HP Pavillion zv5000z Review

Same here, except I see the three BIOS files in c:iosf21 are dated 4/26/2004. So it's an update, just not the relevant one. Each BIOS file has the string "Intel" in it but I couldn't find "AMD", "Athlon", or "Advanced". Nice to see HP pay attention to us AMD users [ !].

 

Well, I had a nice chat with a HP support guy, and he said that they've already alerted their hardware guys to the problem. We should see a working BIOS update... soon.

I took the opportunity to ***** about the weak GPU, lack of 7200RPM HD options, Linux-hostile Broadcom card and BIOS that locks out non-HP miniPCI cards, and anything else I could think of. Maybe HP will pay attention and not screw up their next Athlon 64 notebook.

(Yes, this notebook is great for WinXP users who just want to get work done, which is most of the market, BUT...)

 

Hey, we finally have competition for the Hitachi 7k60. See the below release from Seagate! Do not yet know what the capacity of the Momentus 7200.1 will be or how soon it will be available.

"Momentus 5400.2 and 7200.1

The newest generation of Seagate's popular notebook hard drive family, the new Momentus 5400.2 disc drive increases capacities by offering up to two discs and industry-leading areal densities of 50GB per disc, for total capacities up to 100GB. Seagate's new Momentus 7200.1 will be the company's first notebook hard drive with a 7,200-rpm spin speed, featuring Seagate SoftSonic fluid dynamic bearing motors. Momentus disc drives redefine mobility with low battery consumption and high resistance to 800Gs of non-operating shock."

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

Up to 100GB:

http://www.seagate.com/cda/newsinfo/newsroom/releases/article/0,1121,2169,00.html

Due out this fall. Seagate is my favorite HD brand.

 

Hey I finally got my HP $100 refund! It only took them 12 weeks and 4 days even though my original paperwork was correct.

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

Me too, mine just arrived today. About time.

 

I just received my zv5000 (CTO), with WUXGA 1920x1200 display. I upgraded it to the 7200 Hitachi 60GB drive myself, the stock drive was very slow.

The point of my post... works pretty good with Windows XP Pro (although some apps seem "confused" by the wide aspect ratio and layout text and buttons very strangely, even after resizing windows. not a big deal. I mainly bought it for 64-bit Linux.

So, I installed the latest SuSE Pro 9.1 64-bit on it, no worries. I did a "YOU" online update and got all the latest patches installed, including the NVIDIA drivers. Then when I went to configure the X server, it told me that the monitor was not reporting horizontal and vertical geometry information (DDC2B not implemented???) and tries to run at 1024x768, which works, but is stretched horizontally and looks pretty bad. I was hoping that somebody had a working a graphics configuration for X with this display option, or at least a pointer to a website where somebody is tracking Linux support for the platform, or any ideas at all how best to proceed from here.

Thanks...
[?]

 

Yup. I used the info here to get 1680x1050 working on mine:

http://www.loria.fr/~levy/SciTech/InstallNotes_Linux.txt

He's got modelines for 1920x1200 too. The 75Hz one should work. I'm surprised there wasn't a 60Hz one, normally that's what LCD screens run at. http://www.google.com/linux "1680x1050 XFree" found the link.

I've been playing 64-bit UT2004 with Fedora Core 2 on my Athlon 64 desktop. It's pretty stable at this point. I had to get patched nVidia drivers from minion.de for kernel 2.6 support, sounds like SuSE saved you the trouble. I haven't done much with Linux on the laptop lately, I should try that again.

 

[ ]

Thanks for the quick response, but I managed to get lucky with google (I found a thread on a site about getting a Dell notebook with a 1920x1200 monitor to work under Linux) and copied the modeline out of an example there into my XF86Config and it works like a champ and looks beautiful.

 

Could you all help me decide on a processor for the zv5000?

Celeron 2.8ghz or AMD Athlon XP-M 2800+ (1.60 GHz)

Notebook will be used for WiFi internet, DVD viewing, BASIC gaming.

Thanks [ ]

 

Celerons are evil, so the Athlon wins by default. I do recommend spending the extra $100 for the Athlon 64 3000+, that way you're all set for 64-bit WinXP whenever Microsoft gets around to shipping it (late this year probably), plus you get the hardware worm protection that WinXP Service Pack 2 enables (I'm running SP2 RC2 now, final should be out late this summer). It doesn't stop all worms, but it stops a huge chunk of them. It's much more future-proof, anyhow (and a little faster), and I suspect you're the kind of person who keeps his computers for several years (versus lunatics like me who upgrade yearly, give or take).

 

Ok, I'm starting to be convinced of the AMD Athlon64 3000+ 1.80 GHz, although I doubt I'm going to need the extra power, or that I'll upgrade WinXP to the 64 bit version, or that I'll ever buy any 64bit software. (I stay pretty OLD SCHOOL) But, you're right that I will probably keep this notebook as long as possible.... hopefully over 4 years.

If I go that route, I still need to decide which video card to get:

32MB NVIDIA GeForce 4 420 Go
OR
64MB NVIDIA GeForce 4 440 Go +1394 & 5-in-1

I'll only ever use it for WiFi Internet, DVD viewing, audio recording, and BASIC gaming. Will I notice any issues with the 32mb card, based on my usage?

Am I correct in understanding that the AMD Athlon64 3000+ 1.80 GHz will be comparable to a P4 3Ghz?

I really didn't want a beefed up system, but it's starting to go that way... [ ]

THANKS A TON..... I'm so glad I ran into this site. I can already tell I'll be spending a lot of time here as soon as I get this puppy!

 

I'd get the 64MB option, if only to get the FireWire (aka IEEE-1394) port and 5-in-1 media reader. That, and the GeForce 440 is entry level to begin with, cutting its available memory in half makes me cringe. I don't know where they get off charging $50 for that option though. If you're ever going to do digital video editing you'll need that FireWire port. Given that you can't upgrade that option later... safest course of action is to spend the $50.

You should check the Compaq R3000z too, it's essentially the same guts as the HP zv5000z but the options are sometimes priced differently.

The 12 cell battery is a worthwhile option too. Adds weight, but you'll get close to 4 hours of battery life with that thing.

 

Video editing? Damn.... you think I'll be doing that much work? I guess I'll get the 64mb card though, since it comes with a 5in1 card reader (I didn't realize that!)

I have already decided (thanks to this forum) that the 12 cell battery is a MUST!

The Compaq 3000z is about $150 less, but the sound quality from the HP blew me away at Circuit City! The silver look of the Compaq is nice, but I imagine it looking pretty dirty after some serious use. Also, could be distracting while watching DVD.

...I'm getting more and more confident about what I want.... maybe I'll finalize the order soon... [ ]

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by brianstretch

 

You definitely should get the 64MB option, as this vcard is crappy to begin with, and 32mb only makes it worse. If ANY heavy gaming is to be considered, try to avoid this vcard.

You might want to consider another manufacturer, such as eMachines, Voodoo, or Acer for your Athlon 64 computing needs if gaming is your bag. These manufacturers use ATI Mobility Radeon cards, and generally run about the same price (except for the Voodoo, of course).

The eMachines M6809 is an excellent deal at $1399 after mail in rebates from BestBuy. The Acer Ferrari 3200 is hot looking and hot performing for under $1900.

Good luck!

 

Owners of zv5000z, please advise!
What screen shall one get? Shall I pay extra $ for the top of a line LCD screen?
What is the optimal screen resolution for this particular HP model?

Thanks for the answers.

 

LCDs should be run at their native resolution. I've been very happy with my 1680x1050 res screen, though I'd have probably bought the 1920x1200 if it had been available Just Because It's There. If your eyes are bad you'll have to switch to Large Fonts or Extra Large Fonts. I'd say it's a judgement call between the 1680 and 1920 pixel wide screens, 1680 was probably the right choice for me but I'd really like to see what 1920 looks like. The availability of high-pixel-density screens is THE major advantage of the zv5000z IMHO.

 

I am absolutely aware that LCD's must be run in a native resolution.
I've read all the marketing info. But frankly I am looking for the people's "IMHO".
So your personal opinion is a valuable one for me.
It's very tempting to get 1920 for an extra 50 bucks. On the other hand, 1680 may provide better ergonomics.

I will use the laptop for internet, ms office, occasional 2d design work (high resolution is a plus), rare gaming (don't care much about resolution since the vcard is poor and I will have to use 800*600 anyway) and some multimedia tasks (mp3's and movies).
Unfortunately I won't be able to get my hands on these notebook before I get one
Thanks for the help!

 

brianstretch

This is a little off the subject, but I would sure love to find a small (I.E. reasonably priced) LCD monitor with the 1680 or 1920 horizontal resolution (16x10 aspect ratio) to use as a secondary screen for a desktop companion to this notebook, but even the 19 inchers do not seem to come in anything but 1280 by 1024 (16x12.8 aspect ratio--5x4) which the notebook does not support.

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

brianstretch
forgot to thank you personally for the reply

 

Since you do 2D work it sounds like you're a candidate for the 1920 res screen, especially given the minor price premium. Buy it and let us know how it looks [ ].

 

You've got the point
Let me become the "test mouse".

Another questions for lucky owners - is it true that zv5000z is one of the best sounding notebooks on the market?

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by vr5

 

I am sorry to hear about such a poor experience. I'd suggest returning it back and ordering zv5000 with a lower res.
Thank you for letting me and other potential buyers know about your experience!

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Saparok

I strongly recommend against ordering this size panel, if I had to do over again, the 1600xwhatever option would have been much better.


<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'></font id='quote'></blockquote id='quote'>

 

Thanks much for the info on the highest resolution screen. I was a little envious when they announced that screen after I had my unit (1680 x 1050). I do use Windows Large Fonts and a negligible few web pages have a little problem that I can live with. I am sure the problem would be much worse with Extra Large fonts.

This next week (July 11-17) Circuit City has the zv5260us on sale for $1500 after rebates ($200). It is an Athlon 64 3200+ with good options (512 MB, 80 GB, DVD burner, wireless etc.) EXCEPT it has the 1280 x 800 resolution screen

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

I got my $100 check [ ] after being asked for UPC code.
I received the check while I was away for 3 weeks.

 

I am considering buying the ZV5000Z computer. However, according to support at HP, the computer does not come with the complete version of Windows XP - just a "Quick Restore" CD. Will this be a problem when replacing the hard drive with a higher speed one?

This forum has been extremely helpful.

 

I do not know about the Win XP Home version because I have the Pro version, but I just inserted the "Operating System CD" that I have and it asked me if I wanted to install Windows XP (this is on a non-HP desktop). It has the standard I386 directory. It is a full installation disk!

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

I do believe that the Compaq/HP restore disk will at first ask to install windows on other machines, but it will check for the correct hardware for it to actually install. I haven't tested recently, but thats the way it was with my older restore cds.

With regards to installing freshly onto a new hard drive that you place in the laptop you shouldnt have a problem. I did that myself after I got the Hitachi 7k60 drive.

Good Luck!

 

There are four screws along the bottom back edge, only 3 of them are relevant I think but it's easiest just to remove all four. Once you've done that, continue with Venombite's instructions.

 

Hi what 3 screws were you referring too? I see a bunch of them but none with just 3 screws that'll open up. I have a zv5000z. I manage to open the fan compartment but thats about it but i doubt the memory is there. Can you shed some more light onto the subject. I have a 256MB ram sitting there that i want to replace. thanks a bunch.


<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by Venombite

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by brianstretch

 

CPU-Z will read the manufacturer's info right off the SODIMM. It correctly identifies my Micron memory.

Memory and HD upgrade guide here.

 

I just got a HP Pavilion zv500z (Athlon 64 3000+). It's a nice machine but I have a couple of major beefs with it due to which I am thinking of returning it:

1. The touchpad is placed such that it is under your right palm instead of between your two hands/palms. The result? When typing, your right palm is brushing against the touchpad and makes your cursor jumps all over the place. This makes typing impossible. Changing the touchpad setting to "tap off when typing" helps a little but does not completely correct the problem. I heard there's a setting for this on the Synaptics touchpad drivers but HP uses Alps touchpad, so no go. HP does have the button to turn off the touchpad, but that doesn't look an attractive solution.

2. It's too big!!! They could've easily shaved off a couple of inches in depth. The lid has an inch of extra space on the top edge and an inch and a half on the bottom edge. They could've fit the LCD closer to the edges to save space.

3. The hinge that ties the lid to the base is ridiculous. It's not flush with the back of the laptop but rather sticks out about half an inch. The laptop is already HUGE, and on top of that they come up with this wonderful hinge?

4. It seems sluggish, but maybe that's just me. Opening IE takes about 20-25 seconds. The system seems to think for a while before it does anything after a button click. Mine's an Athlon 64 3000+ so it should be fast. Maybe it's because of the 4200 RPM hard drive.

5. It runs a little hot. The fan is constantly on, and I can't place it on the lap for long. All I've been doing is surfing.

6. I got the 12-cell battery thinking I'd get 4-5 hours out of it. Looks like I only get about 2. Again, all I've been doing is surfing the web.

Other than that, I'm pretty happy with the laptop. I got it with 256 MB of RAM but added a Kingston 512MB stick that was on sale at BestBuy last week for $106.99 PLUS a $17 rebate.

My question to long time user of zv5000z is, how do you guys like your system? How do you get around the above described problems, especially the touchpad issue? I'm now thinking about returning this and getting the z3000t instead. Centrino (a couple of hundred dollars more expensive, but with correct placement of touchpad, and 2 pounds lighter). Should I stick with Athlon 64? How much does a replacement 5400 or 7200 RPM hard drive cost?

 

I just bought the zv5000 with the 3.0Ghz P4 two weeks ago and really like it. The speakers sounds very good for a laptop. I was running Nascar 4 and it said it was hitting 59-60 fps by their own programs measurement. I haven't ran a program yet that the laptop had any problem running wonderfully. My desktop is getting on the older side so this laptop is a welcome sight and has a bit of muscle to make me happy. I don't have any complaints yet.

-Bill

 

It's a combination of the slow HD and all the software HP preloaded, mostly the HD. One of the first things I did was swap in a Hitachi 7200RPM HD and do a full OS reinstall. Now my zv5000z is about as fast as a desktop. 60GB 7200RPM drives are about $180 from newegg.com, mwave.com, zipzoomfly.com.

No touchpad problems here? The pad placement looks fine to me. My palms rest to either side of it, the right palm closer than the left but it's still OK. If my hands were smaller it might be a problem...?

It sounds like you don't have PowerNOW! enabled (which is odd, it ought to be by default). While you're at it get the current Athlon 64 processor driver from amd.com. Set your Control Panel | Power Options | Power Schemes to Portable/Laptop. Figure on 3-4 hours of battery life.

 

I am installing the AMD Processor driver now, hope that it helps. The Power setting is already set to Portable/Laptop. I'll look into getting the new HD drive. I think I paid about $150 extra to HP for getting a 60 gig HD instead of a 40 gig (both 4200RPM). That money would've been better spent on this Hitachi.

The touchpad location does feel odd to me. On my previous laptops (Dell, VPR Matrix), the touchpad was right underneath the space bar (space bar being in the middle of the keyboard). If I placed my hand in normal typing position (left hand fingers on A, S, D, F and right fingers on ;, L, K J), then the touchpad would fall squarly between the two palms, with neither palm touching it. With this HP, however, the touchpad is placed a little to the right, not smack in the middle under the space bar. So my right palm is about an inch over the touchpad, brushing the scroll bar and a little bit of the gliding area. When typing, this results in inadvertant cursor jumps and screen scrolls.

Both the 5000 and 4000 series appear to have the same problem, but not the zd7000 and the zt3000. Just look at the picture of a zd7000 and see how far left the touchpad is relative to the left and right edges of the case, but it falls flush under the space bar.

I am surprised why no one else seems to be much bothered by it (or even notice it!). Maybe you guys know a trick or two that I don't The "tap off when typing" setting helps (doesn't let the cursor jump to another place on the screen), but it still doesn't prevent inadverrent scrolls.

I really do like the laptop and hope I don't have to return it (to Costco). I want to send in the $50 rebate to HP, but if I decide to return it, I am not sure if Costco will accept the return with the UPC missing from the box.

 

Brahmachan 99 thank you for your attention to my request. I have it handled now,and I purchased a Compaq R3000Z CTO instead.Franzwha.[ ]

 

In response:
1. The touchpad

Now that I'm home, I plug in a great logitech keyboard so don't have to contend with that. But I generally found pressing the button not to be too inconvenient, even clever.

2. too big
Yes, it is quite large, but I guess that's what comes with a desktop replacement... but yeah, pretty annoying.

3. The hinge
well spoken.

4. It seems sluggish,

I have the slower harddrive too, and notice the same thing. Especially while in Linux while right-clicking on words to have it correct the spelling takes forever and the CPU goes to 100%. Didn't know it was that hard...

5. It runs a little hot.
It seems to be ok from my experience if you keep it on a flat smooth surface. But yeah in the lap it's hot.

6. I got the 12-cell battery thinking I'd get 4-5 hours out of it.

I seem to get about 3 in Windows and 2 in Linux (but in linux i do the intensive graphic/GIMP work, Windows is just the 'net and stuff.

Overall I love the laptop. Now that I'm off a ship and can also use my 17" flatscreen and regular mouse, keyboard, etc., it's even better because if I want to I can take it places but if I don't I know that I have desktop power. I'd give it an 8.5/10 overall, but a 10/10 from what i knew it's limitations would be when i bought it.

 

brandonfpu, get powernowd for Linux:

http://www.deater.net/john/powernowd.html

Or one of the other power management daemons. That will boost your battery life to at least as high as you'd get under Windows (though Linux does a LOT better than Windows does with no power management). Works for me under 64-bit Fedora Core 2 Linux. The newer notebooks with the CG stepping Athlon 64 CPUs run at 0.95V at their lowest power stepping versus 1.1V for the older C0 stepping; I suspect you might have the latter? I can force 1GHz @ 0.85V on my C0 stepping CPU using ClockGen under Windows (no such Linux equivalent AFAIK), which makes for a merely warm running notebook. Anything made in the past several months has the CG stepping (I bought one of the early zv5000z's).

 

<blockquote id='quote'> quote:<hr height='1' noshade id='quote'>Originally posted by brahmachari99

 

I have been doing a lot of video editing sitting in the comfort of my family room. I love the zv5000z. I have not been preeducated to the offset of the touchpad, so I have not found it to be a problem.

I have not yet upgraded the disk drive. I operate off a 100 Mb Ethernet home network and have my video storage on another computer with 7200rpm drives. I am going to wait until Seagate delivers the Momentus 7200.1 100GB 7200 rpm drive later this year before I upgrade the internal drive. I also have a big external 3.5" drive with a USB 2.0 interface if I have to take my video files with me. (While my wife and sister-in-law were baking in the sun on our recent trip to the beach I was sitting on a comfortable porch sipping a cool brew or two and editing the latest wedding.)

I have developed a capability of comfortably setting it on my knees where the air intake and exhaust is not blocked so cooling is not a problem.

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

Quote:

__________________________________________________
quote from brahmachari99

"4. It seems sluggish, but maybe that's just me. Opening IE takes about 20-25 seconds. The system seems to think for a while before it does anything after a button click. Mine's an Athlon 64 3000+ so it should be fast. Maybe it's because of the 4200 RPM hard drive."
________________________________________________________________

I just checked my Mozilla 1.7.1. It takes a maximum of 2 seconds to open to my own internal home page. Then to open Google it takes about 0ne second! (DSL)

I have removed 90% of the garbage that HP preloads.


Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

Hey, what crap from HP are you talking about? Can you be specific?
Thanks

zv5000z AMD 64 3000+ 1.8 Ghz 768 DDR SDRAM 15.4" WXGA (1280x800) 30 GB 4200 RPM Hard Drive 64MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(TM) 4 440 Go

 

I cannot remember all the programs that I deleted. Go to the Control Panel/Add Remove programs. Check each one out, if it questionable do not remove especially the drivers. Remove (Microsoft Office, Quicken etc unless you plan on paying for these. It is safest to reboot after each program is removed.

I have only 22 tasks running in Windows Task Manager (ctrl-alt-del) that is near minimum. You should have 0% cpu usage when idleing. If you are infected with Internet garbage programs you need antivirus software plus you should run programs like Ad-aware and SpyBot Search and Destroy. You should also get a registry cleaner especially after removing items.

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro

 

hey, what is registry cleaner? Where do I get one?

zv5000z AMD 64 3000+ 1.8 Ghz 768 DDR SDRAM 15.4" WXGA (1280x800) 30 GB 4200 RPM Hard Drive 64MB NVIDIA(R) GeForce(TM) 4 440 Go

 

wgehrke = 1680 x 1050...need ur info & others with that resolution.

i'm debating whether to get 15.4" WXGA (1280x800) or 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050). Money is not the issue, its only like $40 extra.

Haven't seen anyone with 1680 x 1050 resolution. How is it compared to the 1280 x 800. Is the text really really small? How is it when you surf? What about icons? movies? General use?

If you wanted to, can you lower the resolution to 1280x800 & does it look good on that resolution too or is it blurry because its not "native resolution".

Need advice by this afternoon when i purchase my lappy.
THANKS

 

I have 1680x1050 and highly recommend it. The normal font size at this res is about right for me, some people have to switch to large fonts. Some people prefer the 1920x1200 res screen but I'd probably have to switch to large fonts to use that... but it'd be perfect for HDTV-res video (1920x1080), photo editing, and what not. I'd choose between 1680 and 1920. 1680 if you think normal fonts will be OK, 1920 if you're going to increase the font size anyhow. Windows ClearType font smoothing works noticibly better on the higher pixel density displays. You always want to run a LCD screen at its native res.

DVD video looks great on this screen.

 

brianstretch is absolutely correct, I love 1680 x 1050 resolution.

Bill
zv5000z :: 3200+ :: 1GB :: 40GB 4200rpm :: 15.4" WSXGA+ (1680x1050) :: XP Pro