*HP EliteBook 8740w Owners Lounge - PART 2*

the install a newer battery pack is a bios check for the battery that is installed when the computer is made.

If you are getting that error, it means the battery you have is not the original one. i'd just give hp a ring about that!

(source - bios update for F.08 gives this information on the error)

I am envious of your 5000M... i hate not living in the US ;_; sigh

but the stats look sweet, can't wait for specviewperf results.

 

Something I noticed recently when I was looking at the 8740w configuration page... they no longer seem to be selling the screen calibration kit. I wonder why not, although I suppose it could be that those who would use a calibrator in the first place would already have bought one of their own.

 

I'm definitely one who's apt to need one and use it, but I don't have one yet. Hope even tho it's not on the CTO page it's still avail and being sold; maybe I'll buy myself one for Christmas.

This link details calibrating with the non-HP branded calibrator, and I 'think' the difference between that and using the HP branded one is the ability to integrate with & re-calibrate the HP presets in the MDA:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...515591-elitebook-8740w-w-dc2-calibration.html

 

Has anyone tried calibrating the DC2 using third-party or HP tools?

 

yes, Thinkpadded (perhaps you meant has anyone else tried... hehehe, you probably didn't see my post immediately to this one that I'm quoting). Check-out the 3rd post in the link provided in my post above yours.

 

Oooo a lead moderator. How exciting!

 

I missed that post entirely, hehe. Nice. Was wondering how much better can the picture look, since to me the stock profiles (especially the sRGB) are already perfect. I guess, there's still a room for improvement. Good to know.
Thanks.

 

I get truncation of the bottom and/or top 8 of the RGB specturm in sRGB and AdobeRGB. The Rec.601 gives me more detail in black than either of the two wider gamuts for example. If I want to see a difference between RGB 01-01-01 and 02-02-02 or RGB 254-254-254 and 253-253-253 at the same time, only the Full uncalibrated gamut gives me that. So I can see why Thinkpadded stated what he did in that thread regarding starting with the User/Full and taking the levels down to a calibrated gamut. ... reminds me, I should have stated this in that thread too.

 

I currently have both the 8740w and an external DreamColor display (LP2480zx), and spent some time a few days ago trying to calibrate both with two different tools for comparison:

1) HP's APS (which is actually a modified X-Rite i1 Display), and
2) X-Rite's i1 Pro (Spectrophotometer)

Although I haven't given it the focused time I would like (I've been pretty busy with "real" work during this time), I have to say that so far I have been very disappointed with the HP APS system. I'm to the point that I believe there may actually be a problem with either the APS software or the hardware in my specific kit.

The profiles created by the i1 Pro are much better than those from the APS, which really shouldn't be the case. When I calibrated both systems with the APS, the external DC was given a noticeable greenish tint (the laptop DC seemed more accurate, though). Using the i1 Pro, the colors were nearly identical between the two screens. I initially tried calibrations of both screens in Full Color mode (since that is what I intend to use for PhotoShop work), but when I ran into these problems I decided to test it with sRGB as well to see what what happen. The results were the same -- APS profiles created a greenish tint, i1 Pro's were very close.

I hope to have more time in the next week to troubleshoot this further, but right now I'm sticking with the i1 Pro's profiles until I can get to the bottom of the issues with the APS.

One other interesting quirk I noticed is that the luminance level indicated for the 8740 by the MDA was about 8-9 cd/m2 below what it measured to be. In other words, my laptop's screen is actually brighter than it thinks it is. The external DC measured exactly the same as the OSD, which was reassuring.

 

So, I am getting very close to purchasing an 8740w (w/DC2) but I have a quick question. I will be using it for photo processing for one aspect of my business, but I also have a client (the one that really pays the bills) that may require that I install Windows 7 Enterprise (at their expense, of course) for various business needs. So my questions are this:
- Will I be losing a lot of the necessary software tools to fully utilize all the things that make this a great laptop if I have to blow away the factory installed OS?
- If so, can I install those tools manually if I purchase the Windows 7 Driver DVD and/or the Windows 7 Restore Media DVD? Or is there somewhere on the HP site that has these readily (and freely) available?

Thanks!

 

Windows 7 Enterprise is same as Windows 7 Ultimate, just different licensing model. ( reference). So you won't be missing any built-in Windows features.

All of the HP 8740w utilities and programs are download-able from the HP support site.

 

This is it for tonight. They are taking away my other computer tomorrow, I have a lot to do.

Tom's 2D

*1227 (avg of 5 runs...got 1345 avg on my ATI)


Specviewperf 11

*I moved the window during maya-03 causing the rotations to stop...not sure if changed the score...no time for re-test for now...I also have no idea if these are good scores

 

Folks, today the dreaded crash happened. My unit crashed 10 times. Each time i login to windows, after about 5-10 min, the system freezes, shuts down and restarts automatically only to say ' No system disk, Insert and press any key'. It also gave the following prior to it.

"PXE-E61: Media Test Failure, Check cable"
"Invalid system disk error. Replace and press any key"

The only way out of this is power off, then power on again.

The 10th crash completely screwed the system. The power off/on trick didn't work. Then i had to go to BIOS and disable LAN boot (something to that effect).

Initially i thought if the HDD/SSD is not seated properly. So removed and inserted it again. But no help on that front.



These are the error logs found:

1. Kernel-Power :The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused if the system stopped responding, crashed, or lost power unexpectedly.
2. The Network List Service service depends on the Network Location Awareness service which failed to start because of the following error:
The dependency service or group failed to start.
3. The Network Location Awareness service depends on the Network Store Interface Service service which failed to start because of the following error:
The dependency service or group failed to start.
4. DCOM got error "1068" attempting to start the service fdPHost with arguments "" in order to run the server:
{D3DCB472-7261-43CE-924B-0704BD730D5F}

The last time i got errors 2,3,4 was on 8/18 - it was right around i got the unit.

I haven't installed any new programs in the past 2 months other than automatic system updates.

Any thoughts/help?.

 

wow those scores trounce the 2800M lol.

sigh i want one now... my 3D workflow would be so much nicer with the 5000M!

thanks for the update knight. goodluck with swapping stuff over from your computer.

 

Code:

	Folks, today the dreaded crash happened. My unit crashed 10 times. Each time i login to windows, after about 5-10 min, the system freezes, shuts down and restarts automatically only to say ' No system disk, Insert and press any key'. It also gave the following prior to it.

"PXE-E61: Media Test Failure, Check cable"
"Invalid system disk error. Replace and press any key"

The only way out of this is power off, then power on again.

The 10th crash completely screwed the system. The power off/on trick didn't work. Then i had to go to BIOS and disable LAN boot (something to that effect).

Initially i thought if the HDD/SSD is not seated properly. So removed and inserted it again. But no help on that front.



These are the error logs found:

1. Kernel-Power :The system has rebooted without cleanly shutting down first. This error could be caused if the system stopped responding, crashed, or lost power unexpectedly.
2. The Network List Service service depends on the Network Location Awareness service which failed to start because of the following error:
The dependency service or group failed to start.
3. The Network Location Awareness service depends on the Network Store Interface Service service which failed to start because of the following error:
The dependency service or group failed to start.
4. DCOM got error "1068" attempting to start the service fdPHost with arguments "" in order to run the server:
{D3DCB472-7261-43CE-924B-0704BD730D5F}

The last time i got errors 2,3,4 was on 8/18 - it was right around i got the unit.

I haven't installed any new programs in the past 2 months other than automatic system updates.

Any thoughts/help?.

notebook grail, the PXE fail thing is the intel network booting function

that only comes into play if the bios fails to find the hard drive/bootable media

i would go into the system bios - press escape and run a 'start up test'

something could be awry with your hard drive. do the drive tests too, i had a short disk fail when my machine used to do that - (my first 8740W was horrific) i couildn't post on here back then either to tell folks about it.

My problem was a bad HDD, which was causing all sorts of hell with the system, so i would try those to see what they say.

The HDD is easy to get replaced via hp, 1 phone call, you have it next day.

hope this helps man

 

@Knight,
Wow, that card is the real deal when it comes to pro apps, it puts AMD desktop FirePro's to shame.
Still, 2k extra is the price of a very decent gaming laptop or a 10 year old W. Golf, lol.

@NotebookGrail,
It does look like an HDD/HDD controller problem, but I'd also do a power drain and maybe even reset the BIOS (remove the BIOS battery for a minute).

 

Nvidia has newer drivers on their website than HP. But they warn that "OEMs may not provide technical support from issues that arise from the use of this driver." If I just set a restore point, there's no risk, right?

 

Right. Actually, the install should itself set a restore point. You should be able to roll-back to the previous version of the driver w/o even needing to restore to a sync-point (I've done both).

edit: on a different note. Thanx for all that info ProdTog. Bummer things aren't accurate w/the HP branded calibrator. Makes me 2nd guess if I'll get one of them.

 

@Siorah
I did try the BIOS Test right after my 2nd crash. And no errors were reported. Strangely, the chkdsk did run automatically and did some recovery and finally said all good. After that, during the remaining crashes, no chkdk run at all.

@Aikimox
I will try the power drain and BIOS Battery method.

I have the SSD as primary and HDD as secondary and did a symbolic link. I might as well replace both of them if the problem persists.

 

do you have the system diagnostics partition installed?

i'd do the full test. just to check - it could be hardware, or take one of your drives out and test that. it could be the mechanical drive is having problems

 

Nope, Since i put the SSD as primary and did a clean install, i completely reformatted the HDD as well.
I think it might be hardware too - as i first removed the SSD and seated it again - still the issue was there. Late last night, i removed the HDD as well from the caddy and reseated it again. So far this morning no crashes. Will keep a watch and report back.

 

The display assistant is no longer working. How do I roll back w/o using the restore?

 

You might want to give it a re-try before you roll-back. I often have instances where the MDA won't load for the whole up-time session of the machine; if I try to load it too soon, or if I right-click too soon after boot. If I give it time to initialize, it does.

I've touched upon this in the past but not with this much detail. It appears that if the system isn't fully initialized and you try to use the client-part of the MDA too soon, it gets into some state where you can't get it running no matter what you do. I'm usually pretty good at figuring out what NT Service and/or background process needs to be stopped and re-started to get things like this working again, but this MDA when it gets into this state where it won't load has been defeating me until now; I've only succeeded in getting it loaded after it wouldn't load previously once or twice instead of everytime.

Try to do a re-boot [in my case, cold boot only as reboot always gives me a black screen ] and don't try to load the MDA interface or right-click the desktop for a few minutes. I wish there was some indicator and I knew the time I needed to wait but there's no real feedback as to when it's "safe" to right-click and get the MDA selections to show in the menu and remain there for the remainder of the up-time of the machine; the only indicator there seems to be is when HD activity stops after all desktop widgets are loaded. If the destop right-click pop-up menu doesn't show the MDA option, trying to load it via the icon won't work either.

Else, if you wish to rollback a driver you Right-click on "Computer" in the right colum of the Start menu, and select Manage. Then go to Device manager > Display adapters. Right-click on the item representing your card and click Properties. Click the Driver tab then click on "Rollback Driver". However I'll re-iterate, if your machine has any of the similar "quirks" as my machine, the MDA might not load at times with the previous driver if you try to load or reference it too soon; try the "re-boot & wait" approach just to see if it'll load. But then again you have a different display adapter than me, so maybe not. Let us know either way.

 

I restarted, waited 10min and tried again. The problem persisted. I rolled back the GPU driver, restarted and the MDA works again. I guess I'll have to wait for HP drivers, though really I'm not sure I needed the update to begin with. I don't think they addressed 2D performance.

 

Guys -

Whats the deal with the new F.09 BIOS?

HP EliteBook 8740w Mobile Workstation System BIOS Update F.09 - c02535420 - HP Business Support Center

Release date was September 29th, but the latest version that is downloadable is the F.08 version from August.

I'm wondering if they pulled it back for some reason ....

 

I haven't given up on the APS just yet, as there are a couple more things I want to try. And I've seen at least one other reference to someone having green issues when trying to calibrate the LP2480zx with the APS (see here). Their ultimate solution was to replace the APS with a new one.

I find it very odd that there is a difference between how the APS sees color between these two DreamColor displays, which is why I also wonder if there's some kind of software/firmware issue as well. I'll give an update here after I've spent a bit more time on it.

Overall, I'm finding that both DreamColor displays are great, but the supporting software (APS, MDA, "Pivot", etc.) is inconsistent. Granted, it's a new setup for me and I've been making lots of changes. But I get the feeling that it's far too easy for the software to get confused and lose track of current settings, which can have some strange results. Most of the time I can get things back to normal by opening/closing the MDA (which seems to reset some things), and then resetting my display profile through the Windows control panel settings. But I have also had to reset the factory defaults a couple of times with the MDA to get things back to normal when things got really whacked out. I'm cautiously optimistic that the wrinkles in the current software will be worked out over time.

 

I've seen this exact behavior as well. I've had to open the MDA enough that I checked the option to put it's icon into the tray, and I find that it frequently opens the MDA window behind other windows on the screen when I click on it. Annoying, but I'm getting used to checking for that now.

What I'd really like to have is a quick way to select a particular configuration of both DC status (User/Native, sRGB, etc.) and display profile. A popup menu in the tray would be nice. Not holding my breath for that, though.

 

Thanks for the info. I'll just be sure to get Ultimate and hopefully won't have to do any rebuilding for my client. (But good to know that even if I do, it's no big deal.)

 

This is interesting:

HP EliteBook 8730w/8740w Mobile Workstation - Unit Equipped with Windows 7 Enterprise x64 Edition Stops During the OS Boot Showing a Blank Screen - c02010456 - HP Business Support Center

The solution doesn't make much sense ...

 

OK, finally got my laptop back from a draftsman I had to loan it to so he could do some drawings for me. I installed a new hard drive today and it was not to bad. Start with the Windows disk and get the basic OS installed. Then use the application and driver recovery disk. It does recreate the HP Tools partition.

This whole exercise corrected a few minor issues I was having. The biggest I remember was some executable hanging on shut down almost every time.

Anyway, now on to installing all my software.

 

Do you know specifically which 256GB SSD (i.e. manufacturer & model) HP provides if I order it from HP as part of my initial 8740w sales order?

Depending on my final HP discount (yet to be determined), it may be cheaper to buy a 256GB SSD installed in my new 8740w from HP then to order one separately and install it myself. Thank you.

 

Mine came with a 256GB Samsung MMDOE56G5MXP-0VB, which is TRIM enabled.

 

Screen Comparison
1920x1200 vs 1920x1200 DreamColor

As most of you know, I am on my 3rd 8740w. The latest replacement includes a DreamColor Display. This post sumarizes my subjective impressions of both screens. Keep in mind that I am not a graphics professional or photographer.

I had the non-DC (1920x1200) for about 4 months. Whenever I looked at other laptop screens, I noticed how much better mine was. The colors were great and the high resolution really made working on the laptop much easier. The only thing that bugged me was the viewing angles. I was really sensitive to the small shifts in brightness and color you get at the corners whenever you shift your position. I found myself adjusting the screen even if my head only moved an inch as I shifted my seating position in my office chair. I didn't think this was any worse than any other non-IPS screen, but it annoyed me knowing there was an IPS alternative that would fix this for me.

Now that I have the DC screen, I can leave my screen alone. You can glimps small shifts in brightness when you really move your head around, but during normal use, shifting my seating position does not require me to adjust the screen. Beyond this, the colors are stunning. I noticed a huge difference even at the first HP splash screen. And now that I'm running sRGB I feel like I'm seeing websites as they were intended to be seen. Pictures and graphics seem to have more weight to them, much deeper and richer. This even improves readability. The contrast between colors is very clear, which helps reading small text. Reading black-on-white is nearly as good as as print with an ink-like quality.

After working with DC, and looking back at the old screen I had some new impressions. First, the shallower color depth seemed to give pictures a kind of dullness. As if you were looking through a very lightly frosted window. But somehow the colors still look really good. They aren't as deep, but they look very natural. Sometimes the colors on DC are a bit over exaggerated. It's hard to explain.

If you don't need DC, but you are on the fence (and can afford it), I'd say it is well worth your money if you use the laptop screen as your primary (or only) monitor. But if DC isn't an option for you, know that the regular 1920x1200 screen is very nice and will put to shame most anything else you see.

EDIT: I forgot to mention that I tried getting some pictures, but my cheap camera made them useless. Sorry.

 

hey knight,

have they fixed the Display Manager bug with the 5000M - they told me it was a bit unstable and was prone to crashing alot.

just would like to know before i get a new dc screen lol.

Its cheaper for me to actually order another 8740w with maxxed out spec, than it is for me to get the parts for my WD941EA.

the price for my upgrades is actually $4400 >.>

 

@Knight,

Now you need a new sig pic
Glad to hear about the screen. Mine was replaced 3 times to reach the desired perfection!
BTW, what are the temps (idle and load) on the CPU/GPU?
It would be great if we could compare those with the system you had before.
What's your impression so far on the fan noise?

Thanks

 

The fan noise seems comparable. I think it has the same speed settings, I don't notice it kicking in any more often so far.

I haven't even looked at temps once, so I have work to do there. I'll probably run 3Dmark06 and get some measurements and log my impressions as I did with the ATI card. I'm pretty busy IRL though, so not sure when I'll get around to doing this.

Regarding my battery issue, here is what I was told:

So, do I roll that back just like I did the video driver? If so, under what device do I find the BIOS? Also, I though rolling back a BIOS was a big deal. Also (2), is FX5000M even supported in F.05?

 

Hello everyone

I finally bought this stunning PC and it is working well. But me AC adapter broke so I had to buy a new one. Is it possible to replase the broken one using a guarantee?

And could someone please tell is it ok, that when I watch a video online my PC sometimes becomes dead - the screen turns black, some strange irritating noises appear and it doesnt respond to any command.

TY in advance)

 

I'd be very cautious to roll to F.05. If you can live with the current BIOS, - wait till the new version. If not, contact them again. It doesn't look like the F.05 BIOS supports FX5000M.

 

Call tech support and ask for a new AC adapter. I'm not sure if it's covered by the warranty, but it's worth a shot.

The other issue is most likely video driver or BIOS related. Please, provide your system specs and let's check if you have the latest (stable) BIOS+drivers.

 

Of course mine is - (WD936EA) - i5(520M) 4GB 1333 RAM, 7820, 320 hdd

dxdiag says that my grafics drivers are 8.683.1.0 12.02.2010

cpu-z says that my bios is 68cad ver. f.01 02/12/2010

And my HP helper says that my drivers are up-to date.

Thank you,Aikimox

 

F.01 is really old. Press "Refresh" on your HP Support Assistant (upper right). Mine said it was up-to-date when I got it out of the box, but after pressing refresh, it needed to update just about everything.

 

^^ Yup, the video driver is old as well.

 

I pressed refresh - it thoght for 3 min and wrote that all my drivers are up-to date. Why is it like that? Now I visited hp site and it denoted that there is f.08 update. Thank you for help!

 

Sometimes HP Assistant has a weird behaviour.
Worst case scenario, you could always download and install the drivers manually.

 

Is there an opportunity to update the updator?) manual updating is too devastating. Btw your advice helped, at least now I will regard the hp site for stuff like updates

 

I dowloaded 08 bios update and tried to install it 5 times. But my PC starts up with the 01 one. What to do? Thank you for your willing to help.

 

@knight.

DONT go back to f05. as the 5000M isn't supported!

it won't be read on the PCI-E bus, and you'll end up with a black screen!

F.08 *added* support for the 5000M so going back to previous might be a problem.

They are apparently fixing the battery bug with F.10 (December 20ish) as F.09 was pulled because it killed the PCI-E bus speeds for the 2800/3800M's with the new Vbios.


Just to keep ya informed.

(have you looked to see if your 5000M needs a vbios update? i am curious as there was a 5000M vbios in the F.08 update)

Source - HP UK Technical/HP Bios F.08

@ Alexy

you may need to update it using the USB stick option.

If you look through my posts i did a tutorial on how to do this mate,

F.01 is so old, you may need to update to F-05 First,

(i had to on this machine after they flashed it with the wrong bios lol)

Source - own experience

 

Siorah - thanks! Ill get onto this. Can you please privide a link to your reference and instructions? Btw should I update smt apart from bios? My updater doesnt work fine and says that all is up-to date

 

I wrote to my tech explaining my concern about F.05. I think he either forgot I now have FX5000M, or he was confused about F.09/F.08.

I checked my vbios in HWinfo32. It matches the vbios number listed in the F.08 update - Video BIOS Version: 70.00.37.00.0A.

 

http://forum.notebookreview.com/hp-...k-8740w-owners-lounge-new-52.html#post6822502

this is my tutorial about how to update the Vbios for Nvidia cards, but it will tell you how to update the System Bios to F.08 via the usb key. Just follow Steps 1 to 5 - you don't need to worry about the Nvidia bit!

When you have done this;

you'll need to go to the hpsupport site and update drivers - specifically the Intel ones.

I use the ones from intels website, because i get better SSD performance with them.

you can update from F.01 to F.08 using the usb key method.

however, the winflash, cannot update from F.01 (source HP support - i rang the HK branch lol)

Hope this settles some of your problems.

There has been a LOAD of issues fixed since bios F.01!


@Knight

Yea, there is a problem with the factory atm with the new bios and the 5000M, they are having to update them before shipping them out because of the battery bug.

You can't go lower than F.08 unless you wanna have to pay to get it fixed lol. The 5000M is not on the authorised device list for the PCI-E bus in the bios, so you would get a non starter. Very stupid of them to recommend that sheesh.

F.09 i don't think is actually going to come out. i think it'll be a double version bump up. F.09 added a few cool features, and it's thermal table had been updated too so i've been told, but they screwed the APCI tables for everyone on doing it.

Tbh its a worth waiting until mid December.

(source HP Hong Kong)