Dv2700t - Win 7 64 & HDD Upgrade Results = Very Good

This isn’t a novel so the end of this story is at the beginning. For those that are interested in upgrading their DV2700t/2500t series HP notebooks to Win 7, there are few issues and thanks to Win 7 the process was quick, easy, and very straight forward.

Background

On paper the specs for my daughter’s Dv2700t (see below) always seemed respectable enough to run Vista 32 with ease. However, over the two years we’ve owned the unit it always just seemed to lag in places it shouldn’t. No matter how much I tweaked the OS it still took about 70 seconds to the desktop, was slow to load Office programs, and just always seemed as though something was holding it back. With Microsoft’s Ultimate Steal deal available for my college sophomore, we decided to take advantage of the program and purchase a new hard drive, upgrade the OS to WIN 7 Pro 64, and install Office 2010 64.

Installation

With the knowledge that the onboard Nvidia 8400GS is known for degradation and failure caused by heat , I decided to stay with a cooler running 5400rpm drive. I selected the Western Digital Scorpio Blue 500GB. An SSD would certainly have been nice but with a back to school budget and the need for additional capacity, the deal at NewEgg filled the bill.

So… I gathered everything together, burned the Win 7 .iso, pulled the old drive, installed the new drive, and started the install process of Win 7 64. I was totally expecting that I would spend a long while installing drivers when the install completed. Much to my surprise however, I had only 3 “Unknown Devices” after Win 7 install and update was completed. I checked my device list for Vista and found that only the card reader drivers were missing. I installed the reader drivers for Vista 64 and …. Mission Complete! Frankly, I just knew something had to be missing but nope…. everything works as advertised including Bluetooth and that silly little remote.

Of course all of the drivers that Win 7 installed weren’t the most current so knowing that our DV4t and Dv2700t share many of the same drivers, I headed straight to Justin’s DV4t drivers page here at NBR and quickly found the latest (Thanks again Justin !!). I updated drivers, did a quick run of CCleaner, turned off a few things we won’t use, cleared the startup list, and that was about it except installing Office 2010 and other programs.

Result

I was hoping for a modest increase in performance. What we got is a new notebook. It now runs about 45s (+/- a couple) to the desktop. It runs about 10 degrees cooler at idle and about 8 at load (transferring 60GBs of daughter’s music & pics ; ). Program “open & close” is snappy in comparison to the old configuration and there is little if any noticeable difference when multiple programs are open.

Conclusions:

- The 160GB Toshiba MK1625 GSX that was in the unit is (politely stated) a very weak component.

- The folks at Digital River that facilitate the MS Office 2010 download program do not provide the 64bit version. I consider this a deceptive practice. The only way I could get the 64bit version was to download and install the trial version from Microsoft and then use the Office Key provided through Digital River. Google the issue and you find a bunch of ticked-off students. MS should kick the folks at DR in the butt.

- All of the originally provided Cyberlink programs included with the unit function without issue. (Cyberlink DVD suite including the DVD codec & You Cam)

- The only HP programs used are Wireless Assistant & HP Support Assistant including Battery Check. Wireless Assistant installed and functions without issue. The HP Support Assistant for whatever reason would not load. I found the old single HP Battery Check program and set it to run in XP SP3 mode after a couple of failed attempts to get it run normally. Battery Check now appears to be functioning correctly and I didn’t want any of the other stuff in Support Assistant anyway.

- The cosmetic appearance differences between Vista & Win 7 are minor in comparison to the performance changes under the hood. Win 7 requires very few tweaks. As with all OS’s it pays to turn off stuff you never use but with Win 7 that’s about all that’s required. JMO

- Microsoft’s should be applauded for Win 7 and the Ultimate Steal deal for students.


Total upgrade cost:
500GB WD HDD = $54.00 NewEgg
Win 7 Pro 64 = $30.00 Microsoft
Office Pro 2010 64 = $80.00 Microsoft
$164.00 (tax & shipping included)

If you have a DV2700t/DV2500t notebook and don’t want to spend a bunch for a new one, give Win 7 and a new HDD a try. I think you’ll be pleased with the result.

 

Its too early to move on to office 2010 64bit, see office forum here
Unless you have large file of Excel, no need to hassle using 64bit.

Have you considered installing HP MediaSmart instead of QuickPlay?
I installed my dv2700 with Win7 64bit along with HP MediaSmart, all working great, DVD player and volume OSD run better plus new free upgrade software such as photo editing. musics, webcam etc.

The QuickPlay & DVD touch button can be configured by simple edit using in regedit.

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Hewlett-Packard\HP Quick Launch Buttons]
"QAction"="C:\\Program Files\\Hewlett-Packard\\HP MediaSmart\\SmartMenu.exe"

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\MobilePC\HotStartButtons\1]
"ApplicationPath"="\"C:\\Program Files\\Hewlett-Packard\\HP MediaSmart\\SmartMenu.exe\""

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\ControlSet001\Control\MobilePC\HotStartButtons\2]
"ApplicationPath"="\"C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Hewlett-Packard\\Media\\DVD\\HPDVDSmart.exe\""

 

Thats great, I would have probably done the same if my DV2000Z did not die on me last year. I did not had performance problem running Vista 64bit, with 4gb ram, the only bad part of that laptop was the HDD 120gb 5400 it still produced to much heat.

 

I read about the possible issues with 64bit Office while trying to get the download from DR. My rationale for going ahead with the 64bit version is that (1) most of those articles regarding 64bit Office (though updated) originate from nearly a year ago so add-ons should be evolving. (2) I’m betting that my daughter will never need an add-on, and (3) I have the 32bit version available and can uninstall and downgrade if required. It will likely never matter, but it just seems better to run as much 64bit as possible and avoid WoW when possible.

I think about 2 days after we originally got the notebook I did a fresh install and haven’t used Quickplay since. Still don’t ….. it just always seemed kind’a pointless. Might be nice though to be able to program the DVD button to start WMP or iTunes? Which button is HOTStartButton(1) and which is (2). Is (1) Quickplay & (2) DVD play. Also, just wondering….but does DVDSmart include a DVD codec in the install? If so, what kind is it… Cyberlink?

At-any-rate, thanks for the input and for checking my 6 with Office. All the best, Dave

 

I'd agree that W7 is a nice upgrade on older notebooks, as I just recently did this to my Compaq V5000. My aunt has a DV2000 which I may upgrade to 7 shortly......