*HP Zbook 17 Owner's Lounge*

Could not find an owner's lounge for this system, so I'll start it.

Just did a CTO Zbook 17. I am upgrading from an HP 8760w with Dreamcolor.

I am a working photographer and 3D animator using this for Lightroom and Maya.

Here are the main specs:

i7-4900MQ
Dreamcolor
Quadro K5100M 8GB
Bluray BDR/RE

I ordered the lowest RAM and storage, and will upgrade to two Samsung 840EV 1TB SSDs and 1 Samsung 840EV 1TB MSATA as well as 32GB SODIMM Ripjaws. Was wondering if this will work with the 1866mhz ones?

The main reason for this system is the Dreamcolor screen. Dell has stopped including wide gamut IPS screens their latest workstations, and I believe the HP Zbooks are the only laptops out now that include a 30-bit IPS screen with near 100% AdobeRGB gamut, which I need for work.

 

Main specs for mine:

i7-4700MQ
1920x1080 FHD wide view
Quadro k3100M 4 GB
16 G Memory .

Currently running w/ the original 750GB HDD + 32 GB Cache, with a Samsung 840 Pro 240 GB in the second bay . Will eventually go to 240 GB OS + programs, w/ 750 or I TB SSD in the second bay . Primary use as portable Adobe CC machine ( PS and Premiere Pro) . So far so good . Pros include display ( seems to be an IPS - holds SRGB calibration well) , build quality and expandability . Working well w/ application software and Windows 8.1 .

 

One question for any 17 owners ... Does the right-click preference show the 'Run with Graphics Processor' option ? This is a generally supported feature with Optimus , but not sure if HP neutered it .. Have Optimus mostly tamed , but still trying to determine exactly what HP has implemented . It also appears they have blacklisted any HD 4600 Graphics Driver Updates except those from their site ..

 

I did not see that option when I used this laptop. It only had the Nvidia drivers, no Intel drivers were present in device manager.

 

Interesting ..but does it have a dreamcolor display ?? The unit I'm configuring has the FHD 1920x1080 no-Dreamcolor. I think the Dreamcolor can only use the nVidia because of the 10 bit color requirement . Dreamcolor units don't switch graphics .

 

You are correct. It was a Dreamcolor display.

 

Does the optimus work with rgb panel in HP? (that must have been a really costly machine)

 

Just got an estimated ship date of mid May, so will post some pics and maybe a quick review. And you are correct - it was not cheap. I have, however, ordered from HP SMB before and they gave me a nice discount. You can also use coupon code CTOZB17 to get a 20% discount off custom orders (not sure if it has expired yet).

Not sure about Optimus, but I am a power user that almost always has his laptop plugged in, so I have never noticed (it probably doesn't with the Dreamcolor display).

I also have very extensively knowledge of Dells and HP laptops (back in the 90s I used to work at Dell in their product group as a test engineer in their portables division, and am very comfortable taking them apart).

In the past I have owned many Latitudes, XPS, a Precision M6600 (the RGBLED screen could never calibrate correctly), AW M15x (really crappy screen for photowork but build quality was amazing). I upgrade about every 3 years. The system I use now is an HP 8760W workstation with the Quadro 5010M, 16gb RAM, and the Dreamcolor. It has been great since 2011 (the durability on the corner edges are crappy, they are all bent up - very thin aluminum) - but the screen itself has been outstanding for graphics work.

 

As per HP Support Pages for the Zbook 17 , Optimus is disabled for DreamColor displays .. This makes sense given that the HD4600 Graphics cannot support the 10 bit required for the panel . it's in the issues list , with HPs response . That's not necessarily a bad thing, unless there's a lot of off the outlet usage .
i do most of my work in SRGB, so I opted for the wide view FHD panel . So far , it's held calibration ( <2 delta e) very well . It's an LG/Philips in my unit , and it can sit at the table with the Dell UltraSharp Desktop and the Apple Retina it shares space with ( they're all calibrated pretty tightly) .
Only 1 issue at this point; Photoshop CC Liquify caused PS to hang on exit - It's using the Quadro . Might try the beta drivers . Fortunately , liquify isn't a big part of my workflow .

 

They just updated the ship date to first week of July... must be shortage of some part.