G-Omaha's **8790 Review** Now Open To Questions and Comments

Well, Received by 8790 about three hours ago. It has thawed and I am starting to setup the internet connection (Using my existing LinkSys) Access Point so that I can start downloading all of the Microsoft updates.

Initial impressions are as follows:

1). Didn't receive the sub-woofer that I ordered. Also did not receive have any paperwork with the machine to indicate that it will be shipped seperately or not.

2). This this is NOT AS BIG or heavy as I expected. It is about 1/4" thicker than my current 3363V.

3). Anyone complaining about "fan noise" is nuts. My 3363V has a louder fan the the 8790 (except for that short 1/4 second burst upon startup).

4). I have had the unit running about an hour now and the battery is charging (it was at about 76%). I can feel the battery getting a bit warm and the HDDs (I think). The area under and to the left of the touchpad a getting a bit warm. Not hot, but warm. The "rear venting" is "excellant".

5). I did have a bit of a problem with the WiFi getting the encryption key set correctly (My Headspace Problem). I now have internet access and doing the update thing.

6). Powerbrick is "Hot". Not "Burn Hot", but getting very close. I would not want to put the powerbrick on my lap for fear of frying the eggs - so to speak.

7). The color is a very very deep navy blue - almost black. I like it better than the grey of my 3363V.

8). Keyboard is a joy. Need to set the "num on" by default; however, I look into how to do that later.

More to follow. Need to load tons of software on this thing and that is going to take a few hours.

Gary

No Windows XP updates Available.

Ordered on the 5th, They shipped on the 10th, and UPS Ground delivered today. 12 Days - Actually less than 12 days because I ordered real late at night.

Adam,

Thanks for the reply. That's what I thought regarding the subwoofer.

On the Windows update. The O/S was completely up-to-date when I went to the Windows update site.

Now, after I installed Office 2003, It reports 17 Critial, 14 XP, and 1 Driver updates are available.

I have gooten a bit side tracked - trying to get the WiFi to be WAP and work at the 108 "Turbo" Mode. It is not going well ... Upgraded drivers from Sager and still working on it.

Gary

Have abandonded the WAP on the WiFi so that I can continue on.... Real frustrating..

0jpg71 - exactly correct. GS - Thanks, Just what I wanted.

I seem to have a stuck - and sometime winky pixel (teal) at about 3" x 3" from right hand end bottom. It came and went and now is persistant. I have been running this for about 8 Hours now. I need to get used to the keyboard - it is different (better) than the one on the 3363V.

I have installed at that anti-virus and anti-spyware/adware software as well as Office XP-Pro. I have just completed installing all of the XP update... What a chore (forgot what it was like as my son installed XP-Pro for me on the 3363V).

Overall.. still a positive experience despite the WiFi Fiasco.

Gary

Gary

PS ... I really like the wide screen. It actually gives me a lot more "real estate" than I expected for normal types of operation. It's like XGA but a lot better.

Just the one errant pixel as far as I can see. Annoying; but not a show stopper.

Video conferencing and audo - Sweet. Works fine and rather than the "blocky stuff" it looks "blurry" at the distant end for fast movements. Mike and Vidoe works fine.

Well now I need to down load the updates to Office - that should take me some time.

Bye

Gary

OK, All of the Office-XP updates are done. That was really fast!

I'll try installing VISIO and then the updates next.

Viso is now installed, XP updated, and Office updated. All options of Viso were installed even though I might not use them - have excess disk space.

God - I like this key board....


I'm going to reboot - just for good measures now...

Gary

OK - We got the WAP to work and the WiFi is set to 11, 54, and 108 Dynamic. The connection "breaks" every now and again for some unknown reason. I'll look at this again later as I'm "burn't out" out on this topic right now.

Had a BSD this morning (Some -INQR type of message); however couldn't get the whole message as it rebooted too quick.

HDDs - 5,400 RPM 80GB one configured as RAID-0. Combined RAID-0 has 149GB of storage. I can not determine the manufacturer. AIDA and SANDRA can't get beyond the Promise controller and simply report them as SCSI drives. Or I am doing something wrong within these utilities.

TV Tuner works fine. I have it on while I work, etc..

Spent a lot of time finding and downloading bigger wallpaper for this machine. That is what I was doing when I got the BSD.

The machine does not get too hot. I plan to run it for a few more hours and place a thermometer at various points on the machine and give you readings. The power cube gets HOT. I think I'll try brewing coffee with it.

The HDD's can be heard in certain instances. I shut myself in a pretty much sound proof room and worked on the machine for about an hour. Mostly to see if I would get annoyed by the fan noise.

Anyone have a good idea for a program to run that will "Tax" the system - including the Video Card? I don't have many games, just those my son had from a few years ago. I would need to be able to get a hold a "freeware" or "Demo" of the game as I don't want to buy one just to accomplish a test.

I ran 10 iterations of Sandra burn-in without problem.

Have Diskeeper defrag software and it works like a charm - including the Boot mode that also invokes a CheckDisk.

I need to get back to "work" now and will keep you posted. I am recoring off of the TV and trying to see how it will accomplish DVD splits, etc. I have about 1.3GB of MPEG-2 recorded so far.

On a final note. The Screen is FANTASTIC. Good side to side and top to bottom and bottom to top viewing. Much better than my 3363V which "washed out" when I went "off center" by about 25-30%. I don't get that "wash out" until well over 45-50% and then it is not as bad. I could actually read the text from just shy of parallel to the screen. My son was "driving" and I was "helping" from the chair to the right (extreme right) so that I would not get in the way too much.

Q/A and Comments Now Open

Bring them on.

How to hang a 8790....

Just put in a blank DVD drive in the unit and ask Nero to identify it.

Mine locked up completely. Oddly, you could start programs, see the cursor switch as it loaded and then nothing happens.

Had to hold down power button for about a minute to get the machine back. I'll check on this later.