*HP dv6t & dv7t Select Edition / Quad Edition (6XXX series) Owners Lounge*

Get the Umber if you like to clean your laptop every few days. I had both and I haven't cleaned the steel gray after a week of usage. It doesn't show any fingerprints.

 

For those who are curious..
HDD is a Seagate Momentus ST9750420AS 750GB 7200 RPM
Drive is a Samsung TS-LB23L with Lightscribe
RAM is 4GB Micron and 2GB Hyundai

For those of you waiting: it's well worth it. I did a fresh install of Windows 7, and this thing flies. It's ridiculously fast for a laptop. The 1080p screen is outstanding. I'm not spec-crazy or anything. I'm more than impressed with this. Best screen I've seen on a laptop period.

My only complaint is that my left two USB connectors don't seem to be working. Anyone know if they're something special or anything? They worked before I reinstalled windows, but all of my drivers are up-to-date/

 

I did the minimized recovery after making my own disks, and I didn't have any issues at all. The USB 3.0 drivers are very different it appears from the standard Intel drivers.

 

Are those for sure the 3.0 ports? I've tried my mouse and my external HDD and it doesn't pick up anything.
Edit: I'll try reinstalling the 3.0 drivers.
Also, has anyone used the Norton subscription? Does it use up a lot of resources and such?

 

I just got my dv6 today with the 2gb Radeon 6770. I was playing the original witcher today some and I noticed within 10 minutes the bottom where the fans are was noticeably hot, not warm but hot to the touch. I didn't think a game from 07/08 would stress the laptop so much. What is acceptable while gaming on these? It just seemed to me that it shouldn't be so hot after such little gameplay. I was on the switchable graphics thread, but I have no clue how to see if it is switching between the 6770 and intel when I game. Thanks for any help!

 

If your laptop got any louder, that was the GPU kicking in. I would assume that it would automatically switch to it if you were playing anything with decent graphics at 1080p.

 

On my dv7 I did a clean install with no problems. *Provided* you make a set of recovery disks you can I believe safely delete the Recovery Partition. I left the Tools Partition as is because it seems to be used by some of the Bios programs although what for I am not sure. You will see it is a fat 32 partition and is created afresh if you install HP Bios Update UEFI from the HP Software and Downloads page so I thought it safest to leave it and it's a very small partition anyway.

 

I did a clean install as well.. I went in and "merged" the C drive and Recovery partitions. That missing 15GB was bothering me. >_>

 

Anyone get the error message "Unable to start the Bluetooth stack service" after boot up?

 

The ports on the left side are the 3.0 ports for sure.

 

I got them to work. Had to reinstall the drivers.
If you've just gotten it or are about to, make sure you download the ATI drivers through the windows update as well. Wouldn't let me play Minecraft until I did. The switchable graphics is making me mad though... I set Firefox and Java to 'High Performance' my graphics card kicked in for a second and then shut back off.

 

I just finished measuring the 1 TB 5400 drive vs the Momentus XT 500 GB Hybrid SSD drive and there is a measurable difference. The Hybrid has a couple weeks usage now so the cache should have built up nicely.

The test was:

Cold Boot to blinking finger reader
Login with fingerprint to one account
Fast user switch to the other account

Standard drive - 40.4s, 27.6s, 19.1s, 1:29.8 total
Hybrid SSD - 30.8s, 11.1s, 13.2s, 55.1 total

The machine went into hibernate and resume much faster as well. Bear in mind some factors too, the Hybrid had a minimized restore performed on it, but other than that, they were setup identically with user accounts.

 

ok thats a mouth full there. You obviously care a great deal about your wife's happiness. I think in light of the fact that she is into the arts I would recommend you upgrade to the dv7 with the larger screen. It isnt that heavy and I believe she wil appreciate the added screen space. Graphical data eats up a lot of space on disk also so the second HD bay of the dv7 may come in handy down the road or you could just get 2 HDD right off the bat. Color is a personal thing but I have had both and I now have the steel finish and like it better and find that it doesnt show fingerprints like the dark umber I previously had. As little as the 8Gig of ram cost go ahead and spring for it. Get her a good case for the thing. Let her pick that out to her own liking. Thats all I got!

 

I'm going to have to disagree with one point here:

Physical screen size is irrelevant, if you're choosing the Full HD screen, it doesnt matter if its 17" (dv7t) or 15.6" (dv6t), the usable screen space is still 1920x1080, so I would choose the physical laptop size that would best suit her needs. I would assume that if she is a college student that she may move the laptop around a lot. The 15.6" is lighter.

If I were you I would also consider the larger battery (9 cell, or even the 6cell and the 9cell) in order to make it last longer through classes where she may not be able to charge it between or during class. That is the issue I ran into most commonly when I was in college. My battery would last sufficiently through one class but if I didnt have a chance to charge it, it wouldnt make it through another. That's not to say the efficiency isnt better on these laptops, as it has been a little while since I was in college, but its just a thought.

Also, Windows 7 home premium should be sufficient unless she has to join the laptop to her school's domain (this is not common), or unless you need to do some sort of advanced networking with it (however, this is also not likely if you're asking which version of Windows to get, no offense).

 

Hello guys! I really love my HP Pavilion dv6-6031eo I got yesterday! But I wonder, how to I put this SimplePass password to a existing Windows user? I can't find any way to do it, please learn me step-by-step!

 

The weight difference in the two machines is one pound. I dont think this is a deal breaker. I dont think it is irrelivant though but rather personal preferance. Isnt everything smaller on the smaller screen? Ask her what she prefers. The battery life for the dv7 is 5.25 hours which is 0.25 hours less than the dv6. I think that is adequate but given that the HP estimates are probably generous an upgrade in the battery to 9 cell specs 9.5 hours and for the $21 is probably a good idea. I got the 9 cell with mine and like the way it props the back of the keyboard up as well as letting air flow under the notebook as well. The warrenty on the dv7 is 2 years as opposed to one on the dv6.

 

Thank you, I overlooked that subtlety. Well, it seems to be an improvement that interferes with Second Life viewers. Even after trying to assign the ATI card to the SL viewer, it still sees the Intel GPU and will not run. Since these programs specifically look for the type of video card before initiating, software assignment of a card to an application is not occurring soon enough or possibly not at all. They will not run on an Intel GPU. I need to use the older CCC setup and manually set the ATI card overall.

 

Agreed that the weight difference isnt a major concern, but when you're toting around a backpack/messenger bag full of books, 1 lb can be a reasonable concern. The other part of the concern is that the dv7t is 1.5" longer than the dv6t. (16.3" vs 14.8") and more than an inch wider. These are all differences to consider when having to tote the laptop around class to class every day. Not to mention, depending on how large the desks are, that extra inch or so all the way around the laptop may prevent using an external mouse or even a notebook for doing school work.

 

Agreed on all points! Hubby should present her with all the options and let her decide. Dont forget to use the available coupon code I believe its NBQ5286 for $375.00 discount!

I guess Im just a screen realestate junky. I currently have 3 HP 23" external displays running on this dv7 with the notebook display active as well for a 4th screen.

 

Is it acceptable for the laptop to get so hot after only playing for 10 minutes? I just didn't think a 2 year old game would stress it so much

 

You also have to remember how tight seating and desk space is in those classes. And if you plan on being on any kind of mass transit, the 17" will be a burden.

 

The only debate here is the size of the screen. Screen size do make a difference. Although, they are the same res, everything will appear larger on a larger screen with the same clarity.

 

No idea. I haven't gotten my GPU to even work yet. >_<
My laptop actually did get hot while I was burning my recovery discs though.

 

DV6t doesn't come with a dual bay, unless you want to convert your optical drive into a disc drive.

 

Just wanted to post something real quick here about my DV7T Quad Edition with the Full HD Screen.

Unlike some earlier posts who had the LG LGD0283 17" FHD screen, mine is instead the AUO159D (B173HW01 V5) screen. I cant find any specific specs about it though, but I found a page on notebook check in another language that I think says it is 72% color gamut if I am guessing correctly.

EDIT

I found the specs. It is indeed 72% color gamut just like the LG FHD screen.

 

Hi guys i hope you can help me.
I have a DV7t qe and it has a very strange problem. When it's connected to the plug it's ok but when i switch to the battery the system goes unresponsive, sometimes do a explorer.exe error, other times just freeze. It's very odd because when it's plug I push it to the limit and nothing bad happens, but when it is on battery just idling the problem appears. I think it's related to switching graphics card but i can't confirm it. How I can fix the problem? Any info over the issue?

Thanks in advice

 

My screen is that, except V3. I think that's what all the other DV6 people have said. If not, I cba to look up the specs anyway.

 

Thanks...will do. Should be ordering today! I'm excited since this is my first time to buy a notebook. My wife will be really happy...and I may even get to play with it a bit...when I behave! LOL

 

Thank you to everyone....great response. I appreciate your tolerance with the long post. I will definitely take all advice and consider it. FWIW...she already told me in the past that she didn't want too large....rather a bit smaller and really liked one HP...as far as aesthetics....in BB....it was a 15.6" DV6-3225...or something like this? Anyway, I took from that the size and did my research and ended up here with you guys! I will most likely spring for the 8G...go Silver...and get the 9 cell version. I will let her pick out the bag or cover as she sees fit. Again...you guys are all great for taking the time! Much thanks!

 

My laptop gets hot while playing witcher too. According to gpu-z, the temps were in the high 70s.

Not sure if that's normal or not...

On a side note, I wanted to give a heads up that watching flash videos in Firefox defaults to the ati card. You can change it to the intel by configuring "plugin-container.exe" to power saving mode.

 

PS...if I missed anyone when quoting it was just a slip. I really do appreciate the response. I'm kind of sweating this purchase. The advice, discount code and moral support are great. If I had come back here with no response...well that would bite! LOL Cheers!

 

No prob man. Just remember that the 9 cell battery is just a little larger than the standard 6 cell. They have an option for both batteries (6cell and 9cell) that you can select just in case as well.

 

Just for comparison, not apples to apples because who knows what startup items you have. I have Microsoft Security Essentials, Keepass, Dropbox, VirtualCloneDrive, AutoHotkey, Media Browser Service and the usual assortment of startup items from a minimized recovery.

C300 128GB SSD
Cold boot to fingerprint reader flashing: 19s
Swipe finger, time to responsive Desktop: 8s
Close lid, time to hp logo going off: 2s
Open lid, time to fingerprint reader flashing: 3s
Swipe finger, time to desktop after sleep: 1s

I have the GUI boot disabled and no Windows startup or logon/logoff sounds enabled. Those are the only things I've done so far to optimize startup because I don't need it to be any faster. There is a particular startup sound that can be disabled by running gpedit.msc then go to:

Computer Configuration->Administrative Templates->System->Logon
You'll want to Enable the "Turn off Windows Startup Sound" option.

Disable GUI boot by going to msconfig, then the Boot tab, check the "No GUI boot" option. This shaves off a few seconds.

Oh, I also disable the sound for Windows User Account Control, that one annoys the hell out of me and it does seem to make the prompt a bit faster.

 

I had some bad switching graphics problems too, where CCC.exe would always crash and I couldn't switch graphics in non-admin accounts. I did a minimized recovery, or clean install, and everything has conveniently gone away.

 

Today, I did the Minimized System Recovery. After that, I noticed that the Windows Experience Index (WEI) changed. The score for RAM decreased 0.1 (previously 7.7, now 7.6) and for Graphics (Radeon 6770M) increased by 0.1 (previously 6.9, now 7.0). I feel happy for the Graphics score to increase. Has anybody else also noticed this ?

 

OMG! That is so damn fast, unbelievable. Once we can get some more capacity in the SSD's that is going to be the way to go.

 

I have heard one report of a guy in a Flight Sim forum who says it takes him just TWELVE SECONDS from turning on his PC (cold boot), to being inside of FSX!!

 

Guys, I have a question, why do I get a windows index score for gaming graphics only a '6.6' on my dv7t qe..?? Isn't it supposed to show '6.9'?

 

benchmarks are messed up for the new dv6-6100 series. mine shows 6.7 as well, as well as being about 50 points lower in 3dmark 11 compared to the 6000 series. however in games fps is actually about 10-20% faster... doesn't make any sense at all.

 

FOR those of you that wanna feel like god with your puter here are the steps to get god-mode on desktop....step 1. RT click desktop click add new folder..Step 2. Rename folder to this make sure its exact as i type or it will not work without quotes or copy paste without quotes and place as new folder name.. icon should pop up on desktop called GOD-MODE
"God-mode.{ED7BA470-8E54-465E-825C-99712043E01C}" hit enter

Warning WARNING do not Blame me if you screw your PC make sure u make a RESTORE POINT before u start messing with it got it good----this is like jailbreaking your Ithingy or rooting your phones so be careful--and enjoy ,,,,EcHo

 

I heard about god mode more than a year ago--it was quite a yawner, actually!

 

My new DV7T is here
How would I check if they really put 2GB of 6770m?
and what else do I need to check on my new baby?

 

IIRC, Fn + ESC will tell you. let me know.

 

Ok, now do I upgrade my CCC for me to be able to do Manual Graphic Switch?

Please tell me everything I need to do and download.
3D Test or what ever

 

What is the window index score for the hard disk drive for the 640gb @ 7200 rpm people are getting?

 

5.9... Which if I recall correctly is what I got on my original dv7tqe with the 750 gig @ 5400rpm

 

Guys, one more question... Will using the laptop on AC power do any bad do the battery of the laptop...in terms of battery life, lifespan...etc??

 

I leave my 5+ year old Toshiba plugged in nearly constantly, for years. battery is FINE.

 

Thanks for answering my post. I will do what do you advise me and check if the problem persist. I feel that the problem is software related but it shows like it was pure hardware error. Anyway I'll do a clean install.

Thanks again.

 

I read previously that to install the 11.5b catalyst driver, you should install 11.5a first, and then 11.5b. The only download links I can find for 11.5a lead me to 11.5b.

AMD Catalyst? 11.5b hotfix