*HP EliteBook 8740w Owners Lounge - PART 1*

[TechAnimal]

From everything i've read it should be above 7. Try checking your display driver version or doing a rollback of the display driver to see if it fixes the issue.

[Aikimox]

Unfortunately, no. The gamut of colors [or, color space] produced by the screen should not be confused with the number of colors produced. To combine what I'd posted earlier in two posts into one... You'll need to invoke the ATI Catalyst tool, and check the "10-bit" option in I believe the rightmost tab, and re-boot. -- STRIKE THAT! Shut-down, and restart. ...I just suffered another "blank screen on re-boot". 3 tabs then enter does a clean shut-down.

Also, be careful in the HP color profile selector. If a profile reads "User sRGB" or "User AdobeRGB", you've made changes to that profile and it will be in-accurate (Warning: even changing brightness will do so; and I found color hue shift to occur later after switching profiles even tho I never did anything to affect the hue! ). Click the button on the right to restore all the profiles to their default, or you can restore just the profile selected to its default with a button under the selection pull-down. I'm not on my 8740w so I can't reference the exact button names; sorry.

Ok, gotta run. Will check in later.

Oh thanks, m8!
That's exactly what I needed!
+1 Rep from me

[m8o]

Thanx much. Maybe I'll make it to "2" one of these days.

[NotebookGrail]

@Aikimox, when you review, include review of this notebook when using outside in sunlight. I tried it today first time just to see how it is, not much use in direct sunlight, but works in shaded areas. Wish there was a DC2 screen like this video from Pixel Qi.

[m8o]

Warning to you ATI FirePro M7820 owners about changing graphics settings. Be careful changing your Catalyst settings, especially if you're an 'amateur' regarding the options and repercussions.

I messed around with things in the 3D and Avivo Video section last week, not knowing what I was doing. I just found now, both my Graphics and Gaming Graphics was testing as 6.0 this morning when I looked at it, and after I re-tested it.

I thought maybe running in HP Optimized vs. Hi Performance power mode was behind that, but no; no effect changing that.

I reset all the ATI Catalyst setting to their defaults. I don't know if the issue was any one thing or a combo of things. But the Windows Experience graphics related tests are now back to 7.2, now that I set everything back to the default. I ran the test in High Perf and Optimized power modes just to check and there was no effect on the performance.

[kaliatech]

Two questions or potential issues:

1) What is an acceptable temperature range for the Intel PCH?

I'm not doing much of anything, and Everest is reporting 115C/239F. However, HWINFO32 is now not reporting anything. (It did earlier...see screenshot a few posts back.)

Ironically, the air coming out of the vent is cool and bottom is cool right now. That's the first time since I've been running it past two days. Normally air and bottom are very warm. As I mentioned earlier, the fan is running constantly though. It sounds like medium speed.

I can't explain why the laptop has been exceedingly warm and now suddenly feels cool. (...even though Everest is reporting seriously high PCH temp. Could be invalid sensor reading). Perhaps this is the same issue as reported previously here about the fan speeds being ramped up incorrectly when coming out of sleep? ( I did come out of sleep for this current run.)

(Fwiw, I did notice a BIOS setting "always run fan when plugged in". I unchecked that, but hasn't seemed to make a difference.)

Are there any fan speed control and/or monitoring tools for these machines?


2) Has anyone noticed any IRQ conflict type issues? I can't pinpoint anything specific or definite yet, but I tried running a 3D stress test earlier. I noticed that the 3D demo was stuttering about once a second. What has me concerned is that the stutter coincided exactly with the hard drive activity light blinking. It could've just been that particular benchmark I guess. Any recommendations for decent free 3D stress/benchmark tool? (I was running FurMark earlier.)

In general though, my harddisk activity light seems to blink once a second continuously when there's no obvious load.

________________
Kaliatech 8740W | 620M | M7820 | 2x4GB | DC2 | Backlit Keys

[RampageII]

I just ran a torture test with prime95 on my laptop with all 4 dimms full.
It took it like a champ with no crashes at all.
I ran the test for just over 3hrs, which should be more than enough I think. The nice thing about RAM is that if it's bad, you usually find out quickly. If it runs well from the start, than you're golden.
It went through 12 different tests during that period.

Did the benchmark test on prime95 also and it was completed without problems.

CPU was running at 100% the whole time.
CPU core temps stayed between 78C-80C throughout most of the test and reached a max. of 85C in a few occasions.
GPU averaged 47C. With a low of 42C and max. of 52C

Is prime95 designed to test the RAM at full capacity?
It seems the most the system ever used at any given time during the test was 3.66GB.
During most of the test it was between 3.2-3.66GB.

[Aikimox]

For those interested in gaming on DC2:
Perfectly possible...I'd say - a must!
Just played Crysis for 20min on max res and high details - smoooooth! No input lag so far, will continue the testing.
The temps maxed @ 83C (both CPU&GPU) with the ambient of 27C - same as my M17X. The cooling is adequate for gaming! Gorgeous graphics! Never seen Crysis so alive and colorful, hehe...

[Aikimox]

@Aikimox, when you review, include review of this notebook when using outside in sunlight. I tried it today first time just to see how it is, not much use in direct sunlight, but works in shaded areas. Wish there was a DC2 screen like this video from Pixel Qi.

I did it already, under a direct sunlight (you have to manually force the max brightness through the power options). Possible. Not 100% convenient though.
The review is almost ready, BTW.

[m8o]

The review is almost ready, BTW.

I'll have the port pictures in your Inbox in about an hour. Was going to drop to Photoshop to get rid of the few stray dog hairs I didn't notice on the machine magnified by the flash, but I'll have to skip that part.