The HP Pavilion dm3t is a solid, full-featured productivity laptop with good battery life and responsive performance at a very reasonable price. It is a 13.3-inch screen portable notebook targeted towards students and other consumers. The laptop has been on the market for a while now, but it has quickly become HP's most popular 13-inch laptop competing against more expensive laptops like the 13-inch Apple MacBook.

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HP Pavilion dm3t Specs:
Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)
Intel Core i3-380UM Processor
3GB DDR3 memory
320GB, 7200 rpm HDD
13.3-inch diagonal HD HP BrightView (glossy) LED Display (1366 x 768)
6-cell Li-ion battery (62 Wh) and 65W power adapter
Weight: 4.1 pounds

 HP Pavilion dm3t Review
The dm3t is on the small side for a budget 13.3-inch laptop, measuring 1.3x12.8x9.2 inches and weighing in at 4 pounds, hovering on the border between the ultraportable and thin-and-light laptop categories. Thin design and an attractive outer finish make all the difference when buying a laptop, and the Pavilion dm3t hits the mark on this.

The Intel Core i3 with Intel HD graphics chipset offered enough horsepower to play the latest games and stream HD content with ease. The 320GB, 7200 rpm hard drive is fast enough to quickly load most basic applications like Microsoft Office or open file folders without significant lag. Battery life was pretty terrific -- Intel's CULV chips sip juice, and we got a fairly consistent nine hours or so of general usage on a charge.

The HP Pavilion dm3t has a glossy 13-inch LED display with a standard resolution of 1,366x768 pixels. The screen was fairly bright and crisp when surfing the Web, viewing photos, watching House on Hulu, and writing this review in WordPad. The speakers are mounted above the keyboard and offer rich, clear sound for a notebook in this class. Audio sounded very good until we cranked the volume to its highest level; it got a bit muddy at that point.

The dm3t has one of the better keyboards in its class, with a well-spaced and thoughtfully designed chicklet-style layout. The keyboard is chiclet style, the same type you’ll see in MacBooks and is becoming more and more common in PC laptops. The keyboard is comfortable for typing with the perfect amount of key feedback and quiet, cushioned clicks. The keys are well spaced and have just the right amount of vertical travel for comfortable typing.

With the laotop you will get two standard USB 2.0 ports, one combo eSATA/USB 2.0 port, HDMI-out, VGA, Gigabit LAN (hidden behind a rubber door), a SDHC-card slot , and two audio jacks for headphones and a microphone.

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The 14-inch HP Pavilion dv4t is consumer laptop offering a wide range of multimedia features at a cheap price. The laptop is aimed at the student crowd. It is a great laptop with a comfortable keyboard and can deliver good performance and battery life.

HP Pavilion dv4t Review

The design of the HP dv4 has the same heavily chromed accents just like the dv5 and new HDX models. It's covered in mostly glossy plastics, and the chassis is hardened to protect against flexing. Measuring 13.2 x 9.5 x 1.6 inches and weighing 5.2 pounds, the dv4t is slightly thicker and about half a pound heavier than competing 14-inch laptops.  

 

The glossy LED-backlit WXGA (1280x800) panel is bright and vibrant, with excellent colors for viewing images or movies. The dv4t’s viewing angles were extremely tight: the glossy display kicked back heavy reflection as we moved left or right of center.

 

The dv4t has a good, comfortable-to-the-touch Chiclet-style keyboard.  The full-size keyboard is comfortable to type on, with only light pressure required to fully press each key.  The key travel and smoothness is very nice and there is no spongy feeling or flex to the keyboard. Above the keyboard are touch-sensitive multimedia keys, and a Wi-Fi on/off switch that reacted swiftly to our finger inputs. The touchpad is an ALPS made model and feels very responsive with little lag. At 3.0 x 1.4 inches, the dv4t’s touchpad is wide.

 

The HP Pavilion dv4t features 3 USB2.0 ports, 5-in-1 multi-card reader, Two audio out ports, microphone port , One eSATA/USB port, ExpressCard slot, Gigabit Ethernet, VGA monitor out, HDMI out and Kensington lock slot. The notebook has three battery options: a regular 6-cell, high capacity 6-cell and 12-cell battery. 

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The HP Envy 15 is a high end laptop that's a part of HP's unique Envy line. It is an extremely stylish notebook that successfully marries excellent performance with usability and portability. With a fast CPU, excellent video and audio, slick design, and a price that's low for a Core i7 laptop, it is a great laptop.

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HP Envy 15 Specs:

Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)

1.6GHz Intel Core i7 720QM

6GB, 1,066MHz DDR3

500GB 7,200rpm Hard Drive

15.6 inches display

1GB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4830

HP Envy 15 Review

The HP Envy 15’s design is essentially the same as the Envy 13, majoring on solid construction from a multitouch button-less trackpad, a magnesium alloy chassis, and detachable long-life baseplate battery packs.  Its lid has an attractive etched pattern that looks like the skin of a robotic rattlesnake. ike the MacBook Pro 15-inch, it's completely surrounded in aluminum metals and measures only an inch thick (15 by 9.75 by 1 inches, HWD). 

The 15.6-inch widescreen is a boon for video and photo editors, rich in colors and enshrined with a 1,920-by-1,080 resolution. The screen wasn't excessively glossy, and both games and video looked great. The VGA Webcam even includes an infrared LED to make it work better in dark environments.  Its extraordinary 300-nit brightness level allows for great viewing angles even at a full 90 degrees. The screen also has a light sensor that adjusts the brightness based on surrounding light.

While the comfortable Chiclet keyboard lacks backlighting, it does offer an extra vertical row of quick-launch keys along the left edge, as well as function keys that double as media controls. The large keys travel a satisfying distance and prove intuitive to use. In our hands-on test the keyboard quickly proves that it is ready for typing long texts.  Alike its competitor from California, the Envy 15 offers a multi-gesture touchpad without separate touchpad buttons. The touchpad is large, and supports multi-gesture technology, meaning you can use your fingers to zoom in and out of photos and scroll through documents.

The Envy 15 features HDMI, two USB ports, an eSATA/USB combo jack, a combined 3.5mm audio in/out port, Ethernet, and a Kensington lock slot; all are on the right side of the system.  The only area where the HP Envy 15 disappoints is in its battery life, which isn't surprising given its Mobile Core i7 processor and large, bright screen.  The laptop ran for 1 hour and 57 minutes on our video playback battery drain test, using the standard six-cell battery.

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