*HP EliteBook 8740w Owners Lounge - PART 2*

[landsome]

I have an i7 8740W and I have noticed that when it goes to sleep, and then resumes to a login screen, once I type my password, I get a black screen and it never seems to recover and requires a reboot to fix?

Windows 7 x64. Recently upgraded to the latest bios from the HP Website.

Also can someone recommend good quality video driver that is more recent than what HP are offering?

On the first issue, my 8740w (i5, M7820) also sometimes recovers badly from sleep (but the behavior is different: slightly garbled screen) and I have to reboot to fix it. I have another problem as well: occasional BSOD's if, and immediately after, I boot on battery. But otherwise it works flawlessly.

As to the second issue, AMD posts Mobility drivers on their website, and if you select the Firepro / M7820 you are given the option to download a driver specifically for HP. But you can also use the generic HD 5xxxM drivers, and in my case they work very well.

[Molvol]

I'm getting really, really sad. This 8740w seems to be a faulty design. I've been having most issues I have read about. HP changed my mainboard and graphics card. It only slightly changed symptoms. The least unstable way seems to be the oldest Nvidia driver, it keeps the resume from sleep BSODs to a minimum. I think all 8740ws have these defects but only a few people actually realize or notice. Maybe for most it's just how computers are. For me it's the first computer ever to run unstable generally. A lot has probably to do with Win7 64 as it seems, but there's no alternative since XP doesn't support all the RAM. Reading that someone has similar issues with ATI graphics confirms it must be the system that is faulty. I thought it is Nvidia since most issues seemed to at least change when I tried different graphics driver versions. Maybe it is Win7 generally? I have no experience but run XP for months without reboots and BSODs.

[knight427]

I had most every problem documented between my first 3, the fourth required two screen changes, but eventually I got a rock solid 8740w. You need a full system replacement.

[landsome]

On the first issue, my 8740w (i5, M7820) also sometimes recovers badly from sleep (but the behavior is different: slightly garbled screen) and I have to reboot to fix it. I have another problem as well: occasional BSOD's if, and immediately after, I boot on battery. But otherwise it works flawlessly.

The funny part is that, if I boot on wall power, everything works perfectly. I have literally had 0 problems with the brick plugged in.

[Siorah]

Lots of stuff happening while i was away, interesting.

As for the dual chip in a quad board, i did post a LOT of information on this last year sometime, search for '8740w benching/specs thread' it's buried now, but its still on the forum.

Lets get down to business anyway.

Apoligies if you've found out answers, i'm just answering posts in order from my last one.

USB lock-ups

In the early days of the 8740w, in your case with a prototype board, you have a very early revision of the nec chipset. You should look at station-drivers.com to update the firmware, because the earlier firmwares were terrible, and locked up all the time with windows 7.

This issue was fixed with hp releasing new drivers/new usb board revision.

On the 5000M/Ebay posts

You HAVE to make sure the VENDOR_ID of ANY card you put in the 8740w is HP. it WILL NOT BOOT with anything else.

This is from personal experience, not websites or anything like that.

The 8740w will boot with the newer gen cards, 3000m/4000m, but has no compatible heatsinks. The non hp cards will just flash the LEDs above the keyboard to say vga failiure.

There is NO workaround for this at this time.

The engineering sample I5 chip

I have had a look around for this chip, and note that the bios does not actually have the 'support' for it built in, which could be one of your issues. Bear that in mind.

Quad boards run any chip that the bios can support. however you are limited to slot usage on the dual core chips. I haven't had a dual in here for some time, but there is information on this from a while ago, i think on the benching/specs thread.

Stop 9F errors/Graphics issues

People with these, need to look at the graphics settings on their nvidia card. it is a known issue, no 'real' fix, other than to adjust power settings in nvidia control panel. - search for 'potential fix for nvidia owners' thread for more information. You also may have an ancient vbios, the benching thread has information on how to update it.

SLEEP issues

This has been reported to me many times by clients, but i've never actually seen it myself, the fix is to use a different driver, and to ensure the intel framework is installed for the cpu.

It is a bug with ACPI.sys that can cause above bsod. I use the driver from nvidia, due to it fixing stop 124 errors. I've not used a hp driver in a long time. 300-something i'm using with no issues.

For the ATI folks, i have no assistance, as i have very limited exposure to the ati card in the 8740w due to my work needing nvidia cards.

note to users recently updating bios

If you've been running on an older bios for some time, your KBC controller could be corrupted. this is a known issue, though will never be told to you via hp support.

to fix you need to remove power, battery pack, and the tiny battery under the keyboard, and leave your hp for 12-18 hours so it properly discharges.

It's a last resort, but has fixed 'quirks' in the past.

Right i *think* i've covered everything i've missed, apoligies for the wall of text (tm)

Sio

[landsome]

...and to ensure the intel framework is installed for the cpu.
Sio

Thanks Siorah, always pregnant with worthwhile information!

This being said, what is "intel framework for the cpu"? Google, Intel support and HP support sites do not provide illuminating info on this. Is this the "inf" chipset driver? Is it one of the uefi firmwares?

Also, I know there is no updated vbios for the ATi M7820 cards, but are there any bioses other than the one on my card - 012.019.000.008.036573 - floating around? I would be willing to try a different one just to get rid of these annoying problems on booting on battery, which seem to be vidcard related (none when booting on battery without the AMD drivers installed).

[Siorah]

Thanks Siorah, always pregnant with worthwhile information!

This being said, what is "intel framework for the cpu"? Google, Intel support and HP support sites do not provide illuminating info on this. Is this the "inf" chipset driver? Is it one of the uefi firmwares?

Also, I know there is no updated vbios for the ATi M7820 cards, but are there any bioses other than the one on my card - 012.019.000.008.036573 - floating around? I would be willing to try a different one just to get rid of these annoying problems on booting on battery, which seem to be vidcard related (none when booting on battery without the AMD drivers installed).

Intel Management

[landsome]

Thanks. I'll install it now see if it makes a difference to sleep issues.

[knight427]

For those of you with an SSD on your 8740w, how long does it take for you to boot? And what are you getting for CrystalDiskMark scores?

I recently installed a Crucial M4 256GB. According to others on the SSD board, my scores look fine for a SATA II laptop.


But my boot time is ~42 seconds. This seems petty long for an SSD.

I made a clone of my HDD with Acronis, which I was really happy with how easy that process was. I've since tried all the normal tweaks suggested for SSD owners (though most people say these tweaks are no longer needed on a modern SSD in Windows 7). So it appears maybe I should install a fresh image of Win7 on the SSD and go through the painful process of loading my programs manually then recovering my data from a backup. But before I do that, I want to know that I will see a large benefit in boot time and maybe some benefit in read/write speeds.

[landsome]

For those of you with an SSD on your 8740w, how long does it take for you to boot? And what are you getting for CrystalDiskMark scores?

I have a rather similar 256gb ssd - same Marvell controller, made for Dell by LiteOn / Plextor. Except for the firmware - which, of course, is significant -, it's pretty much the same affair as the m4. CrystalMark scores on the 8740w are 220/200, 220/180, 15/30, 75/45.

On a Sandy desktop I had pretty much the same results in 4k tests, but vastly improved sequential and 512k scores, roughly 400/400 and, respectively, 300/280.

For comparison's sake, on the same Sandy desktop my 128GB m4 scored 500/200, 400/200, 25/60, 250/70.