related to a aftermarket upgrade they will probably make you return it to the originally shipped config before supporting it… I know this can be a little aggravating but it is a lot better than the old practice of voiding warranties all together…

CAM 121 nice catch on the VM support, you will be a lot happier with 7xx series. Glad they could get you taken care of and get the order switched out for you. A lot of people don’t look into that stuff and it can come back to haunt you later. We saw a lot of that with intel’s old VT processors…

Rumor Patrol: I really enjoyed all the rumor patrol posts and I really feel bad that you couldn’t get better information. For the record Molly atHP on Facebook is a real HP employee and does her best to supply valid information… Which leads me to the next topic…

Why is it so hard to get info? When I read through 20 pages of people almost begging for info on a product that I truly want there to be hype for and want to sell and it goes on for over a month with very little resolution it is frustrating for me… This has an answer that is as simple as it is frustrating. If we announce something we are going to be held to it… Well that doesn’t sound that bad… you say… what, does HP have trouble keeping its word? I wish it was that simple… Take the envy 17 3D SB for example if we announce an exact day and then SB chips are delayed we miss our date… that’s all there is to it. It takes only one component of hundreds to get delayed to make us look like liars… If any of you have ever been involved in a supply chain anything near the size of HPs you know what I am talking about. You literally are never more than a monsoon or a pirate ship off the coast of Somalia away from letting your customer down. As you can imagine we don’t like to do this so in turn sometimes things seem a little tight lipped. Some companies are so tight lipped they will literally have all the product built and waiting for distribution almost before the rumors and hype start. We are somewhere in between, we try to let some info out so you can make an informed purchase but in all reality it usually comes back to bite us. We almost need to be able to say “here is the info we know now but it is subject to change” problem is if it does change a lot of people are going to think we are leading them on – trying to get them to hold out and not go to a competitor or something like that. I will be honest… we are all human and when you are working with a big company it is pretty easy to go into conspiracy theory mode rather than realize a company can have unforeseeable and unavoidable supply chain issues.
All that said we are trying to do better… Why do you think I am reading 20 pages of comments at 11:49PM MST on a Friday night? One avenue we are looking into is starting a blog/forum of our own where we can have a little more dialogue like this. Some questions like does the Envy 17 3D really have HDMI 1.4 could have been answered a lot faster… other questions like when is the SB model coming out we probably couldn’t have answered exactly. We would also have random tech tips, like actual helpful information instead of just post after post of “hey you should buy this”. Granted most of you would already know all of our tech tips, but there are a lot of people out there that need a video that shows how to upgrade ram or even use a card reader… if nothing else you could post questions and know that if we had a real for sure answer we would give it… but you would have to forgive us when we truly don’t have an answer yet… what do you think? Horrible idea? In a lot of these situations the messenger is just going to get killed, hard part is it still seems like the right thing to do…

Finally last thing Killa Joe emailed me and said you guys had some questions on Envy 17 3D specs… Looks like you have the answer for the HDMI question, I am going to look into your questions about SSD drive sizes as soon as I can get into the office next week… What else, specs for products that are already shipping can always be looked up?

Oh I am 99.99999% sure Envy 17 3D is not getting a radiance screen, also if you are ever wondering why one model Envy 17 vs Envy 17 3D)has one option and another has a different option the answer is almost always supply. Managing supply for the whole US retail and direct takes a lot of componant managment. Think about it we always want to sell the latest and greatest but the latest costs a ton when it first comes out and you never want to get stuck with a bunch of old stuff cause that just drives the cost of everythign up...

Maybe we need a twitter feed that answers the questions as the answers become available… hmm now you got me thinking…

 

thanks nate -- maybe you can influence what appears to be a complex content management operation to do better at syncing up the various content elements on the CTO ordering pages. like a product overview tab that matches the product specs tab. So that when we go to the CTO page for the SB Envy we don't get confused because the overview page there says HDMI 1.3c, and 5850 GP, and does not mention coolsense or WiDi etc.

and about cam121's discovery -- can you get the content folks to put real, actionable information in the "help me decide" section esp. for processors? the content there is next to useless, and is more about disclaimers than being informative. Here in NBR we've been able put together that the 28xx processor, in addition to its L3 cache and VM advantage, also takes advantage of 1600 MHz RAM, but I don't see any information on the CTO page that would inform the customer of any such important detail. Moreover, the SB Envy claims to allow 1600MHz RAM for selected i7 configurations, and I infer that this applies to the only upgraded i7 choice available, but there is no confirmation of such. So the customer has little incentive to pick the upgraded processor from the information provided, when in reality the 28xx upgrade appears to offer a significant advantage for those who need it, combining a larger L3 cache, a faster front side bus, and better support for VM.

oh -- and can you find out for us if CoolSense included any physical changes to the Envy to further advantage the cooling efficiency? or is it just HP Thermal Assistant software with hooks into the HDD accelerometer?

 

dlleno - Ok that is a good list and I am going to see what I can do to help. First chance I get will be on Monday so hopefully you can hold tight till then...

Edit: I just re-read your post, gotta tell you there is some good suggestions in there. Some of them seem very obvious like product overview and product specs pages matching and should be able to get somewhere on that right away... Others like Help me decide is a little harder because we are dealing with so many people with different knowledge levels. Still it would be nice to be able to get this type of info somewhere... I am curious Cam 121... Where did you find it?

 

outstanding. thanks Nate

 

Questions about the Envy 17 3D Sandy Bridge currently available:

• Is the switchable graphics feature included?
• Is HP CoolSense included? Is this just some kind of software implementation or hardware also?
• Is there really 1600 MHz memory speed?
• I fairly sure the answer to the following question is yes but is the touch pad still a click pad? I've noticed the new Pavilion dv series refresh not yet available is getting individual left and right mouse buttons.

I decided to take the risk in purchasing the Envy 17 3D in my sig without knowing for sure the features listed in the product demo (details page) are the real deal. The website is a mess right now with a load of contradicting information. For example, the Envy 17 3D's overview page still has the legacy Envy 17 3D details but the specs page have the new Sandy Bridge and Radeon 6850M specs. Also, the product demo for the dv6 Quad Edition and dv7 Quad Edition show the refreshed version yet the ones being sold are clearly not.

Thanks for that informative post and I look forward to hearing back from you.

Edit: Sorry for posting basically the same exact stuff dlleno asked. It took my a while to think of stuff to ask about while there were new posts.

 

Keep it coming... I will compile a list and try to knock as much out as I can on Monday...

 

Nate this is really appreciated. here's my complete list from a few posts back. The context is from my interpretations of the January 4 press release.

• After describing HP CoolSense Technology as the combination of (1) usage detection (2) strategically placed vents and (3) a fancy fan controller, HP then states that the Envy 17 'now has it'. So to verify this we need to know if the SB Envy has different venting, auto detection based on accelerometer, and if it as HP Thermal Assistant software. But more than that we need verify that running temps are controlled under heavy use.
  
• Without distinguishing between the 3D and the non-3D flavors, HP said the Envy 17 gets AMD switchable graphics with the Radeon 6850. So I want to know if the SB Envy 17 in fact has this card, and how well it automatically switches to on-chip graphics when playing non-3D, non-DX11 content.
  
• HP said that the Envy 17 is getting WiDI. So we need to test that
  
• The product demo says HDMI 1.4, USB3, and gigabit ethernet, so those need to be verified
  
• The product demo says DDD TirDef 3D Experience Ignition Game player is included, even though the press release did not commit to this except in "future models". so is it there is is it not!
  
• The product demo says 1600 MHz RAM so that needs to be verified (might only be available with the 28xx processor)

by the way, cam121 and others, here is some additional speculation on one reason why HP won't sell the Envy 17 with out at least one HDD present: perhaps the accelerometer inside the HDD (for SmartDrive protection) is used for CoolSense. So for HP to support CoolSense they need the HDD in there to hook into its accelerometer.


perhaps the most burning question (pardon the pun) that is on a great many NBR minds is this: How has HP addressed the palm rest heat issue. Some of the gamers here report that it gets uncomfortably hot (legacy Envy 17 of course) , even when CPU temps are within reason. So this is behind our interest in possible real physical changes to the SB Envy and its ability to dissipate heat away from the palm rest. We would be most grateful to know of any internal changes there -- vents, heat pipes, different materials, etc, beyond the Thermal Assistant fan controller itself.

 

Hmmmn after all this hoopla perhaps we now have a shot of getting real answers!?

Looking forward to Monday/Tuesday. I'm sick of the speculation and I'm fearful that the Envys up there will end up being disappointments....

 

Checked the Envy 17 SB Demo changed back to the legacy Envy again o.o

 

If new Envy 17 3D manual made available it would answer mostly all the question people have here.

 

There's a good chance it doesn't have switchable in the 3d version. Alienware has the same issue with their M17x3D. The IGP can't support 120hz displays.

 

I specifically asked my sales rep when I ordered the machine. He quite adamantly said "NO" the machine won't have shared graphics...Netherwind, you make quite a valid point. Won't know unti we get the machine.

 

Forget the name brand of these but does anyone think the Envy 17 SB should have a mix or some specs like these?

ASUS G74SX 3D Gaming Laptop w/ Nvidia GeForce GTX 560M Spotted|Laptop Computer Planet Blog

AVADirect's Clevo P170HM with GeForce GTX 485M: High-End You've Been Waiting For - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News

 

The only thing I'm a bit disappointed about in the Envy is the GPU, but they've never said it's a gaming laptop, so I kinda understand.
It would rock to be able to configure it with a HD6950 or something.

 

I believe HP Nate will let us know next week.

Once again, I want to thank HP Nate for posting on NBR and helping with our concerns and questions. Nate, if HP is not paying you to stay up late at night posting on the NBR forums they really should, I'll put a good word in for ya. Just let me know who I need to talk to.

On a side note, just wanted to let you and HP know that as educated consumers we appreciate the easy 21 day return policy and mostly, the 2 year warranty that HP now provides with American support for the HDX and Envy lines. It lets us know that HP is standing behind its products and we do notice.

There were some great ideas to bring better, correct/updated information to NBR users and other consumers interested in HP products. It would be great having you and maybe bring HP reps into the NBR forums to post and update us regarding products/info, etc... I would think the admins/mods would be more than happy to perhaps create a Support Section for HP with real HP reps posting...( users will create threads and know HP reps will be there to help! I love it! ) Maybe link it to HP tweeter, etc... I think these are great ideas that we all would love to see come to reality.

P.S. HP Nate, I just wanted to add a question to the mix.... Will there be surprise form HP in the next couple months, meaning, will there be a refresh model to the Envy 17 3D SB or can those purchasing this model now be confident that this is the REAL, ONE AND ONLY FINAL RELEASE SB edition Envy 17 3D for the rest of 2011, and there won't be another Envy 17 3D until possibly 2012 with the Ivy Bridge edition?

KJ

 

I just googled for the chipset numbers and "virtualization" and "aes". The three articles of interest are:

• Tom's Hardware Guide - Core i7-2820QM: Sandy Bridge Shines In Notebooks : Meet Sandy Bridge's True Purpose
  
• Starred Reviews - Intel core i7-2630qm vs i7-2720qm comparison and differences | Starred Reviews
  
• Laptoping - 2nd Generation Intel Core i3, i5, i7 Sandy Bridge Laptop CPUs

The summarization of this information is listed below (and I copied most of this from Starred). I "bolded" the important virtualization points. While the below points compare the i7-2720QM to the i7-2630QM, the i7-2820QM contains all the hardware benefits of the i7-2720QM plus more.

• The max DDR3 frequency rating for the core i7-2630qm is DDR-1333 while the core i7-2720qm can support up to DDR3-1600. Theoretically, it will mean a through put of 25.6 GB/s in Core i7-2720qm as compared to 21.3 GB/s in core i7-2630qm.
  
• The other notable improvement in the core i7-2720qm comes in the form of the turbo frequency of the graphics section. While both the processors have base graphics clock frequency of 650 MHz, the core i7-2720qm has better 1.3 GHz turbo core frequency, as compared to 1.1 GHz for core i7-2630qm.
  
• Intel core i7-2720qm has support for WiDI diplay – the core i7-2630qm has none.
  
• The core i7-2720qm has support for the Intel Virtualization Technology for Directed I/O (VT-d) while the core i7-2630qm has none.
  
• The core i7-2720qm supports Intel My WiFi Technology which core i7-2630qm does not.
  
• The core i7-2720qm has been listed with support for 4G WiMAX Wireless Technology
  
• VMware Workstation (and Player) has support for AES-NI which is not supported by the Intel i7-2630QM CPU. The i7-2820QM does support AES-NI.

I'm sure some people will be interested in the claims that the i7-2630QM does not support WiDI. This should be related to the onchip graphics GPU and not any specific built-in discreet GPU (though each laptop manufacturer has a different discreet GPU vendor preference).

P.S. I realize my needs are not typical of your targeted Envy user.

 

cam121!!! Excellent info. I think this will help many here decide between the two offerings. I myself will go for the i7-2820QM...just thinking of the future...well, lol, at least the next 2 to 3 years I should be good to go, I hope.

KJ

 

Ha, thanks. This can be extended to any other computer manufacturer thread on NBR! Of course those companies would have to find reps to post on NBR in their appropriate sections....


KJ

 

In the Envy 17 tested here, HP used an Intel SSD and Samsung HDD so it's likely that won't change with the latest version. Here's hoping that the next review of the Envy gets Maximum PC's coveted "Kick *ss" award!

Maximum PC | HP Envy 17 Review

 

Here's one reason I'd want VT-d and switchable graphics:
YouTube - Xen Virtualization & Intel VT-d: Direct Hardware Access to Graphics Card by Windows Virtual Machines

Even if the IGP has to drive 60Hz rather than 120, they really should give us switchable graphics. After all, you'd already be getting a mode switch anyway.

With VT-d and two graphics devices, we could give one guest the Intel card and another the ATI card... then switch on-the-fly, without rebooting!

EDIT: another awesome thing to do, assuming you can have Intel driving LVDS while ATI drives DisplayPort: run each OS on a different monitor. That'd be well worth the price of admission -- even the EliteBooks can't do that!

 

Xenclient only works with integrated graphics, by the way.

 

dlleno are you sure the video they've got up there for the Envy 17 3D is the latest one?

 

If you're referring to the product demo, it has changed between the latest Sandy Bridge Envy 17 3D and the legacy several times today... No idea what is going on but the HP website is so messed up.

 

good to know....

I'm gonna be watching it closely to see if I see any changes.

 

at least the HP Canada site is consistent... no damn change at all!

 

surfcity, sorry to hear that. Give HP until Monday or Tuesday. As mentioned by HP Nate, HP likes to update during the weekend, so maybe this one.... Besides, now that we have an HP rep reading our thread I'm hopeful we as HP consumers and prospective consumers will get the answers we are looking for shortly. Keep checking on HP's site and on this thread of course. I feel not much longer now....

P.S. I myself have an interest in this matter...and plan on ordering mine very very soon.


KJ

 

I hope I'm not the last in our little circle to get this laptop but at the rate I'm going I won't be surprised if that's how it ends up!

 

Killa Joe - yeh, it's been a long wait but the good news is it gives some of us more time to save up for this pricey beast.
Since the HP Canada site doesn't allow for customization I might end up purchasing elsewhere anyway. And so we wait... :SLEEP:

 

I'm concerned about the GPU. It's getting old even before the new Envy17 is assembled.

 

Lol....God I hate technology....

 

Being last might be a good thing. By that time they'll have all the bugs worked out!

 

True if HP does like it always does by the time I get it they'll add even more options and they'll be at even cheaper prices....

I was like literally one of the first people to get the HDX18t back a few years ago and I came back randomly one week to check it out and I was amazed all the options available for it...

So heres to hoping that by the time I get mine they'll be some nice choices.

EDIT: Just watched the demo video on HP's website and I think its the updated one. If you click on details it mentions the 6850 graphics card, HDMI 1.4, 1 USB 3.0 port and 2 USB ports (which is enough I guess).

Kills me that there is no finger print reader however...

 

See this is what I don't get, I've heard some say the SB Envy GPU is great if you're not trying to run Crysis on max or something like that, but then comments like this make me a little concerned. I'm really pretty uninformed when it comes to things like this (as I'm sure you can all tell ) so is this really that bad? I know the post above was a bit of an exaggeration, but I mean really, how does the SB Envy's GPU rate in general?

Sorry for the question, just want to make sure I don't regret the purchase I'm planning on making on Monday...

 

I have been reading this post ever since January!! The non-3d SB envy 17 still havn't come out... Does Coolsense exist? Does Switchable Graphic Exist? I'm totally confuse... HP's mess up webpage still havn't been fix... I just want to know does "Up to 2 TB of storage capacity, Beats Audio and HP Triple Bass Reflex Subwoofer for outstanding sound and ATI EyeFinity Technology for multiple external display support" exist? Does "future second generation Intel Core processors and AMD switchable graphics technology with Mobility Radeon 6850M graphics" exist?? anyone... Does" Intel Wireless Display technology to share content wirelessly from the notebook to TV’s and other screens" exist??? I am helpless. I will be sticking with HP until Mayish. If maracle does not appear. I am probably abandoning ascetic and getting a dell xps 3d instead since I have always dislike Macbook Pro series. I love windows!! There will never be a day I will switch to snow leopard.

 

The Envy 17 3D SB currently available offers pretty much everything you mention.

Switchable graphics with the ATI 6850 is being confirmed. All Sandy Bridge processors comes with WiDi technology, the new Envy 17 3D includes this as well. Beats audio was always there however we are not sure if it is the new generation like the one placed on the new DV7. CoolSense exist as well at least the software part, hopefully they did the necessary modifications in hardware as well.

 

Thank you so much!! So how does the Switchable Graphic Work? I heard people saying that IGP Just does not work on 120 hz screen... That why i am waiting for review of envy sb 3d and non 3d sb envy

 

Switchable graphics is being confirmed for the new Envy 17 3D SD, thats for sure.
Nobody knows for sure what exactly is going on yet, but it is there 100%.

Maybe they over-clocked the SB GPU in order to be able to handle the 120hz, or maybe the screen now only works on the 120hz when does 3D and this is when the ATI kicks in to handle the situation. Or maybe Intel just supports 120hz (or will support it with a driver update) and the whole situation is just a misunderstanding, but since no one has actually the laptop yet we cannot know for sure.

 

I trust you, I'm just carious that where can I find the information. I will be ordering mine tonight if I got this straighten out!!! Your information is almost heaven for me!!! Thank you!!!

 

Hey you are very welcome.

You do not have to trust me. Just refer to January 4th press release which clearly mention switchable graphics with SB and ATI 6850. Second ATI 6850 officially supports switchable graphics, along with SB of-course, third the product demo just confirms the above.

Again the only thing is not confirmed yet is hardware optimization for CoolSense. The original Envy 17 suffered from major heating issues and horrible battery life. SB processor and switchable graphics will dramatically improve this situation however the hardware optimization is much needed along with the CoolSense software and sensors to get the best results possible.

 

I'd probably use KVM, rather than Xen.

Also, a question about HDMI 1.4: are the Ethernet channel and the return audio channel mandatory? Will the AMD support either one?

As for the ClickPad, one big test: with HasBothButton feature enabled, you should be able to drag with the "middle" button (one finger in left area and one in right).

A hint for dragging: don't put the button finger(s) and the dragging finger down at the same instant.

 

Thank you so much!!!

 

We won't know for sure until it is tested. The 1/4/11 press releases refer to the Envy 17 having switchable graphics. There is no mention of the Envy 17 3D having switchable graphics.

We know that all of the other Sandy Bridge 3D laptops lose switchable graphics with the 120Hz 3D screen because of hardware limitations with the LVDS signal from HM67/IGP. The only hope here is that the ATI HD3D implementation by HP is different because we know that NVidia and Dell have been playing the blame game. So, at least with NVidia, it is unlikely to get 3D to work with Intel's IGP.

On the Alienware M17xR3 with 3D, you could achieve around 3 hours of battery life. The non 3D with NVidia was getting between 4 and 5. The non 3D ATI was getting over 5. The ATI GPU seems to more efficient at completely powering down. Some people had reported that the GPU disappeared completely from the device manager whereas the NVidia GPU never disappears completely.

 

Hell if non 3D = MORE BATTERY then DAMNIT I guess I'll have to wait longer or get the dv7 and pray it comes with 1080p and/or backlit keyboard

 

It's just a rebranded 5850, so it's old technology (the same one as in the old envy17), which concerns me since the competitors comes out with new GPU's. As you said, it's good enough for not playing top games on max gfx, but still, they could have jumped up one notch to the brand new 6950, which isn't a rebranded 5xxx, and has new tech in it.

 

So apoxxx do you think the Envy SB version could run Starcraft II without hassle?

 

Yeah I'd think so, but then again SC2 ain't the most demanding game out there.
I'm more worried about future games like Skyrim, which for me is what I'm looking the most forward to this year. I would have waited until then if I didn't need a laptop for school right now.