HP Pavilion 500 Intel 1TB SATA Desktops

[Preview 1]
http://d3gqasl9vmjfd8.cloudfront.net/b033a26b-6a19-4436-8d33-b644a71286e5.jpg

HP Pavilion 500 Intel 1TB SATA Desktops
Price: $389.99 - 529.99
Shipping Options:: $5 Standard
Shipping Estimates: Ships in 3-5 business days. (Monday, Nov 10 to Thursday, Nov 13) + transit
Condition: Factory Reconditioned

[http://www.wootstalker.com/images/buy.png

Buy It](HP Pavilion 500 Intel 1TB SATA Desktops) [http://www.wootstalker.com/images/amazon.png

Search Amazon](http://www.amazon.com/s/?field-keywords=HP Pavilion 500 Intel 1TB SATA Desktops) [http://www.wootstalker.com/images/google.png

Search Google](HP - Google Shopping Pavilion 500 Intel 1TB SATA Desktops)

Previous Similar Sales (May not be exact model)
8/3/2014 - $379.99 - 549.9 - Click To See Discussion (10 comments)
7/7/2014 - $379.99 - 549.9

Time to compare the processors
[youtube=GLSPub4ydiM][/youtube]

Comments from a previous sale

Ok, I know wooters have opinions on computers. Let’s hear about the features and how to upgrade it.

500-270
HP Pavilion 500-270 Product Support
HP Pavilion 500-270 Troubleshooting and Maintenance Guide
Windows 8.1 x64 Drivers

500-297c
HP Pavilion 500-297c Product Support
Troubleshooting and Maintenance Guide
Windows 8.1 x64 Drviers

500-277c
HP Pavilion 500-277c Product Support
Troubleshooting and Maintenance Guide
Windows 8.1 x64 Drviers

[QUOTE=ThunderThighs, post:5, topic:434153]
Ok, I know wooters have opinions on computers. Let’s hear about the features and how to upgrade it.
[/quote]

The first 2 things that I’d look at upgrading on any of these would be adding a discrete graphics card and a SSD.

It looks like the graphics card shouldn’t be too big of a deal as long as it isn’t power hungry. I don’t know what dimensions of card these boxes would accept though.

The SSD might be tricky as there are only 2 drive slots listed and both are already occupied. You would need to either ditch an existing drive or find a creative way of securing it inside the case.

These have a great price, but I am not going to buy because there is NO room for expansion - thus it is impossible to add an extra hard drive or DVD or Blu Ray, or even SSD drive.

Woot please get us some desktops with similiar specs BUT also with expansion room! I’ll be the 1st in line to buy. Thanks!

Well, if you insist…

The primary bottleneck in this system from an upgrade standpoint is, of course, the wimpy 300W Power Supply. That said, you can still turn this into an high-end HTPC/entry-level Gaming PC thanks to the Geforce GTX 750 Ti, which uses about 60W of power to deliver graphics in most modern titles on medium to medium-high settings at 1080p resolution. Check out the benchmarks from NVIDIA and from Tom’s Hardware.

At the time of this post, you can get an EVGA Geforce GTX 750 Ti 2GB GPU on Newegg for $119.99 after $10 mail-in rebate ($129.99 w/o rebate).

The other key upgrade for these machines is a Solid State Drive, or SSD for short. Simply put, an SSD is the best bang-for-your-buck upgrade you can make for your PC. You’ll enjoy faster boot times, faster application and game loads, and improved system responsiveness over a traditional Hard Disk Drive, or HDD. The main trade-off is capacity, as an HDD will typically have ~8x the capacity of an SSD at the same price point. Thus, it’s recommended to load the operating system (Windows) and most-often-used applications onto the SSD, and save one’s files, documents, music and videos to the HDD.

There are a huge number of models and manufacturers to consider when choosing an SSD, but two enthusiast favorites are the 256GB Crucial MX100 and 250GB Samsung 840 EVO, both of which can be had from Amazon for less than $115.00. If you want a more frugal upgrade, consider the 120GB Kingston SSDNow V300 for $59.99.

[QUOTE=barkwoot, post:7, topic:434153]
The first 2 things that I’d look at upgrading on any of these would be adding a discrete graphics card and a SSD.

It looks like the graphics card shouldn’t be too big of a deal as long as it isn’t power hungry. I don’t know what dimensions of card these boxes would accept though.

The SSD might be tricky as there are only 2 drive slots listed and both are already occupied. You would need to either ditch an existing drive or find a creative way of securing it inside the case.
[/quote]

I own one of these boxes from a previous sale and I can provide some input on the stuff you’re not sure about. I’ve upgraded the power supply and added both a graphics card and an SSD.

-You may not want to upgrade the power supply, but you might need to if you get a better GPU. A lot of newer graphics cards require more PCI Express connectors than the stock PSU in this thing actually has. I don’t remember if the stock PSU even has an unused 12v rail, or what pin configuration it is.

You don’t have to go crazy, anywhere from 500-600w should be fine. If this case is the same as mine, you should be able to fit a normal ATX sized PSU, but absolutely look at the dimensions. The dimensions of the PSU I bought are 3.39" x 5.91" x 6.30" (H x W x D) and that’s about as big as you can fit. When in doubt, measure the old PSU.

-I would suggest against getting any GPU that is overly long or has a huge custom cooler. XFX and EVGA are usually the ones that do this. The board I have in mine is an AMD board but is very similar in configuration to this one. This is the board in these: http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c03885123

It looks like there’s a poorly placed heatsink right by the PCI-Ex16 slot that may or may not impact your fit, depending on how high it sits. For what it’s worth, these are the dimensions of the card I have (Radeon HD 7850), and the case can’t fit much bigger: 7.76" x 4.37" x 1.5"

-Since an SSD has no moving parts, you can pretty much mount it wherever and however. You don’t want it banging around in there, but it doesn’t exactly need its own cradle either. Mine is mounted with a single (M3 size I believe) screw through a hole in the existing frame for the HDD and optical media drive (specifically the bottom front area inside the case where there’s pretty much nothing else around it). You may need to find your own screw, as my SSD didn’t come with any.

Good luck!

Thanks for the excellent info based on your experience with this system, particularly with the PSU and the addition of a graphics card. One of the first upgrades I would make to this would definitely be a 500-600W PSU, as you suggested. I have owned a desktop with this exact case from HP already, and all the advice you provided with dimensions is very good indeed. Inside this case, there is usually no room for a fancy GPU unless you are prepared to remove another PCI card of some kind…and certainly not a GPU with an extended length to it. I wonder what motherboard is used in the i7 version. It is helpful to know both that HP allows the change of a PSU (they used to wire their motherboards to prevent that), and it is extremely helpful to know exactly what size will fit. Thank you!

First, get i7 - don’t even think about the i3 and i5. Go for the biggest CPU offered and this box will provide upgrade opportunities later on down the road.

I concur that…

A.) You’re gonna want a bigger, better, GPU. Size does matter, HP cases tend to be pretty compact.

B.) that bigger video card is going to demand more power and so a bigger PSU will be necessary. I’d look for something between 600+650 to do the job.

As another poster already pointed out, you’re working with tight measurements so be careful.

C.) extra credit - shoehorn in a SSD. I do concur that SSDs have no moving parts. This is good, because this case has no open bays. I’d look to mount an SSD with zip ties, probably vertical. Can’t give better advice than that without actually inspecting the case. One thought, if it came to it, you could ditch the optical drive in favor of a SSD.

HP 500-277c
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/documentSubCategory?tmp_task=prodinfoCategory&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en&product=6743749

Motherboard looks to be pretty basic, not much extendability. But it is ATX, so it could live in lots of other chassis.

I just transplanted the innards of an older, AMD-based, HP p6777c into a new case. With the exception of the front panel connections, everything went swimmingly.

Happy to help!

I did post a (improperly formatted) link to the board in the machine for this sale in my last post. It’s named the Memphis-S if you’d rather google it. The motherboard in mine is the MSI Jasmine 7778, an AMD board, which is pretty similar:
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?docname=c03343058&cc=us&dlc=en&lc=en

I was amazed that I was even able to fit a card with a custom cooler on it at all. MSI and Powercolor seem to make some nice slim ones. Even so, I’ll never be able to easily reach my CMOS battery or the wifi minicard with the GPU in. Such is life in the micro ATX world.

Spot on about the proprietary PSU + MOBO combos from HP though. They actually still do this, but for their business customers. All of the recent Elitedesk models have this setup, and it is mind boggling. My employer had me add a graphics card to one of those, but of course the stock power supply was only 300W. Go to change it out for a nice 700W and of course it doesn’t use standard 20/24 pin power but two separate 4-pin connectors plus a bunch of odd required molex connections that no other power supply has. This computer actually powered all of its internals (optical drives, HDD, etc) THROUGH the motherboard instead of from the PSU itself. It was a nightmare and we ended up having to get a supplementary internal PSU just to power the card, plus some wire splicing to jump the second power supply when the machine turned on.

Moral of this story: Always research your motherboard if you’re buying OEM.