HP and Dell disable HEVC support built into their laptops' CPUs

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Economic motives and “value engineering”

  • Core complaint: HP and Dell are disabling HEVC hardware support to avoid ~$0.20–$0.24 per-unit licensing fees (recently raised ~20%), even on $900+ “pro” laptops.
  • Many argue $25M/year is trivial for these firms relative to revenue, but hardware orgs aggressively cut BOM costs even when it degrades UX.
  • Others note margins per laptop are modest (maybe $50–$75), so even a few cents matter internally and can drive bonuses, despite long‑term reputational cost.
  • Some see this not as “saving $0.04” but as drawing a line against ever‑rising patent-pool prices.

Licensing, double-dipping, and blame

  • Patent pools (MPEG LA / Access Advance / others) were heavily criticized as “rackets” that charge multiple parties along the chain (CPU vendors, OEMs, OS, apps).
  • Debate over who should pay: in practice, the “last enabler” to the end user (OEM or Microsoft Store, etc.) owes the fee, prompting OEMs to disable support.
  • Some blame HP/Dell for penny-pinching and hiding the limitation; others blame the HEVC patent regime and advocate shifting to royalty‑free formats (VP9, AV1, future AV2).

Technical mechanism and workarounds

  • Most commenters think the silicon is intact but HP/Dell’s Windows GPU/media drivers disable HEVC hardware acceleration or omit the codec.
  • On Linux, HEVC reportedly works, implying only Windows drivers/stack are crippled.
  • Buying the HEVC extension from the Microsoft Store (~$1, or via “hidden” free links) installs codecs; disagreement whether this re-enables hardware decode or only software.
  • For enterprises, per-user Store purchases are seen as unmanageable; volume licensing is limited.

Real-world impact and codec usage

  • Tangible issues cited: poor Teams performance, laggy multi-stream calls, disabled GPU-based background blur when hardware acceleration falls back to CPU.
  • Disagreement over HEVC’s importance:
    • Some say “nobody sane uses it”; others claim it’s ubiquitous in 4K streaming, phone video, UHD Blu-ray, remote gaming, and local libraries.
    • Conferencing stacks often stay on H.264/VP8/VP9 and are moving directly to AV1, sometimes skipping HEVC. Teams’ actual use of HEVC is disputed.
  • Several predict this will accelerate migration away from HEVC/VVC toward AV1 and beyond.

Consumer expectations and disclosure

  • Many see this as secretly shipping “crippled” hardware: CPUs and GPUs physically support HEVC, but OEM choices remove the benefit.
  • It appears to affect only new units; existing licensed machines aren’t being downgraded.
  • Strong sentiment that, at minimum, OEMs should be explicit on spec sheets or offer an official one‑time paid enablement option.