30 Days Impressions of Compaq V6608AU Notebook.
So I finally decided to pick up a laptop for myself. I was a bit confused on what to look in for in a notebook as I had never used a laptop before.My first hurdle was deciding on a screen size. I definitely knew I didn’t want a tiny ultraportable 12†or a desktop replacement 17â€. So my choices narrowed down to a 14†or a 15†laptop.
Now came the choice of the platform. Intel had been ruling the notebook market by its low power consuming fast number crunching proccy’s. AMD on the other hand was never a dominant force in the notebook market. So I started searching for a Intel based Lappy. But after reading at various places and with my low budget constraint (About 35K) I was forced to look into a AMD based laptop.
Few things I learnt during my survey which I would like to share with all my forum members:
1. Never Judge a (Note)Book by its cover.
2. Faster Proccy/Bigger screen is not always better.
3. High powered onboard graphics notebook will eat more power.
4. One should stay away from Intel Dual Core(Not Core 2 Duo)
5. Similarly one should ignore Semprons and Athlons based notebooks at all costs.
With these things in my mind I narrowed it’s down to a Compaq V6608AU Notebook. Though this was on a AMD platform but it was powered by a Turion 64 X2 based proccy which is supposed to consume less power. So after a week of research and 35K lighter I had the Lappy delivered to me by SMC International Delhi on 26th October 2007.
Day 1:
The delivery boy handed me with two cartons. One had the actual lappy in it and the other had the leather bag. Surprisingly upon opening the carton of the bag I found that the bag was of HP and not of Compaq. Well since HP had bought Compaq few years ago I was pleasantly surprised with the HP high quality bag. I believe HP supplies this as standard equipment with all its lappies(Both HP & Compaq).
Then I got down with the Lappy carton. The box had four items packed separately. The Laptop, Charger, Battery & Manuals. To my surprise there was no media(CD or DVD) provided with the product. I connected battery to the laptop and connected the charger to the power outlet and powered on the lappy. The lappy came with Windows Vista Basic preloaded on the HDD and after about 10 minutes of setting up the I was greeted with the Vista Desktop. At this moment I decided to post a review of the laptop but dismissed the idea later. I thought that I will use the laptop for about a month or two and then will post my impressions regarding the same.
Day 2:
I started off with installing my favourite apps and transferring my data from my office PC. First thing i noticed is that lappy’s screen is much brighter, crisper and colourful then my Samsung 17†CRT and my Samsung 740N LCD. The screen was quite glossy and viewing angles were much better then my 740N LCD.
The lappy also comes with a trial version of a loads of softwares including Norton Internet Security and Microsoft Office 2007. Full versions of Roxio CD Creater and HP Photosmart Essential 2.0 were also bundled which came preinstalled with the lappy.
The lappy’s HDD was divided into two partitions. The second partition had a file named recovery. I guess it had something to do with the system recovery in case of a OS crash. Anyways i had decided that i would be installing Windows XP on the lappy and will create partitions as per my liking and will look into that Recovery partion later.
Also the lappy had 1 GB Ram(512 x 2 Sticks). I thought I would get it upgraded to 2GB since lappy was on Vista. It would help me with future apps since Vista is memory hungry and not to forget RAM prices were all time low as of then. "Maybe after a month" i told myself since I had already exhausted my strict budget of 35K.
Day 5:
The battery drained out pretty quickly. It did not last for more then 2 hours on full charge. Maybe I was doing something wrong. I had then switched off Wifi and Bluetooth service which was on by default. It did help me a bit.
I also had a chance same day to look at a similar config by HP and others in the mall. Both the lappies(HP vs Compaq) looked almost identical barring few minor exceptions. The HP came with a fingerprint reader and a integrated webcam but costed a cool 10K more.
I also looked at a few Acer and Sony Vaio laptops the same day. The build quality of Acer’s are not up to the Compaq/HP standards. They had a cheap plasticy look to it. Sony Vaio’s were just too expensive to be compared.
I also noticed few other things with Compaq and HP laptops. Almost all the models had rounded edges. This will be more clear with the pictures which I am attaching with the review.
Also the complete laptop has a printed finish on it. This is not very clear with the pictures but I will try to explain it anyhow. The lappy has a grey background with very fine silver lines running with a unique pattern. Thus giving it a look as it somebody has run his hands on the smooth glossy finish of the lappy leaving finger marks all over the lappy body. The same finish continues on inside of the lappy below the keyboard.
Day 8:
That day I had got myself a Wi-Fi router. Configuring my Airtel DSL connection was a breeze with the Lappy’s Inbuilt Wi-Fi. At the same time I would like to point out that transfer speeds on the Wi-Fi and even on the LAN were pretty slow. It had done max to 5 MBps on Lan and 2.5 MBps on Wi-Fi.
I guess that was because of Vista. Another reason why laptops should come with Windows XP and not Vista. I guessed at that time that Vista days were over for me.
Day 13:
I created Compaq Recovery DVD’s with the Compaq’s built in software. What a day to do the same
. Took me about 30 minutes and 2 blank DVD’s to finish the job. I still don’t understand why Compaq decided not to bundle 2 DVD’s with the Lappy. A person with not to much computer knowledge will not realize that he should burn these DVD’s other wise later he will eventually land in trouble and will later call up Compaq for the support. Pointless.Day 18:
It had been almost a week since I had touched my desktop. I would see the desktop as the most space taking object on my office table. Also that day for the first time I connected my laptop to my LCD to watch the downloaded movies with the help of the S Video port on the laptop. The setup was a breeze again and it worked like a charm. Only gripe was the missing HDMI port. Though there was an expansion port on the lappy but till today i still have not found out what is it for.
Also would like to add that the inbuilt speakers of the lappy are quite good. You can watch a movie in your car or can listen to soothing music in your office with the inbuilt Altec Lansing speakers. No need to buy speakers separately if you like to listen to music occasionally in your office.
Day 25:
Probably the worst day i had with the lappy. I had to uninstall the Norton 360. It was a pain in the @ss more then anything. Makes all the firewall settings go for a toss. I had the worst of times doing the connectivity with a different wi-fi network. It was virtually impossible to connect to any other comp with Norton 360 on. I wish if Compaq could have provided a free full version of a good Antivrus with a decent custmizable firewall. That day I installed the freeware version NOD32 till the time i decided to buy a good Antivirus.
Also Windows Vista had grown on me by then. I don’t think I will be shifting to XP for some time. Vista handled all the apps perfectly which i used on this lappy. Also that Issue of connecting to my Samsung Laser Printer on the Desktop through Wi-Fi had was history. The slideshow feature on the Vista was also quite impressive. My work deals with a lot of picture presentations. This lappy handled all that well but viewing angles were not that great for the same. If not placed perfectly in front of the client the colours would seem all wrong. Looked like i had to use my good old CRT for the same if i had a client visit in my office.
Day 29:
Few glitches I thought Compaq could have corrected. The three USB ports on the laptop were a bit less for me. Also I could have lived with two usb ports on the right instead of left. Finally one USB port on the back is a must which I find missing. Connecting printer directly with the Lappy was a big problem with USB ports either on the right or on the left, casue moving the lappy was troublesome with printer connected. Bluetooth worked like a charm thankfully so passing data between my trusty Nokia 6630 and the lappy was a breeze.
Though I could use the inbuilt card reader for my Canon Power shot A95 camera as it uses CF memory but I could use my 6630 RSMMC card with a jack to connect it to the lappy. It’s a real neat idea of Compaq to put in card reader on the lappy. Widens the possibilities.
Day 30:
All in all I was quite happy with the lappy. Although there were few issues (battery consumption, scratch prone finish, shortage of usb ports with a definite usb port missing on the back) but nothing that i could not live with.
Finally
I have now dropped the idea of upgrading the RAM. My work requirements doesn’t require that extra GB of RAM. Working with MS Office and Tally is a breeze with he stock RAM and so is working with big photographs but gaming on the lappy is altogether a different experience. Have tried TF2 and CSS and decided that I will never take this lappy to a lan party. But an occasional round with friends is never a problem considering it happens fortnightly
Finally I am putting down the complete lappy specs below :
AMD Turion64 X2 Processor TL-58 (1.9 GHz)
1 GB DDR2 (667 MHz)
160 GB SATA
8X Super-Multi Drive Double Layer (8.5 GB) DVD Writer
NVIDIA MCP67M chipset
15.4" WXGA TFT with Bright View Screen Technology
NVIDIA® GeForce® Go 7150M GS
Up to 287 MB TAG memory
Altec Lansing Stereo Speakers
5-in-1 Digital Media Reader
56K Modem
Integrated Wireless LAN 802.11 b/g
Integrated Bluetooth 2.0
LiIon Battery
Touch-Pad
S-Video TV Out
IEEE 1394
3 USB 2.0
MS Windows Vista Home Basic
And here are few pictures i clicked of the same:
The Notebook itself:
Side Views with viewable ports
Notice the rounded edges all over the lappy i was reffering to you to you guys earlier
The lappy closed and the view which the user rarely notices
The Keyboard and the screen
The photographs dont do the justice the screen at all
Note:While using the lappy i had noticed that all the softwares provided with the laptop were marked HP and not compaq. Even the driver or the critical update software was designed for HP. This makes me beleive that Compaq's and HP's are produced in the same manufacturing unit. Even all the major parts are same(Read Screen, DVD writer, eyboard) Only difference being the outer shell and the product packaging. Also if you compare the outer shells of Compaq and HP's then both look the same except for a skin change on the top.
This review was although wriiten in one day but the lappy is being used by me since October 2007. This is my first attempt to write a review a bit differently then what we traditionally see all over the net. Let me know if you guys like it this ways
.