*HP HDX DRAGON Owners Lounge, Part 1*

C'mon Doc - 14??? That's a bit OLD for Chinese manufacturing, don't you think?? 14 is like, what, 56 in child slavery years?

The reason the overall quality of the unit is good is because not all the parts are made in China, even though its assembled and shipped from there. Technologically, they're in the 60's, and the fact you found something like that means they're not using any QA systems to monitor their assembly process. Most people don't realize that's how Japan got so far ahead of everyone in manufacturing and product quality.

In Quality Assurance, that's called a "Manufacturing Process Control Point Screwup". Yes, Screwup is a QA technical term. Idiots forget that it's CHINA and not JAPAN that's assembling these things. Somehow I get the feeling that ISO, Mil-I and Mil-Q aren't exactly used as QA systems in China. They were probably watching a Ping-Pong tournament with Forrest Gump or something...

After WWII, a little know PhD named W. Edwards Deming approached US Automakers and other manufacturers with his ideas and methods of Statistical Process Control. They laughed him out of the country, so he decided to try another country. His next stop was in Japan. They were more eager to listen.

Using his SPC and later SQC (Statistical Quality Control) methods not only in manufacturing but in all aspects of business operations, they literally changed how the world (well, except China anyway) manufactures things and does business.

In the late 70's after the oil crisis then, Japanese cars and other imports became more and more popular. Deming had the last laugh when US Automakers had to eat it and learn Deming's methods just to try and keep up with the Japanese.

The rest is history. Just about everything manufactured today ( again, except in China, India, Africa, etc.) is made using some type of Statisical QA system and / or a Quality Management System like ISO 9000. Speaking of which, the US could've set the global QA standard, but being the idiots the Dems are, they let the Europeans do it, and now we're stuck with the Metric System and ISO.

Remember that on Election Day....

 

Hey, if the oil companies can do it, why not others? All it takes is a whisper of shorter inventories and the prices of oil sky-rocket! At least with the HDX, the shortage (and inevitable disappearance) is real!

 

It's basic economics at work.

 

Great - I added that fix to my quick reference post at page 100


... by the way what about the QLB link ? What does that driver do exactly?

 

Anyone ever heard of or used PC Decrapifier? If this works any good, I may use this to clean up crapware instead of a fresh install.

http://www.pcdecrapifier.com/

 

I have a couple of of coworkers that swear by it. I just go through and remove all the crapware manually.

 

The very first thing I did with my Dragon was to de-crapify it. I do that, then my vista updates, antivirus, install my software, then take an Acronis image of my 'gold' system....

ST

 

I find it odd how from time to time, my touch buttons push themselves. This is really freaky when you are in the dark playing FEAR.

 

My system is a HDX9300 built on 07-26-2008 with T8300. It has the ATI card since it was a replacement for a 9010nr that was replaced under warranty (what a bad experience that was, no HDX for two months). I assume that the 8800 card will work in it? Is there anyplace other than HP to get the 8800?

This is my first post. I have been following this forum since January. The knowledge on this site is amazing, thanks to all.

 

Highly likely that you can replace it with an 8800M GTS. A 9300 is sure to have mobo part number 464591-001. But you'll have to open it up to be absolutely certain. There's no other place to get the card but from HP. It's available from their parts store but the price makes me think something is afoul. part# 454311-001 for $76.95. Though it's MXM, it's highly likely that it's proprietary MXM. If it were true MXM, they wouldn't have needed to make a new mobo when the 8800M came out.

Welcome to the forum.

 

You're probably not going to be able to unless you've got several more of the Adobe design programs. Here's a more detailed list of what was running (next time I'll snip the taskbar App/Proc/Serv tabs and the toolbar for a precise list of what was running):

Photoshop CS3
Fireworks CS3
Illustrator CS3
Dreamweaver CS4 Beta
Acrobat Pro 8 (w/ about 6 open documents)
InDesign CS3
Lynda.com DW CS4 Beta course
Netscape 9 w/ approximately 20 tabs open
IE 64 w/ approximately 15 tabs open
Mozilla Thunderbird
Mailwasher Pro
Excel 2007
NVIDIA CP set to multiple display, cloned, laptop primary, Aquos HDMI

I'm sure having all the graphics programs running is what drove the GPU temp up, but I thought it interesting that Core #1 temp was actually lower than the previous snip. I'll try and recreate it and then take multiple snips of everything so we can get a better idea of what's happening next time

 

The P/N is KU826PA#ABG

So does it look like it will work with the nVidia 8800 gts or am I out of luck?

Thanks in advance,
Kris Bennett

 

Yeah, it's a 9300 alright. So you should be good to go. I'd open it up to double check though just to be sure. I don't know what HP's return policy is on parts. But the 8800M part number 454311-001 is selling for $76.95 which seems way off to me.

BTW, welcome aboard.

 

Got my machine, and all I can say is it is truly a work of art, and with the work that I do, I'm glad I got the WUXGA screen.

Got a couple questions while I'm prepping this machine and making recovery disks...

1. Once I create the recovery disks, can I nuke the HP recovery partition to reclaim the disk space?

2. In the disk manager, Disk0 is my data disk and Disk1 is my OS disk. I usually have it the other way. What's the advantage of doing it this way?

Probably a few more questions coming as I play with it.

 

i recieve mine 2maro.....i cant wait!!!!!!!!! hopefully someone is at my house to take it though b/c i have school all day 2maro

 

Hey guys, I would like to know Is it possible for me to change T8100 to X900 on my HDX9494 by myself ?

 

Sure is. Just be sure to grab the manual and take your time.

 

My X9000 just came in. It's an ES, but the seller assured me that ES-es are identical to the retail ones...hmmmm?
Any suggestions/precautions? or is it as simple as in the manual? the only uncertainty that have is related to heat sink compound... some instructions would be great... do I need to update the BIOS (it's already updated with the latest Bios from HP) ...

Thanks.

PS. this time I'll take some pictures ... and I will show you the EJECT button issue also..

 

I hope to be one of those who can say the same thing as the Allens and company. Could you guys list where you got yours from?

 

Some of the ES's are and some are not. Run CPUZ and see what it says for stepping. if it says C0 or M0 then it's all good. If it says B0 or B1 then it's an engineering sample for sure.

As for the heat sink compound application guides, there are a number of them online. I'd recommend Arctic Silver 5. Thin coat is best. Also try not to damage the Northbridge's thermal pad when you remove the heatsink off the CPU. You'll know what I mean when you open it up. The heatsink covers both the CPU heatspreader and the Northbridge's heatspreader. It's a grey pad. Don't touch it with your hand. Also, on the heatsink are numbers next to the screws. Unscrew them in that order and rescrew them in reverse order.

 

I interpret "something afoul" as too low a price? Now that the HDX9000 is discontinued, its probably time to reduce inventory. Inventory costs are usually tightly controlled by manufactures.

 

True, but not that low. Only one way to find out though, right?

 

I was thinking about the HDX and suddenly had this epiphany to write. This is what I came up with. Keep in mind I am not a Writer. I actually do not like to write.

The Monkey and "The Dragon"

The monkey hast farted in the wind, thus created the scene before you. The dimly lit arena is teaming with anticipation as the Dragon enters the perimeter, only to find the stench is too great to withstand. The monkey in the distance smiling ever so softly as his well laid plan falls into place. The Dragon stumbles as its knees begin to tremble. His age has made him wise, but his body has begun to weaken. The young monkey knows this as he has been planning this moment for months now. He has been entering his prime while the Dragon has long since left his. All this time the Dragon has been distracted by the stench and using all the rest of senses to hold steady his knees, the monkey has been approaching for the kill. He glides effortlessly through the air mere inches from the Dragon’s nose letting forth the most deadly of farts he has in his arsenal. A blow far stronger than that of a 100 atomic bombs. The Dragon knows he has been defeated before his first breath. He is holding his breath now, knowing the longer he holds it the longer he can extend his life. The force alone was too much for his already weakened knees. He collapses in one swift fall. The thud of his scaly body hitting the dirt is defining. He is searching though the cloud of gas and dust, looking for his new nemesis. Searching for one last glimpse. His body is getting numb now. His vision dark and blurry. He knows he can not hold his breath much longer. “Is this how it ends?” he thinks to himself. Not even a single blow to his enemy. The monkey laughs now, making sound for the first time since this epic battle began. He stands defiantly in the dragons’ face. Knowing that the final blow has been dealt, that the mighty Dragon has been defeated, after many years of reigning supreme among his peers. This was the monkey’s first mistake, and also his last. This is what the Dragon had been waiting for. This is what he was destined for. He may be older, he may have lost the support of he peers, and many of his loyal fans may have changed their support to the new monkey. But he is unique; a one of a kind, the Dragons mold was broken after he was created. The new monkey may have some new skills and looks, but inside he is weaker, less a warrior and more an under powered overconfident child. His gloating and lack of experience will cost him his life. The Dragon may die here today, but at least he had the honor of truly sitting on the top of his game and having a long and glorious run. The monkey’s run will end before it even started. The Dragon already knew his fate and had accepted it before he even entered the arena. With his final breath he shall strike down the defiant, inexperienced, and gloating monkey. The last deep breath he took, he drew in as deep as possible. For this is how the Dragon ignites the fire deep inside himself. The Dragon locks eye with the monkey caching him off guard, the intensity is far greater than anything he has felt before, not the glare of a helps dying creature. The Dragon returns the soft smile he received earlier. Then quickly replaces it with a tooth fill snarl. The monkey freezes. Realizing his mistake far too late. He has underestimated the beast known as The Dragon! As a deep rumble lightly starts to emanate from deep within the dragon, time seems to stand still. The rumble begins to sound more like a roar. The earth begins to rumble under the monkey’s feet, the rumble becomes a quake. The arena is now collapsing around them. Their eyes still locked the Dragon opens his mouth and lets forth the loudest and most fearsome roar he has ever let forth. For a mere fraction of a second that seems like an eternity to the monkey, everything goes deathly silent… Time stands still… Their eyes locked… The flames are let forth instantly engulfing the monkey and igniting the gasses in the arena. The following explosion leaves a crater that appears to have no end. The Dragon has won; his fate had already been decided before the battle began by those that oversee all in the Realm. But he was defiant to the end proving the Overseers to be wrong. A monkey will never replace “The Dragon”!

 

Very nice. But, for me to fully "get it", what does the Monkey represent?

 

The monkey represents other HDX posers. This was created from a half remembered dream I had Last night.

 

I am fairly sure I read someone installing OSX on their HDX. I cannot find that thread....Can you please give a bit more information on that. Sounds interesting....

Thanks,
Scott

 

Google iATKOS for the "Mac hack"

 

Brentatent12 did it. Go back to the 290's or so or PM him for pointers maybe.

 

@Scott T < ---whoops. Meant Computrekkie.



Very nicely done.

 

LOL,

I googled it and this thread was 3rd on the list...LOL

Not sure what was nicely done, but thanks...errr I think...

Scott

 

Is it worth upgrading from T9500 to X9000 a few months from now? Will the upgrade make any noticable gain in performance? Thank you

 

My bad. I meant computrekkie and his story.

 

Nope. Not worth it. +200ghz = 3-6% perf boost.

If it were overclockable, maybe, depending on what you do to shave a few milliseconds to seconds off. Intel's got a nice racket going.

 

Hey, new to this forum, but excited it exists! I just ordered my new HDX, arrives next week. Apparently its one of the last ones left in the country, no thanks to HP discontinuing it.

Anyway, quick question; mine is set up with only 2GB of 667mhz ddr2 ram, I am definitely going to upgrade to 4GB. But I was also interested in getting faster memory, maybe 800mhz, but I think I read somewhere that 800mhz is not compatible with the Santa Rosa chip, which is in the HP HDX? Can someone please explain that to me, and IF i can get faster memory than 667mhz, someone explain it, and maybe some reccomendations?

Thank you very much !!

 

Is this HDX Dragon series discontinued? I just saw it at HP web site a couple weeks ago. Now, I am unable to find one anywhere.

Thanks,

 

looks that way

 

It will work just fine, but at 667mhz. The PM965 chipset (Part of Santa Rosa platform) has an front side bus with a top speed of 667mhz. 800mhz memory doesn't necessarily mean it's faster. CAS latency is what counts the most. There is lower latency 667mhz RAM available but you're only going to see a 0-2% increase in speed. Not worth it.

There's not much you can do to speed things up on notebooks. You can trim Vista's fat by either installing a clean copy of the OS and tweaking it or tweaking the HP bloated version.

You can overclock the GPU but you're not going to see all that much gain in most games. That might come in handy a year from now. Might make the difference of playable/unplayable at certain resolutions and graphic options at certain points in some games.

The CPU cannot be overclocked. Not even the extreme versions in the HDX. And you won't see all that much performance gain if you have a 2.5 or 2.6ghz processor. All the advantages of the extreme processors have been strippe din the HDX thanks to HP's design of it.

Yes, discontinued. And within a week or two at the most there won't be any of any flavor left in anyone's inventory. Demand is highest now seeing what HP has in its place. Lots of scammers trying to sell them for extremely low prices on ebay and other places, so be careful.

 

Anyone have their internet explorer crashing a lot??? It's only upon closing a IE window... btw I have a HDX9494nr incase it matters...happens maybe 1 out of every 10 times I close IE... firefox anyone?

 

I regret buying this notebook now. I just got it back from repair, turns out it was a defective motherboard to blame this time. Well I went to open the optical drive and it won't open it stays stuck shut (someone didn't put it back together right i assume). So I live chat with HP, and the gal is less than helpful but I finally get her to say we will send you a new optical drive if you take yours out and send it to us. I say It's under warranty wouldn't I void that if I replaced it myself when you send it to me. She replies, yes it could void the warranty, OMG. I say I would rather send it in and have HP fix it since it is under warranty, and it is like a month and a half old, I'm not going to risk voiding the warranty for replacing it myself. So they are sending me another mail-in-repair box to have them deal with the optical drive issue, I only got it back 2 hours ago and now on Monday I'm going to have to send it right back to them for who knows how long this time. Worst purchase I've made in my 21 years and maybe the last hp product. Their customer service is very frustrating . I am In awe that she would suggest me to do something that is going to void my warranty when I could send it in and have it done by HP. Just had to get that out of my system, wow what a mess!!

 

Here's a case for having lemon laws for computers! It's like buying a really sweet BMW and never being able to drive it 'cause it's always at the shop. This computer is the coolest thing I've bought and it has only given me countless hours of joy. I'm really sorry about your lemon.

 

Thanks... There is no drivers in it either but I think I can find all those and the finger print slash tv tuner and whatever other ones I had a hard time with the first time. Hopefully it will get fixed and be fine from there on out. It really depresses me. Hoping A clean install after words will also fix the windows update error problems. Thanks for your concern Matsuda.

Zach aka dumbfounded.

 

Try this: (in case you didn't already)

1. D/L Maintenance manual: http://h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c01279508.pdf

2. Go to pages 49-50

Unplug the unit, take the battery out, flip it over.


3. remove the Optical drive.

4. Inspect it.

5. Get a paper clip, un-bend it. Insert one end into the hole of the optical drive to the right of the eject button. Drive should pop open.

6. reinstall the drive leaving the drawer open.

7. Boot up.

8. When Vista settles down, close the drawer. You should hear the drive seeking.

9. now open it with the eject button on the side.

 

She had me do the paper clip thing, while it was turned off and unplugged with the drive still attached. I really don't want to uninstall it and re do it and void the warranty.. I would rather hassle with sending it and having them fix it, rather than me messing the warranty up. Good decision?

 

Nope, at this stage you won't void the warranty for removing the drive. No chance. There are no void stickers of any kind. It's easy as pie to do it. Take you all of a few minutes. Have no worries my friend. There's probably nothing wrong with the drive. Most likely it just needs to be removed, inspected, and put back. There may even be tape on the connector end of the drive. Something some techs do to protect the connector end when they are working. Also take a flashlight and look into the HDX once the drive is removed to make sure there's nothing in there blocking the contacts.

And you wouldn't void the warranty for replacing the drive they'd send you. That's one of the user serviceable parts like RAM and HDDs.

 

Ok, well I'm not very comfortable removing things like that, so I don't know. But a direct quote from this person said "Yes it may void your warranty". It clicks and sounds like it is going to eject, and it doesn't, to get it to come out at all you have to pull it out from the underside manually. The drive once pulled out, seems to be looser than before so I think they may have damaged it in the process of repair... I would rather them be responsible if they ruin it ya know. So paranoid at this point I just would like a working machine for my $1600.

 

Alright, but seriously, it's practically child's play. One screw on the bottom. You needn't be uncomfortable. Have confidence in yourself. You're more qualified than some of the bozo's that fix these things over at HP. And the way you describe it makes it sound like they may have forgot to install the retaining screw - that one screw. You should at least inspect that.

Also inspect the gap between the top of the drive's bezel and the frame of the HDX. There should be about a 1mm gap. If it looks to be too tight, may mean they forgot the screws that hold the top cover to the bottom plastic.

Anyway, if you're not up to it, that's cool. No worries there. There's just been a rash of horror stories about HP repair lately. How people's notebooks are coming back to them. I worry for you. I feel for you. It maybe something you can fix and reduce the chance of something happening. I'd check the rest of your system to make sure they put things back that you originally ordered. Go into device manager and run down the list.

And about her quote, she doesn't know what the bloody so-and-so she's talking about. And she knew it. That's why she said "may" to cover her arse.
I would have pressed her for a yes or no answer and under what conditions. She'd have to go to a manager to get the straight dope.

Anyway, whatever you do, here's wishing it works out in your favour.

 

Z-man:

Just to cover your A$$, ask the tech support agent to email you the steps they are asking you to perform. If you are afraid of voiding your warranty, at least that way you have an electronic trail proving you were following the instructions of an employee of their company.

And like 2.0 has stated, it's a very simple procedure. Good times!

 

Ok, I will look at that and see this weekend probly... Would the retaining screw be internal?? All the screws on the back of the laptop seem to be there. Thanks I really do hate to send it back in.

 

Ok thats cool ... but how will i tell if it will work when i open it up?

Thanks in advance,
Kris

 

Also I just realised u said $76.95 - Where is that from cause on http://www.hp.com.au/sparescentral/ it says it's $712.48 AUD

Thanks again,
Kris