HP Pavilion dv6-3065ea review
The dv6 is beautifully designed, has reasonable 3D performance and generous features – but there's a catch
The HP Pavilion line was always been classy, and the dv6 is a beautifully designed and built laptop. The lid has a smart engraved pattern, and opens up to reveal a red metallic keyboard panel and glossy black screen bezel. A metallic strip around the edge houses a wide selection of expansion ports, and the entire laptop feels well built.
An AMD Phenom II processor explains the lower than expected price. These budget chips aren’t exactly under-powered, but overall score of 65 lags behind similarly priced laptops with Intel Core i3 chips. The dv6 is far more powerful than a netbook, but about half as fast as a budget desktop PC these days. A dedicated AMD graphics card means you can watch HD videos, it’s almost powerful enough to play 3D games at low quality settings.
A 500GB hard disk provides ample room for your files, and the dv6 has a surprisingly good variety of expansion ports. There are four USB ports, one of which is shared with an eSATA port for fast external hard drives, and a memory card reader for quick photo transfers from your digital camera. HP hasn’t scrimped on the networking either: the LAN port supports Gigabit Ethernet – handy for large backups – and there’s 802.11n WiFi and Bluetooth.
There’s an HDMI output as well as an analogue VGA video output, so you could connect the dv6 to a larger screen or even an AV amplifier for the full home cinema experience. Sounds from the internal speakers are bland, with very weak bass and tinny high notes. They’re loud enough for watching YouTube videos, but movies will be lacking.
Basic Specifications | |
---|---|
Rating | *** |
Processor | AMD Phenom II X3 P820 |
Processor clock speed | 1.8GHz |
Memory | 4.00GB |
Memory slots | 2 |
Memory slots free | 0 |
Maximum memory | 8GB |
Size | 36x378x245mm |
Weight | 2.5kg |
Sound | IDT HD Audio |
Pointing device | touchpad |
Display | |
Viewable size | 15.6 in |
Native resolution | 1,366×768 |
Graphics Processor | ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5470 |
Graphics/video ports | VGA, HDMI |
Graphics Memory | 512MB |
Storage | |
Total storage capacity | 500GB |
Optical drive type | DVD+/-RW +/-DL |
Ports and Expansion | |
USB ports | 4 |
Bluetooth | yes |
Wired network ports | 1x 10/100/1000 |
Wireless networking support | 802.11b/g/n |
PC Card slots | none |
Supported memory cards | SD, MMC, Memory Stick Pro, xD |
Other ports | eSATA (shared with USB socket), minijack audio output, minijack microphone input |
Miscellaneous | |
Carrying case | No |
Operating system | Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit |
Operating system restore option | restore partition |
Software included | Microsoft Works, Cyberlink DVD Suite |
Optional extras | £152 |
Buying Information | |
Warranty | one year collect and return |
Price | £519 |
Details | www.hp.co.uk |
Supplier | http://www.digital-fusion.co.uk |