HP Compaq Business Notebook nx5000

Author's product rating:   

Speed	Fast
Look & Feel	Good
Comfort & Portability	Excellent
Robustness & Durability	Excellent
Value For Money	Good

Advantages:	A good tough laptop that will accept a certain amount of negligence .
Disadvantages:	Built - in speakers are not the best .

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

~Introduction~
This laptop is my link to my head office, it is also my mini office in the field and it gets used up to 10 hours a day, five days a week. It was bought by my company for me as I am normally on the move. I have had the laptop from new for six months, it has suffered some abuse at my hands and still manages to keep working.

~The nx5000~
The laptop's approximate dimensions when closed are 325mm wide, 275mm deep and 37mm thick (13" by 11" by 1 1/2"). It weighs in at 2.6kg or 5lbs 10oz, which is not the lightest laptop, but it is not the heaviest. It is easy to carry in one hand, but it is also easier to drop it this way.

The laptop casing is a dark grey or charcoal coloured plastic. Looking around the closed laptop there are numerous ports, LED's and buttons on view. Along the front are two speaker grills, a rubber -/+ volume control button, a mute volume button and an infrared communication port. Above these buttons are five LED lights so you can see what the computer is doing. I'll describe these in a minute as they are best seen when the screen is up. There is also a light silver coloured button that allows the laptop to be opened up. Down the left hand side, there is the DVD/CD-RW combined drive, a screw sealed flap for the hard disk, a socket for headphones and a microphone socket. The right side houses the battery, two external card slots, a flash memory slot and a telephone line port. Round the back of the laptop there are the normal ports for power lead, communication leads, parallel leads, an S-Video lead, a monitor, a DV video lead, LAN and two USB sockets.
Turning the laptop upside down reveals two sliding buttons that allow you to take out the DVD/CD-RW drive and the battery. There is also an opening for the fan and a slot that I am led to believe is for a special laptop table where you can plug it straight onto the desk and it connects to a computer network.

The laptop opens like a clam to reveal the 15" LCD screen and the flat keyboard. The keys are the same charcoal colour as the casing with white lettering, the keys have a silver surround around them which houses the in-built touch pad mouse at the front, there are a further three LED's and four buttons to the rear. The green LEDs to the rear show the operation of functions during use namely number lock and caps lock. The four charcoal coloured buttons at the rear are power on, laptop lock, blue tooth button and a presentation button. Along the front, there are five additional LED's that I mentioned earlier. These are different colours and they let you know what functions the laptop is currently performing. From left to right they are a blue LED for blue tooth, a green LED for power, an orange LED for battery on charge, a green light for the hard disc and a green/red light for the DVD/CD-RW drive.

As I was given this laptop by, my company there are a few things I don't have or need for this laptop. I didn't need a printer or a projector, though the ports are available. I don't know what it cost my company and I didn't have to install the operating system. The blue tooth and wireless networks were disabled by my friendly IT department, but I don't really need them in the field. In addition, I think that the laptop only came with a power lead as any other peripherals or leads were provided later.

~Using the Laptop~
Setting up the laptop back at head office is easy. I plug in the power socket to the rear, connect a LAN line to the port and plug in a mouse to one of the USB sockets. The laptop screen opens easily and it is ready to use within a few minutes of arriving in the office. It takes up very little room on the desk and I am left with ample space for all my drawings or reports.

The operating system is Windows XP professional so I got all the word processor and spreadsheet programmes that I could want. The keys on the keyboard are a good size, they are not too small and they do not require a lot of pressure when typing. The only trouble I do have is a laptop generic thing and that is with the touch pad mouse as I have a tendency to accidentally hit it occasionally if I am typing or moving my hands around the keyboard. As I said this is a laptop generic thing and I have yet to see or find a better alternative to the touch pad mouse, in reality this is only a minor annoyance. As for using the touch pad mouse, it is one of the better in-built pads that I have used and I used to dislike them a lot. I find that this mouse pad is relatively easy to use and required no adjustment for me to use. It needs the right amount of pressure to move the cursor, yet at the same time I'm not accidentally double clicking random items or moving files. I have persevered with this touch pad mouse and although I was given a separate optical mouse, I now use the touch pad more than I did on previous laptops. Thanks Hewlett Packard for doing a fine job with the touch pad.

The screen is a reasonable size, the colour and brightness are good. Brightness adjustment is achieved by pushing a blue coloured function button next to the left control button and pressing either F9 or F10, to decrease or increase the brightness. I tend to use this much more when I am out in the field under constantly changing light conditions. The only problem I have with the screen is its tendency to suddenly flick into a very dark mode. This was possible caused by me dropping it or spilling Doctor Pepper over the keyboard, I'm not really sure what is worst. I can fix it temporarily by shutting down the computer, resetting the battery and starting up again. It is a minor problem and as it is still under warranty, it is due to go back to HP soon.

The sound from the speakers at the front of the laptop is very tinny, it also changes if I am typing due my hands applying pressure to the casing above the speakers. It's more a problem with the position of the speakers at the front of the keyboard than the quality of the speaker, although I do think the speakers are not that good. I changed over to headphones after a while, as the sound was annoying me and I found that my headphones gave a better sound.

The video card will play Windows media files, DVD and handles AutoCAD drawings well. In short, it can display all the standard and non-standard applications on my laptop with no real problems. On the game front I have no idea how this laptop performs, (this is a business computer after all). As it is not really designed for your top end graphic packages I would not expect it to run modern games like 'CoD' or 'Doom 3'.

The DVD/CD writer is quick and easy to use. It pings out from the laptop with ease and does not feel like it will snap of easily. The tray doesn't bend or flex when you insert a disc and it neatly slides back into the laptop. DVD's play okay and CD's work absolutely fine. I'm not sure of the drive's read/write speeds, but it writes a CD in a few minutes depending on the content. In any case, it does not feel as if it is labouring and it has never given me cause for concern.

Connections to my various peripherals are good, I use the DV video port a lot to download film from my work camcorder. The flash memory card from my camera fits the port on the right and downloads pictures with ease. There is no floppy drive, but the flash memory stick I have transfers data through the USB port without any trouble. The infrared port will transfer data to a similar laptop and as some of my co-workers have the same laptop, this is sometimes the easiest method for large files. Infrared connection distance is good across about two desks, any greater and data loss can occur.

In the field, this laptop is easy to carry around, but with all the peripherals like a printer and camcorder the complete package can be a hefty weight. The battery lasts from 7:30 in the morning until about 11:30 and this is normally with music playing. That is 4 hours of heavy use and on some days, it will idle through until lunchtime if I am not using it constantly. The power pack will recharge a flat battery in around two hours.

In the office the LAN network ensures a good connection to the Internet, whilst in the field the built-in modem is needed. I have a lead that connects it up to the nearest telephone line and from there I can dial up my head office. The modem is quick and by that I mean the dial noise is a blur of clicks, rather than the long drawn out dial tone of old modems. In this respect, it is much quicker at connecting online than my old PC at home. Normal connection time is within 30 seconds and is sometimes completed in less than 20 seconds. Any problems I have had are always due to the use of a remote or poor telephone connection. The modem also works well when I have been using it in hotel rooms and I normally have had no problems in getting online.

Overall, the laptop is user friendly it is loaded with HP's help desk and other information if I am stuck on something. It is tough, durable and cleans up well after a grubby week on site.

~Geek Information for nx5000~
Operating System - Microsoft Windows XP Professional (updated to Service Pack 2)
Processor - Intel Pentium 1600Mhz
RAM Memory - 512Mb (2x256Mb)
Hard Drive - Toshiba MK4025GAS, 40Gb capacity
Display - 15" LCD screen, 1024x768 resolution
Video card - Intel 82852/82855 graphics controller
Modem - Agere Systems AC'97 Modem
Network Card - Broadcom 440x 10/100 integrated controller
Wireless card - Intel PRO/wireless 2200BG Network Connection
DVD/CD-RW - HL-DT-ST RW/DVD GCC-4243N
2x USB ports
1x LAN connection (Local Area Network)
1x DV video port (Camcorder in/out)
1x Monitor port (Projector)
1x S-Video port (Video in/out)
1x Printer port
1x Communication port
1x DC power socket
1x Headphone socket (Audio out)
1x Microphone socket (Audio in)
1x Modem port (Phone line)
2x PCMCIA adapters
1x PCMCIA flash memory port (Camera Card)
1x Infrared port (nx5000's can talk to each other)

~Conclusion~
This laptop has so far given me six months use with only a few minor problems. Most of these little problems are quite possibly due to my negligence in caring for this delicate piece of equipment. It has taken a lot of abuse like dust, liquids, dirt and it's been dropped. It continues to work well and without any major crashes or problems. The only downside is the tinny speakers at the front of the laptop, but I would still recommend this laptop to a business or home users based on my experiences. If it will not fall apart on a construction site, then it will do well in the office.

Thanks for reading, rating and commenting.

Martin