Having recently relocated, and sold all my worldly possessions, I was once again in the market for a second monitor. Back home I had been working with a Samsung 2333 which had served me faithfully for about 7 years. I amazingly paid about R1500 for it brand new, and since then I have been concerned by the ever increasing costs of LCD monitors.

One thing I’ve enjoyed about the US, is the large refurbishment market. It allows one, with minimal risk, to purchase 2nd hand products that have been through some form of quality and performance check. Generally receiving at least some form of warranty. And thus I ended up purchasing an HP Envy 24 with beats audio.

My only real requirement for the product was that it was at least 23″, full HD (1080p) and had either an HDMI or DVI input. I did a variety of Amazon and E-Bay searches before settling on this product. Originally finding it on E-Bay, I actually purchased it through the retailer’s own website: Refurb4Less.

I paid R1300 for this product, which new retails for well over $200. My only concern when purchasing this was that it had a stated quality of B-, indicating “Minor scratches on the frame, base and screen”. At the price though I was willing to accept this.

LHS with volume | RHS with power button and light up touch buttons

It arrived quickly, in less than 3 days, and I opened it with trepidation. However after putting the base together, and going over the screen several times, I can’t find any of the reasons it received a B- rating. And I’ve stopped looking, as this way I’m happier with my product :)

The screen includes beats audio speakers along the bottom, and provide marginally better sound than my laptop’s admittedly impressive sound. The screen came with a separate power supply, HDMI, VGA and 3.5mm audio cable.

pixcels

The screen looks really nice, it’s clean and neat. It doesn’t rotate or lift, but does tilt, which is adequate for my needs. Picture quality is excellent. It boasts an IPS screen with amazing viewing angles, and my only complaints would be because we’re stretching a 1080p resolution across such a large screen. This is not HP’s fault, just the current market.

Setup was easy, I plugged it straight into my laptop’s HDMI port, and sound and picture worked straight away. The screen has a form of touch buttons which I’m not a big fan of, but fortunately one only needs to use them once to set up. It has a power button just below the light, as well as a volume scroller on the other side of the screen which is a nice addition.

My only annoyance, is I’ll often leave my laptop playing music in the background and go do something else in the same room. However after 15min the screen goes to sleep, and with it power to the speakers. I know I can prevent this from happening, but then I’ll have to get into a habit of turning the screen off when I actually want to. So for now it just requires a regular mouse shake to keep things running smoothly.

so thin

The screen is way thinner than I was expecting, and the bezel is also super narrow (especially compared to my old LCD) and I’m really impressed with what I got. Would recommend.

It even has a headphone jack on the LHS of the screen.