Customer Reviews

HP Pavilion zv5430us 15.4" Laptop (AMD Athlon 64 Processor 3200+ (PowerNow), 512 MB RAM, 80 GB Hard Drive, DVD+/-RW/CD-RW Drive)

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
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After reading all of the positive reviews on the HP v5430, I decided to take the plunge and get one myself. Almost 2 weeks later, I have been continually impressed with all the things I can do especially when compared with competing offerings, most of which cost more and have less.

The cool temperature of such a fast processor was quite refreshing. Also, the plastic case is solid, much more so than some of the flimsy stuff used on some Dell notebooks.

Probably I could have used another 200-400 pixels in the vertical display dimension, but that would have increased the cost. Setting fonts to a smaller display size definitely maximizes real estate, and the brightness makes this text quite readable. It drives an external display flawlessly at 1600x1200 75Hz. Gamers can expect some slowness with leading-edge games like Doom3, but some of this may be a lack of system RAM.

Another potential limitation is that maximum RAM is limited at 1280M (256M soldered in, swapping the 256M SODIMM with a 1G module). But so far, the 512M performs well for most tasks; heavy-duty graphics and software development environments may need more memory. Too bad that they didn't make both modules swappable for a 2G maximum.

Battery life is decent with about 2 hours+ of performance. I learned my lesson over the years with notebooks; frequent recharging will eventually shorten the battery life to minutes. I remove the battery when near an outlet, and reserve the battery only for those times when mobile use is needed. Yes, the disadvantage is that I lose the UPS ability of the battery to maintain state in case of a power outage. Also, one should be careful with the power supply plug into the notebook; it is awkwardly situated for true "on the lap" use, and can come out. Another nit; there is a plastic "bumper" on the battery which makes one corner unstable when the battery is removed (they should have put it on the computer case); this can be easily addressed by attaching a store-bought one.

The DVD+/- RW / CDRW works great; this makes the system fairly complete in terms of media versatility. A word to the wise; stick with + or +/- media to ensure forward compatibility.

Firewire, (3) USB ports, and built-in speakers work flawlessly. The 5-in-1 media reader needed a downloadable HP software update to recognize my 1G SD card. Speaking of which, HP's email support is superb; I've gotten answers to my questions within the hour after it has been routed to the correct department. A tip: once you get a good answer, simply keep replying to that email for fast, accurate information.

There's no built-in microphone, nor floppy, but there's a mic input for your own, and a USB input for an external drive should one really need one (given this age of flash drives and ubiquitous networking).

All in all, I'm still looking for reasons to return this notebook before my 2 week period expires, and I can't find any! If you decide to go for it, shop around for good pricing and rebates. Also, the sibling model zv5420US is available for under $1000 presently should DVD writing not be needed.

This computer rocks! Athlon 64! Very cool, no problems with heat and have had it on my lap for 3+ hrs! Nice keyboard/trackpad. This is a big computer, definitely not for the road warrior but excellent desktop replacement. Be careful with the specs of this site, there are certain things that are wrong, such as does not take XD cards. I wish there was bluetooth in it. For the money, you're not going to find a better desktop replacement.