*HP EliteBook 8740w Owners Lounge - PART 1*

[sgogeta4]

Exactly as stated above.

[m8o]

Meanwhile, the thread starter is not actually an owner. ... I'm much more comfortable to wait for the right time to purchase an 8740w. The DC2 will be out eventually, and so will the Intel chip refresh. 940XM + M7820 + DC2 sounds like my new next machine.

But we will be forever greatful to you for doing so, and hopefully your continued maintenance of its first posts.

[Foolmoon_Design]

anybody running Vectorworks with this rig?

[sheltem]

It's not that simple. AMD's TDP is for the chip only (with the GDDR5 memory all in all it's about 70-75W) while Nvidia specifies the total TDP - 100W. In addition, they both have differently calibrated temperature sensors, so it'll take some time to figure out which card runs cooler. Would you prefer a card that gets ~75C on the core but ~90C on the MEM @max load, or would you choose the one that has 80C on the core and MEM?
There's a lot to think about. I'd prefer the RED's as well, but only because of the huge frustration with Nvidia for the past year or so (poor drivers, stuttering issues, overheating, etc).

BTW, don't rely heavily on Notebookcheck as these guys do not dig too deep. We can realistically say something only after an extensive benching of both cards and so far we can't even get the full picture of the 5870 as the drivers are still far from being perfect. It will take another 3-5 months to get the comparative review that we can more or less rely on.

I guess I was oversimplifying things. Anandtech recently reviewed the desktop version of the Geforce GTX 465 and posted power consumption and temperature #'s:

Radeon 5770 / Geforce GTX 465:
Idle Temp: 40 c / 44 c
Load Temp: 77 c / 91 c
Idle Power: 163 watts / 172 watts
Load Power: 243 watts / 349 watts

Based on the specs, the Geforce 480M is a lower clock/memory/shader speed version of the desktop Geforce GTX 465. Not a perfect match obviously, but a good starting point of comparison.

[TechAnimal]

There might not be any hard numbers available yet but i'd bet the 480M will be much more power hungry than the Radeon card. Ditto for temperatures.

[Aikimox]

Maybe. Though MR5870 is already pushing the temp limits. Furmark (@max clocks) will easily bring it over a 95C. Many games will push the memory to 85C+. That's quite dangerous on the long run as the memory will fail sooner.
Ideally, I'd like to see the max temps constantly below 75C while gaming, but looks like it's hardly possible.

BTW, @AlbertRaccoon, could you run any of your games again for an hour or so, keeping both GPU-Z (select display the max temp on the memory sensor) and HWMonitor open? I wonder if the card always downclocks itself to 500mhz. If you could post a screenshot again it would shed some light.

[xsrx]

looks like the BIOS update fixed the memory issue! So far no crashes!

[83bj60]

I've attached a couple of photos. I can't seem to properly capture the keyboard bow. It isn't really that bad and the fact that I can't get a good picture of it proves that.

Also, without flash the keyboard backlight (in action) shots are a little blurry too - sorry.

Great first pictures! LOVE the dark grey front and back bezel around the keyboard. Not impressed by the backlit keyboard... Why can't they fix the light leak issue? Haven't seen ONE backlit keyboard that I liked, the backlight leak is simply too distracting...

From the picture it would seem the front and back keyboard surrounds are similar as those on the 8730w, except for the dark colour... Would make a great replacement for me! Could you send or post higher resolution images?

[knight427]

I have mine up and running. I'll post some decent pics of the backlighting later. It's my wife's birthday so I have to get going for now. But my first impression is that this is an awesome machine. It is everything I hoped it would be, which is saying A LOT.

I don't see any bowing in the keyboard or hear any tapping from keys.

[TechAnimal]

You tease