HP Envy 14 Spectre Ultrabook Review: Something More Than Envy
by Dustin Sklavos on August 24, 2012 10:09 PM ESTApplication and Futuremark Performance
The HP Envy 14 Spectre is capable of enjoying the fastest ultra-low voltage processor on the market as well as employing Samsung's very respectable PM830 SATA 6Gbps SSDs, and the results are impressive. It may be heavy in the hand, but the Spectre is capable of being very nimble when stressed.
Between the SSD and fast ultra-low voltage processor, the Envy 14 Spectre ranks among the fastest ultrabooks we've tested and in many cases actually blows by the Sony Vaio Z2 and its full voltage Sandy Bridge processor. Note also that the Z2 employs a pair of SSDs in a RAID 0, so it's not terribly handicapped in this matchup.
When we get to our CPU-limited benchmarks, the full scope of what Intel achieved with Ivy Bridge becomes evident: the i7-3667U is able to do in 17 watts what the last generation top end i7-2620M needed 35 watts to achieve. That's no small feat, and it's clear the Envy 14 Spectre isn't terribly hindered by its ultra-low voltage processor.
Unfortunately the 3DMarks are a bit less kind. Despite enjoying DDR3-1600, the single channel of memory bandwidth seems to noticeably hinder the HP Envy 14 Spectre. It's still baffling why HP went this route with both the Spectre and the Folio 13, but the results speak for themselves.
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Beenthere - Saturday, August 25, 2012 - link
HP is going to be out of Biz before long the way they are going. They are so confused they don't even know if they are in or our of the PC Biz.ggathagan - Monday, August 27, 2012 - link
The idea of HP getting out of the PC business was pushed by a CEO (Leo Apotheker) that was fired the month after he spewed that nonsense.Given that this all occurred a year ago, you might want to get a fresher news source.
MrTeal - Sunday, August 26, 2012 - link
I can't help but notice that the UX31A is in your charts for this review. I sure hope this means that a review of the new 13" Zenbook Prime review?JarredWalton - Monday, August 27, 2012 - link
Coming very soon. :-)seapeople - Sunday, August 26, 2012 - link
Sooo... the spectre gets beat at Futuremark by two other laptops with the same thermal envelope, graphics, and slower processors (Asus and Intel UB), yet supposedly runs extremely cool at max load so therefore has no thermal issues?Is the cooling really that great, or are they throttling to reduce temperature?
Also, did I miss the gaming review section?
CaioRearte - Sunday, August 26, 2012 - link
Please review the HP Envy 14z (the one with Trinity). I think it's a nice comparison, then we can finally see the graphics power difference clearly.joshv - Sunday, August 26, 2012 - link
I was one of the unfortunates who bought an original HP Envy 15, right after it was first released.The '2' key was stillborn, requiring a trip into the shop. Then the video intermittently began to fail. This resulted in about 4 to 5 round trips to the repair service. Every time but the last failing to fix it. Once it finally returned with a brand new motherboard, 2GB of RAM had gone missing (still recognized by the BIOS, but not by windows) and the BIOS they shipped me was so old it had this nasty little bug: http://h30434.www3.hp.com/t5/Notebook-Hardware/HP-... . I had to fix it myself. Still can't figure out what's wrong with the RAM.
So after that six months of fun I sat down to finally start using my ENVY, just in time for numerous other keys on the keyboard to fail.
$2,000 - down the toilet - the thing is a useless brick.
HP can't make quality, durable hardware. I should have known better.
Sunburn74 - Monday, August 27, 2012 - link
Funny how the bench's for the asus ux31a are available for viewing in this review.CharonPDX - Monday, August 27, 2012 - link
Absolutely, I'd love to have a replaceable battery!
Or not....
Non-replaceable means the space used to make it replaceable can be filled with more battery.
th3architectto - Friday, November 23, 2012 - link
it's a classy amazing design, the best out there, good for "music and watch pictures". no this could be better if it has a 15 inch 1080p resolution display at minimum, upgradable aftermarket ssd, more memory capable, discrete graphics 1 gb ddr5 at least and handles ivy bridge 35/45watts processor, well making the classy design funtional real functional and they can do all that without over raising the price they're gonna be making them best business ever.