HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000) review – it surprised us with its cooling

Truth to be told, 14-inch laptops have been around for years. However, with the release of Apple’s MacBook Pro 14, people started paying more attention to devices of this screen size. This leaves the manufacturers under very high pressure to perform well. This is why many of them started putting powerful hardware in the small form factor – something previously reserved for niche gaming devices.

So, here is the Envy 14 (14-eb1000), which will try to win content-creators hearts. It bears the power and efficiency of Intel’s Tiger Lake-H35 chips, while on the graphics front, you can choose between the GTX 1650 Ti Max-Q, or the RTX 3050. Of course, if your main act is photo manipulation, you won’t need them, and the integrated Iris Xe Graphics G7 should be good enough.

How exactly are content creators going to take advantage of the device, though? Well, they get an option for a 2.2K IPS panel with a 16:10 aspect ratio with an alleged Average dE of <2.0 within the sRGB standard out of the box. We shall see…

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/hp-envy-14-14-eb0000/

Contents


Specs Sheet

HP ENVY 14 (14-eb0000, eb1000) - Specs

  • IVO8C8E
  • Color accuracy  2.9  1.0
  • HDD/SSD
  • up to 2000GB SSD
  • RAM
  • up to 16GB
  • OS
  • Windows 11 Home, Windows 10 Home, Windows 10 Pro
  • Battery
  • 63.3Wh, 4-cell, 63Wh, 3-cell
  • Body material
  • Aluminum
  • Dimensions
  • 313.2 x 224 x 18 mm (12.33" x 8.82" x 0.71")
  • Weight
  • 1.60 kg (3.5 lbs)
  • Ports and connectivity
  • 1x USB Type-C
  • Thunderbolt 4, Power Delivery (PD), DisplayPort
  • 2x USB Type-A
  • 3.2 Gen 1 (5 Gbps), Sleep and Charge
  • HDMI
  • 2.0
  • Wi-Fi
  • 802.11ax
  • Bluetooth
  • 5.0
  • Audio jack
  • 3.5mm Combo Jack
  • Features
  • Fingerprint reader
  • Web camera
  • HD
  • Backlit keyboard
  • Speakers
  • 2x Speakers, Bang & Olufsen
  • Optical drive

All HP ENVY 14 (14-eb0000, eb1000) configurations

#CommissionsEarned

What’s in the box?

Inside the package, we found some paperwork and a 90W power adapter. If you happen to have a version, equipped with a dedicated GPU, you will get a 135W charger instead.


Design and construction

Once we take the laptop out of its packaging, we see a beautiful low-key design with silver color and aluminum chassis. Its weight varies between 1.49 and 1.60 kg depending on the configuration option, while the thickness sits at 18mm. The laptop’s base is pretty resistant to flex, while the lid is a bit bendy.

On the bright side, it opens easily with a single hand. Its bezels are rather slim with the exception of the bottom one. Respectively, the top one houses an HD Web camera. It has a privacy shutter, which is operated electronically, through a button on the keyboard.

Speaking of which, let’s take a look at the base. There, we find a ventilation grill spanning from edge to edge. Below it, there is the keyboard, which is pleasant to type on. This is thanks to the decent key travel and clicky feedback. Moreover, there is a fingerprint reader in place of the right “Control” key. Unfortunately, the “Up” and “Down” Arrow keys are half-sized. On the other hand, there is a dedicated function button, which opens the HP Command Center. There, you find some performance presets. As you can see, the palm rest area has an interesting elevated rectangular design.

The larger footprint contributed to the 16:10 display, allowing for a large touchpad. It has a glass surface, which offers a super smooth gliding experience. Generally, the tracking is accurate, while the clicking mechanism feels comfortable. However, this is not the first HP laptop we’ve tested that has issues with its touchpad. Occasionally, the clicking mechanism stops registering inputs, while the tracking becomes choppy. We are pretty confident that this is a driver issue, and a future update will solve it completely.

Now, let’s turn the laptop upside down, to see the speaker cutouts and the large ventilation grill. On the other hand, the hot air gets exhausted from the back of the device.

Ports

On the left side, there is an audio jack, a USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) port, an HDMI 2.0 connector, and a Thunderbolt 4 connector. Then, on the right, you get the power plug, another USB Type-A 3.2 (Gen. 1) port, and a MicroSD card reader.


Disassembly, upgrade options and maintenance

This device is pretty easy to open. You need to undo only 4 Torx-head screws. Then, pry the bottom panel with a plastic tool, and lift it away from the chassis.

Inside, we see a 63.3Wh battery. It lasted us for 10 hours of Web browsing, or 9 hours of video playback. To take the battery out, you first need to unplug the battery connector. Then, undo all 5 Phillips-head screws. Lastly, remove the battery from the body of the laptop.

Unfortunately, the memory is soldered to the motherboard. On the bright side, it uses DDR4 chips, working at 3200 MHz in dual-channel mode. As for the storage, there is one M.2 PCIe x4 slot.

Here, you can see that the cooling solution is pretty capable. There are two heat pipes, a long heat sink, and two fans. Additionally, the VRMs are cooled by a metal plate.


Display quality

HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000)’s display has a 2.2K IPS panel, model number IVO8C8E. Its diagonal is 14″ (35.56 cm), and the resolution – 2240 x 1400p. Additionally, the screen ratio is 16:10, the pixel density – 189 ppi, their pitch – 0.13 x 0.13 mm. The screen can be considered Retina when viewed from at least 46 cm (from this distance, the average human eye can’t see the individual pixels).

It has comfortable viewing angles. We have provided images at 45 degrees to evaluate quality.

Also, a video with locked focus and exposure.

The maximum measured brightness is 300 nits (cd/m2) in the middle of the screen and 301 nits (cd/m2) average across the surface with a maximum deviation of 6% (“Native” display mode – the laptop offers screen presets through the “HP Display Control” app).

The Correlated Color Temperature with white screen at full brightness is 6210K – slightly warmer than the sRGB standard (6500K).
In the illustration below you can see how the display performs from a uniformity perspective.
Values of dE2000 over 4.0 should not occur, and this parameter is one of the first you should check if you intend to use the laptop for color-sensitive work (a maximum tolerance of 2.0 ). The contrast ratio is excellent – 2030:1.

To make sure we are on the same page, we would like to give you a little introduction to the sRGB color gamut and the Adobe RGB. To start, there’s the CIE 1976 Uniform Chromaticity Diagram that represents the visible specter of colors by the human eye, giving you a better perception of the color gamut coverage and the color accuracy.

Inside the black triangle, you will see the standard color gamut (sRGB) that is being used by millions of people on HDTV and on the web. As for the Adobe RGB, this is used in professional cameras, monitors, etc for printing. Colors inside the black triangle are used by everyone and this is the essential part of the color quality and color accuracy of a mainstream notebook.

Still, we’ve included other color spaces like the famous DCI-P3 standard used by movie studios, as well as the digital UHD Rec.2020 standard. Rec.2020, however, is still a thing of the future and it’s difficult for today’s displays to cover that well. We’ve also included the so-called Michael Pointer gamut, or Pointer’s gamut, which represents the colors that naturally occur around us every day.

The yellow dotted line shows HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000)’s color gamut coverage.

Its display covers 93% of the sRGB/ITU-R BT.709 (web/HDTV standard) in CIE1976.

Our “Design and Gaming” profile delivers optimal color temperature (6500K) at 140 cd/m2 luminance and sRGB gamma mode.

We tested the accuracy of the display with 24 commonly used colors like light and dark human skin, blue sky, green grass, orange, etc. You can check out the default results compared with these with the “Design and Gaming” profile.

The next figure shows how well the display can reproduce dark parts of an image, which is essential when watching movies or playing games in low ambient light.

The left side of the image represents the display with stock settings, while the right one is with the “Gaming and Web Design” profile activated. On the horizontal axis, you will find the grayscale, and on the vertical axis – the luminance of the display. On the two graphs below you can easily check for yourself how your display handles the darkest nuances but keep in mind that this also depends on the settings of your current display, the calibration, the viewing angle, and the surrounding light conditions.

Response time (Gaming capabilities)

We test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “black-to-white” and “white-to-black” method from 10% to 90% and vice versa.

We recorded Fall Time + Rise Time = 24 ms

After that, we test the reaction time of the pixels with the usual “Gray-to-Gray” method from 50% White to 80% White and vice versa between 10% and 90% of the amplitude.


Health impact – PWM / Blue Light

PWM (Screen flickering)

Pulse-width modulation (PWM) is an easy way to control monitor brightness. When you lower the brightness, the light intensity of the backlight is not lowered, but instead turned off and on by the electronics with a frequency indistinguishable to the human eye. In these light impulses, the light/no-light time ratio varies, while brightness remains unchanged, which is harmful to your eyes. You can read more about that in our dedicated article on PWM.

The light coming from HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000)’s backlight does not flicker. This makes it comfortable for use during long periods, without harming your eyes in this aspect.

Blue light emissions

Installing our Health-Guard profile not only eliminates PWM but also reduces the harmful Blue Light emissions while keeping the colors of the screen perceptually accurate. If you’re not familiar with the Blue light, the TL;DR version is – emissions that negatively affect your eyes, skin, and your whole body. You can find more information about that in our dedicated article on Blue Light.

Buy our profiles

Since our profiles are tailored for each display model, this article and its respective profile package are meant for HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000) configurations with 14.0″ IVO8C8E (2.2K, 2240 x 1400) IPS panel.

*Should you have problems with downloading the purchased file, try using a different browser to open the link you’ll receive via e-mail. If the download target is a .php file instead of an archive, change the file extension to .zip or contact us at [email protected].

Read more about the profiles HERE.

In addition to receiving efficient and health-friendly profiles, by buying LaptopMedia's products you also support the development of our labs, where we test devices in order to produce the most objective reviews possible.

Office Work

Office Work should be used mostly by users who spend most of the time looking at pieces of text, tables or just surfing. This profile aims to deliver better distinctness and clarity by keeping a flat gamma curve (2.20), native color temperature and perceptually accurate colors.

Design and Gaming

This profile is aimed at designers who work with colors professionally, and for games and movies as well. Design and Gaming takes display panels to their limits, making them as accurate as possible in the sRGB IEC61966-2-1 standard for Web and HDTV, at white point D65.

Health-Guard

Health-Guard eliminates the harmful Pulse-Width Modulation (PWM) and reduces the negative Blue Light which affects our eyes and body. Since it’s custom tailored for every panel, it manages to keep the colors perceptually accurate. Health-Guard simulates paper so the pressure on the eyes is greatly reduced.

Get all 3 profiles with 33% discount


Sound

HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000)’s Bang & Olufsen speakers produce a sound of very good quality. Its low, mid, and high tones are clear of deviations.


Drivers

All drivers and utilities for this notebook can be found here: https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/selfservice/hp-envy-laptop-pc-14-eb1000/2100800502

Battery

Now, we conduct the battery tests with Windows Better performance setting turned on, screen brightness adjusted to 120 nits, and all other programs turned off except for the one we are testing the notebook with. Here, the 63.3Wh battery delivered 10 hours of Web browsing, or 8 hours and 58 minutes of video playback.


CPU options

This laptop can be paired with a Tiger Lake-H35 CPU, with the most powerful option offering the Core i7-11390H.


GPU options

Besides the integrated Iris Xe Graphics G7, the laptop can be found with the GeForce GTX 1650 Ti Max-Q, or the RTX 3050.


Gaming tests

cs-go-benchmarks

CS:GOHD 1080p, Low (Check settings)HD 1080p, Medium (Check settings)HD 1080p, MAX (Check settings)
Average FPS116 fps86 fps41 fps

DOTA 2HD 1080p, Low (Check settings)HD 1080p, Normal (Check settings)HD 1080p, High (Check settings)
Average FPS117 fps77 fps46 fps

Temperatures and comfort

Max CPU load

In this test we use 100% on the CPU cores, monitoring their frequencies and chip temperature. The first column shows a computer’s reaction to a short load (2-10 seconds), the second column simulates a serious task (between 15 and 30 seconds), and the third column is a good indicator of how good the laptop is for long loads such as video rendering.

Average core frequency (base frequency + X); CPU temp.

Intel Core i7-11390H (35W TDP)0:02 – 0:10 sec0:15 – 0:30 sec10:00 – 15:00 min
HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000)3.42 GHz @ 73°C @ 50W3.35 GHz @ 84°C @ 50W3.54 GHz @ 83°C @ 45W

This laptop shows a surprising consistency throughout the entire torture test. Its clock speed was highest at the end, while the temperature remained at check.

Comfort during full load

Well, considering that this was achieved with the Performance preset from HP’s command center, it was to be expected that the notebook would be loud. On the bright side, the warmest spot on the keyboard was barely warm to the touch.


Verdict

Are content creators going to be satisfied with this product? Probably yes. It has a decent battery life, and processors, that are really capable of photo-editing. Given the efficiency of the cooling solution, it remains unclear why HP didn’t opt for the more powerful 45W iterations of the Tiger Lake family. A six, or eight-core CPU would have made this device irresistible.

Of course, there are some disadvantages here and there. First and foremost – memory upgrades. Or the lack thereof. Unfortunately, the RAM is soldered to the motherboard, so expansion is practically impossible down the line.

Another thing that was particularly disturbing was the touchpad behavior. At least in our experience, the clicking mechanism seemed to ignore all input at some point, just to regain it again at a random time. Weirdly, this isn’t the first time we exhibit such an issue with an HP device, which may indicate poor quality control or an unfortunate driver issue. We really hope it’s the latter one.

HP Envy 14 (14-eb1000)’s IPS display has a 2.2K resolution, comfortable viewing angles, and an excellent contrast ratio. Thankfully, its backlight doesn’t use PWM for brightness adjustment. On top of that, the panel covers 93% of the sRGB color gamut. Its default setting is not justifying HP’s statements, but with our Gaming and Web design profile, the color accuracy becomes really good.

While our unit wasn’t equipped with a dedicated GPU, it is really refreshing to see that there is an RTX 3050 option. This would make the 14-inch laptop a proper solution for video editing, and even gaming. Add the Thunderbolt 4 port, and the HDMI 2.0 connector, and you get the option to plug two separate monitors beside the one you already have. Thankfully, the I/O also includes a MicroSD card reader and two full-size USB ports.

We were also happy with the build quality of the machine. It feels solid when held in hands, but at the same time, it’s pretty light for you to carry it around. Also, it has a fingerprint reader and an electronically-activated privacy shutter.

Ultimately, buying this laptop is not a bad choice. It is extremely cool under load, and photo editing will be an easy task. It can be a pretty life-like experience as well if you opt for our Gaming and Web design profile. However, if you want to reap the benefits of an OLED display, the ASUS ZenBook 14X OLED (UX5401, 11th Gen) is a great alternative. Also, if you would like to throw in a bit more cash, you should seriously consider the MacBook 14 Pro.

You can check the prices and configurations in our Specs System: https://laptopmedia.com/series/hp-envy-14-14-eb0000/

Pros

  • Great cooling and performance
  • Strong aluminum chassis
  • 93% sRGB coverage and accurate color representation with our Gaming and Web design profile
  • High resolution and 16:10 aspect ratio
  • Thunderbolt 4 connector
  • Fingerprint reader + MicroSD card slot


Cons

  • We got some issues with the touchpad
  • Soldered memory

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