Haswell HP Envy vs. HP ProBook 450?

[jmfoottit]

I think the ProBook 4x0 G1 (Haswell) is going to work out. That's a guess though. Can't be sure as we don't have the details since no one has tried yet, although someone today just showed up with one: http://www.tonymacx86.com/hp-proboo...installer-failing-hp-probook-450-4gb-ram.html

Hi RehabMan

Thank you for your speedy reply. I'm down to a choice of 2 (same price) and i noticed you've dabbled in both areas (and ive read lots of threads on Haswell issues etc):

1) HP Probook 450 g1 4702mq 8GB E9Y25EA#ABU pro's, build quality, easy swap of hdd
2) HP Envy Touchsmart 4700mq 16GB F5C64EA#ABU pro's, horse power, price, 1080p, touch (win8)

Essentials:-
a)stability (no reboots, switching off etc)
b)external usb soundcard
c)wifi

Please could I ask your advice... which would you recommend over the other?

thank you

 

[RehabMan]

Laptop Compatibility

Hi RehabMan

Thank you for your speedy reply. I'm down to a choice of 2 (same price) and i noticed you've dabbled in both areas (and ive read lots of threads on Haswell issues etc):

1) HP Probook 450 g1 4702mq 8GB E9Y25EA#ABU pro's, build quality, easy swap of hdd
2) HP Envy Touchsmart 4700mq 16GB F5C64EA#ABU pro's, horse power, price, 1080p, touch (win8)

Essentials:-
a)stability (no reboots, switching off etc)
b)external usb soundcard
c)wifi

Please could I ask your advice... which would you recommend over the other?

thank you

I haven't seen the HP ProBook 450, so I can't really comment on how it compares to the Envy. And no one has hacked it yet (here), so not sure of all the compatibility concerns.

As for the Envy, I have the HP Envy 15-j063cl (a costco model). Here's some notes on the hardware, off the top of my head:
- 1080p screen is nice to have, but it is not a quality 1080p (the AUOv4 I have installed into my 4530s is better). Colors wash out at slight angles and it's glossy (not a fan of glossy screens).
- Fan is noisy when it is on. HP gets this better with the 4540s, and hopefully the same fan tech carries over to the 450.
- Keyboard is a little bouncy in the middle.
- Nice that there's no optical drive (of course, 450 is the same)
- HDD is easy to swap out (I removed the OEM drive right away, so I could easily return it with Win8 intact)
- touchpad is ok (it is a clickpad), but a little hard to press the "physical button". But this is no surprise. PCs come with crappy touchpads, nothing like a real Mac... and I mostly use an external mouse anyway.

Compatibility:
- keyboard brightness keys are weird (brightness up/down generate the same code, so they can't be used). Instead I added a hack to my VoodooPS2 driver to allow adjusting brightness with Ctrl+Shift+Arrow Up/Down.
- keyboard backlight on/off works, although keyboard backlight stays lit when OS X sleeps the display (minor annoyance, could probably be fixed with a keyboard backlight driver)
- audio volume is a little low (could perhaps be improved with changes to patched AppleHDA)
- very stable. Running as MacBookPro11,2 with full PM, sleep etc.
- HD4600 works well... only slight glitches (that go away) at first boot
- USB3 works with native AppleUSBXHCI and GenericUSBXHCI
- Webcam works (looks a little grainy) on this model
- My model came with WiFi that works with only injector kext (eg. compatible with native drivers, did not have to replace it)
- Haswell early reboot problem and laptic panic. Must patch the kernel. I'm currently using KernelLapic and KernelPm with Clover.
- HDMI works, although I have not patched the kexts for HDMI-audio (I don't need it)
- full brightness range is working with patched AppleBacklight or ACPIBacklight and DSDT patches (recent developments)
- card reader does not work. Perhaps with work in VoodooSDHC it could work...

Note: Moved off-topic posts to new thread.

 

[nguyenmac]

- full brightness range is working with patched AppleBacklight or ACPIBacklight and DSDT patches (recent developments)

You mean ACPIBacklight + 4x40s brightness dsdt patch can work with haswell?

 

[RehabMan]

You mean ACPIBacklight + 4x40s brightness dsdt patch can work with haswell?

No. HD4600 is different than HD3000/HD4000. Requires a different patch. But with the modified patch it works, and works well.

I was hoping to get gygabyte666 to try it and report back because he has a very similar machine and the know how to apply it without a lot of handholding, but so far, no response...

Maybe you'd like to try with your Haswell machine...

Most of the details you know (using the script to create AppleBacklightInjector, for example)...

See here for the patches: http://www.insanelymac.com/forum/to...000-quad-haswell-1085109/page-14#entry1983314

 

[nguyenmac]

I'm not clear enough rehabman, I will get these, right?

- All brightness levels with AppleBacklightInjector only.
- All brightness levels with DSDT patches only.
- All brightness levels + smooth transition with your ACPIBacklight + DSDT patches.

I will test it tomorrow with my friend's Dell 7537 using HD4400.

 

[RehabMan]

I'm not clear enough rehabman, I will get these, right?

- All brightness levels with AppleBacklightInjector only.
- All brightness levels with DSDT patches only.
- All brightness levels + smooth transition with your ACPIBacklight + DSDT patches.

I will test it tomorrow with my friend's Dell 7537 using HD4400.

Two scenarios, same as for 4x40s/4x30s:

Scenario 1: Using native AppleBacklight.kext. Needs injector or patch to AppleBacklight.kext such that AppleBacklight recognizes the display with correct backlight levels. Also requires DSDT patch to initialize IGPU backlight registers in PNLF._INI, so backlight works correctly before display sleep.

Scenario 2: Using ACPIBacklight.kext. Needs DSDT patches to implement the methods that initialize the hardware (_INI) and the methods to provide direct access to the hardware backlight controls to ACPIBacklight. Gives you smooth transition and your selection of all backlight levels. On my Envy, the smooth levels work well, with no flickering like the 4540s.

So far, I prefer Scenario 2: More control. Smooth transitions. And you have the possibility of the "micro" levels below the lowest "major" level (not possible with AppleBacklight because of AppleBacklight bug).

There is no "All brightness levels with DSDT patches only"...

 

[nguyenmac]

Got it, and how to get lowest/highest brightness levels with new HD4600? Do I need to use ioio to manually determine them?

Btw, does your new modified DSDT patch work with HD3000/HD4000 as well?

 

[RehabMan]

Got it, and how to get lowest/highest brightness levels with new HD4600? Do I need to use ioio to manually determine them?

Btw, does your new modified DSDT patch work with HD3000/HD4000 as well?

My new strategy involves just using the levels that OS X wants to use. In the case of HD4600, it appears to be a range of 0-0xad9 (Sandy/Ivy is 0-0x710). So there is no need to see what Windows is using.

This patch is specific to Haswell.

The adoption of the fixed range (0-0x710) could be done for Sandy/Ivy as well, but I haven't tested that yet. The patches will always be different because of the different layout/use of the backlight registers on the IGPU hardware.

 

[nguyenmac]

I applied your dsdt patches and ACPIBacklight and it's perfect, full brightness and smooth transition. Haven't tried the Injector yet (not really interested, your ACPIBacklight is much better).

Btw, do I have to change _BCL for each laptop? I think I get full brightness, but haven't used ioio to confirm.

 

[RehabMan]

I applied your dsdt patches and ACPIBacklight and it's perfect, full brightness and smooth transition. Haven't tried the Injector yet (not really interested, your ACPIBacklight is much better).

Btw, do I have to change _BCL for each laptop? I think I get full brightness, but haven't used ioio to confirm.

Thanks for the feedback!

You should not have to change the _BCL, as it has the top level at full brightness (0xad9). The only reason to change the _BCL would be to improve the curve. I used a modified version of your script (removed the 'core patch' part) to generate it (I think with a curve factor of 13 or 14). I think the curve could be steeper yet.

I'm going to do some testing if the same technique (use 0x710 as max) for the HD3000/HD4000 will work as well. I believe it will... It should be better that way too since the backlight driver will not be "fighting" with the main display driver over backlight configuration.