Sunday, January 29, 2012

HP Pavilion dm1z Refresh, Now with AMD Dual-Core Processor E-450+

HP refreshed the dm1z a couple months ago. The biggest changes are new processor options, namely the AMD Dual-Core Processor E-450+ and a Intel ULV Core i3 option. The initial dm1z used AMD's first Fusion APUs, the E-350 (1.6GHz) while the latest uses the E-450 (1.65GHz).

With the new processors come a boost in performance though the reviews state the gains are small. The look and feel (literally) has been refreshed as the outside has been rubberized and has more a black look over the original's silver. The click pad has been replaced with separate mouse buttons and Beats Audio is included. HP also eliminated programs from the startup menu to speed up boot times.

Incredibly the updated dm1z does not come with wireless N that supports a 5Ghz channel. It's still only compatible up to a 2.4Ghz channel. WTF HP?

The price for a comparable model to what I purchased is more but by less than 10% and the free RAM upgrade is now to 4GB (was 3GB). The 320GB 7200 RPM option does not seem to be available anymore so the cheapest 7200 rpm option is the 500GB drive. There is a 320GB 5400 rpm drive option that you can choose and save $45. The Intel CPU option seems to not be available on the shopping.hp.com HP site but I've read that the Intel option adds $100 or more to the price.

The unit I priced out was $469.99. I went with the "Recommended configuration" from the shopping.hp.com site but I chose the 450 processor (the HP recommended configuration had the 300 for some reason). I applied coupon code SAVE25HP to save $25 and got the price to $444.99. With NY tax that would be $484.48. Free standard shipping is still included. I paid $458 for my dm1z-3000 unit almost a year ago. For less than $30 additional you get largely the same unit but with 1GB more RAM, more disk, and a CPU performance boost (albeit fairly negligible) among a couple other enhancements, not too bad.

Some reviews of the dm1z refresh:

YouTube dm1z refresh video "Hands-On: New HP Pavilion dm1 with AMD E-450 APU":




BIOS Update F.13 (sp54026.exe) for HP Pavilion dm1z, support now for 5GHz WiFi? Any beneficial mpact on my current Ralink RT5390 wireless card?

I checked the HP.com site for any updates for my HP Pavilion dm1z-3000 CTO Entertainment Notebook PC (the official name) and there is a BIOS update (version F.13) available for the dm1z (sp54026.exe), released on 2011-07-31. The Fix/Enhancement on the HP.com page is described as:
  • Provides support for a new Wireless LAN card. - Enables the "Fan always on" option in the BIOS setup.
It's great that HP provides updates but this has caused some more confusion for me. Which wireless LAN card does this BIOS update support? And does that card support 802.11n over 5GHz? What's the impact for the RT5390 card that's in my unit now?

A user posted a comment on a prior post on this blog stating: "This update was to add the Intel 6230 2.4 and 5GHz dual channel N plus bluetooth to the whitelist of adapters". I don't know if this is accurate or not. Is this the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6230 (see below)?

Ralink is now headquartered in Taiwan since it was bought by the Taiwanese company MediaTek on May 5, 2011. The Ralink RT5390 wireless card page lists the product as:

The RT5390 is a cost-effective, highly integrated PCIE Wi-Fi single chip containing an 802.11n MAC and baseband, a 2.4 GHz RF, PA, LNA and T/R switch on a single die. It supports a 150 Mbps PHY data rate and fully complies with 802.11b/g/n specifications.

They say the Ralink RT5390 supports a 150 Mbps data rate over 802.11n. I thought the Ralink RT5390 wireless module was a single channel 1x1 supporting only up to 72Mbps? If I upgrade my BIOS to F.13 would my dm1z theoretically be able to get to 150 Mbps? Over WiFi with my cable internet connection I never gets more 30 Mbps (so says speedtest.net) so ultimately this may be a moot point but I want my dm1z to be as optimized as it possibly can be.

Here's the Intel Wireless Products web page and see the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6230 listed there as a current product, the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6230: Product Brief, and the technical support page for the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6230.  I'm assuming that the user who posted on this blog is referring to this item. If so, could I update the BIOS to F.13 and then just buy the Intel Centrino Advanced-N 6230 from CDW and insert it into my dm1z?