*HP dm4t (1XXX series) Owners Lounge!*

does anybody else think the sound is horrid? there's NO detail whatsoever.

also, i disagree with some of the posters here and agree with the laptopmag review in that the trackpad sucks. really bad.

 

Quick question: Are the hinges metal? It looks metal it in the pics..
As for the color, I'm probably gonna check it out personally in a store. Wonder if any stores have them yet.

 

Yes the hinges are metal. And to whoever asked about the display earlier - it's pretty great. It seemed comparable to the 13" MBP I was using earlier (and to clarify, that wasn't the current MBP - it was a 2009 model).

I have the high-capacity 6-cell battery, and while downloading updates, web surfing, and playing youtube videos constantly, I got a little over 4 hours out of it with the "HP recommended" power mode. The screen was plenty bright (I actually turned it down a notch from the default). So I'd say 4 hours is a good conservative estimate of battery life - putting it in "power saver" mode and skipping the youtubing/downloading would definitely bump the lifespan up.

The whole pink discussion may be a little excessive. I asked a couple friends what color they thought it was, and both said silver. When I told them some people were worried it looked pink, they still didn't see it. I think the pink is in the eye of the beholder... it's definitely not the same tone of silver as other laptops, but it is definitely silver. But at the same time, I understand how a little thing like that could bother you when you just bought an item this pricey... everything has to be perfect!

Overall, I'm definitely happy with this laptop. For the price I paid (<$600), there is no way to get this kind of performance and quality in any other laptop. Now I just need to find an equally good deal on a (non-pink!) messenger bag.

 

ok, so in my haste, i did a clean install without backing up the drivers (stupid me).

for some reason, the driver for the SmartPass fingerprint software on the dm4 support website (sp47904) isn't installing correctly and is giving me errors. anybody have a solution?

 

So far only two really strong negative comments; one on sound and the touchpad and one on the build quality and lack of quality control. I have great need for good sound and absolutely no build problems will be tolerated. Many of you seem to like it. Regarding the "pink" color the TM2 had the chameleon color as well, I thought that was a good feature about it, I thought it looked "bronze", like a nice suntan. This by the way is HP's third chance with me. If there is any problem, back it goes and another company will get my business. I remain optimistic though.

 

I guess that I got a better built model than you guys because mine does not have any of these problems. The sound is very loud and clear and the touchpad is seated perfectly, and works perfectly as well. The only problem I have had with mine are the tight USB ports.

 

I should be getting mine today.. I hope I don't get one with any build complications and just be satisfied right out of the box. So far from your reviews, it's been very positive. I'll be sure to let you guys know my impression as soon as I get it.

 

A little review by anyone would be great....

If you guys could give us some temp readings using HWmonitor, you can download it here: CPUID - System & hardware benchmark, monitoring, reporting

And some more notes on battery life, performance, fan/cooling... that would be fantastic!

 

Just posted mine in the HP subforum.

 

I've been following this review for a long time as I'm interested in this computer and probably comparing it to a 13 inch MBP. I'm not much of a gamer but I was still considering the 512 MB 5450...how is the graphics on the Intel HD for movies and general use? Also, how much of a difference does the 5450 have on battery life vs. the Intel HD? Lastly, how much weight does the 9 cell battery add compared to the 6? Thanks.

 

@triplem05 -- I can tell you my friend's experience with the Intel HD graphics. He has an MSI laptop with almost identical specs (except a 5400 rpm HDD), and he can actually play Modern Warfare 2 on lower settings. It's not the greatest-looking gameplay, but it's certainly acceptable.

 

What about watching HD videos? does the ATI strictly benefit games? or does it affect movies and shows etc...

 

Well, I can tell you this much: we tried to stream Avatar in 1080p off his laptop to my HDTV yesterday, and it didn't work too well. So, I would assume that the ATI graphics card would help in that scenario.

 

Just got off the phone with HP about my replacement. I got them to add the 1GB ATI 5450 to it for $45, and they threw in free 2 day shipping.

HP Pavilion dm4t customizable Notebook PC

* • Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
* • Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-620M Dual Core processor (2.66GHz, 4MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 3.33GHz
* • 3GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
* • 320GB 7200RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
* • 1GB ATI Mobility Radeon(TM) HD 5450 switchable graphics
* • 14.0" diagonal High-Definition HP BrightView LED Display (1366 x 768)
* • SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-R/RW with Double Layer Support
* • HP TrueVision Webcam + Fingerprint Reader + Digital Microphone
* • Intel Wireless-N Card
* • Full-size island-style keyboard
* • High Capacity 6 Cell Lithium Ion Battery (standard)
* • Microsoft(R) Works 9.0
* • HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope

Estimated build date: June 17, 2010
No tracking number available

Lets hope this one is built properly this time.

 

Just for the record, the 5450 has a 64-bit bus so 1GB is not to perform any better than 512MB.

 

nvm.

10chars

 

Looks like this laptop isn't all its been hyped up to be Guess I need to start looking some more

 

Just curious, how so? Besides the unlucky few who got poorly built models, how else is it unsatisfactory?

 

For the record, my friend ordered the exact same configuration I had, and his laptop was built flawlessly. One interesting thing to note, the i7 shows up in task manager as a quad core. I think this is due to the fact it has 4 threads, but I'm not exactly sure.

 

did anybody have their laptop delivered to them even though the online FexEx update didn't say it was out for delivery?
Mine's in a facility not too far away but its at "dest sort facility" and it's been like that since 12 am. I tried calling but all they told me was its expected June 3rd like it originally said and that I can't come pick it up until that date.. I'm pretty sure you can't pick up on the weekends or else I would have drove anyways. I'm just hoping the delivery truck will miraculously show up tonight

 

Between the color, more people saying the touchpad kind of sucks, speakers not that great, etc. Touch pad is huge for me because I will tend to use that more so than a mouse. Don't really want a laptop that looks pink either. Guess I need to check it out in person if possible.

Is there no way to get a faster boot up? 1:30 is pretty damn slow.

 

I am getting around 1 minute and I haven't done half of the boot time enhancements I normally do yet.

The color is really the only problem I have with this but at its worse it still looks more champagne than it does pink. I have asked 10 people and they all said it was silver.

 

I think the color is mostly an issue only if you're staring at the laptop and consciously thinking about pink. It shouldn't really be a problem, from what I'm hearing.

 

Can anyone recommend a good 14" laptop sleeve for the dm4? I want something decent, but not too expensive. I already have a nice bag, just looking for a nice sleeve to hold it as well.

I am currently considering this one, but I appreciate others opinions on the matter.

Thanks!

 

i've done a clean install, and the boot time is probably less than a minute for me. if you want a faster boot up, you're going to need to upgrade the components (e.g. SSD).

my gripes with the touchpad has forced me to contemplate on shipping this back to HP. i'm the type who likes to keep my left thumb resting on the left clicker while i use my right index finger to move the cursor. this touchpad/touchpad's drivers don't like this at all. sometimes the cursor jumps to a random corner, sometimes it zooms in/out if i'm browing a webpage, sometimes it tries to rotate the page. i much prefer the 2" x 1" touchpad with separate click buttons on my 4 year old toshiba. i hope future driver updates will address these problems.

the speakers themselves are very tinny. i don't expect a movie theater experience with booming bass, but there's absolutely zero bass here. if you like to listen to music through your laptop's speakers, then the dm4's speakers will not satisfy you. also, since the speakers are located towards the front-bottom of the laptop, you'll muffle the already muffled-sounding speakers if you like to actually put laptops on your lap.

i really wanted to love the dm4, but the touchpad and speaker quality is really turning me off.

 

I had the same problem with the touchpad...just disable gestures. To do this, right click on the red icon in the bottom right corner of your screen, select pointing device properties, and it's in the menus somewhere there.

 

MAN UP !!!!!!!! Real men use pink laptops.

 

He might be looking at it on a crap screen.

my dm3 screen shows colors and grays differently than my 20" AS-IPS panel display hooked to my desktop.

 

If you want you can always disable the trackpad by double tapping the top left corner of the pad, there is a very clear point there.

http://forum.notebookreview.com/att...8-official-hp-dm4t-owners-lounge-cimg0025.jpg

You may want to always have it on, but if you are typing, you can easily turn it off/on as you wish.

 

Yes, the 32nm i7 is the dual core but supports hyperthreading, which pretends it has two cores for every physical core. The i7 quad would show 8 cores in the taskmanager.

 

any benchmarks on the 5450 yet? curious to see how it compares to the 4550 in my TM2. did a search notebookcheck.net, but they haven't run benchmarks yet.

 

I got 4080 in 3dMark06 out of the box.

 

how come HP can't send out pink tacos but they can send out pink laptops when people don't want them?

 

The color isn't bad really. Anyone else have to enable their ATI before it would show up?

 

Is the hard drive easily accessible? I'm looking into swapping for a SSD but don't really want to do so if I'd have to disassemble the entire thing.

 

1. Remove the battery (blocks the access screws off)
2. Remove the big panel on the bottom (2 screws)
3. Remove the smaller panel covering the hard drive

Simple as that

 

Hey abaddon, how would what would you say about the DM4 screen quality as compared to the Dell Studio line? Also have you played any games on it?

 

The only Studio I have used extensively was the Studio 15 with 1600x900 screen, though I have seen a lot of the 14z, and I would put the screen slightly ahead of the 14z and equal to the 15. As for games, I have only tried a few older games (KOTOR, CS:S, things like that) and they obviously ran flawlessly at high settings while the only newer game I have tried is ME and it ran smoothly on medium settings, didn't measure the FPS.

 

Went to Office Depot, and Staples today, but neither of them had the dm4..

 

And this comment is relevant how?

 

First time user on this board. I do not own this laptop YET but I've been playing with it everyday at work. I work at costco and we had this laptop for a few days now. I've open and played with more notebooks then most of you on this board and I gotta say this is the only notebook that I really like. We sell it for $899 with the base intel i5 cpu, 4gb ram and 500GB 7200rpm drive. I just config it online at costco.com and it seems that you can get it cheaper online than at the costco store.

Even though I've been playing with this computer for the past few days I did not have time to really site down and test the performance on it and I have some questions for the owners of this laptop.

I am getting this computer mainly for photoshop and adobe lightroom while I am on the road. Besides working at costco I am also a photographer. I am still pissed that HP screen sucks but it is good enough for indoor use. I am interested in the performance of this computer with PS CS4 and adobe lightroom, but mainly lightroom. Anyone have lightroom installed in there laptop yet? I am interested in how fast you are able to view the pictures and filter them. Is there a lag when you move from one image to another with RAW files?

I know that is a lot to ask but I just haven't had the time to try it at work.

The last question is with the battery. Anyone bought the extended 6 cell battery that gives you a little bit better battery life? If so what is the parts number for that battery? I want to see if the costco version gives the extend battery or not. I know it does not give the 9 cell battery. Also anyone who bought it with the 9 cell battery can you post a picture of it how it looks like on the notebook?

Thanks in advance.

 

so if the HP screens are not very good, is it even worth it to get discrete graphics? or is Intel HD good enough

 

You DEFINITELY want to get the ATI discrete graphics option if you want to do work with photoshop and lightroom. If you can afford the 1GB graphics card update I would highly recommend going for it. The only other limiting factor would be the cpu...buy the best one you can afford.

As for the battery, another user has posted pictures of the 9 cell here: http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-compaq-voodoo-pc/487483-hp-dm4t-review.html

Good luck.

 

Does costco have the new dv5t in store to compare to the dm4t? Since these laptops are pretty similar.

 

You can see all of the Costco HP offerings here: http://www.costco.com/CTO/HPLanding.aspx?Prodid=10029570&whse=BC&Ne=4000000&eCat=BC|84|56670&N=4017749&Mo=1&No=0&Nr=P_CatalogName:BC&cat=28163&Ns=P_Price|1||P_SignDesc1&lang=en-US&Sp=C&topnav=

 

If you are concerned about screen quality, the envy 14 comes with a higher quality panel, when it launches next month a similar config may cost a bit more, but not too much more. And costco is usually pretty close to HP so they may offer it online.

 

I was in a costco this past friday and they had either one of the new dv6 models or dv5 models, it was not a metal casing, it was the plastic frame, but it looked pretty nice. The trackpad was huge in comparison to the older models still on display, and seemed responsive enough, but I am comparing it to those shiny metallic trackpads on the current lineup.

 

If anyone finds a new dv5t would you mind measuring the keyboard? I want to know if it is the same size as the dm4t keyboard so maybe there is a chance of buying a dv5t backlit keyboard and putting it on the dm4.

 

There are now 2 reviews at the HP page for the dm4t.

 

thanks for the update, very positive reviews. im still waiting on mine to come in unfortunately, it should be in tomorrow though. ill let you guys know of my impression of it and if i have any problems.