8510p owners: quality?

This is somewhat a spinoff of my thread in the "What notebook?" forum. I read through both reviews (and the 8510w review) here on NBR at least twice, but a few questions remain. To you 8510p owners, just how solid is it? For example, if you close the lid at one edge, will the screen lock on both sides? I hated that on my last Thinkpad, where often I'd close it from one side and then have to snap it shut again on the other. Any ripples on the screen when opening/closing it? Creaks when carrying around? Any weak spots, other than the area above the optical drive? How's the keyboard?

Also, some pics show the case to be of a dark blue color. Others show a very dark gray. Which one is it closest to?

Lots of questions, sorry. It's just that I have never seen this notebook in person, and I don't think any places carry it around here. Thanks

 

Hi

First, those pictures of the dark blue 8510p were my fault...the camera settings were way off and I forgot to change them before snapping a ton of pictures.

The 8510p is indeed black and gray, although it sometimes looks blue in the right lighting.

If I close the screen at one edge, the other closes too, although sometimes it doesn't click in fully. Someone told me it's never a good idea to close from the side anyway because you put more strain on one hinge over the other.

No ripples on my screen when opening/closing. No creaks when carrying it around. The flex over the keyboard is kind of annoying, but I find it comes and goes...I dunno maybe I'm just used to it

Other than that I find the keyboard is pretty good still. Compared to my brother's T61p it's not as nice for sure, although he seems to like my keyboard better for some reason. The T61p has bigger keys which seem to have more room (space? altitude? wtf!) to go down when typing, but other than that no real complaints...

 

That sounds reassuring. It's not just your pics - the review of the 8510w had me confused as well

So how bad *is* the flex on the keyboard - just a bit, or significant? Is it just the rightmost keys or does it affect the enter key, etc.? Are the palm rests solid at least? Haha ... Most of this stuff bugged me on my last T61p, hope it won't return if I get this laptop

 

there is no flex what so ever just right above the dvd drive but not too much that it will effect you when typing. and yes palm rest is very solid. it is a very high quality note book, take my word for it. hope that helps!

 

Great! So far it's my top choice .

Just out of curiosity, what's the travel weight like? I know the laptop w/battery is about 6.1 lbs. How much does the power brick add to the equation?
Also, I couldn't find any specs on the WSXGA+ panels HP uses. How good are they out of the box, typically? (Contrast, color accuracy, etc.)

So many questions, sorry.... just want to be absolutely sure

 

Don't know the weight of the adapter but it's pretty standard, 2" by 6" ?

The WSXGA+ screens we've seen so far have been pretty good. Everyone comments on the colour quality being excellent. Some (including myself) think max brightness could be a little brighter, but the screen is 200 nits like most others so I dunno. There have been a few cases of crappy screens but they don't seem to be the norm and these people are getting them replaced I think.

 

Don't have anything to add other than to say that I have one and absolutely love it. I take it everywhere and I think it's a very solid piece of work.

 

I have the 8510p's workstation predecessor, the nw8440, which is very similar to the current 8510w series build-wise, except the keyboard is supposedly better on the older nw8440.

If I close the lid on the right edge, it will latch fine, but if I try the left edge, it won't latch, which is rather odd. The palm rests do flex, but only with very firm pressure. Very few (if any) ripples on the screen when opening/closing, and no rippling when pressing on the back of the screen. It hardly creeks at all when carrying the machine.

If you like the pointstick, you will be dissapointed to discover that not only is not nearly as good on the HP, but the cap wears out rather quickly, and replacement caps are hard to find. After 16 months, I am on my 3rd cap.

Some of the fit and finish gaps are a rather uneven (particularly between the lid and the base), but keep in mind that this is after 16 months of daily use and travel.

The power adapter is very fragile, however. I am on my 5th power adapter now. HP has supposedly improved the durability of them, but we'll just have to wait and see. Also, where I used to get 2 1/2 hours of battery life, I now get 35 minutes. A lot of people get less than I do, but a few still get the full 2 1/2 hours (we all have the same laptop on campus). Hopefully they have improved these things on the 8510 series.

Other than that, I'd say it is a very solid notebook.

 

great laptop , have had mine for a month , no complaints

 

I get a squeak on the right hand side latch area at the palm rest, and the touchpad top material has separated from the pad detection surface, causing a *tick* type sound when i tape it. No, it's not a windows sound, it's the two surfaces coming together and then separating. The glue residue isn't strong enough to keep the two surfaces together, so it separates and the makes that sound.

 

Yikes, have you tried using the warranty on that?

Speaking of which, is their tech support willing to ship out replacement parts if something's broken, or do they always want you to send your laptop in?

 

From my experience, HP will not send out parts for user replacement. They will always get their own techs or 3rd party agent to do it. The thing is you need to make sure they treat your notebook gently while repairing it as some of them may be rough on it.

 

Now that you mention it, my touchpad on my nw8440 is doing something similar, except it appears that the entire touchpad assembly is loose on the right edge. I can feel the touchpad "give" and can sometimes hear a "click" when I use the vertical scrolling zone. I know it's the whole tochpad, and not just the surface, because I can also see the bezel give in right with the touchpad. The touchpad works just fine otherwise.

Also when I'm adjusting the screen, sometimes I hear a clicking sound just above the serial port (where the RJ-11 jack is located on the 8510 series).

Keep in mind, however, that my laptop is 16 months old and has seen near daily use and travel.

 

Thanks for the help so far
Here's another question... Should I avoid the Radeon 2600? I keep reading about people having issues with theirs. Just wondering if it would be worth it to get the 8510w instead..

 

From what I can tell the people having problems with the 8510p are in a minority, but it's still a decently sized one. The card itself seems fine...just HP and ATI screwed something up, I dunno. The problem seems to happen much much more often on XP than Vista, but that may be from flawed data, I don't know.

The 8510w has a slightly better GPU, and would be worth the upgrade if you can find it cheap IMO (and if you want to avoid any potential problems). In that case you might as well take a look at the T61p though

 

Lol I had a couple T61Ps. Not only did the first one have the worst LCD I've ever used (which they refused to replace), but it also managed to overheat after about 10 minutes of some non-taxing game. The other one had major build quality problems. Both also had an annoying wobble in the battery (both 6 cell and 9 cell). With such luck, I'm really staying away from those and looking at alternatives

The 8510w commands the sort of premium that's also making me consider a MacBook Pro, should I choose to go the nVidia route

 

I've been happy overall with the 8510p, except for the following:

Keyboard layout: the non-standard home/pgup/pgdn/end keys take awhile to get used to. I came from a 3yr old zt3000 that had a better layout, and keyboard quality that was nearly identical.

Palmrest squeaks: clear, audible squeaks and creaks from the palmrest, to the left and right of the trackpad. I spent a short while with an HP dv2500t, and the build quality on that machine felt far superior despite the ostensibly cheaper parts.

 

Nod...I've seen the 8510w price anywhere from 1600-1800$ USD (for reasonable models I mean, not those 2800 overpriced to hell ones with barely any more power than the base models). MBP would be nice but I think it's still more expensive ($2000?).

 

Curious about the size of the 8510p/w, is it compact enough for traveling, how does it compare to the MBP, I know the dimensions but want to know first hand from someone who has held both, does the hp feel substantially heavier? I am coming from a fujitsu n3010 which is a giant 15" brick that is 2" thick and 8lbs. The only thing holding me back from buying a 8510p is that i fear it is too big. I don't want to lug a brick around anymore. for me the MBP was a perfect size and weight.

 

I had fujitsu n3010 also. OVERHEATING problems and 3 replacements of the fan made me leave it for the 8510W.
I got the 8510w as it was a better deal at $1800 than the 8510p. It had a better graphics card, 7200 rpm hard drive, the p has a 5400,2 meg of memory, the p 1. It came with 3 years ON SITE repair, the P 3 years mail in. Obviously a lot more for the money.
The weight difference from the n3010 is very noticeable. MUCH lighter. I picked up the n3010 yesterday and couldn't believe how heavy it felt. The screen is adequate, but the Fujitsu was outstanding! I miss the Fujitsu screen. This is matte which is less reflective, but not the as clear as the MVA screens that Fujitsu uses. Vertical angle changes more than the Fujitsu. I miss the "You are there" clarity of the Fujitsu Crystal screen. I miss the 4x3 screen of the Fujitsu, didn't think I would but I need the space vertically not horizontally. If HP had offered a 1280 resolution screen I would have preferred that to the 1680, I have the DPI set higher but things still do not display as easy to read as a more moderate resolution would. These things I will have to live with..

The plusses, VERY FAST! Stable system. Graphics card will handle ESRI GiS mapping Very fast. Games are all great. Solid machine. Quiet, very little fan noise.
Stable performance. I put XP on a partition drive thinking I wouldn't like Vista. After 2 months I wiped off XP, as Vista was very good and seemed just as fast as Xp.

 

Also, about traveling, I am on the road 2 to 3 weeks a month. The HP fits very well in my rolling computer case and is noticeably lighter than the fujitsu when taking it in and out to go through airport security. The screen is still large enough to use when working with 2 or 3 clients, which a 14" or smaller would not be.

 

So you say you have the 8510w, right? Where did you get yours? Also, does it run hot at all?

 

I got it from www.shopblt.com. Came in perfect shape, quick shipping. THe Fujitsu was a Furnace with a desktop pentium 4 processor. Toward the end it's fan was on all the time reving back and forth between jet plane take off and full force hurricane. So heat and fan sound were big issues for me. I find it very quiet and cool most all the time.
Cd can sometimes be a little loud spinning up. And when my son plays some games on it that he can't get to run on his Dell 9300, it will be warm after an hour or two. But for normal daily use, web, word, remote administrator session back to my office, and a copy of my companies cmms sytem up for testing.....is is quiet and relatively cool.

 

Thanks I hate HP's "smart buy" pre-built configs. None of them *quite* have what I want The custom builds also start at around .. $3000 for the 8510w? WTF???

 

This was the smart buy model, 7300 processor, 120 7200 hd, Quadro 570 graphisc card etc. config that was $2043 at HP, $1800 from BLT. The custom builds are priced so high it tells me that they really are not interested in the custom market.

 

Yeah. Doesn't have Bluetooth though, and I'm not sure I want the 2.0 ghz cpu.. Does have 2 gigs of ram though, right? I mean come on.. wish it had only 1 gig of ram (since I already have 2 gigs of my own for it) but had the 2.2ghz and BT, or something...

 

I also think it's pretty dumb the smart-buys are the only thing worth getting. Thankfully for me the 8510p smart buy came with bluetooth standard...

 

Unless you really plan on using bluetooth, it isn't worth it IMO. Too many problems with the default HP drivers, and installing the Microsoft drivers may be a bit overwhelming to those that are not so tech-savvy.

 

There is a easy fix for the fujitsu, take it apart and clean out the fan. Remove the plastic bit above the keyboard, remove the keyboard, take apart the fan assembly, and remove all the dust that has accumulated on the heat sinks. i find i have to do this one to two times a year.