I finally got my HP dv8000 today (ordered 2 weeks ago). I'm really impressed with this laptop. I upgraded a few things (screen resolution, DVD burner, Turion64).
There are two things I don't like about this laptop:
1.) No DVI out (but for the cost I can't complain)
2.) Broadcom 802.11 is probably going to require me to use ndis wrappers (but I expected that)
It is not a super light laptop, but you're not going to get that on a 17".
Thanks for posting this OP!