I don’t mean to sound shallow or oblivious to facts, but one of the main reasons that I haven’t given a PC a chance in my life was that most of the ones I found were downright ugly - both in name and design.
Let me show you a perfect example of what I mean. This laptop is the HP ENVY 15t-3200. Yep, the ENVY 15t-3200. For me, branding like this is just ridiculous. Personally, I can’t see a point to numbers that don’t explicitly say what they mean from the get-go. I will grant you the fact that it’s not hard to figure out what the numbers mean – it’s a 15-inch ENVY laptop with an Intel 3200-series processor inside the base model – but I still find them clunky and, frankly, unnecessary.
Other manufacturers can figure out naming schemes that make sense. Look at Apple and its MacBook Pro line, or Microsoft and its recently-announced Surface line of tablets. Those are incredibly easy names to remember; ENVY 15t-3200, not so much.
On top of the bad name, this particular HP ENVY notebook also suffers from a horrible design. At first blush, it may look like a MacBook Pro – but then the red Beats branding makes itself apparent. That strip of red goes around the entire keyboard, and there’s three Beats logos that are visible from the front.
Imagine an ENVY 15t-3200 without that red. It would look very attractive, right? Unfortunately, the red is there to stay.
This absurd branding isn’t unique to just HP, either. Just about every PC manufacturer puts some sort of branding on their products, whether it be in the form of stickers, branding like HP’s Beats stuff, or something else entirely.
I appreciate a beautifully designed product. For the longest time, I just couldn’t find anything with an Apple-like clean design, meaning no stickers or unnecessary branding. Thankfully, there are now PC manufacturers out there that don’t hide their designs with Intel or Windows 7 stickers.
There’s still the issue of naming schemes, but they seem to be getting better. Dell in particular does a great job with names; just today, the company unveiled revised XPS 14 and XPS 15 laptops. XPS is Dell’s performance brand, and the numbers only represent screen size. So, there are 14- and 15-inch performance laptops in Dell’s lineup. Simple.
I hope other manufacturers can start to steer clear from branding and naming issues. These aren’t deal breakers for me, but would appreciate my $1,500-ish laptop to be designed well and give me a sense of pride whenever I carry it around. Thank goodness there are PCs like that for me.
What are your thoughts on PC naming conventions and looks? Are they just not important to you? Or do you, like me, like attractive technology?
…and no fuck was given today
I appreciate your perspective, but I do not agree with your opinion. The issues you mention are things I do not care about, at least not so much that they would make me alter a purchase decision. Price and performance are key for me first. Design matters, and more so than just raw appearance, but, yeah, I like a good looking device as well. But I do not brand something ugly because it has stickers I can pull off, logos that are smaller than the tip of my pinky, or lights that I can turn off. I’d be much more concerned about how the XPS’ cost with regards to its relative performance compares to an Envy than its naming scheme.
When someone asks me what kind of laptop I have, I would just call it an HP Envy or an HP Envy 15 at most. The remaining numbers are pretty much just a SKU differentiator that only matters at the point of sale.
The issues you note, IMO, are interesting things to consider, but do not amount to much in my purchase decision-making.
Well, I think the stickers are a bit of a nuisance. If they’re going to be taken off anyway, why are they there? I could understand it for a show floor model, but not one that I buy.
The stickers aren’t as important as logos from other companies. I’m fine with a big Dell, Apple, or HP; but I just don’t like showing everybody that the premium laptop that I (hypothetically) bought from HP has an unnecessary audio technology.
I appreciate your perspective, as well. I didn’t try to come off as arrogant, but I was curious to see if anybody else had this issue. Interesting thoughts!
Branding? what about a huge lighted apple behind the screen?
C’mon, why that’s right and a smaller intel sticker is wrong?
If you told me about crapware, I can object. That’s plain stupid on a non cheap laptop. But about branding… maybe your lack of coherence is a signal of your inner apple switcher trying to avoid a switch back to… windows.
Please, don’t call an HP envy a PC. a macbook is a PC, since it’s innards are completelly x86 standard. Sony could use all those innards and mount a laptop with diferent EXTERNAL design, but both would be internally identical.
Finally, I don’t enjoy design. I use design as a selling factor in front of my customers. It says clearly that your business is in good shape, if you can spend money in high level laptops. But if you want practical design, there is only one: old thinkpads. New ones are fine, but old ones were THE laptops for work
Like I said in the comment above, a large Dell, Apple, or HP logo doesn’t bother me. In fact, sometimes those logos can look rather nice and give the product extra appeal.
What I do mind is Beats or JBL logos plastered all over the laptop, or a sticker that explains every little bit about the computer. And yes, stickers can be taken off, but the Beats logo and annoying red band cannot.
Regarding “…inner apple switcher trying to avoid a switch back to… windows:” this is my choice to switch back to a Windows-based PC. Nobody’s forcing me to use a PC laptop. But one of my stipulations for a new one is that it has to look nice – and I’ve found ones that do! I want to make the switch, but I don’t need just a powerhouse; I need a powerhouse that was designed by a great designer.
The author is clearly not being serious. This article must be a joke, intended only to get a rise out if us.
I care what a computer can do. I care what a computer costs. If my wife wants a computer with a series of funky numbers in hot pink that has Hello Kitty logos everywhere, and that laptop can play Diablo 3 and I can work off of it, I’m fine.
I don’t personally understand the obsession with how a computer looks. I’ve been disassembling them since they were 3 feet tall and weighed 80 pounds. If the guts do the job and you’re wanting the job done, the wrapper is just to show other people.
As for the name of the computer, I got screen size and processor out of the HP name you mentioned, I can also look it up if I want to know more about it. This is significantly more than I get from something called “MacBook Pro” – I mean, I’m not ragging on Apple here, but is a Macbook Pro a 13 or a 15 inch? Does it have a 2.5ghz i5 dual core or the 2.9ghz Dual core i7? 2.3Ghz i7 Quad core or 2.6ghz Quad? Does your MacBook Pro have the retina display? etc.
Seriously, not bashing Apple, just not knowing any of the specs from looking at a computer is like putting a brown paper sack on the thing and calling it a Computer2. If I know what the computer contains when I see it I can tell someone why a program or device doesn’t function properly.
Branding, meh, I work at a film production company, most of our laptops have been greeked to allow them to be set extras. If you don’t like how something looks, you can customize it yourself.
I accidently strayed from the goodandevo portion of the site to the main site today and found this article. I think I will stay in the goodandevo portion in the future.
Someone above me already addressed the issues with the stickers and logos, so I will speak to your SKU argument.
Apple sells a bunch of different MacBook Pro laptops with different configurations. They are all called MacBook Pro on the site. I went to Apple.com to purchase a 13-inch MacBook Pro and when I went to check out, guess what the order says? I was about to buy a “MacBook Pro – MD101LL/A.”
I am sorry to say that now when someone asks you what computer you have you will have to say “MacBook Pro – MD101LL/A,” in order to be specific as to which MacBook Pro you have. But you wouldn’t say that since that is not he name of the laptop, you would just say MacBook Pro. Just like someone with an HP Envy wouldn’t say HP Envy-15t 3200, they would just say HP Envy.
All manufacturers use SKUs to differentiate their products. In the case of Apple vs HP, Apple just hides it from the consumer better.
P.S. That picture you have on the article just says HP Envy. It doesn’t have any numbers. HP Envy is the branding which is synonymous to MacBook Pro.
If you’re looking for a nice nondescript laptop, check out Sony’s lineup. While there are plenty of off the wall PC options out there, there are plenty that are clean and subtle looking. I don’t like the HP lineup, but that’s just one brand.
I picked this Sony S Series up last year and have loved it since day one. Clean and simple with a pleasant touch of branding, IMO. I appreciate good design in a product and applaud Apple for their strict measures. But, once the couple of Intel stickers come off, I prefer this design than the now boring Mac lineup.
http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msstore/pd/Sony-VAIO-S-Series-VPCSE2MFYB/productID.243729800/parentCategoryID.44066900/categoryID.50787200/list.true
I’ve found that people with pretty devices are happier people.