Category: Geeks r Us
Hello all,
Usually, a mobile workstation is incredibly expensive, though if you know where to look (Ebay) for example, great deals can be obtained.
Because I lack sufficient funds to purchase a $4,000.00 + machine, I discovered and bought an HP Elitebook 8740W with the following specifications:
Processor: Intel Core i7 Quadcore 1.87 GHZ; turbo boost up to 3.2 GHZ; 4 cores and 8 threads; 32 GB of installed memory; primary hard disc is an intel 160 GB, and the second is in a CD/DVDRW tray and is 480 GB in size. Video wise, there is an NVIDIA Quadro 3800 with 1 GB dedicated memory. Screen resolution tops out at 1920 by 1200 and is 17.0 inches.
Since this model is from 2010, it has Windows 7 Pro, and I do not intend to upgrade it to Windows 10. However, when installing multiple versions of Jaws, the computer took along time to load the software. Originally, when I purchased it, I reimaged the drives, wiping them clean of data and reinstalled Windows 7 Pro. Initially, a large amount of space was consumed, but I disabled hibernation through Command Prompt and decreased the page file size to 512 MB. Do you think the reduced size of the page file is causing later versions of Jaws to load slowly, or is it the processor? After trying ver. 16 and 17, it took at least 20 seconds to become usable. Only 15 loads fast. If the processor is not at fault, Freedom Scientific sure has increased features within the screen reader, consuming a lot of memory.
Thanks for any assistance.
Nathan.
It is an old machine, so these specs could be wrong.
I hope you didn't pay much for it.
Smile.
well, yeah. that page file is hella small.
But that really is an old machine, as well.
Though if you have 32 gb ram... I'd suspect your page file isn't really the problem.
It is old. It is refurbished.
It is working and working well, so it is doing as it probably should.
You can't expect it to work like new tech.
If you have not done this already, it would be worth installing the nvidia driver. The generic windows graphics driver would offer minimal or no 3d acceleration for that card. As a result, windows would offload the graphics processing to your CPU which could be slowing things down. Also, I would suspect that the power management for the card doesn't work correctly without the Nvidia driver.
I did visit NVIDIA's website, and installed the drivers. However, I do not see any control panel for that matter. Although the machine consists of Bluetooth, my BrailleNote will not interface through this protocol. There must be an inherit flaw in compatibility here. Actually, by reducing the page file, hibernation, and turning off indexing services, the machine runs a lot faster than it did when I purchased it. Before I tweeked these settings, the 149 GB Intel SSD was 60% full, but now I have 108 GB of space.
Nathan. Plus, my other 447 GB SSD, which brings the total storage to 596 GB. Windows Experience scores put the memory at 7.4, the processor at 7.2, and the solid state drives at 7.1 for disc transfers. Obviously, the graphics card scored the lowest on these benchmarks rendering a meager 6.5
Keep in mind you can't expect top of the line performance from 6 year old hardware. Your getting about 1/3 of the best transfer rates available in todays SSD's because you don't have M.2 connections. Taking a quick look comparing the Core I7 800 series to the latest comprable skylake parts your getting about half the CPU performance in multi threaded workloads that modern high end consumer processors provide.
Told him so. Smile.
Well, now this guy wants to take more money from me. He stated that the processor could be upgraded, though only to a quad-core extreme version. The solid state drives could be put into a raid 0 configuration, though I do not think this is even possible for an elitebook. He wants $980 for all those upgrades, but, it's not worth it. I know it's not. Take for instance a Dell XPS 8900. It is a scaleable machine, and most likely, performs much faster than this one. Of course, there is nothing to dispute, and even if there were, the seller does not offer a return policy, so. Most likely I will resell it in order to pay off PayPal credit. Crazy deal. Suggest machines? For approx. $625.00 that would exceed this?
Nathan. I suggest no one purchase from S3. That is what his store is called. He took 4 weeks to ship the machine. No return policy to speak of.
He's not at fault.
He sales refurbished computers.
He states no return.
His machine is in working order, and works fine as far as what it is.
I'm not sure why his shipping took so long, but maybe he needed to repair the machine before sending it.
Processors alone are expensive.
However, you'd be totally wasting good money upgrading an old machine for that kind of cash.
The only reason you do things like that, is you enjoy tenkering, and have the money to play with.
$625 wasn't to unreasonable, because he charges for his labor.
You buy machines like this, because you like them and again have the money.
Sure, you take a chance, but in this case, the computer is working, so you came out fine.
Yep. has Win 10 now.
For those specs $625 seems reasonable. You can't get a good laptop for that money. The best you could do is the Asus xenbook for $699, that's a modern core i3 processor which runs fast in quick bursts but throttles do to thermal constraints under heavy load.