Entered CNET Catalog: 05/15/2003
SKU: P9859AR#ABA
Manufacturer: HP
Manufacturer description
Easy to use, HP Pavilion PCs are designed for all the family - from children to grandparents, first time users to computer enthusiasts. Good-looking, robust and built to last, HP Pavilion PCs offer a price and performance range to suit every household budget. Backed by HP brand quality and reliability, HP Pavilion PCs complement HP's family of imaging products, offering customers a complete home computing solution.User opinions
Select a User Opinion to view: 1 2
User Rating: 
10/10
Pavilion 533w beats all computer needs
Pros: I bought this computer back in 2002 and I STILL have it, and has not had any hardware failure or anything. I upgraded the memory and HD. HP Pavilion only way I go!!!
Cons: Nothing bad about it
Review:
If you want a good fast reliable computer... the HP Pavilion 533w is the best way to go.
User Rating: 
7/10
Good Looking and affordable with a lot of room for expansion
Pros: Lots of expansion, tons of USB ports, Good Looking, Windows XP, CD Holder on top
Cons: Low RAM, Small Hard Drive, Slow CD Burner, No Secondary Hard Disk Bay, Slow out of box, Crappy Pre-Installed Software, No Firewire
Review:
Hewlett Packard Pavilion 533w Desktop PC Review
By: Aric49
The HP Pavilion 533w Desktop PC was originally released by Hewlett Packard in 2002. This PC was built primarily for the function of basic home and office use. Over the course of this review, we will look at some of the aspects that this PC has to offer, and of course some of the things this PC sadly does not offer.
Review Outline:
I.Case and Outward Appearance
II.Specifications and Performance
III.Drives and Bays
IV.Closing
Case and Outward Appearance
Some people, when they shop for a PC, they look for a clean, appealing to the eye, overall sharp looking case. The HP Pavilion 533w has all of this and more. The case has a primarily Grey trim, with the HP navy blue for the center highlighting all of the frontal features of the PC, such as the CD drive, expansion bay, floppy drive, and very nice looking Grey power button. The bottom of the front is probably one of my most used features, 2 USB ports hidden underneath a hinged flap that is easily retractable and adds to the over all clean look on the computer. My only gripe about this part is that there is only 2 USB ports, leaving a lot of ugly space to either side of them, that HP could have easily stuck some audio or fire wire ports. Moving to the top of the case, we find a pretty odd looking compartment. On further investigation, we find this compartment is none other than a blank CD holder. Very handy and a feature that very few PC's of today do not have. The sides of the case, along with the rest of the PC, is a very professional looking beveled HP logo. This, I think is a very nice touch added by Hewlett Packard. The back of the case, is like any other case basically, you have all your standard ports, nothing special there. The thing i enjoy about this is the audio port located to the right of all the other components, special for the powered speakers that come with this model, and very easy to see for the non-tech savvy among us. Overall, the outward appearance of the HP Pavilion 533w, is a decent design that many computers of today simply cannot touch.
Specifications and Performance
This is the category that really starts to show this computers age. At the beginning of 2002, when this PC first came on to the market, it was a powerhouse. Sporting a mean 256 megabytes of ram, 60 Gigabyte Hard Drive, 64 Megabytes of video memory (chipset video card), 8X CD Burner, 10/100 Ethernet RJ45 port, and a bunch of USB ports, it didn't seem like this PC was going to be in for an upgrade anytime soon. But as we all know, time makes fools of us all, and so it did this PC. On todays market, not many people are looking for these specifications in a computer. Worry not my friends, because this PC is fully upgradeable to meet todays and yes, tomorrows standards. The hard drive, 60 gigabyte, you can easily up that puppy up to a 120, or 200 gig easily. No surprises there. As for the RAM, the motherboard can easily support an entire gigabyte of ram. That's a lot of ram even for todays standards. The CPU, a Celeron 2.0 Gigahertz, is a lot faster than most give credit for, even for the standards of today. The CD drive, video card, and everything else is pretty average.
Out of the box, this computer is not entirely the fastest computer known to man, in fact it lags a bit. Tinkering with the startup using MSCONFIG makes this computer run a lot more efficiently at startup. For only 256 megabytes of ram, this computer is not lacking anything in the performance department. It can easily handle process-hogging applications such as Adobe Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, and even iTunes, very easily. If your into web browsing, this is the computer for you. I cannot even begin to tell you how many hours I have clocked in on the net with this baby. The HP 533w gets a lot of props in the processing category.
Drives and Bays
As I have mentioned before, this computer has a very small hard drive, and a very slow CD burner. This fact sullies the PC little compared to the rest of the bad news waiting for you in the case. Opening the case, reveals 1 floppy drive bay, 1 hard drive bay, and 2 CD drive bays. I didn't like this very much because I was looking forward to installing a secondary Hard Drive that I would have installed Linux on. One floppy drive for me is enough. I like to have a floppy drive on all of my computers in case of an emergency that I would have to pull out one of my handy Windows boot disks. The CD drive for me, is a complete agrivation. I'm a very big music guy, I really enjoy ripping and burning CD's on a common basis. A 8X speed CD writer is not nearly fast enough for my tastes. In fact, as soon as i get some money, I'm going to upgrade it to a much faster one. The drives and bays category, really brings down the overall performance of this computer. However, like all computers, only some of it is easily remedied.
Closing
The Hewlett Packard Pavilion 533w Desktop computer, was a computer designed for the future. Although slow out of the box, the computer can be easily upgraded with all of the features of todays standard computers, with a very affordable price, (Now probably about $200.00). The case is very unique and colorful but retaining a very professional, dignified look that many computers on the market fail to meet in todays world. If you are a student, or a home user that wants a good stable computer for things like web surfing, music, office utilities, and other tasks, look no further, this is the PC for you. If you have any questions about concerning this computer, please email me at aric49@zoominternet.net
By: Aric49
The HP Pavilion 533w Desktop PC was originally released by Hewlett Packard in 2002. This PC was built primarily for the function of basic home and office use. Over the course of this review, we will look at some of the aspects that this PC has to offer, and of course some of the things this PC sadly does not offer.
Review Outline:
I.Case and Outward Appearance
II.Specifications and Performance
III.Drives and Bays
IV.Closing
Case and Outward Appearance
Some people, when they shop for a PC, they look for a clean, appealing to the eye, overall sharp looking case. The HP Pavilion 533w has all of this and more. The case has a primarily Grey trim, with the HP navy blue for the center highlighting all of the frontal features of the PC, such as the CD drive, expansion bay, floppy drive, and very nice looking Grey power button. The bottom of the front is probably one of my most used features, 2 USB ports hidden underneath a hinged flap that is easily retractable and adds to the over all clean look on the computer. My only gripe about this part is that there is only 2 USB ports, leaving a lot of ugly space to either side of them, that HP could have easily stuck some audio or fire wire ports. Moving to the top of the case, we find a pretty odd looking compartment. On further investigation, we find this compartment is none other than a blank CD holder. Very handy and a feature that very few PC's of today do not have. The sides of the case, along with the rest of the PC, is a very professional looking beveled HP logo. This, I think is a very nice touch added by Hewlett Packard. The back of the case, is like any other case basically, you have all your standard ports, nothing special there. The thing i enjoy about this is the audio port located to the right of all the other components, special for the powered speakers that come with this model, and very easy to see for the non-tech savvy among us. Overall, the outward appearance of the HP Pavilion 533w, is a decent design that many computers of today simply cannot touch.
Specifications and Performance
This is the category that really starts to show this computers age. At the beginning of 2002, when this PC first came on to the market, it was a powerhouse. Sporting a mean 256 megabytes of ram, 60 Gigabyte Hard Drive, 64 Megabytes of video memory (chipset video card), 8X CD Burner, 10/100 Ethernet RJ45 port, and a bunch of USB ports, it didn't seem like this PC was going to be in for an upgrade anytime soon. But as we all know, time makes fools of us all, and so it did this PC. On todays market, not many people are looking for these specifications in a computer. Worry not my friends, because this PC is fully upgradeable to meet todays and yes, tomorrows standards. The hard drive, 60 gigabyte, you can easily up that puppy up to a 120, or 200 gig easily. No surprises there. As for the RAM, the motherboard can easily support an entire gigabyte of ram. That's a lot of ram even for todays standards. The CPU, a Celeron 2.0 Gigahertz, is a lot faster than most give credit for, even for the standards of today. The CD drive, video card, and everything else is pretty average.
Out of the box, this computer is not entirely the fastest computer known to man, in fact it lags a bit. Tinkering with the startup using MSCONFIG makes this computer run a lot more efficiently at startup. For only 256 megabytes of ram, this computer is not lacking anything in the performance department. It can easily handle process-hogging applications such as Adobe Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro, and even iTunes, very easily. If your into web browsing, this is the computer for you. I cannot even begin to tell you how many hours I have clocked in on the net with this baby. The HP 533w gets a lot of props in the processing category.
Drives and Bays
As I have mentioned before, this computer has a very small hard drive, and a very slow CD burner. This fact sullies the PC little compared to the rest of the bad news waiting for you in the case. Opening the case, reveals 1 floppy drive bay, 1 hard drive bay, and 2 CD drive bays. I didn't like this very much because I was looking forward to installing a secondary Hard Drive that I would have installed Linux on. One floppy drive for me is enough. I like to have a floppy drive on all of my computers in case of an emergency that I would have to pull out one of my handy Windows boot disks. The CD drive for me, is a complete agrivation. I'm a very big music guy, I really enjoy ripping and burning CD's on a common basis. A 8X speed CD writer is not nearly fast enough for my tastes. In fact, as soon as i get some money, I'm going to upgrade it to a much faster one. The drives and bays category, really brings down the overall performance of this computer. However, like all computers, only some of it is easily remedied.
Closing
The Hewlett Packard Pavilion 533w Desktop computer, was a computer designed for the future. Although slow out of the box, the computer can be easily upgraded with all of the features of todays standard computers, with a very affordable price, (Now probably about $200.00). The case is very unique and colorful but retaining a very professional, dignified look that many computers on the market fail to meet in todays world. If you are a student, or a home user that wants a good stable computer for things like web surfing, music, office utilities, and other tasks, look no further, this is the PC for you. If you have any questions about concerning this computer, please email me at aric49@zoominternet.net
