HP Pavilion Power Desktop (Costco online) - missing hardwired LAN port?!

[navaho42]

I was looking at getting  a desktop PC, but hate wireless.

The Costco ad for a HP Pavilion Power Desktop:

     https://www.costco.com/HP-Pavilion-Power-Desktop---AMD-Ryzen-7---Radeon-RX-550.product.100416234.htm...

lists all of the ports, but does NOT list a "LAN (Ethernet) port". 

Could it be that it only supports wireless?  😞

  I tried cross-checking against HP's official specs, which appear to be here:

    https://support.hp.com/ie-en/document/c05638874

and it DOES show a "LAN (Ethernet)" port but... then issues the disclaimer:

    "The configuration might vary depending on your model (for example, if a dedicated graphics card is included)."

Q#1: does this model PC have a "LAN (Ethernet)" port?

Q#2: if N, are there any other HP desktop PC's (Win10 64-bit, 16 GB RAM) which do have a "LAN (Ethernet)" port?

Thanks in advance!

-Ted

[Paul_Tikkanen · Accepted solution]

Hi, Ted:

This is the model that Costco is selling, and yes it has a gigabit ethernet port.

https://support.hp.com/za-en/document/c05953209

I don't know of any HP desktop PC made in the last 10 years that doesn't come with an ethernet port.

[navaho42]

Hi Paul,

Awesome, thanks!

Cheers,

-Ted

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome, Ted.

[navaho42]

Hi Paul,

Your PC kung fu is very strong - you bring great honor to the entire village 🙂

So I actually have one more question, if you don't mind.

(If I should make a new message thread for this question, just let me know...)

If I just wanted a fast Windows 10 desktop machine (i7 processor, 16 GB RAM, USB 3.0 ports)

but didn't care about gaming, is there a less expensive option than that $600 machine from Costco?

My first thought was just to get another HP 8200 from eBay (some come with Win10 Pro 64-bit installed), but... then I googled and found lots of horror stories about drivers (on this forum).   Apparently the HP 8200 doesn't have official Windows10 drivers...  It can work with Win10, but sometimes (depending on video card) it doesn't.   Given all the push-ups it took to get last driver issue sorted out, I was trying to just get a second PC which worked out of the box.

Thanks again!    

Cheers,

-Ted

[Paul_Tikkanen]

Hi, Ted:

I have two 8200 Elite CMT's and both of them run W10 (latest build) just fine.

The only driver you will need to install, would be the W8 AMT driver.  W10 will install all of the rest, though I recommend you use the latest W10 audio driver directly from Realtek.

You can get one of those, or the newer 8300 Elite CMT (Intel 3rd gen core processor).

I can't justify getting a new PC, because my 8200 Elites run fine.

One has a SSD and both have 32 GB of memory.  I have to keep one with a 1 TB HDD because my wife has a ton of pictures on it.

I added graphics cards to both of them...a nVidia GT 730 in one, and an AMD Radeon HD 6570 in the other.

The only major issue I have read about with the 8200 Elite was where folks updated the BIOS to v2.29 and then it took 2.5 minutes for the PC to boot up from a restart.  There is a workaround, and that is to go into the PC's security setting and hide the TPM device, but then if you use Bitlocker, you can't with the TPM disabled.

I have mine at BIOS v2.28 and they work just fine.

HP has pulled v2.29 and there is now a v2.32 but I am reluctant to try it out.

Buying an off lease 8200 or 8300 elite would be a whole lot cheaper than buying a new PC.

Plus I think HP business desktop PC's are built better and last longer than the consumer models.

I have never had one die on me (have gone from the EVO d510's, through the dc7xxx series and so forth.

I gave them away when they were still working great.

[navaho42]

Hi Paul,

Lots of great info, thanks! 

Perhaps I gave up on the 8200 W10 a bit prematurely...

I concur with your comments about the business PC's being more robust than the consumer grade PC's.

A few more q's, if you don't mind.  No rush on the answers...

Q#1: it looks like Crucial.com wants $280 for 32 GB of RAM.   

That's more than I was expecting.   All of my current PC's are W7 and seem to do fine with 16 GB of RAM.   In fact, the vast majority of my RAM seems to be taken up by Chrome tabs.

Does W10 require significantly more RAM than W7?

Ballistix Sport 32GB Kit (4 x 8GB) DDR3-1600 UDIMM    $279.99 CT2799726

• DDR3 PC3-12800 • 9-9-9-24 • Unbuffered • NON-ECC • DDR3-1600 • 1.5V • 1024Meg x 64 •
• upgrade for HP - Compaq HP Compaq 8200 Elite Small Form Factor system.

Q#2: is the W8 AMT driver required for W10? 

The wiki page on AMT (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Active_Management_Technology )

implies AMT is something that is only needed when one is remotely managing PC's (like in a corporate environment).

Q#3: 8200 SFF (Small Form Factor) vs 8200 CMT (Compact Mini Tower)?

My current 8200 Elite is a SFF.   

Are the 8200 CMT's better (perhaps easier to replace disks, or more expandable) than the SFF's?

Q#4: Any thoughts on the z220 series vs the 8200 series? 

I came across a z220 (i7 processor, 16 GB RAM, W10) on eBay for $279.   Seems like a pretty good value for the $.  The only thing that gives me a bit of hesitation on the z-series is that I called "Computer Surgeons" (whom I've used for 8200 reinstall media, when the HP reinstall media hung), and they said they do NOT carry reinstall media for the z-series.

Q#5: Any thoughts on Raid1 (mirror) for C: drive "CYA"? 

 It looks like the z-series can do this, however... quick googling indicates that sometimes Raid1 mirroring is not as robust of insurance as one might think. 

For example, I ran across a thread where someone had their Raid1 controller die (disks were fine).  They thought they could just take one of the 2 Raid1 C: drives  and boot it in a different computer, but found they could not because... the Raid1 firmware used a non-Windows file system (eg, ext3) for the two C: drives, and "translated" it on the fly to NTFS.

For now, I'm making do with cloning my C: drive periodically (using the free Macrium Reflect 7 sw).  It's pretty nice in that it allows "hot cloning" (cloning w/o bringing the machine down first and then booting off a USB or CD).  Macrium also allows cloning the C: drive to a different size of hard disk (larger or smaller).     Ref:  https://www.macrium.com/reflectfree

But... it would be nice to have a "hot mirror" (Raid 1), which has the advantage of:

   o backup disk is always 100% up to date

   o if one C: drive dies, the Raid1 mirror copy will (in theory) transparently take over, w/o rebooting 

I know this (Raid1) works great on HP-UX servers (MirrorDisk/UX), but am not sure how robust the implementation is in the PC world.   Your thoughts?

Q#6:  Is there a USB 3.0 aftermarker card that would would recommend, if I were to acquire another 8200 and wanted to install a USB 3.0 port in it?

I've been quite happy with my USB 3.0 port (now that you gave me a driver to make it work - thanks again!).  It's literally 300% faster than the USB 2.0 ports that the 8200 comes with.   I suppose I could just get the same make/model of USB 3.0 card in my current 8200, but I'm not sure what it is - it came with the PC when I bought it, and doesn't seem to have a model # stamped on it anywhere.

Thanks again,

-Ted

[Paul_Tikkanen]

You're very welcome.

A1. This is the memory I used in my 8200 Elite CMT's...Looking at my Amazon order history, I paid $29.99 each.

Now the price is astronomical.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0075U12H8/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

You might want to go with this instead...should be backward compatible to 1333 Mhz...

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B007HILOWG/ref=psdc_172500_t1_B0075U12H8

A2:  I don't like a device manager with missing devices...this is the driver you need...but yes, the driver is not necessary for a home network unless you have a serial printer connected to the PC.

This package contains the Intel Active Management Technology (AMT) Driver for supported models running a supported operating system.

https://ftp.hp.com/pub/softpaq/sp69501-70000/sp69506.exe

A3.  The CMT has a 320W power supply, and more room for expansion (and more open space for air circulation).  Otherwise, I guess it is a space thing.  I have my PC's aside the desk on the floor. I gave my son a dc7900 SFF which he has on the desk at his house.

A4.  I don't know enough about the xw or Z series workstations to give you any input.  The workstations are more expensive, and have more options than the business desktop PC's.

A5.  I have never set up a RAID array, so I can't help you there.  I have a dc7800 with the BIOS set to RAID, but I am only running a single SSD in there.  The only other option to set the drive controller to in that model is IDE, and RAID is the better setting to have for both SSD's and mechanical hard drives.

A6.  The 8200 Elite offered this USB3 card as an option...HP SuperSpeed USB 3.0 Card -- BM867AA

https://www.ebay.com/itm/HP-USB-3-0-Super-Speed-PCIe-x1-Adapter-Kit-New-BM867AA-New-Kit-Retail-Box/3...

[jtpolk]

If I just wanted a fast Windows 10 desktop machine (i7 processor, 16 GB RAM, USB 3.0 ports)

but didn't care about gaming, is there a less expensive option than that $600 machine from Costco?

For a new computing machine? Not really, no. I used to build my own computers for years before switching to an iMac/Macbook Pro for 8 years, now switching back to Windows/Linux. It used to be that building your own machine was a way to reduce costs. Not any more. I found a place that allows me to pick my pc parts, and was blown away about how expensive it was to build an inexpensive machine. I could not get within hundreds of dollars by building it myself vs getting a system from a tier 1 vendor such as HP. Now, the same cannot be said for building a machines that are midrange and above, and even then...Huh! At least that is the case for my use case, which is enthusiast photography using Lightroom and Photoshop for printing -- you don't need all that much in terms of massively expensive video cards and the like. My money needed to go for decent Adobe RGB monitor and printer supplies.

Your use case may vary, but I looked at a lot of machines and HP seems to have good value, especially for what I was looking for in a computer, with my getting a HP 590-p0057c from Costco.

enjoy!

[navaho42]

Hi Paul,

Thanks for the link to the USB 3.0 card.   That looks like a really nice package (card + cables + disk with driver). 

A few days ago I was trying to find a (second) USB 3.0 card and the reader feedback (for the item I found) was full of complaints about the card arriving w/o a cable and w/o a driver.

I was puzzled about RAM prices going up - that seems very odd.   But then I came across 2 articles which attempt to explain what's going on in the marketplace:

1. http://www.tomshardware.com/answers/id-3600205/ram-expensive.html
2. http://www.gamerevolution.com/features/361583-high-ram-prices-threaten-strangle-pc-gaming-market

I totally agree with your point about not liking Device Manager entries with missing drivers.  I'm the same way 🙂

A friend of mine had a Z620, and I was impressed by how totally silent it was (as opposed to my 8200 SFF, which has a noticable fan hum).   So although I may get another 8200 in the future, for now I decided to get a z220 that I found on eBay, because:

• it comes with USB 3.0 ports, 16 GB RAM, an i7 processor, W10 Pro, and 1 TB disk, for $300 (shipping included).
• the HP driver site for the z220 actually has W10 64-bit drivers https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/selfservice/hp-z220-convertible-minitower-workstation/5260575

Thanks again for all your help, your detailed replies have been extremely useful!

Best,

-Ted