*HP EliteBook 8730w Owners Lounge*

So the T9900 is the top end dual? I never looked to crack the 8730 or overclock, I have a t9400 I would consider doing a proc upgrade if its not a hassle... Let me know what you might want for the t9900 and we can do a paypal deal.

 

I don't think 8GB DDR2 sticks exist.

 

Oh, i always think 8730 uses DDR3 Dimms, becasue most PM45 platform use DDR3.....

 

I have two questions about my 8730w...

1.) How can I improve the heat development? My notebook keeps overheating since I recently formated the HD and reinstalled the entire system.

2.) My WUXGA+ display does not get very bright and one of the vertical background lights seems to have broken. I still have warranty but would like to upgrade to a better display. Does anyone have an idea of what could be done here?


Here is some of my technical data:

Processor: Core 2 Duo - T9800 @ 2.93ghz
Graphic Card: Nvidia Quadro FX 2700M
System BIOS: 68PAD Ver.F.13

Thanks a lot for any input!

 

Have you cleaned the vent?

What do you do that it overheats?

Have you deactivated the light sensor and turned brightness to maximum?

However, you can try the DreamColor display if you can get one cheap, it has LEDs and should be brighter.

 

Thank you very much for your reply, Sotton.

Not yet. However, I do not think there is much in the vent as everything worked nicely still until I reinstalled the system.

Nothing at all. Just a few downloads, browser windows and music player are enough already sometimes. My second 8730w with slightly different specs also has had the same problem for months already.

Yup.

Are there any options to get this or a comparable product for cheap? I found this display on ebay (xxx.ebay.de/itm/HP-EliteBook-8730w-17-LCD-DISPLAY-Bildschirm-TFT-1920x1200-WUXGA-/230734249161?pt=Notebook_Komponenten&hash=item35b8d53cc9) but do not know if it would achieve the brightness I am looking for.

 

If you buy a TFT with CCFL it would not be brighter, I guess (your link).

Even I think there is only one light source and it is in the bottom and not vertical (I only see light leakage on the bottom. But I have the worst screen and there were at least 2 versions and maybe you really have a different TFT)

If I do not clean my vent from time to time (every month) the fan is more crazy but overheating I do not get during normal usage even with a not so clean vent. This is strange maybe your 8730w needs a check of the heat pipes and so on, seems something wrong.

And, BTW, I don't think changing the TFT is very easy, even if you get one with lid and hinges (HP only sells/has it with lid/hinges assembled)

 

Thanks again for your input.

Is there any screen that's affordable that would improve the brightness of my screen?

I will open the notebook this weekend and clean it according to the instructions on the website of HP. I honestly do not believe it has to do with hardware or dust though, but with settings. The comp still worked nicely before I reinstalled the HD.

 

What are your working conditions? I mean room temperature and so on.

And did you mean that your laptop shuts off or does it just get hot during the overheating? Only playing games should be a problem but not normal work.


I doubt you will get a brighter screen, only if something is wrong (broken light or inverter) with your current one (and the inverter can be exchanged).

BTW, if you switch the brightness to the lowest position can you still see anything?

 

DreamColor is amazingly bright compared to the CCFL's, you almost need to wear shades!

I also concur with Sotton about the dust buildup. Just lift the keyboard and put your mouth up to the external vents and blow. This back flows the vents and blasts any crap back out through the fan.

I just got another 8730w to add to my quiver (that makes it 4 now). I did the vent blow thing and a clump of dust about the size of a coffee bean came out. Removing that single clump of dust dropped the temps by nearly 10 degC.

This one is the top of the range NH346PA (QX9300, DreamColor, 3700m, and a single 4GB stick) which was AUD$7000 two short years ago. I got it for well under $600 shipped and it still has almost a year of onsite warranty left.

The retail QX9300 does overclock better than the QX9200 ES cpus I have in the others. I can run it to 3.5GHz p95 stable without getting C0% throttling. I can run it to almost 4GHz but it C0% throttles almost instantly so there is no point. The ES Q9200's only go to 3.2GHz before throttling due to their requirement for slightly higher VIDs, even though they are all E0 stepping.

 

Just regular... between 17° and 22°. The notebook is constantly hot now but furtunately does not shut off all the time.

I will buy some air pressure spray and try to blow out all the stuff that stacked up inside. Thanks for the tip.... Will let you know how it turns out.

Yes, that still works. I can use the monitor but it is truly not bright enough for such an expensive product.

 

I ran the DC heatsink for the Quad for a few months, realized I needed the bigger sink after doing some video encoding and the CPU reaching 95+ Celcius on all cores despite setting the fan to 100% manually.

Just installed the Quad heatsink, and it never goes above 70. Idle is some 20 degrees lower as well.

So, if anyone else wonders - you can use the DC heatsink for Quad CPUs, but it will go hot as hell if maxed.

 

Thanks a lot for the great tip, Rideass. I am sure this will help a lot!

If I clean the dust from the fan, would not it be better if I open the cover first? However, I could not find any instruction on how to do this. The instruction on the website of HP only recommends to blow it out without opening the cover at all.

 

Blowing it out should be enough. I do it all the time (monthly) with "air from a can" (so it is compressed, I guess?, don't know the exact English translation), I use the opening on the left side to blow in (normally the hot air comes out of that)

However, some say it could damage something if the fan spins from that operation (static is produced e. g.) but just blowing in with your breath is not enough it has to be a stronger stream.

Always a little amount of dust comes out and after that it runs quieter.



Since graphical power is not needed during normal usage you also can clock down your NVIDIA card which may help a little.

And you can try to lift your 8730w a little from the desk that may help, too.

 

I blew in some air now but the situation actually worsened, as some dust apparently got in deeper. Which screws do I need to open on the bottom of the notebook to be able to fully aaccess the fan/ cooling unit, as shown on the website of HP?

Edit: I found the answer already. The procedure is published in this document.

 

Isn't the fan/cooling part a closed system? I mean it only has the opening on the bottom and on the sides and the fan within and no openings to the rest of the laptop and is only connected to the heat pipes.

Would be nice to see a few pictures

 

Ok. When I open it I will try to take a couple pics.

However, I just noticed the fan is not working anymore at all. Are there any adjustments that can be done for this, other than the option in BIOS? I have set the fan on "run all the time" mode there.

 

maybe your fan was the problem all the time?

maybe only the cable is loose?

There is no other option the fan should run all the time if is set to that mode but it is almost not audible when the processor does nothing


I also have a few problems with my fan (runs louder sometimes, maybe the axle bearing is a little worn out)

 

-->

That's why the fan should be stopped manually before blowing air into it... Bearings break and start to make noise.

 

the fan was always off of course or do you mean to block it somehow that it cannot turn during the blowing?

 

Block it. Forced air makes it spin backwards many times faster than it's ever designed to work in the right direction.

I've used straightened paperclip, it usually fits thru the covering holes and stops the fan if I cannot dismantle the laptop enough first. If I can take the laptop apart, I have old toothbrush to remove the dust with...

 

ok, I will block it next time, thx (learning by mistake...) however, currently I have no problem, maybe last blow repaired it, maybe this "repair" last not for long...

 

May fan is working again. I opened the cover and found 2 large balls of cotton that blocked the fan from spinning, so this obviously was my mistake. I would have never been able to get this fixed without disassembling the machine.

Below is a picture of the mess. I think this comp should be blown into and opened once a year to prevent this from happening again.



Thanks again for all your input!

 

I was wondering if anyone put a P9700 in or similar cpu that hasnt been listed by HP.

 

Dear Vitosha, I would like to ask you a question. I got a SWEDISH hp 8730w replacement keyboard last week. I noticed on your picture you've managed to disconnect both ZIF connectors (keyboard, trackpoint) out of the ZIF connector. The basic 8730w manual online and hp Self-Repair Video site do not clearly tell HOW to safely disconnect the ZIF connectors. I opened the keyboard as instructed yet did NOT take the risk of opening the ZIF connectors as did not clearly see how and where to the connectors would open. Please help me with this prefereably by giving CLOSE-UP photos of your 8730w opened with ZIF connectors being step by step disconnected. Second issue. What contact surfaces besides the GPU itself need the Arctic Silver media if upgrading the GPU. Thank you again. ePhysician.

 

Hi
I have a 8730W that had a blown ambient light sensor (the laptop has the dreamcolor display). I have replaced the sensor but the display is not working. If I boot without an external monitor connected all I get is one beep after about 20 seconds and nothing at all on the display.
The laptop does output to the external vga connector. I am thinking that the panel has stopped working. Any clues anyone ??
Thanks

 

The EliteBook 8730w is the worst laptop I have ever purchased and I am very disappointed. I got it 3 years ago to be used as a music production workstation and it's given me nothing but problems. It is certainly a massively overrated computer: I also own a Compaq nc6120, which is a cheap and old laptop and performance-wise cannot be compared with my Elitebook, but the physical aspect and layout are much better designed. To put it simply, the people who designed the Elitebook should be fired.

Here is my long and overdue list of HP Elitebook 8730w issues:

Before I was able to boot off a USB drive, now I can’t (the BIOS splash freezes and I can’t even access the BIOS configuration utility as long as the bootable USB drive is connected).

When using it with certain USB devices (in my case USB sound cards) the laptop will refuse to turn off or go to sleep. Some times it will go to sleep but then it will never wake up again, which mean I have to forcefully shut it down by holding the power button down. Never happened with any of my other computers, same operating system, same drivers.

If USB wakeup is enabled, so that when you hit a key on your USB keyboard or mouse the laptop resumes from sleep, any slight power hiccup (e.g. I turn on a hair dryer connected to the same socket) makes the computer wake up!

Touchpad buttons have a rubberised finish, making it very hard for fingertips to slide onto and off them naturally and easily. The rubber also is prone to scratches from nails. Should be made of plastic.

Trackpad buttons stick out too much, and trackpad is already depressed 1mm, so my fingers need to move up and down constantly when switching between buttons and trackpad, which is very anti-ergonomic. This does not happen in my cheap and old Compaq nc6120.

Trackpad buttons are hinged at the top, i.e. near the trackpad, so in order to depress the button your finger needs to travel 1cm further away from the trackpad, then back to the trackpad, which is uncomfortable. The mouse buttons are also too thick, so using this trackpad is really uncomfortable. This does not happen in my cheap and old Compaq nc6120, which are hinged at the bottom away from the keyboard.

Mouse button travel is too long (more than 1mm), so you have too press the mouse button very deep into the laptop before the click gets registered. On my cheap Compaq nc6120 mouse travel is perfect.

No bumps between the trackpad buttons so it’s impossible to feel where the next button starts, hence I often end up unintentionally pressing the middle button instead of the left or right buttons. On my cheap Compaq nc6120 the buttons can be felt out, so it’s hard to hit the wrong button.

One dead pixel after 8 months of use. Isn’t the display supposed to be the flagship feature of this laptop?

Display colours look very good of course, but when the display is looked at from the bottom it looks like crap, especially fonts. My cheap Samsung display does a better job.

Sluggish BIOS configuration utility. Who needs the stupid GUI? Why can’t they make a simple text-based BIOS config utility like everyone else? In addition, I once had to reset the BIOS password and there is no easy way to reset it (unlike most normal computers which have a simple switch somewhere on the back); instead I had to install no less than 2 pieces of bloatware (HP ProtectTools Security Manager Suite, and BIOS Configuration for HP ProtectTools) and waste an hour to do what normally takes me literally 5 seconds on my desktop PC. I don’t want to know what cr*p these utilities have littered my registry with. My old Compaq nc6120 has a normal text-based BIOS config interface, and it’s great.

Keyboard may be durable because of the material that it is made of, but the surface of the keys feels a bit like the base of a mug, quite unpleasant. In addition, fingertips get caught under the keycaps directly above the one you are pressing because they are not tall enough, which makes typing fast impossible difficult (I therefore use an external USB keyboard). The keyboard of my Compaq nc6120 feels a lot better and enables me to type much faster than on the Elitebook’s toyish keyboard.

Home and End keys are in the number pad, but they have put two useless blanking keys above the Left Arrow and Right Arrow keys which would have been a much more convenient place to have Home and End. This is the implementation used on my Compaq nc6120.

F-Keys could have been made bigger so that they fell directly above the number keys. Instead, there are three gaps between three groups of F-keys.

Touch sensitive button strip along the top is very beautiful but useless. No transport buttons for media player (play, stop, next, previous, etc), but other useless buttons like "Presentation mode" and "HP Info button" are available. Touch sensitive buttons give no tactile feedback of whether or not they have been pressed. A simple traditional switch would have been more effective and cheaper to design, spend the extra money on better touchpad buttons. My Compaq nc6120 uses traditional mechanical buttons, never had a problem with it after many years of use.

Three USB ports are located at the bottom right corner of the laptop. 90% of people are right-handed, so naturally that's the most likely place to put an external USB mouse. Unfortunately any cables connected to the USB ports get in the way when using the external USB mouse, and my hand keeps hitting the USB cables. This is really annoying and anti-ergonomic. Surprisingly, the connectors most of us don’t use, such as PCMCIA, eSATA and Modem are all on the left side of the laptop. Maybe the designer was left-handed... On my Compaq nc6120 the USB ports are on the left, back and one on the top right corner which is still out of the way.

Poor ventilation/heat dissipation when lying flat on a desk. I've got mine standing vertically against a wall and the fan doesn't run at all, but when it's sitting in the normal position the fan can be heard most of the time, because the heat can't escape so easily.

Shoddy workmanship. A lot of things are not well assembled. Some basic design features are not correctly designed. The camera lens is not cantered on the corresponding bezel see-through hole. A lot of plastic parts are deformed by the screws that hold them in place (poor tolerances), for example the display bezel is bent around the screws that hold it in place, as if they had been over-tightened (but then again this is a design flaw, because over-tightening a screw should not result in parts being bent, but rather threads getting stripped out).

The battery is a bit loose in the battery slot and clanks around. In my cheap old Compaq nc6120 the battery stays firmly in place.

Display metal back not flat or even. I look at it against the light and the surface is bent and deformed instead of being flat as one would expect. Not so on my cheap Samsung laptop, which also has a metal lid.

Not a single connector to be found at the back of the laptop. They could have put all the not commonly used connectors there to keep the desk clear of cables. Power, VGA and Ethernet remained untouched while the laptop is in operation for most users. USB is really the only one people often plug and unplug. The modem connector is also on the right hand side. Who uses a modem these days? Put the thing at the back please!! Annoying.

If I pull out the mains plug whilst keeping the power supply connected to the laptop, the power supply starts making small pulsing clicking noises. If I disconnect the DC connector from the laptop the noise stops. It’s like current is leaking from the laptop battery into the power supply. Does not happen on any of my other machines.

USB ports stopped working problem. Requires the user to remove the battery and reboot without the battery installed. Made me waste several hours.

Optical drive eject button flush to optical drive bezel, so I can’t locate it easily by sliding my finger over the optical drive bezel (i.e. I often push on the wrong place). All my other laptops have a button that sticks out so it can be felt out, much more convenient.

HP tech support have not been very helpful.

Some good things though:
• Trackpad is slightly depressed so you always know where its confines are, unlike many modern laptops.
• Not too heavy or bulky, and reasonably sized PSU.
• Optical drive has a physical eject button, unlike MacBook.
• Screen can swivel 180 degrees.
• Screen has a matte finish

In summary, I discourage anyone from buying this laptop, and if you do, read this post carefully and then decide whether you want to keep it or not. I for one will never again buy HP hardware.

 

Well said , Scoox. I agree with you 99%.

BTW, could you throw your current 8730w away ... to me ... for spare part ? My 8730w has some problem of touchpad buttons . They're broken and I had to use silicon rubber and glue to hold them .

 

Joking aside, do you really agree with most of the points? I do think this computer was cack-designed, particularly most of the USB ports being on the right, which forces the mouse to be even further than it is already with the numeric keypad. Of course any left-handed prospective buyers should go now and get one, they'd no doubt be pleased! I was so pissed that I even considered training myself to use the mouse with my left hand (it would actually have many benefits!)

Yesterday I gave it away to my gf who needed a bigger screen for her graphic design work, she doesn't need to connect any fancy USB audio interfaces like me, and with it being free she was very pleased, so much so that she gave me a b... big kiss. I am having my desktop shipped from Europe as we speak (I live in China now) and will probably save up for a MacBook Pro for my mobile needs (with Windows 7 on it *of course*), which is what I should have done in the first place.

HP after-sales support, unlike pre-sales support, is quite bad when you are in a country other than the one where you bought your laptop. I contacted them and they told me to get in touch with the retailer (eBuyer from the UK, perfect).

 

The USB port placement (and all ports) is kind of odd. But there really isn't much they could have done. The entire back of the laptop, that isn't used by the battery, is needed for the fan vents. This is a high performance business class desktop replacement. So reliable performance was put ahead of everything else.

If you compare it to the very similar 8530w, you can see the compromises they had to make on the 87 for the increased performance. Even though the 85 has the same battery as the 87, the port placement on the 85 is much better, because it doesn't have to have even half as many cooling vents as the 87.

So its not that it was badly designed, its just that they had to compromise to gain performance.

The only other issue of yours I agree with is the loose battery. HP have only used this battery on this series. It was a bad design. Usually HP will continue with the same battery for a few models, but not with this one!

The rest of your post is just ranting about the mouse and buttons etc, the kind of subjective things that can and do apply to various other laptops as well depending on who you ask.

 

This forum has been very informative, scrolling through some posts it seems some members have had success buying the Lenovo Quadro 3700m and installing it in the 8730w.

I installed the Lenovo 3700m but I only get a blank screen and the lock icon flashes 4 times, am I missing something or have I run into the HP whitelist issue?

 

yeah, you are getting the "Graphics controller not functional" message but that is all I know

What could be the difference between the Lenovo and HP version of this card? The graphic card BIOS? (which you cannot change...)

 

ePhysician, apologies for my late reply but I only read your post now. Removing these is easy. There is a small trigger on the side of the connector that needs to be opened, as shown on this picture:




By the way, I am still looking for a cheap dreamcolor display.

 

Thank you Sir for the reply. Interestingly your picture depicts the connector as 'laying' sideways. Both my zifs are 'upright' right at the the 'keyboard' slot edges with minimal space. Could you explain further about the trigger if possible as I cannot visualize anything in the crowded motherboard there besides the 'upright' zif connectors themselves. Am I to gently push BOTH (not just one side) sides of the zif connectors straight up towards myself 1mm or so to release the zif connector. Any further pics would be truly appeciated as I do not obviously want to exert any force to avoid damaging motherboard.

Second question. If I swap my FX3700M w/ its heatsink from an 'older' 8730w to my better spec 8730w which however has the FX2700M w/ its heatsink, my question is what if anything goes on top of the 'old' thermal pads factory installed. Am I to apply Arctic Silver (size less than grain of rice) just on the surface of GPU, or am I t oapply some as well to the 'then' 'ripped' thermal pads to compensate that they got messed up when lifting the heat sinks up. Has anyone done this. I know based on the manual the steps to follow. But I have never seen the undersides of the heatsinks nor after extensive websearches did I find any clear information as to the correct areas to applying Arctic Silver 5 to ?

Would Arctic Silver 5 be the best option ? Any other advices from forum experts. When I now finally will replace the OEM Swedish 8730w keyboard into my better spec 8730w, I might as well get the better GPU swapped there as well.

Customer Self-Repair Steps (videos/animations)

Also weird thing. My switch cover led brightness and clarity on the lower spec 8730w is very, very much brighter. I will swap that as well. I've wondered about that but if any of you own 2 or more 8730w please check if you have entirely different brightness leds on your switch covers as I actually do.

Thank you again, and I am really hoping to getting helpful pictures and information about the zif connector issue (as they so tiny and delicate) and about the swapping of the FX2700M to be FX3700M and vice versa.

Thank you.

 

Yes. There is not much you can do wrong but I did not take a picture when I opened them myself. Just pull a bit on the triggers and you will be fine.

 

I have put a second hard disk into the upgrade bay, no problem so far.

If I put the windows system hard disk into the upgrade bay (swap the two disks) could there be any problem or will it boot from it as drive c: after changing boot order etc.?

Or will the hard disk in the primary bay always be c: and the upgrade bay something else, d: e. g., and not boot at all or overwrite something/destroy something and making a swap back impossible?


Any experience?

 

ok, that was no problem but now the fingerprint sensor is not recognized in Credential Manager (w7 64)

any hints?

 

To add to my list of wonders, now the right-hand side USB ports randomly stop working. The USB device works again after I unplug it and re-connect it. This is not the same as the other similar problem whereby the laptop needs to be re-booted with the battery removed.

I still cannot boot of USB flash drives, which I was able to do with some older version of the BIOS. The latest BIOS (F.20) does not allow reverting to an older BIOS version. Hello HP, if you are going to update the BIOS, make sure it fu*king works. Tech support where useless, as usual.

The more I use this laptop, the more I hate it. What an overrated piece of sh*t. I learnt my lesson: never trust online reviews.

The great thing about, say, a MacBook which was my other option when I bought my Elitebook, is that a lot of people own it, unlike the Elitebook, which is only bought by a few unlucky people like essentially everyone in this thread. When a lot of people buy something, it's more likely to work better. Most laptops are anyway. To be fair the only quality manufacturers are Lenovo and Apple. Everything else is low-quality crap.

 

Does anyone have a cheap dreamcolor display for sale? My WXGA+ display is killing my eyes well and I am hoping the dramcolor would help me with this.

 

what is the biggest drive which is working in the upgrade bay? Anyone tried 750GB or 1TB?

 

It's pity to admit, but the quality of HP EliteBook 8730w and its components leaves much to be desired.

After more 3 years of usage (since March 2009) the following items of my HP EliteBook 8730w were replaced (under warranty):

• CPU fan (clicking sound when operating)
• DreamColor LCD display with upper lid (red corner problem)
• HP 180W Smart AC Adapter AK875AA (clicking sound when operating)
• Hard Disk Drive Test Failed (FAILURE ID: MANEK1-4HK5HS-XD6W2K-60TP03; Capacity: 320 GB)
• Primary Battery Test Failed (FAILURE ID: MANEK1-4905J8-XD6W2K-C0EC03)

All these items were replaced under warranty by my local HP office. There was no any error messages during boot process or anywhere. New replaced items have successfully passed all tests.

The following issues appeared after warranty expired:

• Memory Test Failed (FAILURE ID: MANEK1-00068F-XD6W2K-40NV03)

If I didn't use HP System Diagnostics UEFI I would never have thought that there were some problems. Sudden battery loss is bearable, but the recovery of 320 GB HDD is too much for me.
Therefore I encourage all of you to install and check you units before it's too late!

 

Newbie here. I need to upgrade the drive on my 8730W. Right now, I have a 500GB drive, but would like to go bigger. Can this machine take a 1 TB as the primary drive? I saw documentation that mentioned a 500 GB max, but don't know if this is outdated. If 500 is the max, can I use a 1 TB and split it into two 500 GB partitions? I'd hate to lose the upgrade bay, but if I have to, I can use a 1 TB there, right?

Thanks for your advice!

 

It should be no problem. I never tried it though, but I have 1TB as the secondary drive so I cannot think of any problem that it won't work as primary, too. Newest BIOS F.20, BTW.

 

Take the keyboard and powerstrip off and remove your fan for cleaning. Use isopropinol on qtip to clean rad fins and fan blades. When reinstalling fan, leave out one screw which is located under powerstrip, this will not affect anything. Next time U clean, all U remove is keyboard and fan. Whole project takes about 30 minutes for a PROPER CLEAN. Blowing air in just coats motherboard circuits with dust and can cause dust lumps to form on fan blades and cause imbalance. This applies to 8530w as well (powerstrip side screw WILL fall down inside circuitboard eventually) Opps! Do it RIGHT and be COOL!!

 

Guys,
I am about to buy 8730W second hand, but how can I say if it has DreamColor or normal WUXGA WVA display? I only know that it has FX2700 as graphics adapter.

What is Hardware Ids for DreamColor and for WVA Wuxga under "monitor properties" in device manager?

Thank you !!!

 

Greetings!
I want to upgrade memory from 4 GB to 8 GB.
What memory module would you recommend me to purchase instead of expensive official part 598855-001?

 

I found two candidates:

• Patriot Signature 4 GB PC2-6400 DDR2 Notebook Memory PSD24G8002S - $70
• Corsair 4GB (1x4GB) DDR2 800 MHz (PC2 6400) Laptop Memory (VS4GSDS800D2) - $100

A couple of days ago I purchased the first one and it works fine so far.

 

Can some one with quad core motherboard and cpu download windows ACPI tools and run for me iasl -g to dump DSDT tables. I would like to look at DSDT in proper quadcore setup versus quad running in dual core mobo. I have 25% cpu utilization issue under linux and would like to fix it.

 

bummer. Had a power outage as I was blathering on about reinstalling the operating system from cd.

I'll start by saying a looked around and didn['t see any thread on it. I have a centrino p8400 that I run windows XP pro on. That's how I got the system. I gave a choice to
First, I failed to repartition the c drive, and so I ended up wasting a whole day only to find out that all my doc, and software were still in place. Grrr

So, if you intend to reinstall you have to delete the C partition during the install. The D partition can remain, at least mine could, as it didn't have any real files of note in there. After creating a large unpartitioned area on the hdd, you'll need to let it create a new C partition. That bit goes very quickly, and from there the install went fairly clean. I didn't bother with adding back in the internet stuff until after I had installed a number of hardware related file from the other HP driver disc in the package.

Many of the guard protection, and hp update programs I tried to avoid reloading since I don't use them I do think that my mistake the second try was that I used the Intel Wifi 5300 program to control the wireless mangament. I don't like and it and it failed me, so I had to disable by going to this thread here:

Windows XP: Disabling Third-Party Wireless Mangers - GROK Knowledge Base

and then here:

Windows XP: Wireless Zero Configuration - GROK Knowledge Base

in the advanced settings for the xp screen for wireless connections, you'll get a screen that says your wireless connection needs to be changed in the advanced settings. there's a wireless tab and it allows you select a box to use windows wireless zero as the managment for wireless controller HOPE NO ONE ELSE GOES THROUGH THIS.

Back to the install......
After the hp driver install, you'll need to go through some issues to update windows. I had to eventually download windowsupdateagent to continue the process of getting all of Win SP3, and more.

Also, beware when the internet first tries to start the MSN website that was used back in 2009-2010 by microsoft is faulty, so it will crash ! You'll have to go to "start", and then look at the left top and there should be "internet". Right click on that and find "properties" Either way find Internet Properties, and change the default website from the MSN one in the box , to something more current......say.... Yahoo!, or Google, and apply and close the screeen and try again. That should get you going.

I will say that I reinstalled the entire 8730 because the HDD was constantly turning, and the computer seemed very slow. Also, the unit is getting dated. Considering that I paid top dollar for it, I do believe that I can get a 17.3 screen, with an I7 chip for half the cost I paid for the 8730w

 

Dear users, please be aware that HP supplies 8730w with a very weak primary battery:


This is my second primary battery, that was given for free as a guarantee replacement.