HP Pavilion DV9Brand: Hewlett-Packard
Binding: Personal Computers
Nice keyboard, bright screen, memory hog, annoying screen freezes [Posted on 2007-12-17]
I love the keyboard size and the fact that it has a numeric keyboard already built in. The mouse is a bit "sticky" so I use a USB mouse. The screen is bright and clear, very easy to read and not hard on the eyes after long sessions. It is too heavy to tote around everywhere but that is not what I do with mine. I don't like the fingerprint magnet black finish although it does look nice when it's polished up. The only real problem I have with it is its constant freezes. I increased the memory from 1gig to 2gigs and it has helped it to run faster but has not done anything for the freeze issues. Would I recommend it? Yes, but with reservations about the cause of the freezing (not yet established) and would recommend buying extra memory before even opening the box. We have two of these machines in our family. Both perform similarly and both have those random freezes that just appear out of nowhere. UPDATE*** freezes appear to be related to video card driver requiring updates & compatibility issues with Vista. Problem reduced to occasional freezes compared to 2 or 3 per day before finding updated drivers.
Good hardware......bad OS [Posted on 2008-02-03]
The good:
-Display. Screen is bright, clear. No dead pixels.
-Keyboard. Solid feel (compared to other laptops), full num pad.
-Lightscribe DVD. Used it several times. a little slow, but it works.
-Battery. No, it doesn't last all day. Two hours of wifi surfing and listning to mp3s isn't bad for a widescreen computer.
-WiFi and bluetooth built in.
-2GB RAM.
-Dual SATA HDD.
-Dual head video. Nice for presentations.
-Built in ports (USB, Card reader, VGA, S Video, IR - came with remote, etc...)
Take it or leave it:
-Touch pad. Prefer the textured pad found on other models.
-Speakers. Decent for a laptop, but when you boast "Altec Lansing" speakers they better sound great. These are good, not great.
-Web cam. Functional. Rate it below the mid range Logitech I bought last year.
-Pre installed HP software. I don't care for it. But with a little tweaking it doesn't get in my way. Someone else may apreciate it.
The bad:
-Windows Vista. The only part of this computer I really can't stand. Sometimes Vista won't shut down. Sometimes when you turn it on it tells you it has recovered from an unexpected error even after it shutdown properly. I have installed all MS and HP updates. This computer should be much faster then it is.
Summary:
This would be a 4 star rating if it wasn't for Vista. From a hardware / feature point of view it has just about everything.
Good laptop overall [Posted on 2008-02-20]
I got my HP dv9420us back in September 2007, and so far I have been completely satisfied in most respects. The processor (TL-64) is nice and fast, and multi-tasking has not been a problem. Also, the screen is nice and big, and watching movies on it is enjoyable. The only thing I don't really like is the GeForce Go 6150, it's a pretty average video card, although it has been able to handle most games I've tried on it (the most recent game I've played on it in Sins of a Solar Empire, which runs just fine.) So overall, I'd certainly recommend this laptop to anyone, although for hardcore pc gamers it's probably a little weak. Then again, if you want to have a really good gaming laptop, you'll have to shell out lots more money...
Nice hardware, but HP support and options suck [Posted on 2008-04-06]
I bought this laptop as a nice priced option only to discover, that the mighty monopolistic HP corporate approach would kill it for me.
This is a true 64-bit multi-core computer and yet HP is crippling it by installing the stupid 32-bit Vista Premium by default.
I tried to talk to an HP CSR 3-4 time to ask them for video drivers for XP 64-bit version I have a legal copy with license for a PC/Laptop. It was always a dead end call. At the end I escalated to the management, in which case they told me "It is our policy and I can not do much about it. Besides XP will not be supported for us by MS any more". So in short the old "good" MS + "designed for MS Windows" is playing a role here.
At the end of the day I cursed a few times and installed Fedora Linux 8, which is the only one working with the HP new BIOS protection, which prevents you from putting a different OS on their machine and is desperately crying for a class action lawsuit against monopolizing the market of hardware, benefiting the OS vendor.
Good value and rock solid now, would buy another [Posted on 2008-05-29]
Purchased in December 2007. Loved the bells and whistles of this laptop and the display.
The good news.......
In April HP support released a slew of software updates for this computer including a bios update. MS service pack 1 was also included.
After 6 hours of installing the updates the laptop runs flawless, faster and rock solid and great wireless range. I love it now. Awesome for DVD playback and spread sheets. It is now my primary computer.
Battery life can be improved in Vista setting tweaks to about 3 hours for video playback. Expect about 2 hours on normal usage.
Since then I have increased the operating speed by adding another Gig of memory (about $80.00) and replacing the hard drive with a larger faster 180 gig Sata 7200 rpm drive (about $120.00) and using the original drive in the second drive bay for video's and data. You will need a HP Sata drive caddy to install it (about $35.00). The mouse pad can be sticky due to perspiration.
The original bad news....
Initially had intermittent web-cam and external USB devices along with loss of audio and changing of display settings and freezing of video playback and system lockup. Returning from hibernation or sleep mode would crash the system or programs would crash it. Just about every problem others had stated.
HP support solution was to do a system reload which worked until you added a USB device or 3rd party software.
I worked around the problems by reinstalling drivers and not shutting the computer down defeating the purpose of a laptop.
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