HP Envy 13 review: A slim, light, and inexpensive workhorse with discrete graphics - gainesoweig1963

At that place's much to like about the HP Enviousness 13, starting with its super-slim design, its bright 4K display, its comfy keypad and eye-popping quad-core performance. The Envy 13 also manages to bundle off in a discrete GPU and respectable battery life, all for a very reasonable cost chase after. That said, we did encounter any issues with the laptop computer's overly sensitive trackpad (which HP says information technology's investigating), resulting in a jittery cursor that regularly jumped around the screen and even highlighted and deleted our words by accident.

Configuration

For as little as $750 with discounts, you can snap up an HP Invidia 13 with a 13-inch full-HD display, an 8th-generation Intel Kernel i7-8565U processor, 8GB of RAM, and an integrated Intel UHD Nontextual matter 620 core. On the other end of the spectrum is a 13-inch HP Envy with a 4K exhibit, a 1TB SSD, a 10th-gen Intel Core i7-10510U CPU, 8GB of RAM, and a discrete Nvidia GeForce MX250 graphics identity card, all for a discounted $1,350 sticker price. You can search completely these configurations directly on HP's Envy 13 shopping page.

We tested the HP Envy 13-aq0044nr ($1,100 on Amazon), which cherry-picks features from both the higher- and lower-end configurations of the laptop computer.

• Processor: Quadruplet-core Intel Core i7-8565U
• Read/write memor: 16GB DDR4 Read/write memor
• GPU: Discrete Nvidia GeForce MX250
• Display: 13-column inch UHD (3840 x 2160) IPS BrightView touch screen
• Storage: 512GB SSD

Overall, that's an impressive amount of power below the hood for a fairly reasonable monetary value. The 8th-gen Core i7 processor might look equivalent a disappointing downgrade to those thirsting for a 10th-gen Intel CPU, but from what we've seen, there's not much of a performance gap between the 8th-gen Whiskey Lake processor in this configuration and the 10th-gen Comet Lake potato chip in the pricier Envy 13 models. Both of these quadriceps-core group CPUs are assembled on Intel's 14nm process, for one affair. Spell the Comet Lake processor has a slightly higher boost clock, you're probably not active to feel the difference in distinctive daily screen background duties.

Besides the solid Processor, you're also getting a generous 16GB of RAM and a roomy 512GB SSD, meaning you'll love sight of multitasking headroom, plus decent storage to install plenty of programs and even a decent amount of media. The 4K touch screen should fork out razor-sharp visuals (although you'll salary a cost in the battery-life section), and then there's the cherry on top: discrete graphics in the form of an debut-level Nvidia mobile nontextual matter card, handy for working in Adobe Premiere or even playing a bit Fortnite.

Blueprint

Slick, slim and eloquent (operating theatre "pallid gold," if you spit up an unneeded $10 on HP's online configurator), the HP Envy 13 cuts an enviably garnish profile. Measuring 12.1 x 8.3 x 0.58 inches and weighing in at just 2.8 pounds (or 3.42 pounds with the Ac cord, which comes with a compact exponent brick), the Enviousness 13 feels great to hold in your work force, and it's scantily there in your backpack. I should know, because the Invidia 13 served as my laptop at CES in Vegas this year. My backwards is eternally grateful for the Envy 13's lighted, thin beat out.

The top of the HP Envy 13's aluminum lid is featureless save for the HP logo stamped in the heart. When you chummy the lid, the front brim has an hourglass sharpness that makes the laptop easier to agape, while the Formed book binding edge in of the lid covers the hinge, making the rear of the Envy 13 look like the spine of a record. When opened, the hinge props up the Envy 13's lower chassis, angling the keyboard while also allowing for a cooling airflow to a lower place the laptop.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The devolve on the HP Enviousness 13 props functioning the keyboard while helping to maintain air flow below the chassis.

Opening the Envy 13's lid reveals (in the case of this particular SKU) the eyeball-popping 4K presentation, which is surrounded by slim bezels on the top and sides but a rather chunkier one on the freighter. Higher up the keyboard sits a speaker grille with an cute diamond-cut aim. The power button takes residence just above the Outflow key, which should help prevent the accidental presses users sometimes experience with broadside-mounted versions.

Display

Invulnerable by a Corning Gorilla Glass NBT application, the HP Envy 13's 4K touchscreen checks nearly of our boxes. With its IPS (in-plane switching) display technology, the Envy 13's screen boasts solid viewing angles, dimming only slightly when viewed from the side or top.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The aglitter 4K display happening the HP Begrudge 13 features thin top and side bezels, although the nethermost bezel is a tad chunky.

The display is also impressively bright, measuring about 395 nits (or candelas) according to our exposure meter, which is overrun our 250-nit minimum standard for comfortable indoor reading.

Of run, the brightness and 4K firmness of the Envy 13's display will put a dent in the laptop computer's battery life story, as we'll see momentarily.

Keyboard, trackpad, speakers, and extras

The HP Envy 13's backlit keyboard is among the comfiest that I've tried, with a generous amount of move around (the distance a tonality sinks into the when it's affected), a Saratoga chip mid-slash bump, and a bouncy rebound. The Envy 13's keys are likewise remarkably quiet, which your coworkers bequeath likely appreciate.

Ben Patterson/IDG

We're fans of the H.P. Invidia 13's homy keyboard. The niggly trackpad? Not so such.

I did, however, have trouble with the Envy 13's overly sensitive trackpad, particularly approximately the bottom corners. With my right palm regularly grazing the trackpad as I typed (given that the trackpad is centered along the main flesh rather than the space bar), the computer mouse pointer frequently jumped across the screen, occasionally bringing the cursor with it if I happened to poke at the trackpad at the wrong moment. That meant the trackpad sometimes elect and deleted random swaths of text, or moved the cursor from one line to another while I was still typing. The problems persisted even aft I fiddled with the laptop's trackpad sensitivity settings.

We reported our issues with the Begrudge 13's trackpad to HP, and the company was able to copy the problem. We're told that HP is continuing to investigate whether the trackpad bugginess we encountered was an isolated incident or more widespread, and we'll update this review once we hear back. Information technology's also possible that a microcode update could fixing any nagging trackpad issues.

Back happening the plus root, I was impressed with the HP Envy 13's Bang & Olufsen-fashioned laptop speakers. A sizeable cut above the metallic element speakers you normally listen along laptops, the Envy 13's top-firing drivers deliver solid mid-grade sound, with a fair amount of high-end detail and even a young bass. Mind you, the Envy 13's speakers can't halt a taper to a decent dyad of headphones or external speakers, but we've heard worse—a great deal worse.

The HP Envy 13 as wel boasts a Windows Hello-enabled fingerprint reader unreal the freighter-right corner of the keyboard, handy for signing into Windows with a pinch of your finger. A switch on the right border of the laptop electrically disables the webcam (although there's no physical shutter).

Ports

Given the H.P. Envy 13's slim and trim visibility, the laptop's limited selection of ports shouldn't come equally a largish surprise. Happening the left side of the Begrudge 13, you get a drop-jaw USB 3.1 Gen 1 Typewrite-A porthole, a USB 3.1 Gen 1 Typecast-C port wine, and a combo audio frequency jack.

Ben Patterson/IDG

Left-side ports on the HP Envy 13 including a combo audio jack, a USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A port, and a USB 3.1 Gen 1 Case-C port.

On the right incline, there's a second drop-masticate USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A port, a microSD media menu reader, and a gun barrel-shaped Actinium port, along with the aforesaid webcam kill shift.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The right side of the HP Enviousness 13 features a barrel-shaped power port, a second USB 3.1 Gen 1 Type-A port, a microSD slot, and a webcam kill transposition.

There are no Thunderbolt 3 ports, although that's not much of a shock bestowed the Envy 13's $1,000-ish Leontyne Price range.

Performance

While the HP Envy 13 doesn't burst some race records, information technology does a nice problem of reconciliation performance with portability, serving up good benchmark numbers considering its impressively slim and light chassis. If you want well faster performance from a less-than-three-pound laptop that's as svelte as this one, expect to pony up double as much for an Methamphetamine Lake-powered model. That aforesaid, the biggest compromise we're seeing therein especial Envy 13 shape comes in the battery life department, with the bright 4K display being the likely culprit.

PCMark 8 Go 2.0 Formulaic

Our first test measures how well a given laptop performs mean solar day-to-day computing tasks, with PCMark 8 designed to simulate such day-after-day duties as spreadsheet work, online shopping, word processing and video chat. A score of 2,000 or more usually points to silky-smooth Office performance.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The HP Enviousness 13's PCMark 8 score is near the bottom of the pack, just any result over 3,000 (which the Envy handily achieves) works just fine for us.

While the HP Envy 13's PCMark 8 score is second to last in our chart (we've compared the Envy 13 to a range of likewise priced two- and four-core Intel Core-battery-powered laptops, along with a Dell running on a six-core Methamphetamine hydrochloride Lake chip), the laptop computer unmoving has no trouble dusting our 2,000 low-water mark for the PCMark 8 bench mark. So, if you take a laptop that scored about 3,000 in PCMark 8 (such as the Dell Inspiron 15 at the bottom of our chart) and some other that snagged a 3,500 result (like our chart-topping Lenovo IdeaPad S340), you'd be hard-pressed to notice some departure in terms of general calculation performance.

It's also worth noting that the Ice Lake-packing Dell XPS 13's PCMark 8 score sits almost smack-splash in the heart of our graph, which goes to show that paying extra for Intel's hottest parvenu CPU won't pay some in the elbow room of dividends when it comes to web browse or Office.

HandBrake

A well more demanding test than PCMark 8, our next benchmark involves converting a 40GB MKV video file into a format suitable for Android tablets victimization the free HandBrake utility. Unlike PCMark 8, our HandBrake benchmark is a multi-core, Central processor-intensive test that sends internal laptop computer temperatures eminent. Because information technology also takes up to an hr or more to perform, it gives us a ripe idea of how a bestowed laptop computer handles heat management over a long period of time.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The HP Envy 13's HandBrake nock is jolly impressive relinquished its thin-and-light anatomy.

Look at our results, the H.P. Envy 13 turns in a pretty solid showing considering its bladed, light, and therefore thorny-to-assuredness design. IT sits in a tight bunch with similar (and generally thicker and heavier) quadriceps femoris-core, 8th-gen laptops. Meanwhile, the Dell XPS 13 and its six-core Ice Lake C.P.U. (here's where that dear new Ice Lake chip starts to pay off) sits comfortably in first place, while the dual-center Acer Aspire 5 lags way behind the rest on.

Cinebench

Like our HandBrake bench mark, Cinebench is a processor-intensive test that dependably spins up cooling fans. But spell HandBrake takes about an hour more or less to terminated, Cinebench (which involves rendering a 3D image in real time) is generally over within transactions, a scenario that shows us how a laptop handles brief only crushing CPU loads.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The HP Envy 13's Cinebench score gets a small boost thanks to its Intel Core i7 processor.

Again, the quad-core HP Envy 13 does well. The special boost clock on its Inwardness i7 CPU gives it a slight ramification up versus its quadriceps-core Core i5-boxing competitors. In point of fact, the Envy 13 trails merely the Dell XPS 13 and its Crank Lake processor, which manages to crush the rest of the field, while the dual-core Acer Aspire 5 (again) brings up the rear. For such a thin, light, and reasonably priced laptop, the Envy 13's single- and multi-threaded Cinebench heaps are nothing to sneeze at.

3D Denounce SkyDiver 1.0

With its discrete graphics card, the HP Envy 13 is a slim down-and-light laptop that's actually got some modest pun, although "unassuming" is the key word. While the Envy 13's Nvidia GeForce MX250 graphics card is a vast improvement over Intel's co-ordinated UHD Nontextual matter 620 nucleus, we're still only talking entry-level discrete graphics here. Put differently, don't expect to play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare at 60 fps on Ultra settings.

Ben Patterson/IDG

With its discrete Nvidia graphics card, the HP Envy 13 whips  its integrated-graphics competitors in our 3DMark Sky Diver benchmark.

Still, winning a quick look at our performance graph, you can see what a conflict a discrete nontextual matter card can micturate. Even with its new, large-charged integrated Iris Plus artwork, the pricey Dingle XPS 13 commode't meet the graphics functioning of the Envy 13 and the (barely) chart-topping Dingle Inspiron 15 7000, each of which bluster discrete GeForce MX250 graphics card game. The Inspiron plausibly gets its (slim) edge all over the HP Invidia 13 thanks to its larger, easier-to-cool chassis. Far below the Dell Inspiron and HP Envy are all the laptops burdened with integrated nontextual matter, including the hot Dell XPS 13 with its 10th-gen Iris Asset integrated graphics core.

While the GeForce MX250 is primarily intended for pro-TV users impermanent with (for example) Adobe Premiere, it can play some games provided you keep your expectations in check. Sack up Fortnite, the Enviousness 13 managed to squeeze out 50- to 60-Federal Protective Service visuals at medium settings for most five minutes about. That figure fell to a still-playable 30 fps at one time the Envy's fans began spinning up.

Barrage fire life

We test a laptop's battery life by iteration a 4K video using the stock Windows Movies & Television set app, with screen brightness adjust at most 250 nits (which, in the showcase of the HP Envy 13, meant turn the brightness knock down to about 91 per centum) and with the sound dialed to 50 pct, headphones on.

Ben Patterson/IDG

The H.P. Enviousness 13 turned in a solid performance during our battery drain test, especially given its bright as a new penny, battery-hogging 4K display.

With its 53-W-hour shelling, the Horsepower Envy 13 lands about in the middle of the pack, separated from its cardinal closest competitors by only a a couple of transactions. The similarly slim-and-trim Dell XPS 13 squeezed another hr out of its slightly smaller barrage, but information technology also costs a smashing $500 more than than the Envy 13, while the chart-topping Acer Aspire 5 is considerably thicker and heavier.

Of flow, one of the Enviousness 13's key selling points—its fulgent, gorgeous 4K display—happens to constitute its biggest battery run out. If you're looking at for an Begrudge 13 model with better battery life, believe a shape with a scaly-rearmost 1920×1080 (Full HD) video display resolution.

Bottom line

Peppy quad-core processor? Check. Bright 4K display? Yup. Slim and light? Double-check. We'll also plow ahead and mark distinct graphics, the easy keyboard, and more important, the well-founded price tag. So yes, this configuration of the HP Envy 13 has a whole sle going for it, making it a important companion during a demanding trip to Las Vegas for CES. That said, the niggling trackpad was an annoying pebble in my shoe, and we're anxious to get a line what HP's investigation turns up.

Source: https://www.pcworld.com/article/398664/hp-envy-13-aq0044nr-review.html

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