HP Pavilion dv7-1285dx
by Jeffrey Jackson
(Butler, PA, USA)
HP Pavilion dv7-1285dx screen
HP Pavilion dv7-1285dx keyboard
HP Pavilion dv7-1285dx
Okay first I want to say I love this laptop. I have a desktop computer that cost about the same to build, with a better Video card; yet I still use this laptop more often.
It has 6 Gigabytes of RAM, a 500 Gigabyte Hard drive, a 2.4 Gigahertz Core 2 Duo P8600, an nVidia GeForce 9600m GT and a 17” display.
It came with Windows Vista installed but as soon as Windows 7 came out I installed the 64-bit version on it. I’ve had this laptop for over a year and everything runs just as well as it did on day one. I’ve normally got a number of programs open and it takes every one in stride.
Heck, even when I’m running Fallout 3 I can still have Firefox, Google Talk and Skype open without any problems. As with many “Desktop-Replacement” laptops, the battery life is not so good; I’m lucky if I can squeeze an hour or two out of it on “power saver” settings.
One thing I’ve noticed and I’m glad for – is that this thing can survive a fairly big drop with no adverse effects. I haven’t dropped it myself but I’ve set it on the arm of a sofa – a good 3 feet off the floor – and my friend’s cat jumped on the slightly off-balance side, bringing the laptop crashing to the floor.
This has happened at least twice, and I don’t have any bad sectors on my hard drive or any cracks in my screen. I haven’t spilled anything on it though, so I can’t say how well it handles fluids.
If you get this laptop from a store, online or offline, rely on that store’s customer support; HP’s is notoriously bad.
One more very important thing: I love this laptop’s keyboard. I haven’t had any issues with it at all. I’ve memorized the QWERTY layout so I pretty much only have to look at the keyboard when I have to use one of the fn key functions.
Oh, and I can type faster on this keyboard than any other that I’ve had experience with. I don’t know if it’s because the keys are shorter or if it’s because the keys require less force to be depressed, but I love the feel of the keyboard and how fast I can type with it.
