HP Envy 14-2000ea review

HP’s Envy laptops were simply gorgeous when they first appeared a few years ago – they were among the only Windows-based machines capable of giving Apple a run for its money where it comes to design. Little has changed on the outside, but this latest model has brand new internal components to keep it up to date.

First up is an Intel Core i5-2410M processor running at 2.3GHz. This dual-core chip is more than capable of completing everyday tasks, and can also hold its own when it comes to more intense workloads thanks to Turbo Boost, which can push its clock speed up to 2.9GHz. Paired with 4GB of RAM, it achieved an overall score of 53 in our multimedia benchmarks.

It also copes well with gaming, thanks to an AMD Radeon 6630M dedicated graphics card. With its 1GB of dedicated video memory, it eased its way to 34fps in our Dirt 3 test. Unsurprisingly, it’s also powerful enough for watching high definition video, although you’ll need to connect an external display to watch 1080p content at its native resolution.

Dedicated graphics don’t have to come at the expense of battery life, as the Envy 14 can dynamically switch between the AMD card and Intel’s integrated GPU. In our light use test, the laptop managed over five hours away from the mains, so you should be able to get a fair amount of work done on a single charge.

The Envy 14 is also well equipped for multimedia playback. A slot-loading DVD writer looks great and is ideal for watching films on the 14in display plus the internal speakers have Beats by Dr. Dre branding. In practice, this doesn’t mean a huge amount – Beats is essentially an equaliser preset. When activated, bass was slightly more audible than on other laptops, but we would still recommend using a set of dedicated speakers.

The screen itself has a 1,366×768 resolution that’s just about large enough to work on two documents side by side – if you need more screen space, there’s a choice of HDMI and Mini DisplayPort outputs for connecting an external display. The glossy finish picks up a fair amount of light reflections, but there’s a decent amount of screen tilt to stop it becoming a problem. Picture quality was certainly above average, with both text and images looking sharp, but colours were slightly muted at the default settings.

The large Chiclet-style keyboard is well suited to typing in low light, thanks to the bright white LED backlight, and although there’s no separate numeric keypad, we had no trouble typing at full speed thanks to the full-size, comfortably-spaced keys. Unfortunately, the integrated touchpad was more of a disappointment – the buttons are integrated into the touchpad, so you sometimes have difficulty knowing where the touchpad ends and the buttons begin.

It’s a shame the touchpad is so fiddly, as otherwise the Envy would be a desirable laptop. With two USB ports, a single USB3 port and a multi-format card reader, it’s well equipped for all your peripherals, but you shouldn’t need to sacrifice a USB port for a mouse just because the touchpad isn’t up to scratch.

This issue aside, the Envy isn’t particularly good value – the Asus N55SF has a more powerful processor and graphics card, more memory and storage space, an internal Blu-ray optical drive and a higher resolution screen for the same price. It might not have quite such drop-dead gorgeous looks, but it’s definitely better value.