You may remember that we wrote about the HP Tx2000 / Tx2500 “entertainment” Tablet PC earlier in the year. It included a couple of really great features like:
- AMD 64 bit processor
- Inbuilt DVD Burner
- Active digitiser pen.
HP Tx1000, the original model in this series left a lot to be desired. It was a touch screen only model. That was unfortunate because I’ve met dozens of people who bought the Tx1000 because they always wanted to try a Tablet PC and the Tx1000 was cheap.
Many of them were put off the Tablet PC experience altogether because of the touch screen.
With a touch screen it is very easy to accidentally confuse the PC. For example, when you’re writing it is natural to lean your wrist on the writing surface. A touch screen sees that as multiple points of contact and it get’s confused.
So a touch screen is not ideal for writing tasks, particularly when there is twelve inches of screen to connect with. People who bought the Tx1000 were very generally disappointed because of this.
Fortunately, HP listened and included an active digitiser in the Tx2000 and Tx2500 (They’ve been doing that a bit lately, listening). Tx2500 is a good improvement on the Tx1000 series and it is also still a cheap way to get into a Tablet PC.
That said, the Tx2500 “Entertainment Notebook” fits into the home notebook range. It’s not really ideal for full on business use and it’s certainly not rugged.
We’ve finally added the HP Pavilion Tx2500 to our online shop here.
the HP Tx2500 is a price killer when compare to most tablet PC, great GPU, great performance, and great pen accuracy, it is perfect for any artist with the right programs, however the price you get will also tell you how many problems you will get too.
Very hot at the bottom after running
low battery life unless upgrade
(both due to the AMD processor)
Screen is bad when view at certain angle(maynot be the best outdoor computer too)
other then the problems everything else is just great.
I love my tx2500. I bought it in September and was expecting a very cheap experience, but actually it’s a fairly solid and respectable little machine. Sure, I couldn’t club people with it the way I could a Dell, but then that’s not what I bought it for.
The power and performance are good–good enough that it’s comparable to my (admittedly slightly old) desktop. Then again, I don’t game. If you’re looking for a comp you can run games on, you’ll probably be disappointed. What I do is art, and for that purpose, this tablet is aces! I loaded Photoshop and openCanvas on, the laptop doesn’t have any trouble handling these programs even when I run them at the same time, and I’ve worked with image files as large as 400MB and it just chugs along.
There is quite a bit of heat, notably on the upper right side where the vents are located. In the winter, it’s actually nice, like having an electric blanket on your lap. In the summer, it can get a little uncomfortable. The heat doesn’t get bad enough to do damage to the components, or to your knees, but you might find yourself fidgeting if you’re running some CPU-intensive stuff. When you have the laptop in tablet form, it gets warmer, as having the keyboard closed traps the heat a bit more.
I bought a TX2500 for school precisely because of the price. It bought the thing for CA[$750. It’s an excellent computer, great specs for such a small, light computer. I can easily hold it one-handed by the hand rest on the keyboard, something I can’t do easily with anything but a netbook.
I’ve used for everything from notes at school to decent 3d gaming and it does it easily. It doesn’t compare to any gaming desktop in terms of detail, but its more than enough. Playing real time strategy games on the touch screen is amazing.
My only complaint is that the hardware, being from HP (not known for great quality) is not the greatest for durability. It holds up all right, but it feels like I could damage something inside far more easily than on many other laptops. I also have the same problems with the screen in sunlight. In my opinion, they should have used a matte finish on the display and provided a brighter (perhaps LED so less power is used) backlight.
I think the issues with battery life (I have the 6 cell battery and get 2.5-3 hours, tops), noise, and heat come less from AMD’s chip design and more from HP’s poor battery design (I’ve experienced memory issues, where the battery think it is less charged than it is) and poor heat dissipation from the processor, as the fan runs way more than many other laptops. If HP had put a little more time into the case and battery, even if it upped the price 200 dollars, I’d buy it because it would still cost 2/3 the price of any other tablet I’ve seen.
Where can you get this tablet? Can you get it from Brisbane?
Tx2500 is a piece of s**t. I bought it about 1 yr. I use it only on weekend. Just after warranty expired, it motherboard and processor get burn. I’ll ban HP forever.
Thanks HP
could you please tell/mail me how much,specifically, a table PC (tx2500, 4gig RAM, @least 320G etc) cost? It is urgent. Thank you.
Hi there TROKO Emmanuel, you would need to check with a supplier in your country as international prices vary. In Australia, the Tx2 sells for AUD$1600 – AUD$1900. The new HP Tm2 however would be a much better buy.