HP Envy 17 K206na laptop for architecture - any reason why I shouldnt get this ?

Dear All
I am planning to get this laptop for my son who will be doing Architecture from Sept. The idea is that it has a high enough spec to last the 4 year course :-

•

i7 - 5th generation

•

16 GB RAM

•

1 TB ROM

•

NVIDIA GeForce GTX graphics card

•

17" HD screen

I understand the spec is good, but I have come across a few negative comments such as 'whatever you do don't buy a HP' and complaints about HP's reliability. This is concerning me, especially since I will be spending about £900 on the machine.

Does anyone have any (impartial) advice about HP or this machine in particular ?

You help will be much appreciated.

Here is a link to the HP website for its full spec.

http://www8.hp.com/uk/en/products/la...#!tab=features

Many thanks

Reply 1

Stewie2011

12

Dunno about hp laptops, had printers from them and they were decent enough, no reliability problems. My preference though would always be to go for full solid state drive these days rather than hybrid if possible. Either buy and replace after buying if possible or get a laptop with one in. They work much faster than standard HDD and will slow up less as your computer ages and gets clogged up with stuff. Nice and small and light also.

Reply 2

Rosie213

4

I had a HP laptop a long while ago (Vista) and it was horrific. I mean it was fine to check facebook and MSN which was all I ever did, but HP crap kept popping up everywhere which we couldn't uninstall or hide, customer service was poor, and the machine only lasted a year and a half - don't know how it went into melt-down as it was rarely used, but was not due to a virus.

But this was years ago and I expect they've improved greatly since then, personally I think Dell do the best high-performance laptops, currently I have a mid-range Toshiba as Dell is a little beyond my price capabilities!

Good luck

Reply 3

Stewie2011

12

Oh yeah, forgot to say, got a Dell laptop myself, had it for the past 8 years and still goes ok, bit slow on load up and internet browser load up, but chugs away nicely once warmed up. 2ghz processor so not bad even for today, cost me about 6-700 pounds back in the day. Always been reliable so though not a trendy brand I find they tend to feature heavily in Uni Architecture departments and many of the top Architecture companies for desktops. Value for money and for reliability I think they chose them for, and many big companies, means you can deck out a whole office floor relatively cheaply and replace in few years when out of date. Can lack a little in higher end spec though if you look into the ins and outs of each component, so worth looking around depending on what you want.

Reply 4

Architecture-er

19

Original post by ez_accountancy

Dear All
I am planning to get this laptop for my son who will be doing Architecture from Sept. The idea is that it has a high enough spec to last the 4 year course :-

•

i7 - 5th generation

•

16 GB RAM

•

1 TB ROM

•

NVIDIA GeForce GTX graphics card

•

17" HD screen

I understand the spec is good, but I have come across a few negative comments such as 'whatever you do don't buy a HP' and complaints about HP's reliability. This is concerning me, especially since I will be spending about £900 on the machine.

Does anyone have any (impartial) advice about HP or this machine in particular ?

You help will be much appreciated.

Here is a link to the HP website for its full spec.

http://www8.hp.com/uk/en/products/la...#!tab=features

Many thanks

Yeah that's a solid spec, it'll be absolutely fine for 4 years at the very least, provided that it's looked after and there aren't any build failures :smile:

Graphics cards are king for architecture laptops, followed by processor and then RAM (16GB is way more than you need, but it's so cheap you might as well have it)

I'd remove most of the bloatware on it to vastly speed up the machine, 7zip is the only one of any real value the rest seem like superfluous junk, maybe the HP Connected Drive does something interesting, don't know.

Also go into msconfig and disable a load of stuff on startup to get faster boot times, much cheaper than forking out a ton for a SSD which frankly isn't worth the investment at this time

Reply 5

ez_accountancy

OP

7

Original post by Architecture-er

Yeah that's a solid spec, it'll be absolutely fine for 4 years at the very least, provided that it's looked after and there aren't any build failures :smile:

Graphics cards are king for architecture laptops, followed by processor and then RAM (16GB is way more than you need, but it's so cheap you might as well have it)

I'd remove most of the bloatware on it to vastly speed up the machine, 7zip is the only one of any real value the rest seem like superfluous junk, maybe the HP Connected Drive does something interesting, don't know.

Also go into msconfig and disable a load of stuff on startup to get faster boot times, much cheaper than forking out a ton for a SSD which frankly isn't worth the investment at this time

Thanks for your helpful advice, I'll pass it onto my son.
I got the laptop the other day, all seems good and despite the large screen it's not such a monster to carry around.

Reply 6

Architecture-er

19

Original post by ez_accountancy

Thanks for your helpful advice, I'll pass it onto my son.
I got the laptop the other day, all seems good and despite the large screen it's not such a monster to carry around.

Yeah, plus it's good weight training :wink:

I wouldn't ever go below 17'' for design work especially in the later years when you're split-screening on applications like rhino and 3ds max, I actually bought a desktop for 4th year so... :lol:

Reply 7

Stewie2011

12

Hmnn, just noticed looking at the spec the processor is a little low for these days at just 2.4ghz. So load up of system and applications is not likely to be real fast particularly the more stuff you add on the hard drive. Tend to find the hard drive gets clogged up after a while regardless. Hence why I suggest an SSD alone as regular hard drives nearly always slow with age. Know Dell Inspiron 5000 is a 3ghz 17inch laptop for just a bit under 600 pounds. So not a bad deal there, spend the saving on a 1TB SSD and flog the old hard drive on they send you. A fast pc can make the difference in what time you get to bed at night :smile:

Reply 8

denisbill

I got the laptop the other day, all seems good and despite the large screen, it's not such a monster to carry around. HP Customer Support

HP Envy 17 K206na laptop for architecture - any reason why I shouldnt get this ?

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