I bought a brand new HP ENVY 17t 3200 in Jan. It came with Windows 7 and was supposed to have excellent sound and 'beep bass' thanks to 6 speakers, a Subwoofer and Beats Audio. It is a top of the line, expensive laptop. When I got it the sound was terrible, my apple iPad sounded much better! The Subwoofer never worked. I updated all the drivers from the official HP website and still no improvement, all the time my Bluetooth mouse kept disconnecting! (The same mouse works just fine on all my other hardware!). I tried upgrading to Windows 8 and again updated all drivers, still no improvement. I called HP support who had me re-update all my drivers and as it still didn't work arranged for their repair service (operated by NCSS) in Sydney to pick up the laptop. It was acknowledged as received by NCSS on 17th Jan. After 13 days their engineer calls me looking for my Windows 7 recovery disks (he says they must first check if the system works with Windows 7). So clearly they have had my laptop for 13 days and done nothing with it all that time, even though they said I should have my laptop repaired and returned within 5-10 days of pickup!!!
I bought the laptop from a vendor in Tasmania called Entique Systems Australia (found them on Ebay) who source them from the US (didn't realise that when I bought it). Now I'm told that because it's a US laptop I will need to call HP and get a recovery disk from potentially HP USA (I never received a recovery disk with the original laptop). Once I get the recovery disk and send it to NCSS they will reinstall Windows 7, not doubt confirm the Subwoofer and BT still doesn't work and only then will they contact HP USA to order parts which may take another 6 weeks to arrive!!!
So I bought a AUD$2,0000 laptop in early January and it will likely be the end of March or April before I get to use it, that is if they fix the problem which I'm not confident they can given all the other people having the same issue (unfortunately I only found the negative reviews and many reports of similar issues with these HP ENVY 17 laptops after I experienced the problem myself).
So my recommendation is to stay well away from HP ENVY laptops and Beats Audio. It all looks great but doesn't work in my experience and the after sales support is terrible.
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