HP DM1

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Looks like Sony is already selling a Brazos 2.0 equipped 11-12" laptop, although the specs do suggest that there'll be very little performance gains over my DM1-4027sa.

I am actually interested in the Acer V5-171. Ultrabook specs in an 11-12" chassis, with HD4000 graphics. Swap the underwhelming HDD with an SSD, this should make an interesting alternative to AMD's portfolio.

I think if an 11-12" laptop with Trinity / IvyBridge (HD4000) that comes with an SSD and a copy of Windows 7 64bit for £500, I'll happily buy it. Then again, Windows 8 is coming out which will change the market (touchscreen, higher resolution, etc.) somewhat.
 
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I bought an OCZ Agility 3 a few months back for my dm1-4027ea, but I was disappointed with the performance (the laptop seemed to hang at times although it did boot faster) so I got rid of it.
I've had another read through this thread and the general thought is that the Crucial M4 SSD would be a good choice. If I go down this road and buy one (I'd be looking at the 128Gb one), do I need to do anything different when I install it (I'll be doing a vanilla install of Windows 7 x64) as compared to installing a normal mechanical drive?

Also, for the diagnostic tools (HP_TOOLS) partition - what size should I be looking at?
 
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I bought an OCZ Agility 3 a few months back for my dm1-4027ea, but I was disappointed with the performance (the laptop seemed to hang at times although it did boot faster) so I got rid of it.
I've had another read through this thread and the general thought is that the Crucial M4 SSD would be a good choice. If I go down this road and buy one (I'd be looking at the 128Gb one), do I need to do anything different when I install it (I'll be doing a vanilla install of Windows 7 x64) as compared to installing a normal mechanical drive?

Also, for the diagnostic tools (HP_TOOLS) partition - what size should I be looking at?

I have a M4 64Gb.

Removed the existing drive, stuck the M4 in, booted from a USB-attached DVD drive with the win7 disk.


I didn't have the bios options that you're supposed to check for, so had no choice but to go for it. Worked fine.

Did have a wierd issue booting the first few times, but then it went away.


MILES faster - search my posts on this thread, I posted benchmarks.
 
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Thanks petertr2000, I saw the benchmarks - that's quite an improvement! Would be greatly welcomed!
I'll take a look at getting a Crucial M4, preferably the 128Gb (my DM1 has pretty much replaced the desktop and old vaio laptop) although it depends on the price differences between that and the 64Gb one (as you said in an earlier post, after installing W7 on it, you have about 40Gb spare).
 
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Having few problems with my DM1 now, the wifi card started to die month, so managed to source another from the Bay of E for £10, the bios prevents the use of non HP recommended PCI-E cards and won't boot with a non-HP card.

Now the the Trackpad and Keyboard are now freezing when the DM1 gets too hot. I've had a look on the HP support forums and it shows other people suffer from the same problem. I called up HP support this morning who sent me a download of Speedfan to monitor the temps, cpu is hitting 70c just surfing, running virus scans and streaming pushes temps to 82C, I've got HP support set to call me back on Monday, I will be pushing for them to take the DM1 back and replace the motherboard as this is a hardware issue.

For the 9months i have owned it, I have been very impressed with the performance and it runs Windows 8 flawlessly.
 
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I've got the Crucial SSD installed (the m4 128Gb).
It seems a lot quicker with some things but pretty bad on others. Windows Update seemed to take way too long to install just over 100 updates and installing Visual Studio 2010 took a long time too (longer than on the mechanical drive I took out).

I've ran a CrystalDisk test and it all looks acceptable but the 4k tests seem very poor (9.84MB/s read and 16.92MB/s write). I've seen screenshots elsewhere which suggests it should be higher. Is this something to be concerned about?
 
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Having few problems with my DM1 now, the wifi card started to die month, so managed to source another from the Bay of E for £10, the bios prevents the use of non HP recommended PCI-E cards and won't boot with a non-HP card.

Now the the Trackpad and Keyboard are now freezing when the DM1 gets too hot. I've had a look on the HP support forums and it shows other people suffer from the same problem. I called up HP support this morning who sent me a download of Speedfan to monitor the temps, cpu is hitting 70c just surfing, running virus scans and streaming pushes temps to 82C, I've got HP support set to call me back on Monday, I will be pushing for them to take the DM1 back and replace the motherboard as this is a hardware issue.

For the 9months i have owned it, I have been very impressed with the performance and it runs Windows 8 flawlessly.

One of the first things I did was to replace the TIM with some spare artic silver 5 that I had in a drawer. Made about a 5C difference IIRC.

Also, I'm using that Brazotweaker to lower my voltages. Again, this lowered temps.

It does get very hot though, even despite this.
 
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I've got the Crucial SSD installed (the m4 128Gb).
It seems a lot quicker with some things but pretty bad on others. Windows Update seemed to take way too long to install just over 100 updates and installing Visual Studio 2010 took a long time too (longer than on the mechanical drive I took out).

I've ran a CrystalDisk test and it all looks acceptable but the 4k tests seem very poor (9.84MB/s read and 16.92MB/s write). I've seen screenshots elsewhere which suggests it should be higher. Is this something to be concerned about?

I'd certainly check the firmware is up to date first.

Then possibly consider RMA?
 
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One of the first things I did was to replace the TIM with some spare artic silver 5 that I had in a drawer. Made about a 5C difference IIRC.

Also, I'm using that Brazotweaker to lower my voltages. Again, this lowered temps.

It does get very hot though, even despite this.

HP have returned the laptop with a new motherboard inc cpu and Fan, I have cleaned off the new TIM and put thermaltake grease on instead, I am going to try the Brazos tweaker as well to see if I can lower the temps.
 
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I installed Brazos Tweaker and dropped my voltages a bit on the HP recommended setting, hopefully the thermaltake grease will have settled in. It seems to be running cooler on battery only, speedfan shows 52 core and 52 GPU when just browsing.
 
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Good stuff Tigers. I can't say I've paid much attention to things recently, I use the laptop all the time though - Its on almostly constantly when I work night or weekend shifts.

Never crashes, even with the voltages pushed really low.


One thing that keeps annoying me is the number of marks on the LHS of the plastic bezel around the screen. They are breading, I swear.
No idea what's causing it - it had a nice soft case ?????
 
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Has anyone tried the new BIOS update(s) yet?

Released: 2012-06-15
Version: F.16
Fix/Enhancement: - Fixes an issue where the wireless WAN driver does not install properly.


Anyone know if it does anything else? I'd love to get some advanced options, such as overclocking, fan control, HDD modes etc.
 
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2am, and here I am, on nightshift thinking about how to cool my DM1 - Still seems to be very hot when running games.

Haven't looked at this for ages, so fired Prime and speedfan up. The max-heat torture test hits 72C and stays pretty much there constantly. Doesn't sound too bad really.

The odd thing is that I can barely hear the fan - I *assume* its running full speed, but you certainly wouldn't think it!


Thought I'd try a few things:

1 - Tried putting a wedge at the back of the laptop to lift the vents off the table - I'd noticed that the table gets very hot and since this is where it also sucks cold air in (I guess that's what the 2 x vents are for, 1 in 1 out?) then it can't be idea.
Made less than 0.5C difference.

2 - Put a little USB fan behind the laptop, and pointed it under the laptop - 2C difference. Which is a big deal when you think that the new TIM cooled by 2-3C, undervolting another couple and then 2 just for having a daft fan running.

I'm convinced that this thing needs more vents to get cool air in, and hot air out.

Anyone tried that? I'd gladly chop holes in it if needs be!


Still wish I could get access to the fan controller - I'd love to push the RPM up at lower temps to control it.
Tried installing HP Coolsense, but the only option to cool also stops the CPU from running at full power, which is totally useless!


Anyway, suppose Id better do some work!
 
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Try installing speedfan, I think it can also control the fan speeds. Download it here http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

I have installed Windows 8 Preview and it works very well on the DM1, I am just having problems with it coming out of Sleep mode, it just crashes and reboots. I can come out of hibernation with no problems at all but sleep mode it does not like.
 
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I found what was causing the sleep problem, the OCZ Vertex 2E SSD has just died!! Bios won't detect the hard drive, just removed bios battery, reset defaults and the OCZ drive isn't detected. Looks like I will have to RMA it back to OCZ, Only got the drive in December last year - looks like another Vertex 2E casualty. I've the original hard drive back in and all is fine again running Windows 7 and sleep works again.
 
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Remember, if the laptop is in ACHI mode, the bios won't see the HDD - that's normal.



As for speedfan, it doesn't have DM1 support to control fans etc. Apparently the fans on this thing are like voodoo, if you do a bit of googling, you'll see what I mean. Very strange.
 
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Has anyone done some benchmark tests in Win 7 on a DM1-4xxx, then downloaded and installed Win 8 today, then re-run the benchmark tests for comparison? I'm currently with a very poor internet connection for the next 4 weeks so can't try it out myself yet. I've heard that Win 8 makes better use of APUs, so I'm hoping the upgrade will be worth it.
 
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Anyone still using their DM1?

Mine is still my only portable machine and it gets loads of use.


Anyone made any interesting mods? I'm really wanting to improve the cooling - the back is completely solid, no air vents at all.

Has anyone got any suggestions as to how I could improve things?


Also, the Fan Blower - would cutting a hole directly over it improve its performance?
 
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I gave mine to my niece after a year. I struggled with the keyboard to the point where I'd had enough. The whole point of me having it was for being able to use Visual Studio on the move and it worked for that, but too many typos (because of keys not being recognised etc.) put death to that and it sat gathering dust for a few months before I gave it away.

Kind of regret it now as my laptop battery has now died and can no longer use it without being plugged in.
 
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