HP Envy 14

amazon HP Envy 14 reviews

Design

If HP Envy 15 and HP Envy 17 is equipped with a black aluminum case with a rough exterior, the HP Envy 14 Spectre, HP re-apply a different design philosophy. Spectre ultrabook the shell is made of beautiful shiny black glass (scratch resistant). When looking at the machine, you will easily be attracted by the beautiful ridges and corners who rounded. Chassis no decorative anything other than the HP logo in the lower aluminum right corner. Unfortunately, with the glass surface, the Envy 14 Spectre fingerprints very easily.

The opening of the shell is quite difficult, you have to put the nail in the middle and the bottom shell to slide open the machine. Inside, you’ll see a mirror screen adjacent bottom silver similar to MacBook Pro, however, there are differences. touchpad is made of scratch-resistant glass.

Envy 14 Spectre for solid feel. However, the design of the machine is quite heavy and thick with a ultrabvook no optical drive. Heavy Machines 1.81 kg, 12.8 x 8.7 x 0.8 inches size, the Envy 14 Spectre horizontal heavy Samsung Series 5 (13.1 x 9.0 x 0.82 inch) 14-inch version, the DVD-drive. Dell XPS 14z (13.2 x 9.2 x 0.9 inches heavier with 1.99 kg) and Lenovo IdeaPad U400 (13.4 x 9.1 x 0.9 inches to 1.99 kg), but both products are also used in optical drives.

The keyboard and ClickPad

Typing on the island-style keyboard Envy 14 Spectre very comfortable. Flat keypad with large size are arranged with reasonable distance. The keys for a strong response, however, a small part in the middle of the keyboard with subsidence phenomenon. Another very popular feature of the keyboard Spectre is Radiance Backlighting: every key press is made of the light-emitting LED with automatic sensor-based vivacious off the distance between you and the machine. If you leave too far from the machine, the keyboard will automatically turn off the lighting system.

Synaptics ClickPad by HP Spectre is equipped for durable scratch-resistant glass, with large area (3.9 x 2.4-inch) helps users easily portable, making navigation quick and accurate. The multi-touch manipulation, including pinch finger zoom, and rotate with the 2 fingers, type 3 finger (three-finger flick) is generally very smooth. HP also equip this ultrabook features finger type 4 (four-finger flick) so you can see your open documents in Windows Aero interface. However, there are some cases during the test, we’re in trouble when scrolling the page up and down.

Screen

HP Envy 14 Spectre is the second ultrabook equipped with a screen resolution of 1600 x 900. (ASUS Zenbook UX31 ultrabook is the first). HD + Radiance Infinity screen visibility for detailed and sharp. Experiment Youtube video high definition (trailer movie “The Avengers”), you may notice screen allows realize the details of the scar on the person Nick Fury character or scratches on arms Iron Man character. Although using the screen horizontal viewing angle of the mirror, but the machine is still very wide.

The average illuminance of Spectre is 249 lux screen, much higher average illuminance in thin and light laptops (usually 179 lux), higher than the Samsung Series 5 (222 lux) and U400 (165 lux).

Beats audio

One of the highlights of the Spectre’s products are integrated Beats audio technology. HP Beats help ultrabook for clear sound even when placed in the machine hall. Even when placed inside the machine, the machine is very loud speakers. Experiment two tracks “Step In The Name Of Love” and “Turn Up The Music” singer’s voice emits clear, sharp with very strong bass. However, the sound is distorted significantly higher when the volume is turned up.

Inside the machine are arranged left wheel buttons help adjust volume included dedicated buttons to activate the Beats Audio control functions with mute button. HP Envy 14 Spectre equip Wireless Audio KleerNet technology allows users to stream music to the KleerNet machine, similar to Apple’s AirPlay devices.

Heat capacity

After watching a full-screen Hulu video for 15 minutes, the touchpad, approximately between G and H keys and the lower part of the temperature respectively 78, 88 and 95 degrees F (corresponding to 25, 31 and 35 degrees C ).

Envy 14 Spectre is also equipped with HP CoolSense technology helps fans turn more often to realize you are putting the machine inside. However, the real test, this feature proved ineffective. After watching videos on Hulu for 15 minutes when placed inside the machine, the temperature measured at the touchpad and the middle section G and H keys was 83 and turn 90 degrees F (28 and 32 degrees C). The temperature measured at the bottom side 98 degrees F (37 degrees C), higher  3 degrees than the standard for cool.

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Envy 14-2160SE Beats Edition: Buy it now

HP 14″ Envy Laptop 8GB 500GB | 14-k110nr: Buy it now

Hp – Envy 14″ Laptop – 8gb Memory – 1tb Hard Drive – Silver: Buy it now

HP Envy 14-k120us TouchSmart Ultrabook with Beats Audio (free T-Mobile 4G): Buy it now

Touch to Share feature

Thanks to built-in NFC chip, users can use the “Touch To Share” to switch between an Android phone websites (that supports NFC) and the Envy 14 Spectre. After downloading the HP Touch to Share app from Google Play for the Samsung Galaxy Nexus and the NFC enabled phone waves, just put the Nexus on the right hand part list Spectre to connect two devices together. Time to connect pretty fast, take only about 2 seconds.

To transmit from one website Nexus phone to Spectre, you must open the app on your phone Touch To Share, open websites want to convert and press the Home button. Then you put the Nexus on the left side of the palm rests Spectre, the website will load almost instantly.

Connectors and Webcam

Along with volume adjustment buttons and wheel button to activate Beats, mute button, power jack is also located on the right side of the machine. A USB 3.0 port, USB 2.0, HDMI, miniDisplayPort, card reader “2 in 1”, Gigabyte Ethernet port and headphone jack / microphone can be found on the left side. HD resolution webcam can capture images and record 720p video. Tests showed grainy photo, but the colors are quite accurate.

Performance

HP Envy 14 Spectre for an impressive performance in the Core i5-2467M chip test thanks to 1.6-GHz speed Intel, 4GB RAM, 128GB SSD, Intel HD 3000 Graphics. Tests showed that the machine allows to stream movies from Netflix even open tabs in Chrome and IE 8 without experiencing any problems.

PCMark07 benchmark test to measure overall performance, Spectre reaching 3,217 points, higher than the average scores of light and thin laptops is 2142 points. Meanwhile, Samsung Series 5, Intel Core i5-2467M laptop also uses 1.6-GHz speed with traditional hard drives), reaching 2,042 points. Dell XPS 14z Core i7 2640M Intel-speed 2.8 GHz reached 2,329 points while the Lenovo IdeaPad U400 with Intel Core i5-2430M 2.4 GHz reached 2,307 points.

Experiment with File Transfer Test, the Envy 14 Spectre copy 1 video file 4.97 GB took 68 seconds, ie the average speed is 75 MB / s, higher than the average speed of the laptop of the same type ( only 28MB / sec) Samsung Series 5-speed only 22 MB / sec, but the other ultrabook with SSD for better speed. ASUS UX31 for speed 97.9 MB / sec while the MacBook Air 13-inch for speed copy up to 127 MB / sec.

Boot Time

The machine is equipped with advanced SSDs instead of traditional hard drives means that Spectre for fast startup times and high speed file copy. Envy 14 Spectre boot Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit for 35 seconds, 26 seconds faster than the average startup time of the laptop is the same type. However, compared versus Samsung Series 5, Samsung’s laptop only takes 31 seconds to boot thanks to 16 GB SSD Express.

Another feature of the ultrabook can not be ignored is the ability to boot from standby mode quickly. Spectre takes only 1 to 2 seconds to be ready to work from mode “to bed”, this speed on par with the MacBook Air 13-inch.

Graphics performance

Intel HD 3000 Graphics, Envy 14 Spectre can play high-resolution video and casual gaming with ease. Experiment with 3DMark06, Spectre reach 3438 points, lower 1,479 points than the average score 4917 of the laptop same type. However, this score still beat Intel HD 3000 Graphics of the Samsung Series 5 (3430 points).

Thanks to the graphics card is equipped with the ability to switch, the Lenovo IdeaPad U400 (Radeon HD 6470M graphics from AMD/GMA 3000 Intel 1GB VRAM) and Dell XPS 14z (Intel HD 3000/Nvidia GeForce GT 520M, 1GB VRAM) respectively reached 4489 points and 5461 points, although 2 samples not enough thin to be called ultrabook.

Software

HP Envy 14 Spectre provides the bought a set of very useful software. Remote sensor close (Proximity Sensor) help control the keyboard backlight through sensors embedded in the upper screen border. Users can adjust the distance near the time and place for opening the backlight off.

Similarly the other Envy notebook line, the Adobe Photoshop Elements 10 and Adobe Premiere Elements 10 also built into the Envy 14 Spectre.

The third-party applications including Skype, Microsoft Office Starter, Adobe Reader X, Windows Live, and 2-year royalty-free use of antivirus software Norton Internet Security.

Battery life

Using the Laptop Battery Test (continuous Web surfing over Wi-Fi), Spectre for 6 hours 24 minutes battery life, 14 minutes better than the average of 6 hours 10 minutes of the laptops in its class. Lenovo U400 for a battery life of 5 hours 45 minutes while the Samsung Series 5 and the Dell XPS 14z for a battery life respectively 5 hours 29 minutes and 5 hours 23 minutes.