HP Spectre Envy 14 at the CES

Last week we told you about the HP Spectre and the teaser trailer the company released to set the tone for its new Ultrabook. The Spectre—or, officially, the HP Envy 14 Spectre—was unveiled this week at the 2012 International CES in Las Vegas.

Once the realm of the film industry, teaser trailers are now a staple in the tech industry. The Fincher-like trailer for the Spectre alluded to a slick, sexy design, and although the result is a little less Rooney Mara and a little more Daniel Craig (or the other way around, depending on your point of view), the HP Spectre is without a doubt one of the highlights in the Ultrabook line on display at the CES.

HP Spectre & the Ultrabook

Ultrabook is a trademarked term (coined by Intel) used to refer to a sleek line of laptops that must adhere to certain specifications outlined by Intel. Among these specs are a light weight (less than 3.1 pounds), a thin chassis (less than 0.71 inches thick), a long battery life of over five hours, and Intel’s Rapid Start Technology. At least in the area of design, the new HP Spectre falls a little short (and stocky). The new HP Spectre comes in at a hefty 3.79 pounds and a thickness of 0.78 inches. The MacBook Air, for example—which started this trend to smaller, thinner, quicker laptops—weighs in between 2–3 pounds and has a thickness of 0.68 (thickest point) to 0.11 (thinnest point). So, by these definitions, the HP Spectre does not quite fit the Ultrabook specs. And yes, thin is in—but so what?

The HP Spectre still has some pretty sassy specifications. It has 14-inch HD+ Radiance, LED backlit display. The HP Radiance keyboard ‘knows when you are coming’ and gradually lights up each row. How’s that for an entrance? The Spectre also sports a 128 GB or 256GB mSATA solid-state drive that is very quick and agile. It has, of course, Intel’s Rapid Start Technology, a Core i5 or i7 ULV Processors, Centrino Advanced-N 6230 + Bluetooth (2×2 Wi-Fi), a Beats Audio System, and HP TrueVision HD Webcam that is Skype HD capable (for those that like to see their relatives back home in true-to-life clarity). And if that were not enough, they throw in the Apple-designed Mini DisplayPort as well as a HDMI, “gigabit” Ethernet, and USB 3.0 port.

Perhaps one of the more exciting prospects is that the glass frame that the houses much of the HP Spectre will make it compatible with NFC (Near Field Communication) technology that HP introduced in its HP TouchPad with the touch-to-share feature. What NFC technology allows you to do is simply bring another device that shares this technology (like a smartphone) up to the Spectre, and you will be able to move around and transfer information from one device to another—just by touch alone. A nifty little feature, indeed.

If the promise of the new lineup of Ultrabooks on display at the CES is any indication, Ultrabooks are in it for the long haul.

The HP Spectre goes on sale in February at a base price of $1399.99.

The HP Pavilion dm1z is an ultraportable notebook with an 11.6 inch display. It is powered by a 1.6GHz AMD E-350 dual core Zacate processor having a total power draw of 18W.

The AMD Zacate processor is highly power efficient. It doesn’t consume significantly more power than a dual core Intel Atom processor. What’s more it delivers better performance and comes bundled with powerful AMD Radeon HD 6310 graphics capable of handling 1080p HD video playback and moderate 3D gaming.

The Pavilion dm1z isn’t much larger than a typical netbook. It isn’t very costly either. The notebook looks like a larger version of the HP Mini 210. The 11.6 inch display has a resolution of 1366 x 768 pixels.

The Pavilion dm1z comes standard with a 6-cell battery and gets around 9.5 hours of battery life when the WiFi is turned off. The $449 base configuration has a 250GB hard drive, a 2GB of RAM and WiFi 802.11b/g/n. Higher-end configurations are also possible.

The recently announced HP Pavilion and Pavilion g series notebooks are now available for purchase in the US. Besides sporting a refreshed case design, the 15.6 inch Pavilion dv6t Select Edition and the 17.3 inch Pavilion dv7t Select Edition feature Intel’s latest Core i series dual core and quad-core Sandy Bridge processors. These notebooks can also be configured with AMD Radeon HD 6000M series graphics, although that is an optional feature. The standard Pavilion dv6t and dv7t still feature the previous generation Intel Core i series processors.

On the lower end you can find the 14 inch Pavilion g4t, 15.6 inch Pavilion g6t and g6x and 17.3 inch Pavilion g7t. All of these notebooks feature the first generation Core i series processors. Select models are also available with dual core Pentium processors. The available graphics options are the integrated Intel HD graphics and AMD Radeon 6000M.

While HP says that the g6t is for home users and the g6x is for businesses, they are essentially the same with slightly different colored lids.

The HP Pavilion dv6t and dv7t Select Editions start at $799.99 and $899.99 respectively. The quad core dv6t and dv7t are priced at $999.99 and $1,099 respectively.

The Pavilion g4t and g7t have a starting price of $499.99 and $599.99 respectively whereas the g6t starts at $519.99. All notebooks are now up for order at HP’s online store.

The HP Mini 110 and 210 netbooks are now available with the dual core Intel Atom N570 processor. Right now, the upgraded models are only available in Japan, but they should be available in other parts of the globe sometime soon.

The HP Mini 210 and 110 netbooks have 10.1 inch WSVGA display with a resolution of 1024 x 600 pixels. Other specifications include a 250GB hard drive, 1GB of RAM, 3 USB 2.0 ports, Ethernet, WiFi 802.11n, Bluetooth 3.0, mini D-sub and a 0.3 megapixel webcam.

The HP Mini 210 has a 6-cell battery which will reportedly get around 8 hours of runtime. The Mini 110 has a smaller 3-cell battery that should give you 4-5 hours of run time.

The HP Elitebook 8560p is a 15.6 inch business-rugged notebook with an Intel Core Sandy Bridge processor. It sports a platinum-colored chassis with a ‘bead-blast’ finish and an aluminum-alloy hinge. The Elitebook 8560p meets the MIL-STD 810G military standards for dust, humidity, altitude, drop, heat and vibration.

The Elitebook 8560p is available with your choice of a Sandy Processor ranging between the 2.1GHz Core i3-2310M and the the 2.3GHz Core i7-2820QM. The graphics solution is the AMD Radeon HD 6470M discrete graphics with 1GB of dedicated video memory. The notebook supports up to 16GB of DDR3 memory and up to 750GB of HDD. Alternatively you can opt for a 128GB or 160GB of SSD. There is also an upgrade bay which can accommodate either an optical drive or a secondary hard drive.

The Elitebook 8560p has a 15.6 inch antiglare display with a resolution of either 1366 x 768 or 1600 x 900 pixels. Other features include an optional 720p webcam, a spill resistant keyboard with numeric pad, stereo speakers, a trackpad and a pointing stick in the middle of the keyboard.

As for connectivity, the Elitebook 8560p supports 802.11n WiFi, optional Bluetooth and Ethernet LAN. HP says that it will also support the EV-DO/HSPA mobile broadband option in the 2nd quarter of 2011. The laptop also has 2 USB 3.0 ports, 2 USB 2.0 ports, an eSATA/USB combo port, VGA, an ExpressCard slot, DisplayPort video outputs, FireWire, Smart Card reader, an SD/MMC memory card slot, a docking connector and a secondary battery connector. 3-cell, 6-cell and 9-cell battery options are available and can be accompanied by an extended battery to get ‘industry leading run time’.

For security, the Elitebook 8560p has a fingerprint reader and optional hard drive self-encryption. It runs Windows 7.

Pricing and availability
The HP Elitebook 8560p is expected to be available in the US on March 15. Prices will start at $1,099.