HP Envy M6-1310sa review

Working on the M6-1310sa was a little more problematic. The keyboard has enough room for full-sized keys and a numeric keypad, but there could have been a lot more travel between individual keys. We made numerous mistakes while typing as it often failed to register certain letters we’d pressed, but it’s possible to get used to this over time if you don’t mind being particularly heavy-handed while you type.

Fortunately, the touchpad was much more responsive and easy to use. Multitouch gestures such as pinch-zooming were a little fiddly, but two-finger scrolling worked perfectly and the individual buttons gave a great level of feedback when we browsed through our files on the desktop. The touchpad’s slightly ribbed edge sometimes got in the way of swiping inwards from the sides to use Windows 8 shortcuts, but we were typically able to swipe from the sides correctly without any problem.

As a general-purpose laptop, the M6-1310sa has a good range of ports. In addition to its three USB3 ports and one USB2 port, it has VGA and HDMI outputs, a Gigabit Ethernet port, a DVD optical drive and a combined headphone and microphone port. The integrated BeatsAudio speakers produced a welcome amount of bass, but a lot of it was lost due to its downward-firing subwoofer.

The M6-1310sa’s battery life was more encouraging, as it lasted 7 hours and 8 minutes in our light use test with the screen set to half brightness. This is roughly two hours longer than your typical general purpose laptop and, at 2.4kg, it’s not too heavy to move around or carry in a backpack.

If you disregard price, the HP Envy M6-1310sa is a fairly average general purpose laptop, with a good amount of processing power, but at £580 it’s an absolute bargain. It’s significantly cheaper than many Core i5 laptops, and while it may not have a touchscreen like the similarly-priced Acer Aspire V5 Touch, the Envy M6-1310sa has superior graphics performance and a more stylish design. It’s a shame the keyboard and screen aren’t better, though, as these items prevent it from gaining an award.