HP dv4t - Wondering What To Expect

I'm going to be ordering an HP dv47 soon with the following hardware specs:
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- Intel(R) Pentium(R) Processor T4200 (2.0 GHz, 1MB L2 Cache, 800MHz FSB)
- 3GB DDR2 System Memory (2 Dimm)
- 320GB 5400RPM SATA Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
- 512MB NVIDIA GeForce G 105M
- 14.1" diagonal WXGA High-Definition HP LED BrightView Widescreen (1280 x 800)
- LightScribe SuperMulti 8X DVD+/-RW with Double Layer Support
- Webcam [For LED Display]
- Wireless-G Card with Bluetooth
- 12 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
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I was wondering what to expect in terms of battery life and heat.

 

PhaZ - I have ordered a dv4t similar to yours - to replace my dv4z because of battery life problems. I am only getting two hours on a good day out of the dv4z with AMD processor and graphics. I'm hoping to get three hours with the P7450 on mine with H-P's "high capacity" six-cell. Since your has a 35-watt processor/chipset - but since you have a 12-cell, hopefully you would be able to get 5+ hours. I really like the build quality/etc of the dv4 series - just had a problem with battery life.

 

Thanks for the reply. I might be going a step up on the processor which would upgrade it to a Core 2 Duo of the same speed, so I'm guessing that will decrease my battery life a little, but I'm guessing what will probably really kill my battery life is the dedicated graphics card. I'm hoping to get at least 4 hours of battery life with regular usage, which basically would be when I'm not trying to play a game that would use the graphics card a lot.

Do you have any heat problems? I'm going to probably have it on desks around campus most of the time, and the rest of the time I'll just put it on the sleeve case, which i hope will be enough to dampen the heat for a couple hours.

 

Isn't the 105M a dual card? Said on Nvidias site that it has something called Hybrid power, so it uses the integrated 9100M when nothing heavy in use or something like that..

Though now after just reading it, it says you need a tool to change it.. I wonder what tool you need, because my battery life is pretty bad

 

the 105m in the dv4t is NOT a hybrid....

 

If it came with a 9400M or a 102M in conjunction with a 105M, then it'll be hybrid.

 

A 6-cell will never get more than two hours. My DV5 gets a hour and a half. With a 12-cell, 4 hours would be a more "real-life" estimate. 5 hours or over is only achievable by low-voltage processors. And that 12-cell battery is so damn expensive, but i need one myself so i'm saving up for it.

 

Th3 - I received my dv4t yesterday and I have to disagree with you about the 6-cell - at least with Intel processors. My dv4t has a P7450 and I have it set to power saver. After a full charge, I surfed with it last night for 40 minutes - and for an hour/15 min so far this morning (including defragging) - and its at 48% on the "old" dv4z battery (I didn't even un-pack the battery with the new dv4t). So - as of now - I have an hour/55 min with just under half of the charge remaining. AMD processors and graphics tend to be power hogs and thus your poor battery-life experience with your dv5z. My only task now is to try to sell the dv4z - I will be hard-pressed to buy a laptop with an AMD processor in the future.

 

Oh ok I see, well dang that sucks, was hoping there would be a way to add more battery life..

One Q though, why does srtest.com say I have 1.7 GB of video RAM? And on my computer it says part of it is the dedicated 512 MB ram, but the rest is shared video memory.. Why does it have both shared and dedicated?? Is that just a Vista thing?? Also any real need for that shared memory?

 

Yes it is a Vista thing. XP will not show it to you however it is still allocated. You remember the old "AGP Aperture Size" setting in the BIOS? It was user configurable. Now on PCI-E it is allocated automatically depending on the amount of memory in your system.

This memory is used in intensive 3D applications and games to store textures when the video card's RAM is full. It is only allocated upon demand, it is not permanently "stolen" like onboard graphics cards do. And like i said above, this thing has been around for years, only not known by the general public.