HP Stream 14 Laptop with Beats Audio (Natural Silver) (Discontinued by Manufacturer)

First off, all those people who said that this computer is slow is either lying or their internet service is slow. I was so scared on buying this laptop because of all those negative reviews that i had read about but, I must say that this laptop is so beautiful and it runs so smooth and quiet. All those bad things that were said about it are not true or they themselves must of received a defective laptop.I had to write this review just to assure you the buyer that this laptop is wonderful. It is well made and it is so light and thin that It actually reminds me of a Mac Air. If you are looking for an inexpensive laptop that runs well please consider this one. I think your $300 will go a long way because of the way it is made and how it runs. To be honest it actually looks and feels like a high end laptop.. Another thing i must mention to you about this laptop is, not to worry about the DVD or hard drive which is NOT included but that stuff is so cheap that it doesn't even matter. A 32gb Flash Drive is included thou and you get 100gb of cloud for free for 2yrs but I actually bought a 1tb portable hard drive and an LG Electronics External Slim DVDRW 8X with Software GP50NB40 for 80 Dollars total on Amazon.The Links are posted with my review.If your looking for an inexpensive lightweight laptop just to do schoolwork, movies or browsing well this is it. Try it for yourself i believe you wouldn't regret it.*****Remember to install all the new updates for this Notebook as it will the computer to be faster and smoother.. Any internet problems or processor problems will be solved by the patches.. I just love this notebook. LG Electronics External Slim DVDRW 8X with Software, Black GP50NB40 Silicon Power Rugged Armor A80 1 TB 2.5-Inch USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 Military Grade Portable External Hard Drive SP010TBPHDA80S3B (Blue)

Very happy with product given its price point- Mac feel with Windows functionality.Had an issue w/ screen not working after 60 days or so, called HP support (866-671-7362) and they resolved the issue.Basically you need to hold the power button down for 15 seconds, unplug, replug, power on and it goes into auto system repair mode.It worked, screen came back on , Root cause not shutting down properly (use windows key and press X, then choose shutdown) my son was just pushing the power button to shut it off, need to do proper shutdown.Back to laptop - very happy w/ it, good battery life, good wifi receiver, good monitor.etc..

I wanted to wait until Windows 10 came out because I knew it would be a make or break for this product. I have messed around a lot with this product over the last little while because I wanted to make sure it was worth keeping, or if I should send it back. I could barely find any current information on the product anywhere on the internet and it seems as if HP doesn't make it anymore so I wanted to be sure it could hold up in the coming years. Hopefully my findings will help any future or current owners of this product as there's not much help out there for discontinued products. The Stream 14 is a great little product, that with the right tweaks can make it feel like a top dollar one. I love how it practically weighs nothing, runs the full windows system and has a pretty nice keyboard, sound system and screen. While its made of cheap products it really doesn't feel that way when you get to using it. The web camera is pretty awful... but I didn't buy it for that. I got mine for under $200 and would do it again but probably wouldn't pay more than $300 for it (there are plenty of low end PC's for that price). Don't expect to do a million things on this little "netbook", but do expect a great fully functioning Windows PC that boots up fast and is great for smaller tasks (I haven't tried games on it, though I've heard they do surprisingly well on it). With a 64 GB MicroSD and a 32GB USB I have been able to do a lot with this PC (I recommend at least an 8 GB USB even if you aren't going to use many files on it-- helps with recovery and other updates).Now for the tips: I bought mine refurbished with Windows 8.1-- so my experience may not be identical to other purchasers out there but I'll bet it'll be similar.Right out of the box the HP Stream 14 is pretty unusable, I struggled trying to get it to connect to the internet and found that it was due to an outdated and faulty Wifi Adapter that could barely pick up any Wifi Signals. So you will need a USB and an internet connection from another computer to manually download the driver update from HP's Website-- searching for the product you will find a list of the most current drivers. After updating the Wifi worked perfectly and I was ready to start the nightmare of downloading the most current updates (Pre-Windows 10). Depending on if you're going to stick with Windows 8.1 or move on to Windows 10 there are a few things that I would recommend doing that will make your life easier. Out of the box the system files take up more than half of the already limited space so you'll want to make the most of it. I was really worried about this because under Windows 8.1 I couldn't update the computer any further. Even with no documents or files on the computer I had no space to do anything (a MicroSD and USB are worthless as far as installing updates to this computer)If you're going to stick with Windows 8.1: Go ahead and download whichever of the updated drivers you see fit (HP Highly recommends the Audio Driver and the Graphics Driver) as that will give you the Beats Audio features and some updates to the screen. I would also update touch pad as it seemed to work better after the update. As for the rest of Windows Updates-- they basically will fill up the remaining space on your already small eMMC card so I would be picky on which ones you install. If you're like me you like to install all the updates you can- but like I said earlier its nearly impossible on this system. The problem is that the recovery partition takes up half the system (even though 5 GB of partition are free they can't be added to the main C: partition without software that I didn't want to mess with). I read that the recovery partition on this particular device couldn't be removed as it included files needed to boot up the computer. However in trying to make room to install Windows 10 I was successful in deleting it without affect the boot up as far as I could tell. I don't know if an update made that possible or what the case was but you can move the recovery partition to a USB and see if that works for you. If so you will have a lot more of a much needed breathing room.If you're updating to Windows 10: Set it up first as Windows 8.1 and update the Wifi Driver; I'm not sure what updates you'll need to download from Microsoft to make that happen but whatever you do DO NOT let Microsoft download all the updates automatically. There isn't enough space so it will download all the files and then won't be able to install them. After you are able to update to Windows 10 you can do a fresh install and delete the remaining Windows 8.1 files and gives you a lot more space. Saving all your Documents, Pictures, Music and Downloads to a MicroSD will give you plenty of space for programs like Office, Chrome and future updates. Just like with Windows 8.1 you will have to update the Wifi Driver as it still wont work. Luckily (or unluckily) Windows 10 will update the rest of your drivers when you scan for Windows Updates-- oddly even after installing the Wifi Driver manually it reverted back to an older one, it still worked but not very well. I had to go into Wifi Adapter settings and search for an update. I'm not sure why but that's what I had to do and Wifi worked great again.I almost gave up on this laptop, I didn't want to because I liked it so much and was really glad I held on until Windows 10 because it has made it so much better. There's also an option coming out in future update to give the ability to save Apps on an MicroSD so that will give you even more space. HP Stream 14 despite being discontinued is a great for if you can find it at a bargain price.******* UPDATE ********* I'm was experiencing a little bit of internet problems with Windows 10 that I wasn't experiencing with Windows 8.1 so it probably is an issue with the Windows 10 update (also my internet isn't the best quality) but it seems to have cleared up (maybe Windows Automatic Updates fixed it?). Also I'm really impressed with the battery life on this!! I've been using it for web browsing and playing a little solitaire and I can go unplugged for a good part of the day. Even was it says I have 20% battery left it still says I have about an hour and a half of battery life left (obviously depends on what I'm doing). So yep still think this is a great product once you get past all the update issues!!

A very good laptop for typical home users i.e. bill paying, web surfing, email, document storage, banking, etc. I do caution that it requires a very clean WiFi and internet access. The laptop comes with good software from HP to alert you to connectivity and software updates. Utilize the HP assistant to do both the windows and hardware driver updates; even on a clean connection the inherit Microsoft Update in the OS takes forever. The HP Assistant takes a fraction of the time for some reason. The stream and windows arrangement prefers the Microsoft Internet Explorer 10 (my experience) over Mozilla and Chrome. The Stream loves Office 365 and effortlessly stores documents on the One Drive or the HP Connected Drive. My experience is the stream prefers the former over the latter. Also, get a wireless mouse the touchpad is not the best (I believe the guy with the video points that out and he his correct). Using the touchpad got to be annoying. I almost add that this is the best implementation of a non-touch screen Windows 8.1 device ( I am in IT and deal with this stuff all the time). It really is smooth for an OS that is moving towards touchscreen.