Well, they’re official now – HP just announced their Envy 13 and Envy 15 ultra-thin, stylish notebooks. The Envy 13 looks extremely appealing and looks like a good replacement for my Pavilion dv4 notebook… in a year’s time, and if I can afford it by then.
HP Envy 13:
- Intel Core 2 Duo processor
- 13.1 inch LED-backlit widescreen display (16:9 aspect ratio; 1366 x 768 pixels)
- 2 DDR3 RAM slots
- Chiclet style keyboard
- 512 MB ATI graphics card
- Intelligent switching between dedicated ATI HD 4330 and Intel integrated graphics for battery life/performance priority
- 2 USB ports, 1 combined audio in/out jack, HDMI port
- Optional battery slice extends battery life up to 18 hours (think of the super-thin extended battery of the Elitebook 2730p)
- Less than 1 inch thick
- $1699 introduction price
HP Envy 15:
- Intel Core i7 processor
- 15.6 inch LED-backlit full HD widescreen display (16:9 aspect ratio; 1920 x 1080 pixels)
- Chiclet style keyboard
- 1 GB ATI HD 4830 graphics card
- Night vision/Infra red equipped VGA webcam
- 4 DDR3 RAM slots
- Dual drive bays
- Optional battery slice extends battery life up to 7 hours
- About 1 inch thick
- $1799 introduction price
Both HP Envy models also have ‘HP Clickpad’, which is a fancy name for a button-less trackpad ala Apple’s MacBook computers. There’s also an optional optical drive attachment which doubles as a ‘dock’ of sorts with two external USB ports.
Two main things that I really, really, really, absolutely need to find out include:
- Do these two HP Envy notebooks have backlit keyboards?
UPDATE: Nope, sadly
- Any matte screen option for the display?
UPDATE: No, again =(
Remember two weeks ago when there were whispers about the Envy series going global/outside of North America? Well, turns out there’s a HIGH possibility that might be true. The new HP Envy 13 just came out ahead of its Tuesday announcement. The new notebook features an ultra-thin profile, 13 inch screen, chiclet-style keyboard, huge trackpad (possibly multi-touch) and will most likely make it to computer stores around the world (unlike its Voodoo PC counterpart, the Envy 133). As for port selection, pictures show 2 USB ports, HDMI port and a combined audio in/out jack. Stay glued in your seats people, I predict a slew of new HP things coming real soon.
I’ve just heard news that HP may be taking Voodoo PC’s Envy ultra-slim notebook on a ‘trip’ to some places around the world – there seem to be whispers around the web that HP might make the Voodoo Envy notebook ‘officially available’ in several countries by the end of this year. Currently, Voodoo PC’s products are exclusively available in North America only.
If this actually happens, then it’s fantastic news for those living in Europe, Asia and elsewhere around the globe. Think about it, you probably could scrap your plans to order the Envy 133 via your Uncle Bob living in Texas and buy it from a local HP store instead. I said IF it happens because the news hasn’t been confirmed yet.
Reading about the leaks online about the HP Firebird 803 feat. Voodoo DNA this morning caught me by surprise… not because of any mind blowing specifications, but a gaming PC setup in a net-top-like form factor (plus the Blackbird 002′s design). The Firebird 803 will supposedly feature a Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83GHz processor, 4GB [included?] RAM (though for a gaming PC, I’m expecting it will be able to SUPPORT up to 8 GB of RAM), Blu-ray drive and dual NVIDIA GeForce 9800S cards with NVIDIA nForce 760i SLI. The “confirmed” features (looking at the leaked images) are a single slot-loading DVD drive, dual hard drive bays, 6 USB ports, 1 Firewire 800 port, 2 eSATA (non USB hybrid though, unlike those on the HP HDX16/HDX18 notebooks), HDMI, 1 S/PDIF and 1 DVI dual-link port.
The HP Firebird 803′s PSU will be external to reduce heat and supposedly shares the same one as the Voodoo Envy 133. Based on the leaked pictures, I’m pretty sure the PSUs of HP’s latest notebooks can fit as well (whether they can be used is another story).
Looks to be a solid concept – miniature Blackbird 002, less features and customizability, but probably less expensive as well. I’m guessing it’ll be available in February, from $1300.
In other news, Dell has confimed that they will be releasing their ultra-thin notebook, MacBook Air competitor very soon… which will also be competition for the Voodoo Envy 133. It will be called the Dell Adamo (sounds a whole lot like the Honda Asimo)… Voodoo, are you feeling the heat?
My all-time favorite notebook PC trackpad has gotta be the one on the HP Pavilion tx-series notebooks. The tactile feedback of the little dimples are absolutely fantastic and I have no problem finding the trackpad area, even when I’m not looking at it. And the thing still works great when using wet hands to touch. By the looks of it, I suppose the one on the Voodoo Envy 133 will offer the same, nice control as the HP tx-tablets. Next up is the ones on HP business notebooks, which always have a matte like finish to the trackpad area and rubberized buttons.
The vertical scroll zone has gotta be the best thing since sliced bread too since I don’t need to shift my hand to the arrow keys or page up/down controls, or move the mouse to the scrollbar on the side of the screen. Practically, minimum finger/hand movement. I don’t quite care for horizontal scroll zones on my trackpad though, as it somehow isn’t as precise or natural as vertical scrolling and it takes up precious real estate (Really now, with widescreens and high-resolution displays nowadays, how often does one need to do horizontal scrolling?).
I’m not a big fan of the slippery trackpads on the HP HDX, and some of the HP dv-series and Compaq Presario models, which make them hard to use with wet hands and the horizontal scroll zone makes things worse, in my opinion.
I can’t wait to see multi-touch on more notebook PC trackpads. The Voodoo Envy 133 already has one which supports multi-touch and chiral gestures. I’m sure this will trickle to high-end notebooks and other premium notebooks, before (sooner or later) becoming a standard feature on all notebook PCs.
