Hewlett-Packard Pavilion 540N Desktop (1.5-Ghz Pentium 4, 256 MB RAM, 40 GB hard drive)

Product Description

With full power and the right features, the HP Pavilion 540n desktop PC is just right to help you track your finances and have fun while doing it! Powered with high-quality processors for speed and functionality, you can burn your own CDs with the CD-Writer. Love music? Record your own CDs with the hp CD-RW drive, create personalized play lists with pre-loaded MusicMatch software, and enjoy incredible sound from the Polk Audio Stereo speakers. HP Internet Command Center one-touch keyboard puts the Internet at your fingertips. Plug in your digital cameras or other peripherals with the convenient front-access USB and serial ports. Bring your music to life with the included Polk Audio stereo speakers with PowerPort technology. Setup is a snap with easy instructions and color-coded connections. Enjoy e-mail and Web-surfing with the integrated network interface, built-in modem and preloaded Internet service providers.

Customer Reviews:

Beware the dark side of HP..........2002-04-07

This isn't a review of this exact model of HP computer, but one very similar that was recently out-moded. As computer technology moves so fast, models that were hot 6 months ago don't even exist now. Still, I've found that a generic "$[money] HP computer" has most of the same problems, many of the same short cuts made to cut costs.

In my HP, the specs sounded very fast and powerful - 1.2 Ghz, 30 gig hard drive CD writer, nice software bundle, 128 meg memory. Upon getting the computer home, I found it to be very professional, everything worked well, Windows hardly ever locks up or freezes, and things work smoothly. Except...

HP cut corners to save money, and it shows. Loading a program on this modern 1.2 Ghz computer can take over 2 minutes, and I'm talking Internet Explorer, which should take 16 seconds. American Online often takes 5 minutes. Unacceptable. This stems from getting a cheap, slow hard drive and a motherboard with a small cache and slow IDE interface. It doesn't matter how fast the processor is, or how much memory you have, you still have to wait for your programs to load from the Hard Drive.

I still find that $[money] buys you a better computer from Dell or Gateway than anything you can get from Best Buy. Compaq, HP, IBM, all of these manufacturers make cheap computers to sell at Wal-Mart and Best Buy and similiar places. They cut corners to max out their profits, and I've seen people complain again and again about such "Deals". Beware.

Electronics:

Electronics

Electronics