*** ALL QUESTIONS dv9500t ****

anyone set up the fingerprint reader?

 

can anyone post some wireless N speeds from your dv9500t?

 

Ok, i've been playing around with the quickplay and I notice how weak the volume is on the Quickplay dvd player. I switch to WMP and the sound was working great. Anybody else experience this?

Sadly I didnt get the fingerpring reader

nevian, did you get your 9500 yet?

 

Quick button volume control is application dependent. Meaning, generally, if I have nothing active but the desktop, and I adjust the volume, I'm adjusting master volume (called "Speakers" in Vista). If QuickPlay is active and I adjust the volume, I'm adjusting QuickPlay volume. If you open the Vista mixer, you can see the relationship between applications and master volume, and you can adjust each according to your preference. This is a new feature that people have been waiting for since Windows 16-bit days. Essentially, everything up to Windows 2003 has used the same Windows 3.x mixer technology. Now we have per-application volume control in the mixer.

The trick to make QuickPlay louder is to first adjust the master volume by clicking the desktop (or exiting QuickPlay altogether), then crank up the volume, then enter QuickPlay, and turn that up or down to an acceptable level.

One thing you will find is more wattage is delivered to the speakers when the master volume is at 100%. If your application is set to 50% and your master (called "Speakers" in Vista) is set to 100%, it will have better quality than if your application is set 100% and your master is set to 50%, because you are essentially pumping out the same volume with more wattage (better quality) when master is at 100%.

So always set master (speakers) to 100%, and individually set the volume to each application according to your preference. That will always deliver the best quality, and you will avoid hitting a volume ceiling when you are trying to increase volume within an application.

 

yeah, i got my laptop this morning...but i haven't had a chance to play with it since i'm still at work and haven't gone home...

when i do, i want to transfer some files around from my laptop to cabled computers on my N network... i want to measure the throughpput of this new wireless protocol on the laptop and see if it's on par with desktop N cards.

excellent advice, kubel...

 

kubel, i totally forgot about that! thanks man

 

i don't see any software installed for the fingerprint security feature

i found this link on HPs website, i'll give this a try and let you all know the results

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/...softwareitem=ob-49006-1&jumpid=reg_R1002_USEN

 

ok, it works... the fingerprint app is pretty cool. it shows up on your logon screen as "Swipe finger to log on" and you just swipe the finger...and it logs on as normal

 

So my HD is possibly wacking out. It says that i have 140gb total and that 96gb's are free. I was look at all the files in the C: drive and they dont add up to forty gigs. they only add up to about 15. Are the other 25 gigs missing or am I just going crazy and not seeing everything?

 

that's strange...

i'm looking at my hdds right now in My Computer and i can see that i have two partitions on my 160 disk...

C: has 120GB free of 140GB
D: has 1.8GB free of 8.34GB


i've only installed 2 programs



what do you guys think of the fingerpritn reader...i think it's awesome. saves time from always haveing to type in a password at the login. do you guys know if you can use the fingerprint reader for folders?


thanks

 

I know nothing of disk defrag, but I was running that and I stopped it. would that do anything to the HD?

I havent heard anything about the fingerprint reader working with folders...I didnt get it so i cant test it

 

maybe its some of that hidden bloatware HP loves to put on their new laptops....

 

on the network side, i've been a solid 130mbps since i connected to my router. i'll try post some actual benchmarks for the throughput on wireless N

 

Just bought a dv9500t and an hp w2007 monitor. (I plan to use the laptop as a "desktop replacement" with external monitor, keyboard, and mouse 99% of the time.)

Anyhow, I have my HDMI-DVI adapter, and using the nvidia TwinView feature (set to 'clone'), I get the GUI desktop output on my w2007, looks very nice.

Problem is, I also want to see the power-on BIOS messages, Boot loader, Linux kernel, init, etc. I don't get any of that output on the external monitor. Nothing at all until KDM starts up and gives the GUI login screen.

So my question is how to make the external monitor the default? The BIOS on this laptop has almost nothing useful in it at all, no gfx settings or anything like that.

Anyone else using an external monitor on the dv9500t and have this problem? This is obviously something BIOS / hardware settings related (not operating system related).

Edit: Here are the laptop specs FWIW,
dv9500t
Core 2 duo 2.0 Ghz
2.0 GB RAM
Nvidia 8600M GS
2x 100GB 7200rpm
DVDRW
1680x1050 display

 

Update on my hardrive:

I didnt delete anything and magically 6gb's reappeared. It is now up to 102g free...anybody have an idea why its being all funky?

 

Vista's shadow copy maybe, saving old versions of the files.

 

is there anyway to turn that off? or do i want that on?

 

Shadow copy is a nice feature. It backs ups files in the background so you can restore a past copy. Handy if you accidentally save over a file and decided you needed the old copy. Shadow copy will let you recover it.

 

and yes, you can disable shadow copy if you want to. I leave it on.

 

how do you disable it?

 

stupid question, but did anyone that ordered the 9500 with the nvidia graphics get their sticker on the side? I did not but I was just wondering....yeah stupid question.


BTW got my 9500 this morning. Holy crap its amazing!

 

Info on Shadow Copy and how to disable:

http://www.windowsitpro.com/Articles/ArticleID/38282/38282.html?Ad=1

 

More Shadow copy info:

http://technet2.microsoft.com/Windo...dd8b-4ae7-80fa-b9d77cd8104d1033.mspx?mfr=true

 

It's called "Vista". It knows better than you do, so do not question it! Bow down to the almighty Vista!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7eTguZ5OzJ4

 

stupid question, but did anyone that ordered the 9500 with the nvidia graphics get their sticker on the side? I did not but I was just wondering....yeah stupid question.


**** i did not get the sticker

 

Shadow Copy isnt on Vist Home Premium, so my harddrive troubles cant be from that. Thanks for all the help though.

 

Well, I think we can't be sure about that. I was also troubled by the fact that my hard drive (160 GB) was "reducing" its free space day by day. Until I found these two articles> http://www.pcpitstop.com/news/dave/2007-04.asp
http://pcpitstop.com/news/rob/rcheng0704.asp

The writers claim that Vista Home Premium actually makes shadow copies of your files but you aren't able to see them! The feature "Previous Versions" of files and folders exists only on Vista Business and Ultimate but that doesn't mean that Vista doesn't make shadow copies.

So, I just tested it myself on my dv9362ea. Following the instructions on these sites, I disabled System Restore, ran Disk Cleanup, then turned System Restore on again. I was surprised to see that 11 GB were "regained" in my hard drive. Do you think that all this space was only from System Restore Points? It made me wonder, since I own my notebook for just 8 days now...

 

What is this sticker that you speak of? I have no decals or stickers with nvidia logo if that's what you're asking.

 

thank you hector. i think this will do the trick...but im at a complete loss on how to turn off system restore...wait, i figured it out! thanks man! Now theres 115gb! woot woot, happy day!

 

This is question for every one that owns a dv9500t.

I purchased a dv9500t two weeks ago and recieved it today at 10:30 am. And sent it at back at 11:15 due the fact that the label on the screen said " dv9000". I called hp and they said that they have'nt updated the computer body to reflect the model. Which sounded like a load dung, so I sent it back.

Has this happen to anyone? Was it labeled Dv9500t or dv9000

Also, when I pull the computer out of the box plugged it in and turned it on, the screen was extremely dim. I could not see anything, it almost completely black. The qiuck play buttons did not work. So to make long story short. I am truly unhappy with my first hp laptop. But I'll give then a second chance.

 

Strange. I just looked at mine (received it just a few days ago) and the label on the frame around the screen does say "dv9000". I never even noticed.

The specs matched what I ordered though, so I don't really care what the label says.

 

And sent it at back at 11:15 due the fact that the label on the screen said " dv9000".


all 9500t's say that

 

I sent it back mainly because of the screen malfunctioning. I can deal with the label being different. I just wanted to know was all other 9500's labeled the same.

 

mine was, and if you look at similar threads everyone else recieved the same thing.

 

Lupin,

Can you comment on how the dual HDD's are configured - RAID 0, 1, or is there an option to treat it as separate drives (i.e. RAID disabled)? I just ordered a similar configuration and I'm curious as to the drive performance.

 

There is no hardware RAID. The OS sees two separate 100GB drives, /dev/sda and /dev/sdb. I'm using software RAID-1 compiled into the kernel, and mirroring them. If you use Windows, I imagine you could do something similar with 'Dynamic Disks'.

(See my dv9500t page here, scroll to the bottom: http://home.earthlink.net/~george164/dv9500t/dv9500t.html)

I configured and mirrored the RAID1 partitions *before* installing Gentoo so that I could boot from RAID as well. (I don't know if Windows supports booting from software RAID though). I even have my swap partitions RAID1 mirrored and the GRUB bootloader in the MBR of both disks - I'm totally 100% redundant and can lose a disk with no impact on the performance and functionality of my machine! Yay!

Performance is good. ~48 MB/s writes at the beginning of the disk and around ~38MB/s towards the end of the disk. I'm quite happy with it.

You didn't say if you were planning to use RAID1 or RAID0. RAID0 will of course give higher performance than RAID1, but with much greater risk to data loss.

 

Thanks, I thought I read somewhere that the 9500 had a built in RAID 0 or 1 option via hardware. I'd actually prefer to just have two separate drives and no RAID for what I'll be doing.

Once Windows Server 2008 goes live I'll seriously consider running it headless with Virtual Server only and virtualizing multiple OS's on the beast. Of course that will probably limit gaming and it all just sounds cool in my head at the moment.

BTW - Castle Cagliostro is one of my all time favorite Lupin's...

 

How is the 1680 resolution on the 9500t? my friends 1440 ultrabright is terrible in my opinion. The bottom half of his screen is brighter then the upper half. This is halting my choice between this and a MacBook Pro.

 

Mine arrived yesterday!!!
Setup in the kitchen. Cable TV, DVR etc. Wireless network. Sweet machine!!!
Vista Question: On my other computer (WinXP), I use a .html (webpage) as my desktop background. Can this be done with Vista??? Seems they only give an option to select 'picture files' as backgrounds.

 

The 9500t's 1680 resolution is awesome. Yeah, things might be a bit small, but you can change the resolution and it still looks good. The screen is evenly lit. No brightness problems that I know of.

 

Mine has consistent contrast and lighting across the whole LCD, pleasant to look at. It's only $50 more than the 1440 so IMO it's a no-brainer upgrade. Why would anyone not do it?

 

Question:

What BIOS version are your dv9500t's running? Mine arrived running F.09 which according to the hp support page for this notebook, doesn't even exist yet. F.08a is the latest you can download:

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareList?os=2093&lc=en&cc=us&dlc=en&product=3369393&lang=en

 

Bump for the BIOS version question.

 

he should return it, i dont have that problem on mine.

edit: Lupin, i have F.09 as well

 

Uh yes - F.09 is running, took awhile to make it into the BIOS this time which is unlike me. The only thing I ended up enabling is the Intel Virtualization Technology which I will make use of frequently between Virtual PC and Server.

 

I just found this thread tonight, and I have SEVERAL comments and a couple of questions, being that my current plan is to order a dv9500t this coming Friday when my state (South Carolina) has its annual, three-day "back-to-school sales tax holiday," to save the sales tax (been ready to order for at least two weeks now, just waiting for the tax holiday, lol... pricing configuring and shopping systems online and in stores since sometime in June).

First, as to the dv9000 being imprinted on the actual upper-right-hand side of the screen case, my guess is that HP manufactured WAY MORE cases with that printed on them than they ended up needing, as the ONLY 95** series they have in stores (to my knowledge -- the dv9535nr, which has been at Best Buy for about a month now for $1,399.99 but JUST THIS WEEK -- JUST IN TIME FOR THAT SALE, LOL, hit a sale of $1,249.99 -- VERY TEMPTING, actually), ALSO has the "dv9000" imprint on the upper right side, which I noticed recently on like my 5th time looking at it...

Interestingly, by the way, although that model has only a 1.66 Ghz Core 2 Duo processor in it (pretty comparable with the dv9500t in other ways, except no bluetooth or fingerprint reader options), it scores a 4.5 overall Windows Experience Index, which is just slightly BELOW what some who tested theirs for me in a different thread got with 9500s with much faster processors (mostly because the slowest score dictates the overall score, and that could be the hard drive or even the video card, which goes only so far, even with the 8600 -- still a VERY decent score for a laptop).

Second, I, too, have questions about the 1680 x 1050 screen vs. the 1440 x 900. 1440 x 900 is actually the STANDARD resolution for a 19" monitor if you're buying a regular, stand-alone flat-panel, with the higher resolution not being standard until you get up to 20 or 21", like the one I'm using right now... I've used the standard 1440 that comes with the 9535 at Best Buy and it seems very pretty and quite adequate in the store, although I have no idea how I'd feel after much use, but as I couldn't read text much smaller than it is on this 21" widescreen monitor set at 1680 x 1050, I have to wonder how I EVER WOULD on a 17"? Have ANY OF YOU seen both different screens and actually had a chance to COMPARE THEM?

Currently, I have my "build" at the HP Website set up for the 1680 x 1050 screen, although this is my FIRST build that size (all before were the standard)... In the past, I've always been a believer in going with the largest resolution that's standard for a particular screen size, which in this case, 1440 x 900 is even a "bit big" for 17", but I think it's a good fit... On the other hand, IF the screen "down-resses" well and the video card has good, compatible lower-resolution settings at refresh rates that WON'T give me a headache, going with the 1680 x 1050 for just an extra $50 IS sort of "a no brainer," as Lupin said, because it DOES give me more options.

Finally, SPMulk*** (the *** are because I don't remember the rest of your user name), PLEASE don't get offended by what I'm about to say and ask you, but ARE YOU MESSING WITH US with some of your questions and some of the things you said earlier in this thread, or do you REALLY not know any better than to do some of the things you've done???

First, STOPPING a defragmentation in the middle is potentially one of the most HAZARDOUS THINGS you can do to the data in your hard drive aside from throwing the drive against the floor or wall while it's running or throwing it in a hot fire! Fragmented files are files that have been saved, because of the way hard drives operate, in little pieces all hard drive in different sectors, which can CONSIDERABLY slow your hard drive down over time if it becomes very fragmented because, as you can imagine, if you have A LOT of files fragmented into A LOT of pieces, every time the hard drive has to access each of those files, it has to read each little piece separately from each different sector, rather than all from the same place (this happens mostly on drives where a lot of files are saved and deleted and saved and deleted over and over again, and isn't likely to exist much, or at all, on a new drive)... WHEN a computer DEfragments a hard drive, it finds all those individual pieces of each file and puts them all back together into one "contiguous space" on the hard drive, as much as is possible, but in order to do that, it may have to move many files that also AREN'T fragmented, as well, and at any given time it may also have MANY files in active RAM, and temporarily saved to OTHER parts of the hard drive awaiting reallocation... By STOPPING THIS PROCESS IN THE MIDDLE, you have NO IDEA at what point the process is... It could cause NO HARM AT ALL, or you COULD end up losing data... maybe very little, or maybe a VERY IMPORTANT piece of System Software...

Now ASSUMING the VERY FIRST THING you did when you powered your new system up was run the System Backup Routine, where you burn Backup Disks to a DVD (or however many DVDs it takes -- if you bought the $19 backup disks with your system, you don't have to do this), then you're SAFE if something like this happens, assuming you haven't already saved irreplaceable photos or business files, or something to the hard drive... If you DON'T have a backup of your system and you do something like that and your system is screwed up, well, you'll be without a computer until you get your $19 set of disks from HP.

As for System Restore... YEAAAA!!! You turned it off and 15 more GB of "free space" MAGICALLY reappeared!!! Let me ask you something... Do you drive your car without insurance? Have no health insurance? No life insurance? No insurance on your HOUSE???

System Restore is SYSTEM INSURANCE... Every time you install a new program or make any sort of major new change to your system, System Restore creates what is known as a "Restore Point" that saves a "Shadow Copy" of your system, as it was, at that date and time... IF, the next day, or the next week, or whenever... suddenly everything starts acting funky, and nothing will work, and it's NOT a hardware problem and your antivirus can't find a problem, nor your Antispyware, Doing a System Restore to the last date BEFORE you began having that problem might be your ONLY SOLUTION, and quite often it will TOTALLY FIX the problem (and all you will lose is any changes you've made to your computer since that date -- you won't lose any new files, like pictures and such... but programs you've installed since then won't be installed any more -- and since one or more of them is QUITE LIKELY the problem, that's why you're running System Restore to begin with)

Trust me, it's saved MY BACON more than once!

The lesson is: if you're not sure what you're doing, be cautious before you do it. Windows is NOT GOD, and it's NOT always right, and NOT all the automatic junk it does in the background is always something you want, or necessary, but some of it IS very good to have, and frankly, I think System Restore is DEFINITELY one of those things... If you think it takes up too much hard drive space, External USB 7200 RPM hard drives are cheap (Seagate 7200 RPM hard drives with 5-year warranties were just on sale for $129.99, and I picked up TWO at that price).

Storage is cheap... Losing your data -- PRICELESS!
Jeff

 

Jeff,

"Standard resolution"? In the eye of the beholder, IMHO.

Is 4200 rpm a "standard" speed for a HDD?

I have an "ancient" 5 year old Presario 2500 that has a resolution (SXGA) that is much higher than today's so-called standards for a 15" notebook.

The standards of which you speak is simply the consumer's collective acceptance of mediocrity. My 17" dv9500t is 1680 x 1050, and I would not accept any less. If people would be a bit more discriminating, it too would be the "standard" of which you speak.

A perfect alternate example is HP falling back to a VGA webcam on the 9500 in the spirit of speedy webcasting. LOL My Microsoft Webcam for my Dell has a 2 megapixel capability, that can be easily throttled back, at will, for speedy webcasting. How about that HP?... Even the reviewers of the 9500 have bought into the HP "standardization" reasoning BS of the new webcam.


Bottom line: Go for the WSXGA, like previously noted, "it's a no brainer". Don't let standards of mediocrity and yesteryear influence you. The only reason for a lesser native resolution would be if your eyesight demands a larger clear type. Then I can see why you would opt for a lower native resolution LCD.

 

I agree with you about HP's continued use of the common ground slug of a 1.3 megapixel webcam (very first time I've actually mentioned THIS) and Dell and others using a better, 2 megapixel camera (although they don't offer the other options, like the fingerprint reader)... Frankly I have a THEORY about HP. I think in order to keep their prices so low (and nobody can argue they have the best prices), they don't throw anything out or relegate it to the "recycle bin..." they just continue to use it until they RUN OUT OF IT. Thus all the dv9500 series computers coming out with dv9000 nameplates on them. My guess is that when they first came out with webcams as a standard, they WAY overbought the 1.3 megapixel models, NOT anticipating that 2 megapixel would become a "standard" with other manufacturers as quickly as it did, and they're NOT gonna just quit putting them in their laptops because everybody else has... I don't like it, but if it means my computer is a couple hundred bucks cheaper, it's worth it as little as I'll use that feature.

As for that "standard resolution size" on monitors, the folks over on the Dell area in the Inspiron 1720 Forum Owners section (where I spent a lot of time debating whether to buy that system or this one), just LOVE to thumb their noses at the "low-rez" HPs that don't go above 1680 x 1050 (which is Dell's low-rez version of their 1720)... Very MANY of them are buying the HIGH-REZ version of the 1720, which has a 1920 x 1080 screen...

To MY thinking, that's WAYYYYYY over the top for a 17" screen... I mean, you'd have to have all your fonts at like 36 points to be able to read ANYTHING... MOST webpages -- which have standard font sizes not easily changed -- would be TOTALLY unreadable... The ONLY justification for that, to me, is IF you're going to also spend the extra $600 or so Dell charges to also include a Blu-Ray burner and watch 1080P Blu-Ray movies on that little 17" screen... But GEESH... what's the POINT??? You'd NEVER see a resolution difference between 720P and 1080P on a 17" screen... NEVER!

And you can now buy a brand new Sony Blu-Ray player for $500, since they FINALLY got smart and cut the price in half... and you can get a 61" 1080P DLP TV for about $1,500...

I think people can get really carried away with NUMBERS and just totally FORGET about the REALITY of what you can actually see and hear (used to run into this with audiophiles and amplifiers, arguing over who had the best THD ratings, when ALL the amps they were talking about were down below 0.1%, and ANYTHING under that is COMPLETELY inaudible, so it makes NO DIFFERENCE other than some "geek bragging rights."

Frankly, I couldn't care less about "geek bragging rights." I just want something that's really nice and suits my needs... and to help others do the same when I can (and seek help when I need it).

Happy Hard Drives!
Jeff

 

Jeff,

Read my post a little closer. It's even worse than that. I guess HP ran out of the "ground slug" 1.3 Megapixel units. LOL As it stands now, HP only offers a 640 x 480 webcam on the dv9500t's. Let's hope they didn't overbuy them too. LOL

 

i like the VGA webcam. the frame rate is great and the picture quality isnt terrible. just my two cents