Ok... some time with the laptop has been done.... Bottom line...there's a lot of good, some bad, and some "what the hells?"
First some bad...or at least some "I would have done it different" Btw, we are talking about the New dv8000z laptop I just upgraded to. The placment of the USB ports.... two on the left and two on the right.... not a bad solution to crap being plugged into the back of the laptop...I always hated that...but the current placement is not perfect... Now I'm right-handed, but I think this statement holds true for both lefties and righties... putting the USB ports on the side is a good idea, BUT....putting them at the front of the side...not so good. The issue is that now I have USB crap hanging off the sides towards the front and (in my right-handed case) the stuff plugged into the right front is in the way when I want to use the wireless mouse that sits to the right of the laptop.... I know it's a habit as to where I place and move my mouse (which is not likely to change any time soon)...and Yes I could try to get use to the built-in touch pad...but I would be nice to have the USB ports more towards the back of the laptop...
One solution I though...and I'm going to need one anyway...is to get a USB 2.0 hub...plug it in on the left side and plug all of the USB stuff into it and place it behind the laptop out of the way...gee kinda makes me wish there was at least one USB port on the back side 
... It's a minor thing...but I have to be honest...the USB ports could have been placed better... As far as everything else.... it's a great laptop for the money....it's has everything you need (minus an over the edge display card that some will whine about).... for a general all around purpose laptop...kudos...
Now, the only real complaint...and I know now...it's a marketing issue... the dv8000z has a 64-bit processor...I got the Z on purpose because I would like to move to 64-bit come Vista...well, and here's where I should have read the specs better...I was expecting that a 64-bit Windows XP would ship with the 64-bit hardware...Yeap! 
you guessed it...this laptop does not ship with a 64-bit OS...well, if you read closely you get the option of Windows XP Home or Professional, or Media Center...not WindowsXP 64-bit That's right...I got caught in the marketing imply one thing while selling something else trick.... Oh, well... I guess I'll suffer the Vista upgrade to 64-bit at some point (and expect half to of everything to stop working)....... Now, some good but gee did I have to work to get it running....
Wireless- I have a wireless Access Point (802.11 b/g) now getting the wireless to work was a somewhat of a challenge....the wireless assistant does help somewhat...but I had to reconfig the wireless AP and after running the wrong wireless driver on the laptop...finally got it to work... Well, that's all for now.... I'll write something soon about the wireless mouse and the new bio-reader I got.... Later, 
cse
cse
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