HP Pavillion HPE h8-1222

[bullywug]

Hello all,

I have a HP Pavillion HPE h8-1222 gaming PC.  I'm running Windows 7 64-bit which is the OS that shipped with the device.

I have thus far tried to play 2 games on this machine.  One was Skyrim and the other is The Witcher 2 Assassins of Kings.  Both work fine on mediocre graphics settings but when I try to turn things all the way up my frame rates drop to around 10 frames per second.  With Skyrim I thought maybe my system just wasn't good enough to play it even though I drastically exceed their recommended system but now with Witcher 2, a game thats a year old, I should definately be able to play with the graphics turned up.  What I found in looking around the web is that there is and has been for some time a update for the Radeon 7670 graphics card the machine shipped with.

What I learned in trying to update it is that the Radeon 7670 is an OEM device made for HP.  Someone hinted that it's a rebranded 4850 (I believe) which would explain the poor performance.  Either way, there is no update for this card on HP's website even though it would appear there is one floating around the world that could solve all my problems.

My questions are, does anyone know if there is a way to get a driver for this card that will install (the one's I found when I googled failed to install (windows says it can't find a better driver than the one installed even when I point it to where the driver is)) and secondly does anyone know for certain if this graphics card is a propper 7xxx or has HP branded it in a way as to be misleading?

Any help anyone can provide would be most welcome.

Thank you. 

[erico]

You can update your video card driver at the AMD graphics driver & software website. Use the automatic method and let the website find the driver for you.

[bullywug]

AMD's auto detect tool and browsing their site does not provide any usable drivers for this computer.  The error that the tool gives is quite clear.  I don't own a compatible product because HP, the manufactuer, is required to support OEM products.

Please let me clarify my previous post: I need to know where to download or order a CD for the appropriate drivers for my machine.  As this is OEM that location most likely will not be on another hardware component's manufacturers website.  I know a lot of people like to monitor these forums and offer suggestions thta are really just guesses, educated or otherwise.  I know this will cut down on the responses and I don't mean to be rude but please do not post guesses unless your relatively sure.  I don't need people helping to create extra work for me.

Thank you for your time in your response.

[erico]

The available drivers provided by HP are located at your desktop PC's web support portal drivers & software download section.

Being somewhat snide, although props for trying to compensate with an apology, is definitely counterproductive. It makes people not want to post in your thread at all. 

[Big_Dave]

Hi,

Your PC has the potential to be a better gaming PC but not with the AMD 7670 unless you turn down the game quality settings.

Check on patches for both of your games.

If you want to run on the higher game settings then you will need a better video card and possibily a bigger power supply if you have the base 300 watt model in your PC. Review this posted document for background information.

While the 7670 and 4850 have similar memory bandwidths, the cards are technically much different from each other. 

[bullywug]

Hi Dave,

I really appreicate the information.  I've bookmarked your post and will come back to it later.  I would like to ask you a follow up question.  The two games are the Witcher 2 which recommends an Radeon HD 4850 with 1 gb vid ram.  The other is Skyrim which recomends the Radeon 4890.  When you look at the specs of the machine it would appear to have a 7000 series video card but from what I'm getting I think your saying it has something much lower.  Could you please confirm if I'm understanding you correctly?

Thanks. 

[Big_Dave · Accepted solution]

Hi,

The Radeon 7670 has a memory bandwidth of 64 GB/s which is the same as the ATI 4850.  You can review this chart if needed for the ATI video cards.  Notice the absence of the 7670 which can be found at this site. The 7670 is DirectX 11 rated and the 4850 is only DirectX 10.1.

This site doesn't have the full results of the 7670 but it does have the 7770 which is one model up from the 7670.

Your last post mentions the Radeon 4890 is 125 GB/s and is DirectX 10.1 rated.  The newer AMD Radeon 6850 is a faster than the 4890 and is rated for DirectX 11.  The at this comparison between the 6850 and the 4890.

The games that you mentioned can both take advantage of the DirectX 11 hence the reason for referencing that functionality.

[nymus2012]

Hp Uses A proprietary CCC(catalyst control center)  You can not update your video drivers with ati due to this.  I would Imagine that the 7670 is also underclocked considering that the recommended power supply for this particular video card is 400 watts and the power supply that came with your pc is 300.  I found out, the hard way,  that the h8-1222 is a bad way to go for gaming.  Surfing through various forums, I discovered that numerous hp owners were complaining that their video card drivers were 6 months to over a year old and could not update due to the hp specific CCC.  You are outa luck.  You could wipe your drive(to pull out the hp crap), install a better power supply and video card but since h8 doesnt come with a windows disk, you would have to buy that as well.

I spent over an hour with online support assistant trying to update my driver.  The assistant kept trying to figure out why I couldn't install one from amd's site.  Makes you think. 

[bullywug]

That's actually what I'm used to from HP.  About 5 years ago I bought a convertable laptop from them and the thing was litterally physically dangerious.  It used an AMD processor that caused the machine, even with propper ventallation, to overheat to the point chips popped off the logic board.  Their tech support was like talking to a teenager who's trying to help but has no clue what he's talking about.  I swore them off and said I'd never use their products again.

Then my Thinkpad finally died and it was time to replace with a new machine.  Given the uncertanty in the video game console market right now and the fact that I'd left my laptop sitting in one place for 4 out of the 5 years I owned it I decided to buy a gaming machine.  I wanted one that would be fast enough to play any game currently on the market.  I found a custom built at Tiger Direct that had what appeared to be exactly what I needed.  I didn't want to drive all the way to Tiger Direct so I went to Futureshop to see what they had to offer not expecting much and I saw this machine.  I reviewed the specs over and over.  It appeared to be very nearly identical.  Even the video card appeared to be the same.

Of course it was not as I now know and by saving about $50 I have created a nightmare for myself in dealing with HP to get this fixed.  Their tech support so far has been terrible.  I wrote the office of the CEO because it was the only way I could get ahold of someone without holding for 45 minutes.  Their chat support was busted and emailing seems to just put you in a loop where you never actually get to email.  I had a call from the CEO's office yesterday and I intend to tell him that this is misleading and deceptive and I want a refund or a fixed machine.

Thank you all so much for your feedback. 

[bullywug]

I'm sorry that you thought I was being snide.  I was actually being blunt.  I did not mean to offend you but simply to ask you not to make posts that are not helpful.  {Content Removed: Be Respectful}

Thank you.