HP Envy 14 review

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The HP company succeeded in delivering good performance and graphics punch for HP Envy 14 , all while correcting a teensy overheating problem and adding an optical drive and backlit keyboard.

Then there was that rock-solid, engraved metal chassis that made it one of the most attractive notebooks on the market, a distinction it still holds to this day. So as you can imagine, when HP refreshed the HP Envy 14 this summer, there wasn’t exactly a lot to improve.

The last time we reviewed the HP Envy 14, we concluded, by and large, that HP got it right. The company succeeded in delivering good performance and graphics punch, all while correcting a teensy overheating problem and adding an optical drive and backlit keyboard. Then there was that rock-solid, engraved metal chassis that made it one of the most attractive notebooks on the market — a distinction it still holds to this day. So as you can imagine, when HP refreshed the Envy 14 this summer, there wasn’t exactly a lot to improve. What we have here is a nearly identical machine, with the same stunning design — not to mention, $1,000 starting price. Now, though, HP is selling it with Sandy Bridge processors and USB 3.0 — the kind of tweaks laptop makers have been rolling out for the better part of this year.

Normally, that kind of speed bump wouldn’t warrant us re-reviewing a laptop. In fact, we probably wouldn’t be revisiting the EHP Envy 14 if it weren’t for two things. For starters, we’ve received an unusual number of emails, tweets and comments from readers, imploring us to weigh in on the Sandy Bridge version before they pull the trigger. Secondly, in addition to that processor swap, HP has fine-tuned the touchpad drivers, and assures us the trackpad isn’t the flaky mess it was the last two times around. So how much better is the HP Envy 14 in the year two thousand and eleven? Let’s find out.

With the exception of screen size, the HP Envy 14′s design has barely changed since the first generation of Envy laptops arrived on the scene two years ago. As always, its tough metal body, black chiclet keyboard and giant clickable trackpad make it near-impossible to avoid comparisons with the MacBook Pro — a machine HP is surely going after here anyway. Still, the Envy retains its own personality, thanks to a copper-colored body covered in divets arranged in a sort of paisley pattern. Like any MacBook Pro, it has a glowing logo on the lid and a sparse keyboard deck with almost no buttons.

There’s really a lot to like about HP’s keyboard, but since we have to start somewhere, let’s talk about the sound. Yes, the sound. The panel feels as sturdy as the chassis itself, and typing produces a deep, quiet noise that inspires confidence in the machine’s build quality, an improvement over the bendy keyboards and high-pitched clacks you’ll find on lots of cheaper systems. But more than that, the keys’ soft finish and balanced spacing make them a joy to type on.

Regardless of how much money you sink into it, the HP Envy 14 has a 1366 x 786 display — a clear let-down from the 1600 x 900 screen we were treated to last year. If this were a $700 system we wouldn’t be complaining, but on a system that costs northward of a thousand bucks, we’d expect more. 1366 x 768 is the mark of a budget machine, not a premium one. Given the glossy finish, we were pleasantly surprised by the viewing angles. Which is to say, they weren’t terrible.

Our HP Envy 14 ($1,080 as configured) came loaded with a 2.3GHz Intel Core i5-2410M CPU, 6GB of RAM, a 750GB 7,200RPM hard drive and dual graphics cards, including Intel’s integrated HD option and AMD’s Radeon HD 6630M with 1GB of video memory on the discrete side. Starting with benchmarks, it delivered a score of 6,735 in PCMark Vantage, which is on par with the score we got from HP’s Pavilion dv6t with the same processor and 6GB of RAM. And while its 3DMark06 score of 7,214 falls about a hundred points short of the Dell XPS 15z (admittedly, a $1,534 machine with a Core i7 CPU), it’s still a healthy improvement over the pricier Sony VAIO S we recently tested. In our standard battery test, which involves playing a movie on repeat with WiFi on and the brightness fixed at 65 percent, the Envy 14′s eight-cell lasted three hours and 55 minutes. That’s squarely mediocre when you consider the 15-inch VAIO S series lasted a near-identical three hours and 59 minutes with its integrated graphics card enabled.

It’s been thirteen months since we first reviewed the HP Envy 14 and while that’s dog years in the gadget world, we’re still pretty pleased with the thing, though we’d be exaggerating at this point if we said we were smitten. On the one hand, its well built, beautiful design hasn’t changed and frankly, most competitors haven’t delivered anything as memorable in this size / price class. The performance remains more than adequate for everyday use and while the battery life isn’t anything to write home about, it at least keeps pace with the competition. This time around, too, the trackpad is actually usable, even though it’s not without its quirks.

Source: ENGADGET