Are Elitebook screens crap?

I am not sure if I do something wrong or are the panels in the Elitebook series just extremly bad?

First I bought a 2170p. I really liked it for its sturdy case, very compact dimensions, good performance (first I had the i7 model, than the i5 and liked it better for less fan noise). But the screen is dark and colors are bluish. Besides the overall screen looks like it has a gray layer on it, whites are not really white.
It performed excellent attached to an external monitor. So it ended up in the dock forewer. It is that it was not the purpose I bought it.

Then I bought the 8470p. Both the model with integrated on the CPU GPU and the model with dedicated GPU. Luminosity is better than with the 2170p, but not really great. Screen is the same bluish, white not really whites, contrast bad.

And finally I got the 8740w without Dreamcolor.
Same story.

I do understand these are all TN panels ant that my ancient Fujitsu-Siemens P19-2 has an IPS panel (with brilliant, almost "correct" colors) so I shoudn't compare. But I used other laptops with TN panels from Toshiba (excellent), IBM/Lenovo (very usable), Fujitsu-Siemens (just so usable) but they all were better than the Elitebooks.

I am a happy, long term HP server user and refuse to believe that they on purpose mount crappy panels in their business line of laptops.
What do I wrong?
I want to use the laptops with their on screen (= mobile), not as stationary computers with external monitor. But it is a pain in my eyes.
I want brilliant whites and brilliant colors generally, not that washed up, mushy greyish-blueish. I also want normal skin tones, not persons (in movies or pictures) looking as if they were fished from a frozen sea and have gone purple from hypotermia.

 

Quite often most basic business laptops are kept in the docking station 24/7, connected to single or dual 24" monitors.
I have had same models as you do (2170p, 8470p but my 8560w has dreamcolor). My go-to laptop at the moment is 840 G2 that came with IPS option and is quite nicely equipped otherwise: wwan, wifi, m.2 and 2.5" ssd all at the same time.

 

The 8740w has the FX2800m and I was able to get acceptable brilliance and luminosity by using the Nvidia software. Still colors are not accurate. Skin tones are now not blueish but more yellow-greenish. Maybe a calibration would help? Or at least an approximate icc profile to start with.

 

An inexpensive calibration device like a Spyder Express would probably help a lot.

Charles

 

Could be. As a first step I would like to have an ICC profile to see if anything changes at all.

 

Something else I'd mention is you're using older machines. For typical displays, the picture quality has gone up noticeably in recent years. I think if you got a newer EliteBook with an IPS-level display that you'd probably be fine. It's pretty rare there is a bad IPS panel on a modern notebook.

Either way, I stand to eat my words. I bought an EliteBook 840 G6 and am waiting for it to arrive. I don't know what screen it has beyond it being an FHD panel.

Charles

 

Maybe part of the problem is that I have much better monitors. The ones with IPS are beautiful, but I also have laptops with TN monitors,not newer than the HPs and they are still worlds better than what HP built into the Elitebooks. For me this is so incredible I still think maybe I am doing something wrong. Can it really be that HP put in their notebooks crap, asked thousands in real money and people still bought them?

 

I got my EliteBook today. It has a 14" IPS screen, 1920x1080 resolution and anti-glare. It seems colorful and bright enough for everyday usage. It's not washed out or anything like that. I haven't tried other EliteBooks in many years so I can't say how "normal" this is, but as I noted, modern IPS screens in notebooks are rarely reviewed poorly.

It's very possible the HPs you're using have garbage screens. These business-class machines are often purchased or leased by the thousands for fleet use, so it shouldn't be surprising that vendors will offer options that allow them to cut the price down as far as possible. To this day you can get a 1366x768 screen on a Dell Latitude 7400, which is Dell's top-tier 14-inch business notebook.

You're using older machines, as I noted, so you just have to move on at some point. HP's mid- and high-end business notebooks offer IPS or better screens now, as does just about every notebook vendor in the high-end business space, so just be a little more selective when you buy.

Charles