Bought my first notebook(HP dv5t). I hope I did the right thing here?

I called HP and placed my order over the phone a few hours ago because the website had problems with my coupon.

- HP Pavilion dv5t Entertainment Notebook
- Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium with Service Pack 1 (32-bit)
- Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo Processor P8400 (2.26 GHz)
- 15.4" diagonal WXGA High-Definition HP BrightView Widescreen Display (1280 x 800)
- FREE Upgrade to 2GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm) from 1GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)
- 256MB NVIDIA GeForce 9200M GS
- FREE Upgrade to 250GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
- Webcam Only
- 802.11b/g WLAN and Bluetooth
- SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-R/RW with Double Layer Support
- High Capacity 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
- USB Optical Mouse

The grand total was $1,065 including taxes and 2-yr warranty! I thought it was a good deal, right?
Well anyway, my initial plan was to stick with the Intel GMA X4500 IGP because I am not a gamer much and was only going to use the laptop for school, watch DVDs, surf the web, Photoshop and run 3D anatomy software in about a year for school. So I figured the X4500 integrated graphics card was going to be enough but after searching the threads, the suggestion was to at least get a low-end dedicated graphics card because of Windows Vista, Intel's bad reputation with IGPs, for the DVD playback and to release the workload off the CPU. So I went for the Nvidia 9200M GS.

My other concern with choosing the dedicated graphics card was power consumption. Will I be sacrificing significant battery life for upgrading to the 9200M GS? What about production of heart? I hope it was a wise move of me to make the upgrade
Any feedback?

 

thats a nice deal..I guess you have to make some sacrifice for the discrete graphics card though...

 

Yes, unfortunately, your battery life will decrease and your heat production will increase. I'm wondering why settle for 32-bit and not upgrade to a free 64-bit vista which will be used more in the future, so right now you are limiting yourself. All the decisions are your opinion for what you need, but yeah its a good choice to get a dv5t. The video card, again unfortunately, is going to use more battery and increase heat in turn for better performance on things that require the GPU, but honestly, I think sticking with the integrated would have been fine, especially if you need that battery life and, well, less heat. But, you said you looked at a few threads that disagreed, so maybe it was a wiser decision to switch the 9200M GS for your photoshop, 3d anatomy software, and better movie viewing experience.

 

From a performance standpoint, Intel's new GMA X4500 IGP is a HUGE improvement compared to the GMA X3100 that it replaces. The new IGP shows an improvement of 85% on 3DMark05 and scores 125% higher on 3DMark06! Here are the scores of the X4500 and 9200M GS (along with the data for the X3100 and 8400M GS for perspective)-

GPU------/3DMark03/3DMark05/3DMark06
X3100----/1591/808/524
X4500--- /2502/1508/1174
8400M GS/4748/2671/1380
9200M GS/5951/3541/1623

If you were debating between the X3100 and the 9200M GS, the 9200M would be a no-brainer! But Intel has finally figured out how to build a decent mobile integrated graphics processor for the average user!

HP has compounded the battery life issue by only offering the standard 6-cell or the Hi-Capacity 6-cell (a 16% improvement, at best). The dv6700-series, the dv5's predecessor, offered those two options OR a 12-cell battery that effectively doubled battery life over the standard unit (good for up to 5 hours). I can't fathom why they don't have a similar option available for the dv5!?!?

Hope this helps....