Need suggestions for shopping for a new 8540p

Should I go i5 or i7? And how powerful for each choice?

I do a lot of video editing and burning so I want something that will keep up easily.

Also are we ready for 64bit yet? I have a new copy of Office 2010. Will it work on 64bit?

Suggestions are welcome and desired...

Thanks

 

Okay here it gooooes

1.) If you value battery life, stick with the i5. My girlfriend's father just got an i7 Studio 15 and the decrease in battery life compared to the i5 is huge for some reason.. If you have access to an outlet and can live with 1.5-3 hours of battery life at a time, and you really need that extra power, go for the i7.
2.) You will be required (HP should preinstall 64 bit) a 64 bit OS to recognize 4+ gigs of ram
3.) Office 2010 64-bit; the only increase in speed that you will notice over 32-bit is if you're working with huuuuge worksheets in excel. Other than that, 32-bit will be more than enough for you.

 

Wow, that sucks. That royally sucks. I mean I keep it tethered to the AC power outlet most of the time, but 1.5-3 hours is pi$$ poor.

Well 32bit will recognize 3.12GB of RAM with the rest just unused. As long as it's upgradable to 64bit and the motherboard is upgradable to 8GB, I should be ok.

Actually I heard that 64bit Win7 had some issues with Office 2007 and Office 2010 which were designed around a 32bit system in mind. Is that no longer the case? Any edition off the shelf will work?

 

I'm also considering two 500GB 7200RPM HDs instead of an optical bay. Ideally I would like to use the second drive for the OS page file and the rest for file and document storage. No RAID configuration.

That's not set in stone, though...

 

Agreed. Been running it since Beta (bought a copy) and it works flawless. I suggest losing the Optibay, and loading up an SSD in one slot, and a 500 gb 7200 rpm HDD in the other slot. CD drives are useless... as long as you have a desktop computer at home or a laptop with a cd drive, that's all you need. Transfer the CD contents onto a Flash drive and you're good to go! Not to mention installations are much faster if you're installing from a flash drive!

 

If they offer SLC SSDs, then I'd consider it. For the price I'm willing to pay, I'd expect it.

But I suspect they're selling cheaper MLC SSDs and using TRIM as a band aid.

Are you saying there's a 64bit version of Office 2010 and a 32bit version of Office 2010? Two retail versions?

 

Pretty sure you can install either version with one key.. but for that you should a make a thread just by itself!

 

Well that's too bad. I may have to stick with 32bit since I'm not about to spend more money on another Office Suite.

Well I am buying the machine as a whole and this is (or can be) included with it.

 

Just stick with 32 bit version of Office and if you don't have more than 3 Gb of ram install Windows 7 32bit....they just work !

 

How's that? I didn't see a 64bit option when I installed it on my other HP.

I should point out that it does come as a 3-pack whereby I can install it on up to 3 separate machines if I want to

And is it supposed to be like the retail version of Windows 7 where you get two physical discs? A 32bit disc and a 64bit disc? Because I only got one disc when I bought it.

 

Again, that didn't happen, so...

Looks like 64bit still isn't ready for the prime time yet...

 

That's possible. I'll have to check it out.

No it's not. I wish it was, though.

Still missing lots of peripheral drivers (scanners, printers, cameras, etc...) and still no 64bit Flash from Adobe.

Maybe in another year or so...

 

I have an HP LaserJet 1320 that's only a little over two years old. I'd definitely need a 64bit Win7 driver for that.

Yeah, I've heard that's pretty buggy, causing some browsers to crash unexpectedly.

So there's a 32bit compatibility mode for 64bit Win7? - - - Is that what you're saying?

 

Well that looks like a Universal Print Driver. I hope it will allow me to continue to use duplex. The universal print drivers I've used in the past don't have that function.