HP Pavilion Media Center dv9341eu Entertainment - Turion 64 X2 TL-56 - 17" TFT

Author's product rating:   

Speed	Very fast
Look & Feel	Excellent
Comfort & Portability	Excellent
Robustness & Durability	Excellent
Value For Money	Excellent

Advantages:	High Specs, Low Price, Great Graphics, Dual Core CPU, Two 120gb Hard Drives
Disadvantages:	None i Can think of

Recommend to potential buyers:

yes

Full review

I am current looking to purchase a laptop I want a laptop that I can play games and do work on, and I wanted it to have the small stuff such as webcam, Bluetooth, WIFI and microphone built in so that I don’t have to carry around all those extra hardware and cables (by the time you have finished connecting all that stuff your laptop becomes about as portable as a desktop). I also wanted it to have a dual core processor and at least 1GB of ram and a decent graphics card (with at least 128mb dedicated memory).

So when I saw this laptop it was everything that I wanted and some extra all packed into a sleek and stylish case. Once I looked over the specs I have decided to purchase this laptop from my locale computer outlet (once I can get the money together, you know students are poor right LOL). But I have looked into this laptop on a lot of forums and review sites and I haven’t found any problems with this laptop, and I was pleasantly surprised that people have used this laptop to play games such as “The Elder Scrolls: Oblivion” and “Prey” and on pretty high settings too which is what I want.

I then looked into the benchmarks tested on this graphics card (NVIDIA GeForce GO 7600) and it was pretty impressive for a laptop graphics card (the card that was tested was the 256mb dedicated memory version, I say this because I have heard there is a 128mb dedicated memory version).below are some of the test results from the benchmarks used to test this card. (This card was tested in a slightly different version of laptop so the results may vary).

Benchmarks:
3DMark01: 17000 points
3DMark03: 7800 points
3DMark05: 3400 points
3DMark06: 1900 points

As you can see the benchmark results are good for a laptop card, the specs of the card its self will be listed below, along with the full specs of the laptop of course.

Specs:
Microprocessor: AMD Turion™ 64 X2 Mobile Technology TL-56

Memory: 1024 MB (2x 512 MB) Level 2 cache 2x 512 KB

Memory Max: Up to 2 GB DDR2

Video Graphics: NVIDIA® GeForce™ Go 7600

Video Memory: 256 MB dedicated

Hard Drive: 240 GB (2x 120 GB) 5400 rpm

Multimedia Drive:
Lightscribe Super Multi DVD Writer (+/-R +/-RW) with Double Layer support

Display:
17" WXGA+ High Definition BrightView Widescreen (1440 x 900)

Fax/Modem:High speed 56K modem

Network Card:
Ethernet 10/100BT integrated

Wireless Connectivity:
802.11a/b/g WLAN
Bluetooth®

Multimedia Features:
HP Pavilion webcam with stereo integrated microphones

Sound:
3D Sound Blaster Pro compatible sound
Altec Lansing® speakers

Keyboard:
Full size desktop keyboard (with separate numeric keypad layout)

Pointing Device:
Touch Pad with On/Off button and dedicated vertical Scroll Up/Down pad, volume control, mute buttons, 2 Quick Launch Buttons

PC Card Slots:
One ExpressCard/54 slot (also supports ExpressCard/34)

External Ports:
5-in-1 integrated Digital Media Reader for Secure Digital cards, MultiMedia cards, Memory Stick, Memory Stick Pro, or xD Picture cards
1 VGA port
1 HDMI port; 4 USB 2.0 ports
1 IEEE-1394
1 RJ 11 modem connector
1 RJ 45 Ethernet connector
S-video TV out
Remote control infrared port (Remote Control optional)
2 Headphones-out one w/ SPDIF Digital Audio, 1 Microphone-in port
Cable docking connector
Dimensions:
28.50 cm (L) x 39.60 cm (W) x 4.18 cm (max) H

Weight:
3.56 kg (7.8 lbs)

Power:
90 W AC Power Adapter, 8-cell Lithium-Ion (Li-Ion)

What's In The Box:
HP Pavilion Media Center dv9341eu (of course)
HP Mobile Remote Control
Power/Charger Cable
Manual

Graphics Card specs:
Pipeline: 8 pixel-pipelines and 5 vertex-pipelines
Clock: chip: 450 MHz, memory: 500 MHz
Memory: GDDR3, GDDR2, GDDR1, maximal upgrade: 256 MB, bus: 128/64 bit, partially TurboCache
DirectX: 9c, Shader Model 3.0
Features: PureVideo
Application area: notebooks with medium weight and size
Other info: 90nm, 177 millions of transistors, PCI-E, 8 raster operation units (ROP), 8 texture mapping units (TMU)

The 17” screen is crystal clear and of superb quality for all you movies, games and other activities. The screen is also High Definition which adds to the overall quality of this already great laptop. And for the price that the laptop is currently available for it is a bargain it easily out features even some of the top range laptops which are way over the price of this one.

Additional features:
This laptop has lots of features which are listed below with brief explanations of them.

Built in Webcam:

The webcam that comes built into the case of this laptop is also a 1.3 megapixel still camera. It can be used to take digital photos, film and for video conversations using you favourite chat or instant messenger client

Microphone:

This laptop has two omni-directional built in microphones so there’s no need to attach external devices or wires - the camera and microphones are conveniently integrated into the sleek, hands-free design.

Expresscard/54 slot:

This card slot is for the new design of cards available for laptops, it replaces the old PCMCIA cards for laptops, the mew cards come in two sizes one is the 54mm named the expresscard/54 and the 34mm named the expresscard/34. the expresscard/54 slot can take both 54mm and 34mm cards but the 34mm slot can only take the 34mm cards, so with this laptop and its 54mm card slot you have more cards and thus more features available for you.

802.11 a/b/g WLAN:

This laptop has wireless technology built into it, it supports A, B and G WIFI technology, and this means that it can connect to almost any wireless network anywhere. So you have more access to the internet without having to purchase or carry around any additional devices

Capacitive Buttons:

These buttons are used to control quick launch applications and control media activities, they have the normal functions such as Stop/play/pause etc, but there is something special about these buttons they aren’t only backlit with a very stylish blue l.e.d, they are also touch sensitive, this means you don’t actually press a button but they sense your finger and activate as you touch them (kind of like the touchpad for the mouse).

Infra Red Remote Control:

This control can be used for a lot of features on the laptop mainly multimedia of course. It can be used for navigation too, it has page up/down so you can navigate through presentations, WebPages and more, which would be good for work presentations and home photo albums. You can also use the toggle button to switch between the integrated display and external display.

And it also has play/pause, skip/fast forward, rewind, stop movies while they play and adjust the Volume up/down and mute, so you can control DVD, CD and movies on the large hard drive(s). And when you have finished with the remote don’t worry about having to carry the remote around with you, you can store the remote inside the laptops card slot and it fits flush with the side of the laptop.

HP Quickplay 2.1

HP QuickPlay allows the user to watch DVD movies, listen to music, browse pictures without starting Windows, thus reducing power consumption and you can also toggle easily between music and pictures/video with a comprehensive user interface in the HP QuickPlay application or with the dedicated media buttons.

Overall I think that this laptop is a great laptop and one of the most feature packed laptops I have seen, and for the price (shown below) it is a real good deal. I recommend this laptop to anyone who loves gaming, needs a good laptop for work or in general enjoys using computer, you will not be disappointed.

Price: about £600.00
(That’s how much it is at my local computer store)