New Laptop

**Bunkerbarge** · 07-02-2006

I have just bought a new Laptop for work (OK work and play), a HP ZD8369EA.

The specification was very impressive with a 3.2 Gig processor, 100 Gig hard drive, 1024 Ram, 256 MB ATi Mobility graphics card and a wide screen format.

Initial tests have proved to be very impressive with the screen being the most significant. It is quite stunning and was the main attraction in the first place. At just under £1300.00 I also thought it was a very reasonable cost but this is a very subjective opinion.

Anyway I also bought a copy of Silent Hunter III, based entirely on Nigels recomendation, so I am going to see what it really looks like graphics wise. Quite what conclusions could be drawn from the fact that a Merchant Navy Chief Engineer enjoys sinking merchant ships on his computer remains to be seen!!

**wonwinglo** · 07-02-2006

Sounds very nice Richard,these laptops have come such a long way,what they are able to cram into them is simply amazing,have fun.

Nigel.D · 07-02-2006

hey richard we can play on line too :-)))

**Bunkerbarge** · 07-02-2006

Barry,

The spec is mind boggling. I have just played a bit of a DVD and the sound and picture just blow your mind.

Nigel,

When I get back to the ship this time I will have a go at setting it up on the wireless network. I suspect that it may not be fast enough to play games online though as it uses satellite links for communication but I'll give it a go.

Paid the price though, it cost me a day round the Trafford Centre going clothes shopping with Annette. Our feet were like lead when we got home, unlike the considerably lighter wallet. Still she's worth every penny!

**John** · 07-02-2006

Nice spec laptop, I think it's worth the price to you as your going to get the use out of it, I've got a Dell Insperion, got it about 6 years ago needed it for my job then, now it just sit's in it's bag collecting dust, it's no where near as good as the one you have and it cost a lot more, but that's computers for you, I remember paying £200 for 4MB of memory many years ago, I bought 1GB the other day and I think it cost me £60

dynamite25 · 07-02-2006

Your laptop leaves mine standing as mine is only 1.3GHz but does what i need and i still can play games on it alsong as they don't need a more powerful processor,if they do then my PC is used but that needs upgrading abit more so i can play my medal of honour game as it runs abit slow on it.

Anyway Richard top laptop you got there and mines wireless and keeps picking up someones BT voyager router but they have a password or something on it so no one can use there internet connection.

**Bunkerbarge** · 07-02-2006

Strangely enough John, the machine it is replacing is a Dell Inspiron 7500 of about a six year vintage and it cost over two grand!!

I have been telling myself for a while that it still does what I want of it but the new one has just shown me how much things have advanced.

squiffythewombat · 07-02-2006

Richard, that is some serious hardware, i looked at a VERY similar version before buying mine, nice bit of kit and the screen is beauitful! Having built pcs & laptops as a job for two years i have seen many!!!

HP are among the best, the build quality is second only to toshiba, the aftersales is very good and the drivers are updated regularly! My personal laptop is HP, as is my business laptop, both are great and have behaved flawlessly!

TIPS_

Out the box it runs great, but ASAP goto the HP site and make sure you have the most recent drivers! www.hp.com

Reset the vitural memory to min768/max1024 as HP oftern have this set at random values (or worse still they let windows determin it)

Disable remote access which will be enabled as default.

The ATI card onboard is good and a recent generation but still needs the right drivers, this will enable your games to run that much more smoothly. ATI's site or HP should have the most recent.

Get rid of the nasty HP "help suite" or whatever its called these days, its known for being useless and taking up space!

Also- your laptop may of come with norton installed, this is a good thing BUT if not setup correctly will hinder system performance noticably. I could write an entire thread on this so the long and the short is go through the options/maunual and config it yourself, forward known ports and block unused ports.

Run regedit.exe and remove unwanted programs (like HP suite) from startup. My laptop boots from cold to XP in 22secs, yours should be quicker than this once these mods are done.

Check to see if your drive is using NTFC not FAT32 format as the latter is very old and doesnt work well with XP.

If you know all this already please forgive me, i dont mean to be patronising. If you dont these should really speed up your laptop, think of it like "tuning" a car engine. If you dont understand anything or want a more detailed step by step instruction sheet then just let me know, ill be happy to help!

squiffythewombat · 07-02-2006

i forgot, HP are known for "iffy" bios setups, so if you can, go through this and check all the values. I can write a tut if need be.

**Bunkerbarge** · 07-02-2006

Squiffy,

I can assure you that you are not patronising, you are talking a foreign language though. Today is the first time I have ever seen an operating system other than Win 98 SE, which both my other machines use. Consequently it has taken me all afternoon to find the Control Panel and hence speed up the dam mouse a bit.

The points you make all sound like they are sensible checks to make but I wouldn't know where to start to look for them. If you have time to explain the suggestions in a bit more of a "Configuration for Dummies" mode I'll be in with a chance.

I got Silent Hunter III running though and it looks stunning!