HP DV6000 series laptop review
By Jonathan Schlaffer
HP has some relatively new laptops on the market like the DV6000 series which can be customized or bought in made-for-retail editions. Two models are available for retail purchase, one of which is the subject of this review.
Standard features of the DV6000 series
The models that can be purchased at retail are the DV6770SE and DV6775US. Both laptops feature a 15.4″ glossy display with 1280 x 800 resolution and integrated webcam, nvidia Geforce 8400M GS graphics with 512MB of dedicated graphics memory, 3GB of main memory (RAM), 250GB hard drive, 3 USB ports, Firewire, media remote, Express card slot, an HDMI output and a lightscribe DVDRW optical drive.
Differences between models
Where the laptops differ is the case color and processor. The DV6770SE features a white case with silver keyboard and HPs “imprint design.” This laptop features an AMD Turion 64×2 TL-62 processor running at 2.1GHz. The DV6775US features a black lid with gray case and “imprint design” but has an Intel Core 2 Duo T5450 processor at 1.66GHz. Don’t be fooled by clock speed, the current crop of Intel processors clobbers all lines of AMD offerings. But, essentially, these laptops are on equal footing.
The Intel processor will probably give you longer battery life and run cooler, AMD processors are not forgiving when it comes to battery life or heat generation.
So, that’s the back story and now its time to get to the point. I got the DV6770SE for review but what is said here will apply to the Intel version 99% of the time.
Case/Design
The case is a nice white color with the imprint pattern and goes nicely with the silver coloring and imprint design of the keyboard. The keyboard is quite sturdy and has a smooth feel to it, not like the “matte” feel of many other laptops. I can’t say how long it would stand up but it feels like it should last you the life of the laptop (two to three years – five if you’re lucky or keep computers for a long time). It feels better than the MacBook Pro keyboard.
Keyboard/Media Controls
Above the keyboard you will find quick access media controls to launch a DVD player, CD player, music and media controls. The media controls consist of back, forward, stop and play/pause buttons. Next to that there are volume controls which is a volume slider (much like the touchpad of an iPod) and mute buttons.
All these controls are touch sensitive, glow a nice “blue” color and emit a “click” when touched. Be careful when resting your fingers on the keys as I have accidentally triggered the controls on more than one occasion.
Display quality
The display is of what could now be called “average” resolution being only 1280 x 800 (1440 x 900 is becoming more standard) and I wish it was higher. It’s still nice bright and crisp, there were 10 steps between the lowest brightness setting and highest brightness setting. There are enough settings there to keep most people happy. If that’s not good enough for you then additional settings are available in the nvidia Control Panel.
Networking options
Like many laptops in this class, it has a modem, Ethernet jack and WiFi options for connecting to the Internet. But lacks Bluetooth which should be standard these days. Just about any USB Bluetooth dongle can be plugged in and used with the laptop. Vista found the appropriate driver for the one I had on hand almost instantly. This left two free USB ports which should be enough under most circumstances.
Never once did I lose the signal from my WiFi “g” router in my two story home, nor in the basement. Wireless performance was outstanding but I wasn’t pushing it to the absolute limit either, it would probably be possible to get a few feet away from my house and still have picked up a usable signal.
Speakers
Normally I wouldn’t bother with this section as most laptops have speakers that sound about as good as headphones found in a box of Cracker Jacks but my ears were pleasantly surprised. The two Altec Lansing speakers are not going to sound as good as your $1,500 home theater system but the audio quality was quite acceptable. They lack bass and that “boom” effect but overall quality was good, bordering on excellent in some cases.
Activity lights
Again, not many people think about this on a laptop. Most other laptops have a mix of orange, green, blue and red lights but HP did something different here. Every single activity light on the laptop is a nice “blue” color, even the “caps lock” button and charge indicator are blue. The only change I would make is on the power input, “red” for charging, “blue” for charged which would be similar to Apple’s approach but this is hardly worth crying over.
Performance
Vista has its say about what it thinks about your hardware so lets take a look. As you can see below, despite the “average” nature of its hardware, Vista thinks highly of it. What’s a shock is the rating assigned to the hard drive.
The hard drive on this laptop is surprisingly fast. Surprising because it is “only” a 5400RPM (as opposed to a faster 7200RPM) drive with a capacity of 250GB. This usually translates to slow performance but I can say that is not the case with this drive. It’s fast, fast enough to receive a data transfer rating of 5.1. Similar 5400RPM drives in my other laptops only rate a 4.2 or so.
While the 8400M GS graphics card is not a screamer or anything to write home about, it holds its own. You’ll be able to play modern games on this if you lower the graphics effects and resolution a bit. This particular card scored just under 1,700 in 3Dmark06. The same card in a Sony Vaio with 64MB of memory scored barely over 1,000 points.
It would have been nice to see something closer or a score a little over 2,000 but for this card a score of 1,700 is still nice but not quite on the “excellent” side of things.
Battery life
If you don’t mind getting it down to the point where you’re running on “fumes” then its possible to get about 2 hours out of the battery, maybe a few minutes more. Should that not be long enough, HP sells extended life batteries that last longer.
Pricing
Both versions of this particular laptop can be found for right around the $1,000 mark. There aren’t very many corners that HP had to cut to keep the price down. The only things lacking on the laptop that I could really complain about is the lack of a higher resolution display and Bluetooth.
Conclusion
It’s almost the perfect blend of hardware/performance/price ratio. If the “limited” resolution and lack of built-in Bluetooth doesn’t bother you and you’re looking for a new laptop then buy it today!
If you’re willing to spend as little as $200 more then search out a laptop with those “missing” features and you’ll probably wind up with the 8600M or 8800M series of mobile graphics chips. We’re talking gaming class performance for not much more money but you have to catch the sales “just right” either online or from brick and mortar stores.
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Entry was posted
on Tuesday, January 29th, 2008 at 5:18 pm
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Read more entries by Jonathan Schlaffer.
Stumble It!
January 29th, 2008
The 5400 v.s. 7200 RPM isn’t very noticeable if the drive is SATA and using perpendicular recording.The
data is pack much closer, the heads don’t need to travel as far.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perpendicular_recording
Given the benefits of a cooler running drive, and longer battery life, it’s a trade off that makes sense.
February 4th, 2008
Broadcom onboard wifi adapter is worthless for wireless auditing which was what bought the computer for. It doesn’t have a PCMCIA slot so I can use my good wifi Card. Other than that its a good pc. Read the specs before you buy.
July 23rd, 2008
The dv6000 series has some known design defects. HPs own website identifies the issues here:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c01087277&lc=en&cc=us
I’ve had a bad experience with this laptop. A few months after its purchase, I encountered the following:
* The broadcom wireless adapter was no longer detected.
* The DVD Writer did not write CDRs/DVDs. Blank disks were ejected.
* 4 out of 5 times, the laptop throws up a blank screen and does not boot.
I would not recommend buying this laptop. Here is another review I posted on this one:
http://www.mouthshut.com/review/HP_dv6000-147294-1.html
The laptop has good looks and aesthetic design. The configuration and features also seem good. Unfortunately the product is not very robust and has several known design issues.
October 19th, 2008
DO NOT BUY! After just four months of use my harddrive crashed and I was instructed to send it to HP. However, they FAILED to mention that I should back up my files! An external hardrive enclosure did not work so I took it to geek squad and it shut down their system! They presume I was sold a lemon and I am still waiting for my files to be backed up. This is slightly unlikely, however. I have many pictures dear to my heart on that hardrive.
IF you have any value for your money, time, dignity, precious memories and important files, DO NOT BUY AN HP PAVILLION dv6000!!!
January 13th, 2009
don’t buy, it’s shit
most dv6000 ARE DEFECTIVE by fabric. google it and see for yourself.
April 28th, 2009
HP sucks, just like roshan sez a coupla months after i bought this laptop , wireless went bye bye and screen went piff. .i had to replace the motherboard which cost me 10 thousand rupees or 300 $
and it still keeps goin blank every two weeks, i’v been to the technicians atleast 20 times in the last few months
May 19th, 2009
All of this while my laptop is only 2 months out of warranty:
I like many others am having serious issues with my HP laptop. I’m posting here in hopes that others will follow my lead and do the same. Apparently my motherboard has also fried itself. My laptop now just powers on and off repeatedly with only a black screen. The first DV6000 I bought froze up while creating the backup discs so I took it back for an exchange 2 days after purchasing for a replacement. I’ve never dropped my laptop or otherwise subjected it to any abuse. In fact I’ve always treated it like solid gold. If anyone is having similar issues then I highly recommend you visit http://www.HPlies.com and join up as a member. So far HP has flat out lied to consumers and wants to cover up this whole problem. Voice your opinion and speak your mind at http://www.hplies.com as this seems to be the only solution for consumers thus far.
July 31st, 2009
HP DV6000 —> S.H.I.T
Don´t buy HP laptops, they are crap. My DV6000 is now just a piece of junk. The cooling system may be one of the causes of the mainboard damage along with the poor hardware components.
First the wireless stopped working, then the battery was gone, and now its over. Hope I can repair it, will buy a Dell or Lenovo instead.