*HP dv6z AMD Llano (6XXX series) Owners Lounge*

30% coupon, $90 in credits, and 2% cash back from billmelater.

 

You guys killed it with these credits. Maybe I should call and act like I want a return.

 

Quick question for a current dv6z quad owner, or someone knowledgeable with it...I just bought one with the A8 3530mx and I was curious to know what kind of expansion ports, if any, it has. Specifically whether or not it has an msata slot for adding an msata ssd. Thank you.

 

Don't think it does.

 

thanks for this

 

Third time is the charm.

Not sure why but she told me I would be getting $75 back.. Hope they don't drop my proc down. She said I would be getting the original config that I ordered.

Who knows...

 

Thanks for attempting...still hoping to get a concrete answer though...

 

I've been following this thread on and off for a few days now, and I wanted your opinions. I got the base model for this laptop with the A6-3400M and the iGPU (I think that's what it's called) 6620G. The only upgrades I got are the 7200rpm HDD and the high capacity 6-cell battery.

I just got into PC gaming and have only picked up Borderlands so far on Steam. This laptop runs it silky smooth. The windows experience index has assessed the gaming graphics as 6.5. I wanted to know how well this machine should run games released in the near future. I don't mind running games on medium or even low settings as long as they run at the native resolution 1366x768.

Also, since I got the low end model, I didn't use the 30% coupon. My configuration was $673.99 - $75 coupon. The $75 coupon is gone now but I see that there is still a $50 coupon applicable for this config. So, coupled with the $50 price drop, will I get a $25 refund?

 

People have been talking about this coming with a 120 watt PSU, but on the configuration page, the spare PSU I'd be buying is just a 90? Is that wrong/bad?

Dang...this coupon makes this a really, REALLY good deal... wish it still had the 1.9GHz CPU though (I suppose that might be a good thing from AMD's perspective, if it means their best CPU is selling out!)

 

It is 120W.

As for the CPU, knowing that it can be overclocked so easily I kind of wish I went with the A8-3510mx to save some money. It probably can run at the same clock speeds as the A8-3530mx, for $25 cheaper.

 

Just got my tracking number up on HP's website. Hopefully it will go out the door today and I have it this weekend. I'm going to call customer service later today and see about that $50.

 

I tried the 90W PSU from my older DV6 (because of the lower weight), but a windows/hp message appeared, that performance could decrease with that PSU. The battery also stopped charging under heavy use, under normal use the battery was charged more slowly. I´ll go with the heavy brick...

 

What expansion slots did it come with? Does it have an msata slot by any chance? Thanks!

 

Well, at least it's only $25 (only $17.50 with 30%) instead of like $150+ for going from an i7-2630QM to i7-2720QM. But I know what you're saying, if it can overclock so easily it seems like a waste of money.

 

I'm trying to decide between these two configurations.

dv6tse:
dark umber
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
2nd generation Intel(R) Dual Core(TM) i5-2410M (2.3 GHz, 3MB L3 Cache) with Turbo Boost up to 2.9GHz
1GB GDDR5 Radeon(TM) HD 6770M Graphics [HDMI, VGA]
FREE Upgrade to 6GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
640GB 7200RPM Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
No Additional Office Software
No additional security software
30% OFF! 9-Cell Lithium-Ion Battery (over-sized) - Up to 9.75 hours of battery life +++
15.6" diagonal Full HD HP Anti-glare LED Display (1920 x 1080)
FREE Upgrade to Blu-ray player & SuperMulti DVD burner
HP TrueVision HD Webcam with Integrated Digital Microphone and HP SimplePass Fingerprint Reader
Intel 802.11b/g/n WLAN with Wireless Display Support
Standard Keyboard with numeric keypad
HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope


And

dv6z:

dark umber
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
AMD Quad-Core A8-3510MX Accelerated Processor (2.5GHz/1.8GHz, 4MB L2 Cache)
1GB GDDR5 Radeon(TM) HD Dual Graphics [HDMI, VGA]
8GB DDR3 System Memory (2 Dimm)
640GB 7200RPM Hard Drive with HP ProtectSmart Hard Drive Protection
No Additional Office Software
No additional security software
9 Cell Lithium Ion Battery
15.6" diagonal Full HD HP Anti-glare LED Display (1920 x 1080)
FREE Upgrade to Blu-ray player & SuperMulti DVD burner
HP TrueVision HD Webcam with Integrated Digital Microphone and HP SimplePass Fingerprint Reader
802.11b/g/n WLAN and Bluetooth(R)
Standard Keyboard
HP Home & Home Office Store in-box envelope


I can get 8GB ram (though I may drop it to 6GB to save money) and still be 40 dollars less than the dv6tse config. (meaning I can splurge on 2 day shipping) But I'm kind of worried that I'll have a slow processor, and the 6655g2 on notebookcheck seems very slightly below the 6770m. Does the dv6z shine after it is overclocked? I've never overclocked anything and I don't know if overclocking damages your laptop or whatever. Seems like a an amazing deal by all the posts I've read, but I'm wary for the same reason.

 

I got a 90W adapter - probably because of integrated graphics.

 

Get the 8GB, will help the iGPU. Also, in gaming, the DV6z will be faster, but only in DX10 and 11 games. After OC'ing the CPU, it isn't a bottleneck. Also, it dosen't hurt it persay, but might reduce the life of the components from 15 years to 6 years, but 6 years from now, an IGP will be faster than this.

 

Okay, thanks guys! Their order configuration thingee has it screwed up then.

And...HP's site let's you find the 120 watt one pretty easily...but it's out of stock.

Also in the screw up category-it lets you add a Windows recovery disc now (YAY! I think HP is the only company left with the option?) but right now if you have Home Premium, it throws up an error unless you select Pro for the recovery disc LOL.

Oh well, it's almost there.

 

To the person that asked about 3dMark 2003, the score is about 19000 without Crossfire.

 

I don't think the CPU will be a bottleneck in any case. It's still pretty powerful, just not up to the Sandy Bridge speeds, which are phenomenal.

And OC shouldn't hurt the components AT ALL. Like abaddon is doing he's UNDERvolting the CPU and still getting high speeds and low temps. Voltage is what kills a CPU due to overclocking more than anything, and bumping up the voltage is required usually on an Intel rig to get much faster than stock (speaking of Core 2 era of course).

 

Has he 3530mx? Is he used 6620g instead of 6750? The 19000 is huge upgrade from Core I5 520m, but I would be happy if you also run that bench. It's not a big deal, you can download it for free and run it for 5-8 minutes...

 

Can we get confirmation of OpenGL support, does it work with integrated GPU, dedicated GPU, or crossfire? And is crossfire even working, has anyone been able to confirm this, or is it currently just manual selection of iGPU or dGPU? Thanks.

 

How did you get 2% back from bill me later? All I see is no payments and interest for 6 months.

 

Be sure to use ebates.com too. Just sign up, go to HP site through their link and voila, money in your account. You have to wait a couple months to claim it, but it's still good money.

 

Don't get the 8gb from HP. Save the money and buy 1600mhz RAM off Amazon or Newegg or something. That will help the iGPU a lot more.

 

And probably be cheaper once you sell the 6GB that comes with it

 

Did anybody actually get confirmation of the $50 credit (via email or something), or did the rep just say "you'll get it when the notebook ships"?

 

I got the confirmation email right away.

 

I think I am going to order mine with the 8gb memory. I do not need the larger capacity hdd nor the 8bg of 1333 but I can sell the 8gb to offset the cost of 8gb of 1600.

 

Right abaddon4180 already got his notebook so he was credited right away. The rest of us will get it when the notebook ships out. I'm hoping mine is this week.

 

When i got mine i had a $25 dollar coupon, when i called the coupon wasnt valid anymore so they only gave me 25 back. so ya you probably will get $25 back.. I have the same, 3400m.

 

When i bought mine they were offering $30 dollars back for new customers

 

Ah, that makes sense. It seems that the HP reps all forgot that with the 30% off coupon the difference is only $35... Hehe.

Just save your money... The 8GB upgrade is not worth the price and you'd save more money if you didn't get it and sold the 6gb instead..

 

In order to use the 30% off coupon you have to have 999.99+.
If you max out the cpu to the current 3510mx, max out the gpu, and up the hdd to 7200 rpm it comes to $934.99. So what would be a good upgrade to get to 999.99 or just a hair over?

 

bump? anybody?

 

1080p screen? It'd be more than a hair but it's worth it.

 

Call and ask! That's all I can say. And dajohn17 already responded above in post 1081.

 

You should really just call them and find out. Regardless of what our opinion is on what we think you should get, HP will do what they feel like.

EDIT: Didn't read a post down lol...

 

You didn't get the 1 GB dedicated graphics upgrade? And you play games?

....

 

Sorry. I should've removed that part in my bump. The refund is moot since the $50 coupon disappeared shortly after I posted my post originally. So, now, the new price is actually ~$25 than what I paid with a $75 coupon.

I already explained that I'm just getting into gaming and really don't mind some settings people deem unplayable. I don't want to spend the ~$100 extra for the 1GB graphics if I don't have to, especially since there seem to be problems with the crossfire driver. The integrated graphics keeps the adapter brick at 90W (which isn't much bigger than my previous 65W adapter), keeps the heat down, and prolongs battery life. I just wanted opinions on how well 6620g should work for a casual gamer over the next couple of years.

 

Define casual gamer. Casual gamer that plays the latest games on occasion or older and/or simpler titles? If you want to play games that exist today for the next couple of years you should be ok with most. But in a year, who knows. Gaming tech advances quickly, and it seems devs are quickly growing tired of the limitations of the consoles these days and seem to be trending back to the PC as the primary dev platform, so you might see a spike in system requirements. But that's just based on third party information I've gathered over the months.

 

I think I'll fall in the occasionally-plays-simpler-older-games category. That's what I needed to know: if this card will run today's games decently, it'll play the one or two games released next year that I'll want on at least low details. I saw that just now after running the Star Craft II demo. It performed respectably on the default medium settings. I don't have Fraps so I don't any fps to share, though.

 

i got the two battery option. one six, one nine. seemed eminently useful Still you need another few dollars...hmm.

Seer

 

There is a review of the dv6 out there, can't remember if it was an a6 or a8, but the guy tested a lot of games on just the igp. I was surprised at how many he got to play, tho at medium to lower settings. Can't remember how I found it, but i *think* i may have googled "LLano Laptop". I'll see if I can find it again.
seer

Here, these guys disabled the discrete card on an A8 so that should give you some idea.

http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/laptops/1285288/amd-llano-laptop-full-hardware-test

seer

 

Thanks. That just about settles it for me, then. I'm extremely satisfied with the balance of performance and battery life in this laptop. My only qualm about the integrated graphics has been eased with that link, HT's comment, and some other reading.

These readings at ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5650 - Notebookcheck.com Technik/FAQ helped, too. Notebook check lists that card as comparable to the 6620g. I was taking that with a grain of salt, but notebookcheck's Dirt 3 performance is in agreement with what expertreviews reports. It looks like I won't need the dedicated graphics after all.

 

I have finally decided to buy this laptop with the high end specs. My only question is "is it worth it to include the 15 months Norton Internet security 2011?" Coz I was just wondering if this would be a good security system and especially with the big discount.

 

i get mine tomorrow

 

No. Download either Microsoft Security Essentials or Avast. Both are free and more than adequate for general anti-virus.

 

I believe in sc2 if you hit ctrl alt f it should display your fps

 

I just use Microsoft Security Essentials. It's free, doesn't slow down your computer at all, and has been shown to be generally just as, if not more, effective at stopping and removing viruses as Norton, Kaspersky, etc.

EDIT: HT beat me to it.