*HP HDX DRAGON Owners Lounge, Part 1*

Dox's 180.43 works with Hell's Highway very well. It'll probably work with the newest games very well. It just has issues with just about every older game I threw at it.

I might try the orig beta with a modded .inf later. Sort of thinking of waiting for the official driver to be released.

 

WOOOOOHOOOOOO!!!!

The HDX I ordered since late August finally arrived at my doorstep!!!

I AM ABSOLUTELY IN LOVE WITH IT!!!!!

Just before that, the office issued me an Asus M50 unit. It simply blew my old HP 14" nc6000 lappie... it's 15.4 screen dwarfed many lappies in the office and was the second largest in the office (someone got a 17" HP lappie)

But then.. the Dragon came... and after bringing it to the office, every person who saw it was just blown away. Other people even brought more people in just to look at it and touch it. It was like as if it were a celebrity!

I thought the Asus M50 was a big enough unit already.. but next to the Dragon, it looked like some regular sized unit. My old 12" lappie felt like a 7" netbook.

Ah... absolutely happy with the purchase. I had to repeat myself over and over per person on exactly what the Dragon is, its capability, and everything else. IT personnel drooled over it. Regular employees gawked at it. Dumb and JEALOUS ones said.. "why didn't you just get a desktop pc?" and snorted... "uhh.. I'm looking for a lenovo.. don't like HP". Hah!

Now... to continue marvelling at this piece of "antiquated" art.

I swear... everyone's been asking how much I got it for and where to get it. They simply could not believe the VALUE of this monster.

(whew... too much excitement here)

Anyways... dumping some trash apps and putting in some apps now. I'll probably get a spare drive to mirror this onto.

 

That's really awesome!!! Glad to hear you like it so much, and I got the same reaction in two airports and a hotel lobby in Madrid, Spain when I pulled it out. It's pretty cool to see the way folks marvel at the HDX.

 

So it isn't just me !

My zd7000 was my first 17" laptop. People marvelled at it. In my mind a 17" screen isn't large enough for everyday work. Its OK when you are on the road, but its not a great day to day size. That is what the Dragon is for.

I am really surprised that HP and others aren't building more Dragon-esque laptops.

 

Hovercraftdriver:

Where did you download Dox's 178.24, and what kind of overall performance gain has it given you?

2.0 mentioned downloading physix separately. Where do you download that from? Am I right to assume that the HDX 18's driver includes physix?

Thanks

 

That is the same as my experience. I did some work for my uncle at his house the other weekend. As soon as he saw my Dragon, he wanted one. We searched high and low and found him one. He should get it this week.

We had a party on the weekend and my desk was on the way to one of the bathrooms. Everyone that saw my laptop was ga ga about it. Including more than a few Mac guys.

My Dragon was set up with a 20 inch external monitor, side by side, both running screensavers. Its a very nice combo.

I wonder why HP isn't building these things anymore.

 

hovercraftdriver, elmerfud,

I sure wish HP would realize how guys like us got to fully appreciate the work they've done on this.

If they don't remake a 20.1" sized one.. well.. our consolation is that we guys have the "last dragon".

I'd feel cheated if I got the 16 or the 18 inchers. It's like getting a celeron when you've already had the real thing.

(and man.... other than page 100... any other page that is necessary so I can get up to speed? Looks like I've got almost 100 pages to catch up with)

 

It is the same driver I did all my testing with in the post on this page(with link to driver):

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=169232&page=366

The HDX 18 driver does not contain Physx, as only 177.30 and above came with Physx, but you can get it here:

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=21312

 

2.0 please can you tell me why does my system won't install the update that i got from nvidia website?
named: 175.32_notebook_winvista_32bit_international_whql.exe
it tells me that the hardware is not compatiable
Thank you

 

Because it is for desktops - rather the included .inf file is.

You can only use mobile infs.

This thread (a page of 2 back), including page 100 has mobile drivers for you to download. Some signed, some not. But they all work with the HDX.

 

I think your testing was done with the driver plus overclocking. I was wondering if you'd seen a performance gain just from Dox's "tweak."

As far as the future of 20 inch notebooks, raised elsewhere, I think the Voodoo division would be the most logical place to direct attention and correspondence to. Weight in technology tends to decrease with new versions, and so screen and body weight are likely to decrease (for those averse to exercise...I like 15 lbs). Designers and gamers are the best and not inconsiderable niche market, and a lighter version would attract media types.

Plus, the CEO of Voodoo, Rahul Sood, is a real enthusiast with a desire to push computing (and gaming) into the future. I wish more CEO's had his vision.

Cheers

 

Not likely. They don't sell well. Sager, HP, ASUS and Dell have made one and they all failed commercially. The most popular size is 15" with 17" for gaming rigs.

Not with his "pricing vision." Premium notebooks are NEVER worth the premium price all things considered.

 

\

here is a very helpful link to help install graphics drivers and the moddef .inf's that are downloaded with them (but separately)

http://www.laptopvideo2go.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=33

 

This is true, but the stock driver still performs nicely. Mine usually is running stock, as when the machine reboots, I generally lose the settings, and forget/choose not to set them again.

 

The Dell 20 inch model could hardly be considered a laptop. It was a desktop. It reminded me of those lunch bucket type computers that were around in the late 1980s.

Note sure about Sager, but isn't the ASUS model an 18 inch widescreen ? Or am I thinking of the Acer 1920 ?

You have a point there, though it depends on how you are defining "premium". Manufacturers like to jack up the price of their higher performance laptops, for no good reason really. The price difference between a mid and high end desktop is 20%. On laptops its 50% or more.

Are these machines worth the price difference ? Depends. If the performance follows the price difference and you have to have something mobile, then maybe. Otherwise, probably not.

That is what I like about the Dragons... they are pretty high end (except 800 MHz FSB) and yet reasonably priced. Or at least mine was... clearance pricing though ?

Bottom line is, if you are mobile and you need to take your computer with you and it needs to run high end applications, you need a real machine. You just do. A slow processor, not enough RAM, a poor display and a poor keyboard just don't cut it. I know, I used to do that. Its painful.

Anyway... I've beat this horse to death. Enough. I won't say another word about how much I love this thing.

 

Can anyone tell me if there is an appreciable difference between running a second monitor on HDMI input over the VGA. My second monitor is a HDMI HPw2408h 24 inch monitor. Anybody know the difference...Thanks All, David
Love my Dragon......

 

They had a 20" which they discontinued sometime this Spring. I forget the model number offhand. Or maybe it was ACER.

Yes clearance pricing. It started @ debut over $3000. And with an ATI card. Which was no more powerful than a 8600 GT. I remember frowning at that spec. Loved the look of the machine, even thought about owning one. But not at that price with that GPU.

When they debuted the 8800M GTS, price had dropped a little and specs went up. Was very interested then. But was waiting for an updated HDx since Monetvina was set to debut in a few months at the time. But thing s happened which convinced me that HP wouldn't update the HDX. So I bought 2 - with a $450 off ea coupon no less.

Yep.

Indeed. It's just so bloody lovable, this.

 

I performed a clean install of Vista Ultimate x64 retail on my HDX (replaced Home premium).

I had a couple of minor hickups but nothing challenging at all. My main issue was with the eSATA port not recognizing my HD and I didn't know exactly what the driver was, but after going though all reasonable software and drivers in c:\SWSetup (which I backed up prior to the process) I got it to work.

Also, I notice the issue with the quick launch buttons and could not fix it until I read the posting by eto176 at page 305 mentioning that there was a new version of Quick Launch buttons (QLB SP40139 ).

The QLB SP40139 works fine in general and fixes the issue with the eject button and the quicklaunch and DVD, however, the TV botton does not work for me (that is the 3rd quick button from the left, right?)

For those wondering why to do a clean install and not ordering the notebook with Ultimate in the first place, well, because 1st Ultimate is very expensive for me through HP (I got it from the MS store, which is a bargain) and 2nd and most importantly, because there is a lot of crapware pre-installed that I wanted to get rid of.

Anyway, my experience with the HDX is nothing but positive. I am very glad I got one before HP discontinued this line.

 

Oh just in case, before anyone asks... the HD on eSATA is obviously external.

 

Good question. I'm wondering the same thing as well. My external monitor is using VGA because my last laptop didn't have DVI or HDMI. The Dragons have HDMI. A 6 foot HDMI-> DVI cable sells for $20. I've been thinking about getting one.

 

I used both on the same SONY TV which has both VGA and HDMI. There's no meaningful difference in picture quality. In both cases, the max external reso is 1920 x 1200.

 

But with HDMI you get digital sound and video to the TV thru just one cable.
Otherwise the HDX has no digital out.

Also I used to have an older flatscreen which only supported 1024x768 resolution through VGA, therefore in that case it wasn't the PC but the TV the troublemaker.

 

As far as I know only the ATi cards have audio pass through over HDMI. The 8800M doesn't, so it's the same situation.

 

I'm a bit more sanguine about what might come out of Voodoo. Here's a link to a story on Tom's Hardware.

http://www.tomshardware.com/news/hp-voodoopc-envy-voodoo,6401.html

Gaming laptops from Voodoo are likely to be more competitive, with (as the article states) manufacturing shifting to HP's Asia operations.

I still believe that as weight comes down (it always does in technology and electronics) that thin large screen notebooks are a possibility.

Just my two cents, which currently is worth 1.3 cents.

Cheers

 

RECANT!

The 180.43 (dox's) works great! This time I installed it over the 175.97. That's the rub. Dox extracted a few things too many.

PhysX is working nicely also. Version 8.09.04 is stable. The latest version 8.10.13 was glitching objects in a few RTS games like Age of empires III and C&C Kane's wrath. Will test in gears of war and hell's highway.

The latest PhysX, 8.10.13 has to be extracted from the 180.43 off Nvidia's site using winrar.

BTW, 180.43 runs Crysis warhead very nicely.

Will test Far cry 2 as soon as I get a chance to install it.

 

That's a good bit of coin. Certainly worth more than 1.3 cents.

The argument of weight coming down is a valid one. I mean, after all it's only the size of a messenger bag. If they can get it down to about 7-8lbs, and a base cost premium of 10-20% over a suffciently equipt 17", they may have a winner. But it will necessarily need to be innovative and not reminiscent of the failed 20"-ers of the past. I prefer a 20" notebook to an all-in-one desktop PC. I think others would if it's marketed properly. HP completely failed to market the HDX

In any event, we may need to wait until the next economic boom before anyone is willing to take a risk on what many consider a luxury item meant of conspicuous consumption.

 

Ok ok.. I know this is gonna sound so newbie-like... but here's what I've done so far after getting my dragon:

1. Backup SWsetup folder
2. Uninstall some apps (like Norton and MS trialware)
3. Updated Vista through Windows Update
4. Installed and updated AVG free and Spybot Search & Destroy
5. Placed a bunch of kiddie songs and movies for my toddlers

Questions:
1. Are those apps like Muvee and Sims worth keeping? If I don't take them out, will they hamper the performance of the HDX? If they just take up space, I'm ok to keep them.
2. I do have Nero.... so... should I remove those other apps?
3. My blu buttons all work well... should I still update that critical update from the HP site? (then do the Blacknight fix?)
4. What drivers do I really need to get? I've been amazed by the sounds as it is (which puts my altec lansing equipped Asus m50vc to shame) and the game I'll be playing would be World of Warcraft which should be a lightweight challenge for the HDX. Should I go and get that 15% boost Hover wrote about?

5. What other upgrades do I need? So far, the best upgrade does look to be the hard drive. (with me having a fast SSD in mind to lessen the boot up even more)

Been reading up http://www.notebookreview.com/resource/ssd/ for SSD matters. But hopefully, they'll be a good purchase soon enough.

As for the memory and processor, I'm quite happy with the stock ones. Upgrading to 8GB and to a faster proc doesn't look all that beneficial for me for the price I have to pay (well.. I don't have as much cash to burn like some of you guys here)

6. I didn't make recovery disks from the get go... what did Blacknight mean about the creation of the recovery disks refreshing the recovery partition? Did he mean that once I do a recovery disk with my kids' songs, removal of crapware and installation of my own apps... the recovery partition there will mirror what I backed up to the DVD disks?

If so.. maybe I should clone my HDD first before making a recovery disk to sidestep this item?

Thanks for any help!

Cheers!
Teletran

 

Firstly....

Congrats! I know it's been a long time coming.

Now onto your questions:

1. It only takes up space. They don't have any services to hamper perf, so you can leave 'em if you like.

2. You might want to wait. I have Nero also but decide not to install it. found that I didn't need it after all. Not even for burning really. Nero has a bit too many components and takes up a fair bit of resources. Vista is quite capable and can write to RW discs treated as if they are hard drives where you can drag and drop. That's what I liked about Nero's InCD which doesn't work in 64bit Vista.

3. Off the record, yes. On the record, maybe. If anything, update quickplay to 3.7 through the software's update feature.

4. Leave things as is for now. When you get more demanding games, you can decide then. That's one of the best way to appreciate a driver update. As for sound driver, if it ain't broke...

5. I only recommend a HDD upgrade. It's not necessary but is a nice and cheapsih way to boost systemwide perfromance.

6. Make the discs just to have them in case you ever have to send it back in for repair. Or if yu need to troubleshoot with tech support. You don't want to give HP any excuses not to honor a warranty. As for what Blacknight said, you'll have to ask him. I don't know the context of what you are referring to, to comment on.

Otherwise... go play, explore and enjoy.

 

Much thanks 2.0!

What would this thread be without the master?

Guess I will just do the following then:
1. Do the fix
2. Do the disk backup
3. Go play, explore and enjoy all the way!

The Dragon has arrived!!! YEAH!!!

(better make sure that my 2 toddlers don't spill milk or dump cereals on it or something)

 

How much does a driver such as 180.43 impact graphics performance without overclocking?

Is it okay to install this driver over the stock one. I was under the impression from earlier posts that an uninstall was necessary.

Regarding Voodoo, I think that they will find themselves competing with Dell gaming notebooks.

Cheers

 

Just a note to those that use the program Power ISO - I noticed after installing this software (or when its loaded), the Dragon's quicktouch button stopped working.

If you don't let Power ISO to autostart in Windows, the softtouch eject button will work again

I was quite relieved I thought I had a faulty panel - phew!

 

Well in this case, the big thing about the 180.43 is the physx and the driver itself (180.xx or higher) along with phsyx being required for the new crop of games. As for impact on graphics performance... that depends on the game we're talking about. The thing with drivers is that sometimes they retard perf on some older games in favor for perf inc in newer games. Though it does get higher 3D mark06 numbers. But that didn't seem to matter at first with all the stutttering I was getting with a clean driver install as oppossed to an overlay.

Unistall isn't always necessary. Best method is not to install a signed driver over an unsigned one. But it's generally ok to install an unsigned over a signed or a signed over a signed. But not always. All depends on the package. With this particular driver package, the modder stripped out a number of elements/components that HP's signed drivers have. Like the SR elements, Media player extensions, SR TV, driver service... etc. He designed it to be fast and light. But the HDX is a multimedia system and seemed to miss those other components. HP drivers are different in a number of ways let alone the fact that they use 2 infs to install themselves.

 

Hello 2.0

Though not notebooks, Psystar is offering powerhouses that may be of interest to you and others.

Posted on MacRumors.com

Psystar's Mac Clone Offers Blu-ray and NVIDIA 9800GT Options
Tuesday October 28, 2008 05:22 PM EST
Written by Arnold Kim
http://www.macrumors.com/2008/10/28/psystars-mac-clone-offers-blu-ray-and-nvidia-9800gt-options/

Despite an ongoing legal dispute with Apple, Mac clone maker Psystar announced today that they are shipping OS X-compatible PCs with Blu-ray optical drives and the NVIDIA 9800GT graphics card. Apple does not currently offer either peripheral on the Mac.

According to the FAQ, Mac OS X Blu-ray support is limited to to read/write data capabilities only and there is no Blu-ray software capable of playing back Blu-ray video on the Mac. Apple had described the licensing of Blu-ray as a "bag of hurt", but was likely referring specifically to the video playback licensing issues.

The two peripherals are build to order options from Psystar. Two weeks ago, Apple and Psystar agreed to Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) in which both parties can try to work out a resolution rather than going to trial. The process may still require several months.

Psystar OpenPro and OpenGamer:
http://store.psystar.com/
Psystar Open Computing:
http://psystar.com/

2.0 ~ Check your PM

 

Today I installed sp2 beta for vista, and maybe by luck or accident the tv touch button is working.

 

I wouldn't risk my money on a Pystar computer. The company will continue to be under some kind of litigation threat from Apple. What's more they have no proven track record, spotty customer service and have had considerable shipping delays in the past.

 

As of right now I have the HP drivers from the HDX 18 driver page ver.”175.97”. I am moderately OC'd to 605,905,1475 and running Far Cry 2 at 1650x1050, all settings Max, and AAx2. My max GPU temp is 69. I am using FRAPS and am getting 32-35 FPS consistently. I am very impressed with these drivers and GPU.

When I get home today I will try the new 180.43 Drivers with PhysX mentioned and see what I get. Hopefully Blue Ray play back will still work.

I also get the "your video Drivers need to be updated" message every time I start the game, but all is good. If these new drivers work it would be nice not to see that annoying message anymore.

 

Likely they (Dox's or the other one) won't work with Blu-ray from a clean driver install. But if you install Dox's 180.43 on top of the 175.97 it might as some of the 175.97's components are retained using this method.

 

I don't think PhysX is necessarily required to run the games, only gets the most out of the graphics engine in the game itself. Basically the same concept as DirectX 9 vs 10. Ultimately, I think games will require at least 10, but I don't think there are such games yet.

Also, when you talk about installing over, are you talking "have disk" method? This way seems to work best when doing this, as the actual driver component is the only thing being written over during the process. I assume this is what you mean by some driver components are retained in your other post. Also, important to note, is that a higher driver version number doesn't always correlate to a newer version, so have disk will sometimes tell you that the most current available driver is installed. Conversely, installing over a "newer" driver with older driver via standard "setup" method may cause problems. Doesn't matter if signed or not.

Please correct me if I am wrong on either point, but this is the way I have always understood it.

 

In my post on this page, I identified a link to a possible work-around to the Blu-Ray problem with non-HP drivers. Think someone confirmed it works for the HDX, but I can't find the post right now.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?p=4014927#post4014927

 

All correct.

Clearly, you can see I've gone geezer and lazy in me posting.

 

Nah, it was just early. Cheers

 

What about nVidia Mobility Modder Tool? Here is the link http://www.driverheaven.net/nvmodtool.php. Some are saying that blue-ray is working for them after modification to the official nvidia stock drivers.

 

Just to clarify...SP2 isnt in beta yet, its pre beta still last I herd, please correct me if I am wrong

 

Not sure about others, but after I used that tool $hit the fan for me. Drivers got all screwed up and blue screened. I could not even get it to work with a system restore. I went back to the point of just installing VISTA but something in the reg was so FUBAR it would not correct it. Luckily I have VISTA Ultimate and make regular backups. I just did a complete system restore from backup. Might have just been a fluke the time I ran it (It is a Beta). I will be making restore points and a backup before I mess with 180.43. If it does not work with Blue Ray but I like gaming aspect I may give it a try again.

 

Please forgive if this is a stupid question - Does the bluray drive on the HDX have the ability to write/record onto bluray disc?

I was just checking out the Vista SP2's native blu-ray write capabilities and started to get excited about backing up onto Bluray.

I hope it does. Thanks in advance!

 

Unfortunately no. The drive that comes with the HDX is a CD and DVD R and RW, but only Read for Blue Ray.

 

2.0

When you use the "have disk option" in the upgrade, do you have to burn the driver to a cd and install from there, or is the "have disk option" only used as a step to permit a "soft" upgrade.

Thanks

 

Soft upgrade. You browse to the directory where the driver is located. Being on HDD, USB, SD card, or CD/DVD.

Or you can use the driver's installer to install over a previous driver. But follow the caveat rules if you do that.

 

I know this is a little lazy to be asking because I'm sure the information is out there somewhere but... to take my HDX to Japan, am I going to need a transformer of some kind, or just a simple plug converty... thinger?

Not quite sure what the power requirements of the HDX are like, but I just thought it would be worth asking in case I need to be wary of anything (the HDX being such a big *** machine and everything).

Cheers folks!

 

I believe this is what the folks in my link ultimately point to, but since I don't have the Blu-ray drive, I haven't messed with it. Only put it up there for informational purposes.