At TB Tech: HP Pavilion dv5 ‘Falling Leaves’
Tom on January 23, 2009
Our first impressions of the HP dv5 Special Edition have been favourable.
The product we’re currently subjecting to the rigorous scrutiny of our review routine is the HP Pavilion dv5 Falling Leaves Special Edition (more accurately the dv5-1140tx).
As our regular visitors will know, we put our review units through three categories of testing: performance, usability, and design. Although a full review will not be ready for a week or two, the dv5-SE is shaping up nicely.
The dv5 is a high-performance machine for those on a budget, with some models in the A$1000-A$1500 brackets including strong graphics capability. This model retails for around A$2500, so we expect quite a lot of a machine that competes in the premium price bracket.
There has been no disappointment so far. The dv5 is a strong performer with a 2.53GHz Intel Core 2 Duo chipset, a 320GB hard drive, 4 gigabytes of RAM and a 512 megabyte NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT.
This model is unlike the rest of the chrome/black range. It is stark white – very crisp – on all of the usable surfaces. A few silver and lime-green leaves fleck the lid and touchpad, but otherwise it’s a giant, uninterrupted canvas of brightness.
HP’s touted ‘Infinity’ display is standard, and it appears so and works much like the displays on the Unibody MacBook range. It’s big, bright, vibrant and has a heavy black frame around it to give the impression of a gapless display when switched off.
So far, I’ve used the dv5 in a number of situations – working at a desk, on my lap, at the coffee shop, and at work with no power adapter. It’s held up well. The graphics card is a suck on the battery life, but when engaging in web browsing, productivity – or writing a post as I am now – the dv5 is very fast and the battery will give at least a couple of hours.
The keyboard is very comfortable, although I would have liked a larger touchpad. It could be a little thinner, too.
They’re our first impressions of the HP dv5 Special Edition. A comprehensive review with pictures and benchmarking is on the way.
my one makes a humming noise, did yours?
Comment by Anmol on April 7, 2009 at 11:45 pm
[...] At TB Tech: HP Pavilion dv5 Falling Leaves 23 January 2009 Another consistently popular post on a recent special edition of HP’s [...]
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