Product Listing

HP Pavilion dv3 (Intel Core i7-820QM) - Silver With Envy

By Aloysius Low - 19 Jul 2010
Launch SRP: S$2199

Battery Performance and Portability Index

Battery Life and Portability Index

This 6-cell 10.8V 55Wh battery powers the HP Pavilion dv3.

Battery life of HP notebooks have always been pretty decent and we’re expecting no less of the HP Pavilion dv3. Our review unit came with two batteries, a 6-cell and a 9-cell but to keep things standardized, we’ll be reviewing it using the 6-cell.

Battery Life and Power Consumption

To test the battery life of the notebook, we’ve done our usual DVD loop test, where we play a DVD movie with Wi-Fi turned off and setting both audio and brightness at 50% until the unit dies. Our result? The HP Pavilion dv3 lasted a little over 2 hours at 128 minutes and it wasn’t as good as we would have expected. Then again, the ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5450 is one in the 5400 series (the other two behing the ATI Mobility HD 5430 and 5470) that doesn’t have switchable graphics, so battery life is bound to take a hit in the process.

As we can see from our power consumption graph, it’s actually consuming more power than the older MSI GX400, but if our unit were to have a switchable graphics feature, then perhaps we would see power consumption approaching that of the Apple MacBook Pro (which has its own switchable graphics solution). Right now though, the dv3 feels like a power hog compared to the older MSI GX400 and it’s probably a good idea to bring along the 9-cell battery for when a power point isn’t available.


Portability Index

Our portability index is a simple test where we take the battery uptime and divide it by the product of the unit's weight and volume to get an idea on how portable the notebook is. The higher the number, the more portable the notebook is. For the HP Pavilion dv3, we’re looking at a score of 0.417, which while not very high, but is what we would consider an average score. Just be sure to pack in the above-mentioned 9-cell and you’ll be fine.

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8.5
  • Design 9
  • Features 8.5
  • Performance 8.5
  • Value 8
  • Mobility 8
The Good
Sleek and sexy design
Decent performance
The Bad
Short battery life
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