*HP HDX16 Owners Lounge*

I asked myself the same questions about running Windows 8 pro x64 on my HDX-16 and so I did a clean install. Most important reason for me to try it was the lower system requirements that Windows 8 needs to run.

So first I was anxious to see if the Windows 7 drivers would get the job done on Windows 8 and they do! Windows automatically found the latest drivers and everything except the webcam is running perfectly now. My webcam already had problems on 7 and I didn't expect it to work now either.

Futhermore Windows 8 uses like 1 gigabyte less on idle than Windows 7 so that's a real advantage in using a laptop witch has is a coouple of years old. But the best advantage that I like is that it makes a lot less heat overall. When running idle the cooling functions good and seems to get grip on the heating up. When using it to watch movies it heates-up but it doesn't get overheated as I would experience in Windows 7.

The MetroUI is crap without a touchscreen but hey, there's an app for that! With Classic Shell I ended up using only the desktop enviroment in Windows 8 and having a startmenu to do everything I was used to before ( Welcome to Classic Shell)

Running it like 2 months now and can't complain!

You should definetly give it a try. Cheers

 

I asked myself the same questions about running Windows 8 pro x64 on my HDX-16 and so I did a clean install. Most important reason for me to try it was the lower system requirements that Windows 8 needs to run.

So first I was anxious to see if the Windows 7 drivers would get the job done on Windows 8 and they do! Windows automatically found the latest drivers and everything except the webcam is running perfectly now. My webcam already had problems on 7 and I didn't expect it to work now either.

Futhermore Windows 8 uses like 1 gigabyte less on idle than Windows 7 so that's a real advantage in using a laptop witch has is a coouple of years old. But the best advantage that I like is that it makes a lot less heat overall. When running idle the cooling functions good and seems to get grip on the heating up. When using it to watch movies it heates-up but it doesn't get overheated as I would experience in Windows 7.

The MetroUI is crap without a touchscreen but hey, there's an app for that! With Classic Shell I ended up using only the desktop enviroment in Windows 8 and having a startmenu to do everything I was used to before ( Welcome to Classic Shell)

Running it like 2 months now and can't complain!

You should definetly give it a try. Cheers

 

4 years later; a lot of problems with my hdx16; and now I am looking at lenovo t530's. How about you guys...what sparks your interest 2013 wise?

Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk 2

 

Hi All,

I've still got my HDX16 but due to a keyboard, fan and battery problem I've not used it in a while.

The fan will need replacing, that is definite, the battery holds pretty much no charge now but will replace it with a 12-cell so that'll help heat distribution, but as for the keyboard problem I am stumped,

Only half the keyboard works (the right side), I would buy another keyboard but wondered if anyone on here has seen a similar thing, it's a UK model I have, not that it makes much difference I guess. USB keyboard works perfectly as expected.

And on a last note, my screen has scratches on the bottom, similar to most other HDX's due to it clashing with the quick-launch panel, has anybody found a way to replace or at least make the scratches less evident?

Cheers,

Neil

 

hey all, been a while since anyone has posted here, just wanted to say I'm 4.5 year in on my hdx and still going strong. It gets used every day, though not for any high-end processing or gaming. Still a sharp looking unit. Replaced the HDD with an SSD recently, which made a nice boost. I've had some problems with screen flickering and going dark, but took it apart today and discovered the wires powering the LCD had gotten a bit loose. Shored them up a bit and it's much better now. This has been an excellent PC for me and my wife...love the 1080p and the full keyboard. Anyone else still using their HDX?

 

I will never buy another HP because of my experience with this laptop and the last HP laptop I had.

The keyboard had to be replaced, the optical drive had to be replaced, the battery crapped out...

In the last year I replaced the hard drive with a larger one and upgraded to Windows 7. I've since got a Macbook Pro and the only thing I use the HP for is things that require a PC (which is still more than one would think).

I'm going to start using Plex soon and am hoping this will handle the job. Has anyone used this as a Plex server?

 

I've had my HDX16 for what, 5+ years now? I updated to Windows 7 when it came out. Even reduced the RAM to 3GB because I wanted more RAM on my Acer (swapped out one of the HDX's 2GB sticks for one of the Acer's 1GB stick.) I've dropped it dozens and dozens of times off the arm of the sofa because that's where I use it. About six months ago the screen started to flicker, go dark, then come back to full brightness. Good thing I did a search. I'll have to take it apart and see if it is just some loose wires from all the droppage.

Aside from that, the glass getting scratched up due to hitting the keyboard area, and the trackpad getting a bit intermittent, this thing has been rock solid. It still does everything I need to do with it. I almost pulled the trigger on a new Toshiba at a good price, but the lack of a fingerprint reader stayed my hand.

Cheers!

PS I can't believe people complain about the battery. This thing is like 5 years old. Batteries only hold their charge for 12 months at best before significant degradation in my experience. That's why I won't buy a phone without user replaceable batteries.

 

I am too a HP HDX16 owner, since December of 2009!

The specs are:
-Intel Core2 Duo CPU P7350 @ 2.00GHz CPU
-2 x 2GB SODIMM DDR2 Synchronous 800 MHz (1.2 ns) RAM
-NVIDIA GeForce GT 130M GPU
-TOSHIBA MK3255GS 320GB 5400rpm HDD

The specs have remained unchanged since the beginning.

I must say, that the laptop has been heavily used. It should suffice to mention that the hard disk alone has 2033 power cycles, and has been powered on for 3.7 years (SMART data).

Therefore, the disk performance has also decreased through the years:
$ sudo hdparm -tT /dev/sda

/dev/sda:
Timing cached reads: 2918 MB in 2.00 seconds = 1459.67 MB/sec
Timing buffered disk reads: 168 MB in 3.01 seconds = 55.87 MB/sec (I think it should be around 100MB/sec)

But anyway, no bad sectors.

The laptop initially came with Windows Vista, and it became very slow and almost unusable in a few months time. I wiped it clean by the end of 2010 and installed Ubuntu 10.04 LTS.
I have not had a problem with it ever since, and for the last 3-4 years I have had it powered on 24/7. Last year it even fell off a table, about half a meter off the ground, and I thought "that's it",
because the thing is pretty heavy. But it just cracked open a little on the sides, and I pushed them back together until they clicked.

The battery of course died within 3 years. I bought another one during 2013, if I remember correctly, which lasted for a year only (it was not an HP-official product and apparently not a good one either).
So, for the last few months I am using it without a battery, it is plugged on an outlet and I power it off when I move it (rarely).

This HP has served me as the main computing device for studying, conducting research experiments, document writing/editing, browsing, listening to music, watching movies, and I have been
travelling with it to various destinations. For the last part, travelling with it, which concerns portability, it was a pain to carry it around, but other than that the laptop itself did not give me any reason to replace it, so
I never replaced it with something else, or bought an extra portable laptop. I had it as a present, so I was never asked about any specs, I would have preferred a 14"-15" laptop.

In any case, the laptop nowadays has clearly started to show its wear, and I just keep it for all-around simple tasks and wonder how much more it is going to last. It remains powered on 24/7, and
I should also add that I never opened it up to clean it or something like that.

This was my review/tribute to HP

edit:// I forgot to mention that my charger started to fail last year, it would make a strange sound and sometimes it would give power to the laptop while other times it wouldn't. I replaced it with a conventional one.

 

Well, I also just decided to replace my HDX16T, after using it for about 6 years now!
So far I replaced the battery twice, AC adapter replaced, replaced Hd to a faster 500GB 7200rpm, and last year I replaced it once again to a 120GB SSD and put the 500GB HD in am HDD caddy (a huge performance impact!).

Now It's running Windows 8.1. I faced problems like extremely irritating noise issues (fan is on almost all the time), terrible noise from speakers and headphones once attached.
But overall, It served me really well, and I always enjoyed it's large keyboard!

Due to a bad experience with 2 other HP laptops (14" DM4T and another 15" laptop), I was still thinking to buy the new HP SPECTRE X360, because I really like the idea of having a convertible, but for me 15" is the minimum for daily use, as I need a desktop replacement laptop.
In the end I decided to move to DELL, so I just bought an XPS 15 with the highest config (3K touch screen, i7 CPU, 16GB RAM, 512 GB SSD), hoping it will serve me for many years to come!

I'll keep the HDX16T as a backup laptop, as it's still working fine, but it's really time to move on.

This was my tribute to this great laptop

 

Anyone know where I can find the recovery disc? I f*cked up my hdd and I erased the recovery partition, my HDX is still allive and strong, upgraded to max cpu, ram and 2 hdd.

 

Well, my screen went black after about 6 years of intensive use of this laptop. The rest of the laptop is still operational,
I can hear the login sound, I can login, and then open a terminal to shutdown the machine for example.

I wonder if it is easy to replace the screen, although it might not even be a screen problem, but a power issue on the
motherboard that powers the screen.

It started around 1-2 weeks ago when the screen would sometimes turn black, or flicker..

Now I am using a Dell M4600 as a temp.

 

Saw the previous poster never got a response regarding replacing the screen on the HDX16. I ended up replacing my screen last year and it was not that difficult. Only had to make sure to buy the correct screen which was a 1080P screen, the HP repair manual for the HDX16 walks you through the disassembly. Ive used this laptop for 6 yrs and its still going. The screen isnt cheap, i paid around 200 for it a year ago so you would have to decide if its worth replacing the screen or buying a new laptop.

 

Thank you for your answer!

I got a replacement laptop through my lab, so I never tried to repair the HP. I think the problem lies in the (soldered) nVidia graphics chip, because if I plug an external monitor it doesn't work either. I found out a replacement motherboard at around 150 euros, but I figured it would be too much of a hassle.

I only bought an external HDD case at 3 euros to have my data, and operate on my new laptop.

 

Sorry, for bring to life an old thread. I still use my HDX16 CTO regularly, had to replace the screen panel with replacement from China, upgraded the HDD with 500GB SSD and upgraded the CPU to T9900. So I have a duo core running at 3GHz and Samsung EVO SSD makes it a sweet machine.
Replacing the panel was not easy by any means. I am running win 10 pro x64 v1511. I need assistance from anyone who may have successfully updated to win 10 pro x64 v1607. I am having a problem with the upgrade to the Anniversarry Version. Any assistance is welcome. My problem is the upgrade dies without any error code, I just get the message 'update failed'.

 

Never mind. I ended up doing a fresh install of the win10 anniversary update from an ISO image. The system is working much better. Something was badly messed up. sfc would fail and troubleshooter would try updating/correcting the update modules without real success. The pain has been worth it.