First Impressions - HP dv4t

Following my brief yet impressive experience with the budget HP dv4-1225dx notebook back in February, I wanted to revisit this model to see just what it was capable of in a more potent configuration. Welcome the new HP dv4t-1300 series CTO model, available directly from HP.

PROS: LED screen, styling, 12-cell battery, smart bay hard drive, gaming performance

CONS: Heat and noise, poor speakers, no firewire

DETAILS:

In early March of this year HP did a slight refresh of their dv4 lineup. Gone unfortunately is the bronze/chrome color scheme that I was such a big fan of, but in place HP now offers a glossy black and, what they call, moonlight white color scheme. Something has me thinking someone at HP wants to mimic that "other" black and white notebook maker. Like it or not, if you want a notebook from HP now it's going to be either an all black or white unit - no bronze, no silver - so get used to it. The specs on my unit are as follows:

-Moonlight White color scheme
-Vista Ultimate 64-bit
-Core 2 Duo 2.66GHz
-1280x800 LED display
-4GB RAM
-512MB nVIDIA G105M
-500GB 5400RPM HDD
-webcam and fingerprint reader
-wireless N with bluetooth
-integrated modem
-lightscribe BD rom/DVD burner
-integrated TV tuner
-12-cell battery

You can pretty much tell that this is an awful lot to cram into a 14" footprint, but it is indeed a potent little package. My unit was priced at over $2100 when ordered, but you can actually get this same exact deal with the Vista recovery DVD thrown in for around $1400, thanks again to HP's generous 30%-off deal they have going right now.

Unfortunately, due to a production delay by HP and a volcano in Alaska (???), my package took longer to arrive than the specified build schedule, taking exactly 18 days from order to front door. HP did offer a complimentary $50 coupon for the delay, which was nice.

Again, let me highlight the differences between what this model offers compared to the details I've given on the dv4-1225dx in my previous review.

First of all, the white color scheme is jaw-droppingly nice. On taking the unit out of the box you are treated to a smooth pearlescent-white lid with a high-quality wave imprint finish. Fingerprints and smudges are not a problem, but you may want to watch your fingers after you've laid the newspaper down, those marks definitely will show on the white. I will say that the unit is easy to keep clean with a simple wipe.

Open the unit up and you are presented with an all white keyboard/surround/palmrest, chrome trackpad/buttons and a black indicator bar along the top. The display bezel is also black. The end result is a very sexy black and white color scheme that looks great and will definitely appeal to many. It will also get you noticed in that sea of black, gray and silver notebooks everyone else around you has, which for a handsome young guy like myself, isn't a bad thing.

One of the first concerns I initially had when going for a white keyboard would be keeping the thing clean. From my observations the keys don't seem to get any dirtier than any other color keyboard I have typed on. As long as you keep your unit clean as usual, a white keyboard shouldn't present any problem.

Having used the dv7 CTO notebook last year with the 2.8GHz CPU, I was pleased to find that the 2.66GHz CPU offered just as good performance. Applications opened up just as quick as on the dv7 and everything felt just as good. It's too bad HP no longer offers the 2.8GHz option, but with the 2.66GHz processor it's near impossible to tell the difference in performance between the two sans benchmarks.

As I mentioned with the dv4-1225dx, this unit also comes with the smart bay hard drive option, making the dv4 the only 14" notebook to support dual hard drives. It's great being able to swap your optical drive for a 500GB second hard disk, especially for ISO's, backups, movie rips, software libraries or anything else that you need to have with you. It's hotswap capability is just icing on the cake.

The second reason I wanted to explore this model again was the 14" LED backlit display. LED displays differ from regular cathode tube displays in that they provide far longer backlight life, are thinner, offer less weight, more screen brightness, and most importantly, improve battery life. The display is indeed very bright on maximum, and when fully turned down lets you work in a night environment as well. The white keyboard is a decisive advantage here, since the display will let you see the keyboard in the dark without needing a second light - good for folks that like to surf in bed or work on a plane/coach without disturbing their neighbors.

The third reason for revisiting this model was the 12-cell battery option. The size and weight of the dv4 makes this notebook very portable, and the power-saving LED display made the 12-cell battery here the obvious choice. This battery is about double the height of the regular 6-cell and jutts out the bottom of the unit, raising the back slightly and slanting the keyboard. It makes for better typing comfort, but also allows the fan on the bottom to breathe better and run a notch cooler/quieter. It also lets me grab and hold the unit more securely. One great thing HP doesn't note is that the 12-cell battery has a 4-segment LED power meter on the side to tell you how much charge you have left in the battery - a nice touch indeed.

BENCHMARKS AND GAMING:

Again, as consistent with previous reviews, I ran the same performance benchmarks. Encoding the near 3-hour feature "American Gangster" from VOB to WMV took exactly 3 hours 59 minutes. Using Windows Media Encoder 64 to convert the resulting file to ppc format took 2 hours 21 minutes. That's only 14/26 minutes longer than the time needed by the beefier 2.8GHz Core 2 Duo. For a small and light 14" unit, I find that kind of performance quite good.

In the graphics department, I was keen to see how nVidia's latest G105M would score. 3DMark06 came up 2216. That's not great, but definitely better than the score posted by the integrated solution on the dv4-1225dx. How does it translate to actual gaming? Surprisingly very well.

Despite the lower 3DMark06 score, the dv4 was able to hold it's own at gaming with the higher-spec dv7 CTO I looked at last year. How is that possible you ask? It's all thanks to the 14" display and the CPU. Instead of trying to push games at 1680x1050 or higher as most 17" notebooks would do and become graphics-card dependent, the dv4 is only working at 1280x800, a resolution where CPU power is more significant than graphics power. At 1280x800, framerates ran above 30fps for every game I tried, and eye-candy could be turned up with very little performance hit. Civilization 4 ran exceedingly well even on the most detailed/largest maps, playing GTR2 was just as immerse as on the dv7, and even the OpenGL-killer X-Plane ran without problem.

Crysis? 1280x800 + low settings = 25-45fps. No fancy effects but you do get a playable game.

If you're like me and have a slew of older DX8/DX9 titles like Far Cry, Doom 3, HL2, BF2, GTR2, NFS, Hoyle Casino, TW06, FEAR, etc... then a dv4 model paired with the 2.66GHz CPU and nVidia G105M will run them very smoothly with decent eye-candy, all at the native resolution. Indeed, for a 14" non-gaming notebook, this configuration runs many games quite good.

As far as noise and heat is concerned, the unit is definitely more noisy than the dv4-1225dx sister model and a lot warmer. I'm guessing the faster CPU and dedicated graphics may have something to do with that. The fan is audible at all times, and does crank up when on full load. Although I wouldn't call it a nuisance, it does become evident in a quiet setting after a while. With the hard drive located under the left palmrest the unit does exhibit more heat in that area. The design of the Pavillion notebooks with dedicated graphics means the fan will crank on full during gaming, but the internal heatsink will also pass the heat over to the hard drive, which in turn ends up under your palms. There is a vent on the hard drive cover, but I'm not sure exactly how much that helps. After an hour or more of solid gaming, the unit is definitely quite warm - not dangerous or hot, but it is warm.

BATTERY:

So just how well does that 12-cell battery perform and is it worth the price premium over the 6-cell? I have to say it does an amazing job. Running Civilization 4 on balanced power settings I managed to get a record-setting 2 hours 26 minutes run time before the unit switched off. That's almost 90 minutes longer than the time I got with the behemoth Toshiba X305-Q708 and over an hour better than the dv4-1225dx. If your idea of gaming means being totally unplugged, then a dv4 notebook with the 12-cell battery is what you need.

But for this review I wanted to test more than just battery time with gaming - I wanted to see exactly what a 12-cell battery can do for a compact 14" LED-backlit notebook, and how far that "max battery" setting can take me.

First, I reran the Civilization 4 benchmark at the balanced power setting, but turned the LED display brightness all the way down. End result was... no difference! On further reading the specs point out that the LED backlight consumes a measly 2W, making the brightness setting irrelevant to your battery times. That could be important when you need battery power but don't want to kill your eyesight over time squinting at a dim screen.

On my next test I ran a benchmark to see how many hours of movie playback time the notebook would provide. I set the power option for max battery, yanked the cord and then fired up my WMV version of the movie "300". This movie is 1 hour 55 minutes long, after which time the battery meter showed 57% capacity. Using basic math that easily gives you over 4 hours and 20 minutes of audio/video playback on a single charge.

On my third test, I decided to see how long I could surf the web on a single charge. With nothing plugged in except my USB trackball, ethernet cable and wireless off, I started firefox and began browsing newegg.com and hp.com, clicking, scrolling and viewing different pages. After exactly one hour of non-stop surfing, I took a peek at the battery meter which displayed a healthy 80%. That's 5 hours of solid work time from a single charge on the max battery setting. Carry a 2nd 12-cell battery with you and you've got yourself a 10 hour workday. Can you say mobile web warrior?

Is it possible to get even better battery times? I don't know. Limiting the CPU to throttle speed or voltage is something I did not have time to experiment with. To be honest though, the portability of the dv4 combined with the power from two 12-cell batteries should be enough to convince the great majority of folks that this is a mobile notebook with big potential.

THE BAD:

I was disappointed to find out that my $2100 purchase was now available for $1400, but sometimes that's what you get when you want to be the "first kid on the block" with the cool stuff. It seems that HP does regularly promote their 30% discount though, which is good if you happen to miss out on that killer deal.

As I pointed out in my review of the dv4-1225dx, the speakers are awful for music listening. The lack of bass should not be a factor for a notebook sold as an entertainment pc, but it seems there's only so much HP's engineers could cram into the space available. Movies play fine on the unit in general, but if you're passionate about your music a good pair of headphones are mandatory. Fortunately I got myself a pair of Sony's latest XB700 cans not too long ago, so poor notebook speakers for me will no longer be a concern.

Another small problem is the lack of a firewire port. If you've got a firewire camcorder, you'll need to invest in one of those express card firewire adapters to get a firewire connection.

OPTIONS:

One thing I didn't touch upon with my review of the dv4-1225dx is the slew of options and extras HP has available for the dv4 series notebooks. I've already mentioned the smart bay hard drive option, but one useful extra most folks are not aware of is the great docking station HP has available. Sold as the xb4 notebook media docking station, this device docks your notebook while giving you a set of better 2.1 speakers, a full set of connectivity ports, wireless keyboard/mouse and a dock to hold a 3.5 inch personal media drive. If you use your notebook as your primary computer, a docking station makes a lot of sense.

Like to have a matching mouse? HP has you covered. Need an auto/air adapter for the dv4? HP has one. Looking for extended warranty coverage for 4 years? Lost your recovery discs? Want a HP branded leather case to go with your purchase? Decided you need a matching pair of bluetooth headphones? The list of options and extras available for the dv4 notebooks from HP is impressive if not complete.

CONCLUSION:

With the 12-cell battery and LED backlit screen, the HP dv4t-1300 series becomes an impressive, no-compromise 14" notebook that you can easy take around with you. With it's exceptional battery times, capable performance, stylish color scheme, dual hard drive option, gaming ability, full wireless suite, built-in tv tuner and BD drive; the HP dv4t is a very portable and potent little notebook you will find ready to use for both work and play, be it at home or on the move.

And if you can grab that 30% coupon from the HP website when you order, you'll get a great-looking and great-performing notebook for a sweet deal.

Recommended.

 

A beautiful review, Luscious. Very easy to read and - seemingly on purpose - a focus of not becoming caught up in the technical specs and measurements.

I know, it's not related to the computer at hand, but thought you deserved to be complemented for a well written, easily read, and useful review.

 

Nice!

Hey man, where did you get the hard drive bay from? I've been looking through the HP site and I cannot find it.

Also, how were you able to use the 30% code but every time I do I get a different error saying that it's not for this laptop or something....

Here is a Q for u:

If you were to stick with the IGP and a P intel CPU.... the temps including the HD.... you think they would be significantly cooler or.... ?

 

Great review! I ordered a dv4t on the 13th and my configuration is exactly the same as yours but I didn't get the bluetooth, modem, and fingerprint options though. I'm really looking forward to getting my laptop. It hasn't shipped yet but I hope it will soon. This is my 2nd laptop from HP. My first was the dv2500t which seems to have an identical body to the dv4t. Anyway, I bought the dv4t with a $500 off coupon which brought the price down to $1170 or so. What a great deal!

I found the deal on dealnews.com and they only had 2000 coupons or so. It was $500 off if the laptop was configured to cost over $1399. I did see the 30% off coupon too but the $500 off gave me more of a discount.

Once again, thanks for the great review and I'm looking forward to my moonlight white dv4t!

 

The computer comes with an extra bay that you can fit a hard drive with. It's not an option you purchase, they all come with it. You can just swap out the DVD player with the hard drive as you see fit.

 

Luscious: Do you have any pictures of the computer? Also, I was looking at the dv4t-1300 driver page at HP and it says the graphics driver is for the Geforce 9200M GS. Is this the same driver as the 105M?

 

That sounds like a good laptop. Wish it had a higher resolution. The battery life seems kinda low, but then again it's a first impression. I have a 12-cell battery on a dv5t, I don't tihnk having integrated graphics is going to matter much in normal uses, but I get like 6-7 hours on max battery with the brightness all the way down (classrooms tend to be dark), 5 hours with it around 50% brightness. I would expect a smaller LED type of screen to get much more, at least 6 hours average with 50% brightness. I do notice though, that the first 10% does go down the fastest for me. I guage my measurement just on the number of clases I go through and the time I'm using it. I have on certain days 5 classes (use it in 3 -4 of them), and I also have an hour break inbetween, by the time I get home, I have like 20% battery, good enough for another hour. And in all my boring classes, I am web surfing here and there, and typing notes as I go through. Also using my laptop during my break. Maybe after a few uses, the battery should be higher?

 

What you mean? I know it comes with the weight saver, but I don't think you can just stick the hard drive to it........ or can you?

Is that what you mean?

 

Can you post some pics of it? or mabye a video

 

I have ordered dv4t with P8600, 3 GB RAM, 320 GB HDD, 14.1 Inches LED display, Intel Next-N wireless and 12 cell battery. I have ordered it for 777 $ incl taxes.

I am looking at battery life balanced with performance.

All i do is surfing when unplugged. I usually keep the screen brightness at 40% (less than 50%) most times when unplugged.

Could anyone tell me how much juice i can get out of the battery?

Thanks

 

Thanks for the response from everyone. I get a real kick out of doing these reviews, and it's great to get such good feedback.

1. Regarding that smart bay hard drive. HP doesn't list it on their regular site because they don't sell it at the moment as an accessory or option. What you need to do is go to their online parts store and order it as a spare part. The url for that is http://h20141.www2.hp.com/hpparts/ and the part no. you'll need to look for is 488128-001. If you have a bronze notebook, the part no. will be 502597-001. They are both the same, only the bronze version has a bronze bezel while the other has a chrome bezel. Last time I checked the price was around $80. Keep in mind this does not include a hard drive, it's just the bare hardware kit. Once you've got this kit you can screw in any 2.5" sata drive onto the bracket, pop out your burner and insert your new smart bay hard drive.

2. A 25W CPU with integrated graphics WILL run cooler, quieter and provide longer battery times than the 35W CPU with discreet graphics. That's one reason why some units come with a 65W brick while others like mine have the 95W adapter.

3. The display adapter driver is specific to the G105M. There was one update for the graphics card when I ran windows update, but I didn't install it because it was listed as optional. The driver version in device manager shows 7.15.11.7932.

4. Battery times will depend on many varying factors and conditions, but the biggest contributors are how you use your notebook and your individual habits. If you run a game for 20 minutes and then rest for another 10 minutes with the machine on idle, you will have more juice left in your battery after 30 minutes than if you were gaming for those same 30 minutes without a break. Because it's impossible to predict how (or where) someone will use their notebook, the only measurable way to quote battery life is to run a specific, repeatable task over a set period of time and monitor the change in battery capacity.

5. Photos and video - I'm not quite set up for that yet. If I can post pictures I will update here.

 

We currently have a Dv4t (specs below) with the 12 cell battery, and it easily lasts 5.5 to 6 hours while doing light duty activities (i.e. web, word….. ) with 60% brightness and Wifi on.

The “P” series processors are much more efficient than a similarly clocked “T” series ( 25w vs. 35w) and in conjunction with integrated graphics and a LED backlit LCD, will provide a much cooler unit with better battery life than a similar equipped “T” series unit. Also, I would guess, that adding the additional SmartBay hard drive to any unit would reduce battery life while installed and being used.

Remember also that the old “ 2x rule of thumb” for 12 cells and battery life has changed from older HP units. With the new DV4t series the 12 cell battery now offers about 3.5x the power of the standard batteries.

HP 14” Laptop Examples:

HP Dv1000, V2000, L2000, NX4800 (From Maintenance & Service Guides).
6-cell (Standard)- 4.00-Ah
6-cell (Standard)- 4.40-Ah (Standard, Dependent on Unit)
12-cell- 8.80-Ah

Dv4t (From Maintenance & Service Guide).
6-cell (Standard)- 2.20-Ah
6-cell (Extended Life)- 2.55-Ah
12-cell- 8.80-Ah

I’m not sure why HP reduced the battery power for the “standard” batteries on the newer units; weight savings perhaps or reduced production costs. But whatever the case, I think its worth understanding the difference when you choose a battery and why “T” series equipped units with discrete graphics and standard batteries have such poor battery life.

 

I purchased mine on sunday for a total of $980.11 thanks to a 500 dollar off coupon!
btw, I would assume that the 105m graphics card uses ddr2?
have you tried to overclock the 105m? (i would think not since you seem to indicate that it runs perfectly fine as it is)

Also, are the dv5t optical drive compatible with the dv4t? I ask because my dv5t has a blu-ray drive and I would love to take it out and put it in the dv4t.

 

I tried the nTune utility but had no success getting it to work. Riva tuner did give me sliders to adjust the frequencies, but considering the heat I was getting after just one hour of gaming, you're better off playing it safe and letting it run without any overclock. Any warmer and the notebook will become hot to touch, and that's not good.

I don't know about replacing the optical drive. You'll need to remove the black interface connector strip which on the dv4's optical drive is held in place by 3 screws, and fix that to your other drive. You may also need to switch bezels, since I can't say if they're a perfect match for both units.

 

Some pictures on this thread would be awesome.

 

Definitely

 

$500 off?! how, what, where?!

 

Pictures indeed would be delicious. I ordered my dv4t but it hasn't come in yet. I'm definitely looking forward to it though.

Any word on how well the HDTV tuner works. I am really looking forward to using that feature. What about the battery life while watching HDTV?

Right now I have a dv5z and I only get 3.5-4 hours of battery life on the 12-cell, and that just isn't good enough... My dv4t has the C2D P 2.4 ghz processor and LED screen, so I'm expecting to get about 7 hours with wifi and bluetooth off + brightness lowered. I am a student and a writer so I find myself using those settings frequently.

 

I too hopped on the dv4t bandwagon last week. It should be here on Wednesday, so I'll try to post some pictures when it gets here. With the coupon and discounts, it ended up at 928. I plan on getting an OCZ SSD to put in it to really make it zippy.

- Espresso Black
- Genuine Windows Vista Home Premium with Service Pack 1 (64-bit)
- Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo Processor P8700 (2.53GHz)
- 4GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)
- FREE Upgrade to 320GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
- 512MB NVIDIA GeForce G 105M
- 50% OFF LED Display!! 14.1" diagonal WXGA High-Definition HP LED BrightView Widescreen (1280 x 800)
- SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-R/RW with Double Layer Support
- [For LED Display] Webcam Only
- Intel Next-Gen Wireless-N Mini-card
- 50% OFF!! HP Integrated HDTV Hybrid Tuner
- HP Color Matching Keyboard
- 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery

 

Why on earth wouldn't you get the 12-cell battery? it's like the best feature HP has over other manufacturers and also helps lower the temperature (lifts laptop).

 

Kind of my thought too, but maybe battery life was secondary to weight and size for him. That 12-cell does pack on an extra 0.7 lbs, and with my configuration, I did began to feel it get a little heavy after an hour or so of walking around with it in my hand. I didn't have a notebook bag at the time...

I'm guessing that with his setup and an SSD drive, he'll probably get around 2.5-3.5 hours max with that standard 6-cell. If he would have gone for integrated graphics and a 12-cell, you'd be seeing almost 8 hours.

BTW: Everybody asking for pics - you can see the white at Best Buy. They've got a dv4-1313dx available for $549. Near identical to the dv4-1225dx I looked at earlier, and an awesome deal for what you get.

 

dv4 laptop users do u experience fan noise when connected to AC main while charging???Which bios d4 currently has?
By using 12 cell battery does your laptop weight increases?

 

yes.......

 

That pretty much says it all, i have the same Dv4t same specs and all that except mine is espresso black. i just got it today may17 09 , and i was wondering if you have had any serious problems up to this date. thanks , real good review.
specs:
vista Ultimate
Intel core 2 duo processor T9550(2.66GHz)
4G DDR2 system memory(2 Dimm)
500G HDD protect smart
512 NVIDIA GeForce G 105M
LED display
light scribe super multi 8x
web cam and fingerprint reader
next gen wireless N mini with bluetooth
HDTV
6 cell hight capacity battery

great lap top !!!

 

i dont know if you can hot swap the drives, but you might wanna try. i would assume that you can if your dv5 is 14 incher.

 

I never tried. I instead replaced my optical drive with an extra hard drive.

 

Other than the heat, noise, weight and speakers I found little to complain about, but even those four issues I could accept in the long run when you understand the chassis design and component placement. Portability rocks, battery time was awesome and the gaming performance is worth a mention too.

Sad to say, I actually returned my dv4t - am waiting to get a white dv3t with the T9900 once HP lets that screamer loose.

 

Heat/Noise.... lol. That's it?

You were a pretty big DV4 advocate... why the change?

 

No change, I still am a big dv4 advocate, it's the best 14" notebook available today no argument, and I stand behind my recommendation.

Like I said, heat and noise is something that comes with integrated graphics and the T-series CPU. I can put up with that if it gives me good GPU/CPU performance in return, but for others it'll be just too warm for comfort and too loud. For those folks, the chipset graphics and 25W CPU is the logical choice.

My other issue was weight, and the dv4t with the 12-cell was a little heavier than what I considered comfortable. My golden rule is always to travel as light as possible, and the best test for this is to carry a notebook around in your hand for an hour. I did exactly that with the dv4t. I found it became tiring, I was switching hands often, and the fatigue/distraction would get in the way of my productivity. You could argue that a case would have helped, and many folks would be comfortable with, but my objective is to travel light. In that respect, a smaller notebook with two batteries may work better than a bigger notebook with the biggest battery.

My interest in the dv3t was exactly the smaller size and lighter weight with the same CPU/GPU performance as the dv4t. But HP does have a dv3t available with the more powerful T9900 3.06GHz Core 2 Duo. I'm waiting on this release so that I can do another review and make a proper comparison.

 

well for its size its a pretty powerful machine.

ill be with this lap for a while till hp upgrades it.

 

Hey guys, can you tell me how long your laptops takes to go to the desktop screen and load everything. I mean, when the HD lights really stop to blink.

I've just bought a dv4t-1200 and i'm a little disappointed with the performance, it takes more than five minutes to the HD light to stop.

Should be like this? It's a T9400 2.53 / 4GB / 250GB
It's still with the hp bloatware, but i dont think that this is the reason

 

Oh bloatware probably is the reason. Manufacturers load down their new systems with bloatware these days. Reformat and set those horses in the T9400 free.

On the battery discussion, I think I have a standard 6-cell (using a DV4-1283cl from Costco) and on the battery, it printed 10.8V 47Wh and 4160mAh. Are these numbers accurate for a 6-cell? I did do a run-till-hibernate discharge while onboard an trans-Pacific flight. I shut the screen off, listened to music off iTunes, had WiFi off. The thing ran for 3 hours 45 minutes staying incredibly cool (fan never came on.)
Specs: T6400, 4GB RAM, 500GB HDD, Intel 4500MHD

 

The five minute HD blinking is most likely due to Superfetch loading stuff onto your RAM. Programs should be loaded long before that even if you have lots of startup programs running.

 

hi, im totally new to the notebook arena and can get by on the pc but i am technically challenged when it comes to reading all this. I just bot a dv4T and this is what i got on it, but im not sure what any of it means really. any breakdown would be helpful, and what didnt i get that i should have if anything. thanks!

HP Pavilion Entertainment dv4t customizable Notebook PC
• Espresso Black
• Upgrade to Genuine Windows Vista Ultimate with Service Pack 1 (64-bit)
• Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo Processor T9550 (2.66 GHz, 6 MB L2 Cache, 1066MHz FSB)
• 50% OFF!! 4GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)
• 500GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
• 512MB NVIDIA GeForce G 105M
• 14.1" diagonal WXGA High-Definition HP BrightView Infinity Display (1280 x 800)
• Lightscribe Blu-Ray ROM with SuperMulti DVD+/-R/RW Double Layer
• [For BrightView Infinity Display] Webcam + Fingerprint Reader
• Intel Next-Gen Wireless-N Mini-card with Bluetooth
• HP Integrated HDTV Hybrid Tuner
• HP Color Matching Keyboard
• 50% OFF!! One 6 Cell and One 12 Cell Lithium Ion Batteries
• Integrated 56K Modem
• System Recovery DVD with Genuine Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit)
• $50 OFF!! Microsoft(R) Office Professional 2007
• FREE Upgrade to Norton Internet Security(TM) 2009 - 3 Year Subscription from 2 Year
• Adobe(R) Photoshop(R) Elements 7 & Adobe Premiere(R) Elements 7
• HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope

 

Mrs Bells….

The following are some basic explanations and personal thoughts on your DV4t purchase.

• Upgrade to Genuine Windows Vista Ultimate with Service Pack 1 (64-bit)
The installed Operating System (OS) on your notebook is Windows Visa 64bit. Vista comes in either 32bit or 64bit versions. 64bit is the future but if you have older devices (printers…. etc) that do not have 64bit drivers available you could run into problems and need to upgrade those as well. 32Bit will still be available for a good while but 64bit is slowly replacing it in the market place.

As a side note, if you just purchased this unit you are eligible for a free upgrade from HP to the new Windows 7 operating system that will be released next month. This is replacing Vista and will be the standard OS for new PC’s in the coming months. Most early indications are that it’s much better than Vista

• Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo Processor T9550 (2.66 GHz, 6 MB L2 Cache, 1066MHz FSB)
Your notebook processor is an Intel model T9550 that runs at 2.66GHz. This is a very fast processor for gaming or intensive graphics work but for everyday computing (web, office, light graphics or video editing it is a waste of money. The “T” series Intel processors also use more power than the newer “P” series processors and therefore offer significantly less battery life and generate more heat.

• 50% OFF!! 4GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)
Your unit is equipped with 4GB of RAM. This is a good thing, especially with a 64bit operating system.

• 500GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
Nice hard drive…. lots of storage space for pics,music,video, etc….
ProtectSmart is a new feature that protects the platters in your hard drive by parking the heads if a sudden shift or fall is detected. Parking the heads prevents them from banging against the platters and detroying data or the entire drive. It's a good thing !

• 512MB NVIDIA GeForce G 105M
Nice video card if you do light gaming but otherwise this is a waste of money that increases the heat generated by the unit while decreasing battery life.

• 14.1" diagonal WXGA High-Definition HP BrightView Infinity Display (1280 x 800)
The "Infinity" display is a nice display cosmetically, but many users have issues with glare and dust getting behind the screen. From comments I’ve read here at NBR, HP likely won’t fix it if you have such an issue.

• Lightscribe Blu-Ray ROM with SuperMulti DVD+/-R/RW Double Layer
This is your DVD/CD drive that is capable of:
Playing Music CD’s
Playing Movie DVD’s
Recording on either CD or DVD and
Incorporates Lightscribe for burning images on Lightscribe enabled disks (DVD or CD)

• [For BrightView Infinity Display] Webcam + Fingerprint Reader
You have a webcam and finger print reader for secure log-in.

• Intel Next-Gen Wireless-N Mini-card with Bluetooth
You have a wireless device that works with 802.11 A,B,G, or N wireless networks, and also incorporates Bluetooth for short range wireless Bluetooth equipped devices. (i.e. mouse, printer, headset, cell phone, PDA, etc… )

• HP Integrated HDTV Hybrid Tuner
You can watch TV.


• 50% OFF!! One 6 Cell and One 12 Cell Lithium Ion Batteries
You got two batteries; 6 Cell for short term use, 12 Cell for long. While the 12 cell weighs a bit more and therefore reduces portability, it also props the rear of the unit up a bit which aids in cooling while providing a better ergonomic position for typing. It’s a personal choice but since you have both you have no worries.

• Integrated 56K Modem
This is an on-board old phone line style modem for connecting to the Internet. You know…a scretching sound followed by multiple beeps of different tones followed by “You’ve got Mail”. Circa… 1985 !! Likely you will never need this and therefore it's a waste of money.

• System Recovery DVD with Genuine Windows Vista Ultimate (64-bit)
Keep these disks in a safe place. They are nice to have and are used to restore your units software to its original delivery condition should things really get messed up.


This is just my opinion..... but if you do not game and spend most of your time with light duty stuff then I have to tell you that this unit is way overkill, will likely have short battery life, and will run much warmer than you are likely to be happy with. If someone talked you into this unit and you do not game, then in my opinion they’ve done you a great disservice.

If this is the case, and you are still within your return window, return it asap and get a unit designed for what you primarily do with it. It will save you a bunch of money and in the long run you'll be much happier with it.

If you game however... then enjoy.... you got a killer piece.

 

hey guys im buying a DV4t heres my specs. i was wondering if i could get the bad graphics card and then buy a good grapihs card better then nvidia G 105m. if not do u guys think this is a good confirmation? thnx. is it possible to swich the graphics card?

Espresso Black
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo Processor P7550 (2.26GHz, 3 MB L2 Cache, 1066MHz FSB)
50% OFF! 4GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
FREE Upgrade to 320GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
512MB NVIDIA GeForce G 105M
14.1" diagonal WXGA High-Definition HP BrightView Widescreen Display (1280 x 800)
LightScribe SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-RW with Double Layer Support
Webcam + Fingerprint Reader
Intel Wireless-N Mini-card
HP Integrated HDTV Hybrid Tuner
HP Color Matching Keyboard
High Capacity 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
Integrated 56K Modem
Microsoft(R) Works 9.0
HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope
Targus Heat Demence
Noise canciling headphones

i dont need the 12 cell battery

 

No, the graphics is not upgradable. As far as the specifications, its a decent system, not a gaming machine but should be fine for regular usage.

 

I bought a DV4t-1400 CTO. There are no media access keys other than mute and volume. Why is this? DId HP cheap out? I installed the latest audio drivers. The pictures on the CTO page (well some of them) even show all the media access keys. The ones I'm talking about are the play, stop, next, previous. Thanks.

 

hp removed them from newer hp dv4 models

 

Why? Any specific reason? What a loss of a great feature and draw.

 

These buttons work great on my hp dv4 with no issues even in windows 7 , so dont know why they did this.

 

Yeah I have two DV4-12xx computers and they work amazingly well. THey worked with Windows Vista and also now with Windows 7.

Staples (and i'm sure many others) still sell some DV4's with the media access keys. I'm planning on picking up the DV4-1540US tomorrow there.