Notebook Hunter

While we'd have expected such an overtly Beats Audio branded notebook to have a huge price tag, for $747 the 14in HP Pavilion dm4-3011tx is actually really good value. While sound quality is fairly subjective, for us the 3011tx had sound quality a cut above what’s normal for a notebook. This alone puts this ultraportable in good stead, but the specs are also impressive for the price. Key among these are a full-voltage 2nd Gen Intel Core i5, 8GB of RAM and an AMD Radeon HD 7470M dedicated graphics card. It’s a well-rounded package, and at 2.05kg it’s not going to be a hassle to carry around.

The screen’s rather unimpressive, but in general the stark black exterior’s really nicely finished. Metal is used for the screen backing and keyboard deck, and while the rest is plastic it’s a fair compromise for the price that doesn’t overly diminish the build quality. One last point worth noting is the red backlit keyboard; it’s pleasant to type on and the backlighting is excellent, although if you have a problem with red then it’s not going to appeal.

See the special online here.

See a summary of the specs below.

Processor
The 3011tx features a 2nd Gen Intel Core i5-2430M (2.4GHz), a mid-range processor that will have no problems with productivity applications and most intensive software. It can burst up to 3GHz using Turbo Boost 2.0 Technology if a particularly demanding program is running.

Graphics
It comes with a dedicated graphics card called the AMD Radeon HD 7470M. It’s a fairly reasonable low-end card that can play modern games like Skyrim smoothly at low settings or with some mild stuttering at medium settings.

RAM
8GB of RAM is enough to either run many programs at once fluidly or run very intensive image and video editing software.

Storage
A 500GB hard disk drive is about average in size. It’s big enough for plenty of documents, but movies and the like will fill it sooner rather than later.

Screen
The 3011tx sports a 14in (1,366 x 768 resolution) gloss screen. It’s got good colour reproduction, but the viewing angles are largely unimpressive.

Portability
The 3011tx has good portability, because it weighs 2.05kg and is 33mm thick. It’ll be very easy to carry around.