Microsoft Office 2007 HP Compaq Presario CQ62 Revi

Pattern Micro 32-Bit Editors',Microsoft Office 2010 Home And Business
Rating

The Compaq Presario CQ62 functions a delicate texture around the lid which makes it pleasing to look at and hold.

Port selection to the CQ62 is incredibly basic. VGA, LAN, and two USB ports, in addition to headphone and mic jacks, are on the left.

The keyboard is roomy and, although not pitch perfect, fairly comfortable.

On the proper, you'll find a modem and one particular in the three USB ports. You really do not obtain a memory card reader or an HDMI connector.
HP Compaq Presario CQ62 ten Remarkably very low value; significant display; passable functionality for your funds; moderately desirable style No memory-card slot, Webcam, or HDMI port; stiff mouse buttons; narrow LCD viewing angle; constrained availability If you require a really inexpensive laptop computer, the CQ62 is just not a bad wager. It’s lacking some functions, however it delivers good all round overall performance taking into consideration it fees below $400.
Price (at time of critique): $398 (mfr. est., as examined)
Key Specs Processor: two.1GHz AMD Athlon II Dual-Core P320
Memory: 3GB RAM
Storage: 250GB tough drive
Optical Push: DVD±RW
Display: 15.six inches (one,366x768 native resolution)
Graphics: ATI Mobility Radeon High definition 4250 (1GB)
Weight: five.5 pounds
Dimensions (HWD): 1.4x9.7x14.seven inches
Working Technique: Windows 7 Home Premium (64-bit)
HP Compaq Presario CQ62 Review Reviewed by: Jamie Bsales
Review Date: June 2010
If you have been thinking about a $400 netbook solely because it is an affordable method to nab a functional laptop computer,Windows 7 Discount, Hewlett-Packard, in mixture with Wal-Mart, incorporates a powerful choice: a "real" laptop computer. The Compaq Presario CQ62 is a full-size fifteen.6-inch laptop computer with an AMD dual-core processor,Office 2007 Ultimate, available at a beyond-bargain value of just $398 (starting this Sunday, June 13, 2010). That’s lower than you’d pay for a refurbished notebook with lesser specs from those deal-a-day sites (or about what you’d pay for a netbook with a fraction in the performance). The catch: It is missing some attributes now common even on budget laptops, and it’s available only at Wal-Mart whilst supplies last.


Usually, budget machines are bland and brick-like. But with its textured imprint finish, the matte-black Presario CQ62 includes a somewhat stylish look. And at 5.five lbs and measuring just 1.4 inches thick, it is notably compact given the lower price tag and significant display screen. The left and right sides of the gently rounded chassis house an optical push, three USB ports, a VGA connector, LAN and modem ports, and headphone and mic jacks. That’s it: no flash-memory-card slot, no HDMI connector, no ExpressCard slot, no eSATA port. Also deleted to hit the under-$400 price tag mark are a Webcam and a fingerprint reader. Some of those items you may be able to live without, especially if the Presario CQ62 would be a secondary machine for you or your household. But we would have preferred to see a card reader and a Webcam make the final cut. Around the plus side, the optical generate is a full-featured 8x DVD burner with LightScribe disc-labeling abilities, and the Presario CQ62 also includes a 250GB 7,200rpm difficult generate and 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi wireless networking.


The Presario CQ62’s fifteen.6-inch screen is bright, and colors in images and video really pop. (The LCD's glossy finish helps.) The resolution is 1,366x768, which makes for really readable text on Web sites and the like, although more pixels would let you make better use from the expansive real estate for multitasking. The panel’s viewing-angle sweet spot is also somewhat constrained: Move too far off-center, and you’ll notice a brightness shift. Within the other hand,Purchase Windows 7, the built-in Altec Lansing speakers deliver plenty of volume and good enough sound quality for Web audio and even movies. But as with all budget machines, sound quality for music playback is a bit strident and lacking bass.
We were pleasantly surprised by the keyboard within the Presario CQ62. Many low-cost machines’ keyboards exhibit flex, but the unit on this machine includes a solid feel. The flat-top keys have a good amount of up-down travel, and the widely spaced keys are comfortable to type on. We’re happy to see that HP has inverted the purpose in the Function ("F") keys, essentially giving you 12 hotkeys for actions such as volume, mute, screen brightness, next-track/last-track, and so on. If you require to access a function, you press a Function key combo.


Less ideal is the Presario CQ62’s touch pad. We like the clean search from the hidden-pad layout, where the touch pad just isn't isolated from the surrounding palm rest, but the textured pattern (carried over from the lid) imparts too much friction on your fingers, making mousing much less smooth. And the single-bar mouse button (you depress it on one particular end or the other for left and proper clicks) is too narrow and stiff.
As expected, the Presario CQ62 doesn’t have cutting-edge efficiency components. But the 2.1GHz AMD Athlon II Dual-Core P320 processor and 3GB of fast DDR3 memory deliver pretty good productivity functionality for a $400 laptop. The machine scored 3,152 on our PCMark Vantage benchmark test, which measures total method functionality. That’s lower than the $650 Gateway NV5933u we tested recently (it scored 4,493), but it's not alarmingly far off the 3,800 score that is average for your mainstream class. It also manages to beat out similar budget mainstream notebooks from a year ago, which scored as low as one,829. Plus, this laptop computer uses the 64-bit version of Windows seven Home Top quality, and it held its own to the 64-bit version of PCMark Vantage, too, with a score of 3,459, just a hair below the $849 Asus UL50Vf’s score of 3,563. That's nice for the value.


The cracks in performance start to show a little more, however, when it comes to multimedia-intensive work. The machine needed 8 minutes and 16 seconds to encode a video on our Windows Media Encoder test, which is more than 3 minutes longer than the Gateway NV5933u took and about 30 seconds longer than the average laptop computer in this class. On our iTunes encoding trial, in which we convert 11 standard MP3 files to AAC format, the Presario CQ62 completed the task in 6 minutes and 4 seconds, while the Gateway finished in 4:31. (The average showing for this size of technique is 4:42.) Finally, on our 32-bit version of the Cinebench ten benchmark test, which taxes all the available cores of a processor, the Presario CQ62 scored 3,927. Here, the gap starts to widen between the Gateway budget entry (5,448) and the class average (4,761). But keep in mind the Gateway laptop computer charges nearly twice as much, and the class-average price is over $1,100.
We didn’t expect much in the way of gaming abilities (beyond low-impact Web games) from this machine, and unsurprisingly, we were proper. The ATI Mobility Radeon High definition 4250 graphics chip in the Presario CQ62 delivered one,901 on 3DMark06 at one,024x768 resolution and an unplayable 18 frames per second at that resolution in a single of our standard test games, Company of Heroes. In this laptop's defense, very few budget machines deliver impressive overall performance on these tests. With scores like these, you can expect this machine to render images fine and play video, but video editing, 3D gaming, and other graphics-intensive tasks should be reserved for better-equipped laptops.
As for battery life, the Presario CQ62’s six-cell battery lasted two hours and 23 minutes on our harsh DVD rundown test (in which we loop a movie from disc until the battery conks out). That's just 3 minutes shy with the average battery runtime for this class of laptop. By comparison, the Gateway NV5933u lasted only one:36.
The Presario CQ62 delivers a serviceable choice of software for your value. In addition to the 64-bit version of Windows seven Property Premium, which includes the handy Media Center multimedia environment, you also get CyberLink PowerDVD 9 for movie playback and CyberLink DVD Suite for CD and DVD creation. HP also preloads 60-day trials for Norton Internet Security and Microsoft Office 2007. The company backs the Presario CQ62 with a one-year warranty and 24-hour, seven-day toll-free tech support, which is typical for HP and nearly all manufacturers.
To be sure, the Compaq Presario CQ62 just isn't perfect,Discount Office 2007, but this machine is all about the value. If an Atom-processor-powered netbook just isn’t your speed and your computing needs are mostly basic, this is a good choice at the cost. It offers solid-enough performance for everyday tasks, a nice big screen, and even a relatively stylish layout. We wish HP worked in a memory-card reader and a Webcam, as photo sharing on Facebook and Skyping with family members is a likely scenario for those in the market for such a budget machine. But if those functions are lost on you (or on whomever you might be considering buying this laptop computer for as a gift, like Grandpa), you’ll be happy you didn’t have to pay extra for them.
Cost (at time of critique): $398 (mfr. est., as tested)

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Compatibility: Compaq Presario CQ32, CQ42, CQ43, CQ56, CQ62, CQ72, CQ430, CQ630; HP g4, g6, g7, G32, G42, G56, G62, G72; Pavilion dv3-4000, dm4-1000, dv5-2000, dv5-3000, dv6-3000, dv6-6000, dv7-4000, dv7-6000; HP Envy 17-1000, 17-2000 series