Does HP ProBook 4330s run quiet ?

Hi all.

I'm looking for a 13''/14'' notebook (with Express Card or USB3 at least) and I'm interested in the 4330s with:

How about the fan noise produced? Is it really distracting ?
I can't find any info about this configuration.

I'd like a silent laptop in normal use (at least) ! My old dv6000 bothers me like a vuvuzela

In case the 4330 was noisy, could you suggest a similar (but quiet) notebook to me ?

 

I use one at work, fan hardly ever kicks in and I have an SSD so virtually zero noise for me. Even when it's flat out its not particularly noisy.

 

My 4430s is pretty close to silent, as well.

 

4430s isn't available in Italy.

I hope that 4330s was close to 4430 about noise and thermal design.

I've found a few reviews (and they're contrasting).
I don't know how accurate they are .

In this review (CZ->EN)

In this review (RU->EN), it seems that the 4330s is not so noisy:

 

I have had the 4330S for two weeks now (Core i5-2430M with ATI 6490M graphic and 640GB hard drive and HP Renew stock code LW813EAR#BCM) and its not the most noisy laptop ever but it most definitely isn't a silent one. If you buy a puny Intel Atom laptop then clearly you will by contrast normally get a silent machine but almost no processing power.

The sources of the noise are twofold:-

1. The system fan.

The latest BIOS for the unit has an option you can select that the fan does not have to run all the time the unit is on AC Power but sadly enabling this is more or less useless as what happens is you then have no fan for about two minutes after starting up the machine from cold but then the fan kicks in with a bick start up rush before settling down to a much quieter whirr for the rest of the time the machine is turned on. The reason for this is that the temp trip for the fan has now been exceeded inside the unit.

2. The Hitachi HDD

The unit has a 640GB Hitachi high capacity drive. Even when the fan is off the spinning of this disk makes a background sound that is very like the fan whir. A sort of low level but constant noise. You can also just about hear the heads writing in a completely quiet room but it is a very low level and minor head noise that you can only just hear and pretty trivial compared to other hard drives on computers I have bought in the past that had hard drives that sounded like clattering machine guns in some cases and so had to go back. The power management settings in Windows 7 do have an option for the hard drive to spin down after so many minutes of inactivity but even if you set this at say 3 minutes in practice the hard drives doesn't seem to spin down.

I got the machine at an incredible price at least 100GBP lower than any other suppliers and there is no other notebook machine of this size at this prices with a Core i5, dedicated graphics and an Express card slot or with a metal rather than plastic finish. So I'm going to keep it because whilst I wish the noise was not there as someone using it an often quiet home living room the noise is bearable and you only hear it when you don't have some other noise source like a radio or television turned on.

The bottom line is that this is not a completely silent notebook machine but it not aggressively very noisy and it has many other advantages such as fantastic access to the unit's innards for upgrades and the fact that the processor can be upgraded later on (when they become affordable) by the end user all the way to a Core i7 2820QM or possibly higher in due course.