New laptop: i7 Sandy vs A8-3510MX

The thing they don't show you in the reviews is that the a8 is drastically underutilized in the dv6. Unlike the SB cpu's, the A8 can be both overclocked and undervolted at the same time. It has substantial headroom, most are running it at 2.2 to 2.6mghz on all 4 cores. It's very easy to customize the performance for what you need as ALL of the apu Pstates are capable of manipulation. The chip is also set up for OpenCL which puts all that graphics power to computational use on apps that are coded for it. Since you appear to be a professional, I would check and see if your software can utilize OCL either now or in the near future. If so, the LLano might suit you very well. All in all the dv6z seems an impossible value, but the guys over in the HP Pavillion forum at notebookreview.com are investigating every aspect of this machine and while there are some driver issues with gaming side of things, that are being worked on, the overall quality and specs of the machine are serious bang for buck. There is also the Dv6T version incorporating the Sandy Bridge cpu's for similar money. You might investigate that model.

Lastly, HP heavily discounts its laptops with coupons. Do NOT buy one without one   The current coupon is for 30 percent off if you put together a retail specc'd one that reaches 999.00. Real world prices not including taxes (there is no shipping charge) run from around 650 to 750 depending on the 1900x1080p screen (xcellent btw), and a 7200 drive, either 640 or 750. Other considerations are the option to get both a std 6cell bat AND a 9 cell for a modest increase in price. Throw in the blueray, the 6gigs of ram, the fingerprint reader which actually works (once you use it you'll be hooked, its just so much faster)AND, you even get the Beats audio sound configuration system which will b right up your audio alley.

Reports are that it runs cool, quiet, and without localized hotspots. The keyboard is very nice, an island style, the trackpad is receiving favorable comments, and its remarkably light feeling for a 15.6. The USB 3.0 ports may very well interest you for external drive speed etc. All in all quite an amazing package for the money.

After doing much the same research you have, and being a musician myself, I ordered one   I couldn't find anything that comes close.

Seer

Couple of more things. Yes the I7SB's are faster at coding, but they cost more, and run hotter. The A8 is easily configured to b very competitive. It multitasks VERY well, and I guess the question comes down to, is it *good enough*. For me the answer was yes. It has no problem running studio software, and its quiet. It's video decoder is very good and vid quaility is excellent. The screen is simply one of the best I've seen. It's just a nice all around package, but again, you can easily get pretty much the same box with your choice of Sandy Bridge, but it will cost a bit more.