HP EliteBook 8760w: Color, So Dreamy
by Dustin Sklavos on August 25, 2011 2:30 AM ESTConclusion: But You'll Pay for the Privilege
So now that you've seen what a monster the HP EliteBook 8760w is, you get to experience the sad knowledge that you'll probably never afford one like the one we tested unless your job buys it for you. It's an incredibly attractive piece of kit, but $6,500 is a heck of a lot to pay for a notebook. So let's see if we can't break that down somewhat, shall we?
First of all, the major upgrades that bury the needle on the price are the NVIDIA Quadro 5010M, the DreamColor display, and the SSD. The Quadro 5010M costs a punishing $700, while the DreamColor is $650 and the SSD is $500. If you just want a solid workstation notebook, the 8760w preconfigured model at $3,499 seems a heck of a lot more reasonable, giving you a decent workstation GPU and the benefits of the DreamColor display. You sacrifice 8GB of RAM, the i7-2820QM, the SSD, the blu-ray drive, and the Quadro 5010M, but the RAM and SSD at least can be made up for down the road (though it's worth mentioning the upgrade cost on the SSD at least isn't unreasonable). The problem is Dell will sell you a Precision M6600 with roughly the same specs and performance as HP's $3,499 EliteBook 8760w for $2,624, and that's a massive difference. When you look at it that way, the premium on the DreamColor display goes up to nearly a grand.
There's another wrinkle, too. If you're willing to put up with a bit more noise, a lot more weight, and a non-IPS glossy screen, Clevo's X7201 actually supports the Quadro 5010M and some boutique vendors like AVADirect offer it (for an impressive $2,000 upgrade cost). If performance is the only metric you're interested in, the Clevo X7201 is nigh unbeatable, since you can get the Quadro 5010M and an i7-990X hex-core desktop processor.
So why buy the EliteBook 8760w? If build quality and aesthetics aren't a concern for you and you have no need for HP's helpful Performance Advisor software, it's going to come down to exclusives. HP can sell you the DreamColor IPS display and NVIDIA Quadro 5010M with 4GB of GDDR5; the best Dell can match on the screen is a high-quality TN panel (or even a touchscreen if that's what you're into), and they only go up to the Quadro 4000M at present (though we'll almost certainly see 5000M/5010M at some point).
When you're dealing with notebooks that cost as much as cars, it's a little difficult to make recommendations. That's doubly true as you start having to make compromises and trade-offs. What's most important? Battery life? Mobility? GPU performance? CPU performance? Build quality? Display quality? The HP EliteBook 8760w undoubtedly finds a niche here, offering the best mobile workstation GPU performance alongside very fast processors and a fantastic IPS display that the other vendors can't touch. Build quality is also frankly stellar, and it's not too heavy given the high performance components inside.
Oh, you'll pay for the privilege. Then again, if you need a mobile workstation and you happen to use one of those >$20K software packages these are certified to run, what's another six grand?
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damianrobertjones - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
In the future could you actually make a point of informing users about the fan (A bit more info)? Does it stay on all the time? Does it switch off as this is one of the more important aspects.For instance I've had a chance to use the following new models: (Fitted SSD, clean install, tweaked)
HP 5330m - core i3, fan off most of the time
HP 6460b - core i5, fan always on and annoying
HP 8460p - core i5, fan always on and annoying
Dell Vostro v131, celeron, fan ALWAYS off!
Also here are the extended battery options that you missed off:
HP VH08XL
HP ST09 - Extended life battery (Fits under the laptop)
HP BB09 - Ultra extended life battery (Massive slice, fits under the laptop)
The BB09 along with the standard battery on a 6460b will play full screen media non-stop for 14+ hours (Wireless off, lowest brightness, audio via headphones).
Thanks
nirolf - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
+1, more info on the noise would be nice.B3an - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
Same. More fan info please.wawawiwa - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
In my experience, the fan starts spinning on high usage like rendering or hd editing. It spins sometimes in photoshop but for short periods while in illustrator it stays off all the time (cs5.5). It also spins up but on lower rpm when i'm using both external and laptop display and it stays on all the time. If I'm using "projector" only or the laptop display only, it stays off.Standard temperature (CPU) is around 45°C, the maximum I got it to go is up to 80°C but still the keyboard and the part around the power button never gets hot, just warm.
It is a beast.
heymrdj - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
These are high end workstation systems. Like any user, one must make a tradeoff between power and cooling. You can't run dual 6990's without fan noise, be it a watercooling radiator setup or fans, you *have* to pay the price for power in fan noise and/or size. The only way to get fan noise lowered is to thicken the fan and thicken the unit itself. Using workstation systems myself fan noise is a non issue, I know it will be loud according to the chips I outfit it with. A high end I7 and an always on quadro GPU is going to be producing a good deal of heat even idling, no way around it, just as my 5.4L V8 in my Expedition costs more to idle in fuel and heat than the 2.3L I4 in my fiance's Ranger.damianrobertjones - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
I'm aware of this. The entire new Elitebook and Probook range are thicker than nearly any laptop I've used in the last 5 years YET the fan is always on even after updating the bios which enabled the 'fan' option. That said same option no longer even does what we think it does.I'd expect the 8760w to have fans the size of a small room :) but it would be nice to know if it EVER switches off
Barfo - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
yesvelis - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
I too bought an 8740w just for the x1200 dreamcolor. Had it been 1080p I wouldn't have bothered. I sure hope this notebook lasts me until monitors finally start picking up resolution. This convergence to 1080p and nothing higher gives me the creeps. Thanks for pointing out that fact in this review.Oh what I wouldn't give for a nice 24" 2560x1600 standalone - which would be the exact monitor obtained from this same dreamcolor 17" glass (the 1200p one of course)...
I saw that HP offers a dreamcolor standalone, but its resolution is a useless 1920 and the price is stupenduously prohibitive. Why can the upgrade on a notebook cost $500 ($600 now), but a standalone costs >$2500???
Rick83 - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
Well, mostly because the upgrade also includes the price of the base display (probably around 150-200$) and because you get much better back-lighting for desktop screens.Additionally, size does matter, there's a bunch more material costs, more/better control circuits, a power supply, a foot, and finally dream color is just a brand - so the panel is probably utterly dissimilar from that used in the desktop.
Also, the desktop screen market is a much more competitive market, as you can plug any screen into any computer - with the laptop you're limited to the options your producer gives you.
If you compare the dream color offering to NEC and eizo offerings, you will see that it is priced for a certain market.
It would be interesting to see direct performance comparisons between high end IPS laptop panels and mid-end PVA/IPS desktop screens, to see just how good/bad these high-end laptop screens are, and whether they're worth the extra 600$, if you mostly use the machine at a desk, or if the same money buys a vastly superior dedicated screen.
Dustin Sklavos - Thursday, August 25, 2011 - link
I have to be honest, I think the screen quality (at least subjectively) is at LEAST on par with my desktop HP ZR24w and LP2465, if not outright better.