*HP ENVY 15 (3XXX series) Owners Lounge*

[gameface25]

na its def a fan, im just not sure its the GPU fan... I know these have 2 fans. WHat concerns me besides the lack of a revving up fan, is that I cant get any fan readings in speedfan or any GPU monitoring gadgets that also monitor fan speed

I have 3DMark so Ill run it a while and see if it kicks on. I been playing SWTOR all night tho, and the fans have never ramped up. Bottom got uncomfortably hot on the right side tho

[colonels]

na its def a fan, im just not sure its the GPU fan... I know these have 2 fans. WHat concerns me besides the lack of a revving up fan, is that I cant get any fan readings in speedfan or any GPU monitoring gadgets that also monitor fan speed

I have 3DMark so Ill run it a while and see if it kicks on. I been playing SWTOR all night tho, and the fans have never ramped up. Bottom got uncomfortably hot on the right side tho

i am also playing SWTOR 1920x1080 low details shadows on smoothly but my fan kicks on quite a bit

but 120 farenheit is not bad thats like 50 celsius
i usually get around 70 celsius playing SWTOR and that is overclocked 700/925

[Rubenstein]

For those of you asking about the Audio capabilities, I tried my AKG 701 on the Envy 15 today. They worked fine, and the Envy was capable of driving them to a loudness that was far higher than what you need. Those are headphones with a high resistance, so you should be fine to use pretty much any headphones you want on this notebook.

[gunny5821]

na its def a fan, im just not sure its the GPU fan... I know these have 2 fans. WHat concerns me besides the lack of a revving up fan, is that I cant get any fan readings in speedfan or any GPU monitoring gadgets that also monitor fan speed

I have 3DMark so Ill run it a while and see if it kicks on. I been playing SWTOR all night tho, and the fans have never ramped up. Bottom got uncomfortably hot on the right side tho

Hello!!! I would make 3 suggestions:
1. Switch your reading from "Fahrenheit" to "Celsius" as pretty much everyone speaks in the Celsius language.
2. Start using Core Temp Gadget 2.7 add on to monitor your Envy's CPU on a constant basis ( Core Temp - Add Ons ). Runs on your desktop!
3. Start using HWINFO64 for the occasional monitoring of your CPU and your GPU ( HWiNFO64 Download ). You also can make a desktop add-on with this program, but it only provides the bare essentials. I use this program for ALL of my Envy critical info gathering needs...

>>>>>> <<<<<< I hope this reply was helpful.. >>>>>> <<<<<<

[Thors.Hammer]

na its def a fan, im just not sure its the GPU fan... I know these have 2 fans. WHat concerns me besides the lack of a revving up fan, is that I cant get any fan readings in speedfan or any GPU monitoring gadgets that also monitor fan speed

I have 3DMark so Ill run it a while and see if it kicks on. I been playing SWTOR all night tho, and the fans have never ramped up. Bottom got uncomfortably hot on the right side tho

Have you tried HWiNFO? Available in 32 or 64 bit versions at HWiNFO, HWiNFO32 & HWiNFO64 - Hardware Information and Analysis Tools for free. Works great.

[gameface25]

Ill try HWiNFO, I have GPU and CPU monitors on the desktop but neither detects the GPu fan.

I may be overreacting... if that temp isnt that bad, I guess I just got a lil worried. When it would heat up that much, my sound was getting alot of... static, like cutting out over and over, then it fixed itself. It scared me.

[gameface25]

installed, and it shows the ATI card fan speed at 30% so, thats the first hard evidence I have seen its working. I guess I got lucky with a really quiet fan

[timebomb]

Here are some battery tests on my personal machines HP Envy 15 vs Dell XPS 15z in case anyone was interested.

Both machines are the highest spec for their respective brands and should drain the battery the most.

Settings:
Power Saver On
Screen Brightness 50%
Keyboard Backlit Off

HP Envy 15
Core i7-2860QM 2.50Ghz
ATI 7690M 1GB
Web Surfing 4:30
YouTube 2:30

Dell XPS 15z
Core i7-2640M 2.80Ghz
Nvidia Geforce 525M 2GB
Web Surfing 5:45
YouTube 4:00


Web surfing on the HP Envy 15 is reasonable at 4:30, but watching YouTube videos drains my battery in about half the time at 2:30. The Dell XPS 15z handles YouTube much better lasting 4:00 and Web Surfing goes all they way to 5:45.

You can check out The Verge battery tests below:

HP Envy 15 (late 2011) review | The Verge

[c0mplex]

Here are some battery tests on my personal machines HP Envy 15 vs Dell XPS 15z in case anyone was interested.

Both machines are the highest spec for their respective brands and should drain the battery the most.

Settings:
Power Saver On
Screen Brightness 50%
Keyboard Backlit Off

HP Envy 15
Core i7-2860QM 2.50Ghz
ATI 7690M 1GB
Web Surfing 4:30
YouTube 2:30

Dell XPS 15z
Core i7-2640M 2.80Ghz
Nvidia Geforce 525M 2GB
Web Surfing 5:45
YouTube 4:00


Web surfing on the HP Envy 15 is reasonable at 4:30, but watching YouTube videos drains my battery in about half the time at 2:30. The Dell XPS 15z handles YouTube much better lasting 4:00 and Web Surfing goes all they way to 5:45.

You can check out The Verge battery tests below:

HP Envy 15 (late 2011) review | The Verge

The drop in battery life for the Envy 15 is pretty dramatic. Did you experiment with the notebook to figure out what causes the decrease? Maybe it's due to the Beats Audio speakers playing the sound from the Youtube clips. Also, how do you have the switchable graphics set? Is it on dynamic or fixed?

[timebomb]

The drop in battery life for the Envy 15 is pretty dramatic. Did you experiment with the notebook to figure out what causes the decrease? Maybe it's due to the Beats Audio speakers playing the sound from the Youtube clips. Also, how do you have the switchable graphics set? Is it on dynamic or fixed?

The switchable graphics is set on dynamic. The sound was set to low/medium on both machines. I started noticing dramatic battery drains on video websites so I wanted to find out why.

2 possible reasons for the big battery drains:

CPU:
The HP Envy 15 comes with a true Quad-Core Core i7-2860QM 2.50Ghz vs the Dell XPS 15z Core i7-2640M 2.80Ghz Dual-Core and requires a lot more power.

Speakers:
The HP Envy 15 has the 6.1 Beats Audio System with soundwoofer. The Dell XPS 15z has just the standard 2 speaker system.