Recent content by Sashko

Applies to computers even more so. All my advise is based on real life experience - we repair about 20 units per day of various brands and over the years we've been seeing same recurring problems for the same brands/models. Some laptops are very thoughtfully made and some are like HP's dv...

Data phone is actually useful because it's always in your pocket :D If you hook up your netbook to 3G then you have to pay for data plan all the same. Netbook has the same ergonomics as a full blown laptop, but performs significantly worse, occupying that "neither fish nor meat" niche in world...

I used USD (well, same as a loonie nowdays anyways). If he buys on eBay, or generally online, there shouldn't be much difference (so around 400 pounds is very much doable for a mint 1.5 year old XPS, which will perform better than most of current desktops). I'd stay away from anything...

DELL XPS1330 (in current rendition or used, both are good options). Work with tons of different brand/model laptops everyday and 1330 is the only one I'd actually contemplate getting for myself if I didn't have a free one. Well built, very light with lots of aluminum parts, and an excellent...

I didn't mean that it was a CPU's fault. I've never seen CPU fail in dv series tbh. It's just a fairly widely accepted standard to categorize dv series by CPU configuration. And as I said, different board setups have slightly different issues. Totally agree that it's HP's fault. They still...

Start by finding an air-compressor and blowing all the dust out of your vent exhausts (any gas station should have it). If this doesn't help, then chances are that you have a hardware issue (contact HP if it's on warranty, problem is not unique and tons of people are having it). CQ60 are not the...

Problems with DV series are VERY board specific. HP uses variety of board configurations for different CPU setups within same series and all of them have their own problems associated with them. AMD CPU board is different from Intel CPU board and AMD integrated is different from AMD + Nvidia.

Depending whether you have AMD or Intel dv several things could have happened: 1) Intel units - most frequent problems are with video chips. North Bridge almost never goes out (never seen it tbh, and we repair 4-5 dv units a day). 2) AMD units - if integrated video card is used then North...

It's a consumer series HP - 90% sure that it is a motherboard issue. Video chip/North Bridge issue caused by excessive heat being the most likely reason. HP's bad batteries throw annoying messages, but they do not make the computer stop working. There is also a very long history of very...

Knowing HP consumer series' "wonderful" build quality, your Nvidia 9600M GT is starting to go. DV5, as well as most of HP's dv series, have horrible heat dissipation causing quick GPU detioration when running GPU-intensive apps. Older dv series lifespan with everyday use was pretty much 14...