The new HP Envy 13

From the looks of the photos, the extremely skinny HP Envy 13 Ultra Portable Notebook looks well set to take on the MacBook Air and the Dell Adamo.

Full specs are very hard to come by at present, so stay tuned for impending info. For now, we can see that it features a 13.1 inch display, HDMI, 2 USB ports and an audio jack. Processor, memory or graphics info are our next target.

Check out our current HP laptops…

HP laptops join forces with NME to attract students

NME Radio is teaming up with Hewlett Packard (HP) to launch a sponsored music event that will tour universities around the UK and include promotional activity in the popular student mag.

The HP Uni Tour has been created to raise awareness of the new HP laptops – notably the Pavilion dv6 artist edition – among the student population.

The tour will take in six universities in October, with live music from VV Brown, Does It Offend You Yeah and Bombay Bicycle Club, among others.

Prior to each leg of the tour, a promotional bus will be parked on campus, where students will be encouraged to sample the laptops and get one-to-one advice from HP technology experts.

HP team up with designer Vivienne Tam for laptop design

During New York fashion week, HP unveiled a new Vivienne Tam laptop sporting a design inspired by the classic Chinese love story, ‘Butterfly Lovers’.

Laptops are clearly a thing of the past for the renowned fashionista, who prefers to describe this product as a ‘digital clutch’. Apparently, the new HP laptops design symbolises “love, freedom, independence and transformation,” and Tam reckons “women around the globe will carry HP’s digital clutch and wear my clothes – I want them to feel independent and free, like butterflies.” Ok then.

The HP Vivienne Tam digital clutch is expected to be available in spring 2010.

Dr Dre puts the HP in hip-hop

Hip-hop star Dr Dre has collaborated with the biggest names in the music industry, from Eminem to Snoop Dogg to Mary J Blige – but now he’s teaming up with Hewlett-Packard in an unlikely duet.

Dre has struck a deal with HP which will see the electronics manufacturer launch a range of premium HP laptops, headphones and software under the Beats By Dr. Dre brand umbrella, all in the name of improving sound quality. They are expected to hit the shop shelves in the US this autumn.

Universal Music exec Jimmy Iovine, who is the third party also involved in the shake-up, said: “Our position is to go to all the sources and try to improve sound and educate people. We can’t put anything weak in the line. Whoever puts out things that sound bad shouldn’t be as cool as something that sounds great.

“I just want our product to sound better.”

Music mogul Dre has already launched a headphone range earlier this year in conjunction with Monster Cable in the US.

Google Announces Partners For Chrome OS

Following Google’s announcement of plans to unveil their new operating system, Google Chrome, they have now released more details – specifically which brand partners will be involved.

Acer,  ASUS,  Hewlett-Packard, Lenovo, and Toshiba are on the list of notebook manufacturers that Google will be working with. The glaring omission is Dell, whilst MSI, who have been heavily involved in the netbook space for the last year, are also missing. Sony are also nowhere to be seen as of yet.

Google is also working with Freescale, Qualcomm and Texas Instruments all which make ARM processors for the emerging class of smartbooks.

It’s anticipated there will be more partner announcements in the next couple of months.