D820 vs D830

Hi, All!

I have a dilemma I'd like your advice on. I currently have a Dell Latitude D820 and a Dell Latitude D830. I'm wondering which to keep. I've had the D820 for going on 5 years now and love it. I picked up the D830 from e-bay last week.

I use it as a desktop replacement, and as a laptop for travel, so I want a screamin' machine that has decent battery life (I've been getting about 2.5 -3 hours from the 820, which is acceptable)

Both are running Windows XP SP3

The specs are:

D820
T7600 C2D CPU A10 BIOS
2 GB RAM
80 GB HDD (5400 rpm)
WXGA 1280 x 800
NVIDIA 110 256mb
CD Burner / DVD ROM


D830
T7100 C2D CPU A15 BIOS
4 GB RAM
320 GB HDD (5400 rpm)
WXGA 1280 x 800
NVIDIA 135M 128 MB
DVD/CD Burner

The case on the D830 is hammered - it has a stain and a couple of what look like cigarette burns on the palmrest.
The D830 also says it can "see" all of the 4 GB of RAM

The case on the D820 looks great. not even any dings or scratches.
I've read that XP can only "see" 3.5 GB of RAM

I don't have a problem with moving the RAM and HDD and Optical Drive from one to another. I just want your opinion on which is the better machine.

So what do you think? Should I transfer everything to the 820 or keep it on the 830. Is there something inherent in the 830 that makes it a better machine?

Thanks for your help!

 

Wasn't the Nvidia card in the D830/D630 defective? If so, I would put the ram in the D820 and use it.

 

All of the parts should be interchangeable between the two, including the plastics and LCD cover.

You could swap the parts on the the D830, or pull the memory, hard drive and DVD burner out of the D830 and upgrade your D820.

The memory thing isn't just XP. It's an issue with 32 bit operating systems. You won't see 4GB unless you are running 64bit.

 

Even with 64-bit, the DX20 series cannot see more than ~3096MB because of the chipset. The DX30 series can see up to ~4096MB with 64-bit and can take a maximum of 8GB.

I would use the D830 as primary and the D820 as a spare, although the CPU in the D830 is no good (I would go with a T7500, but a CPU upgrade may not be cost-effective).

A new palmrest would only be ~$20 if you want to use both systems.

 

The D820 and D830 should be almost identical, even as far as connectors are concerned. I would use the D830 mainboard, transplanted into your D820. The CPUs should also be interchangeable, so you could swap in the better CPU from the D820 mainboard - but only do that if you know EXACTLY how to reapply the heat conducting pad or paste to the CPU and graphics chip. Of course, swap the hard drive too, if SMART tests check out.

The D830 has much better graphics performance and can accept up to 8 GB of RAM with the BIOS you are using. The A15 BIOS will protect the NVidia chip to some degree, at the cost of more fan noise. Battery life on the D830 is slightly better than on the D820, in my experience. Probably the difference between Centrino and Centrino2 chipset.

 

I don't think the CPUs are compatible, the T7600 is Socket M and the T7100 is Socket P, and they also have different bus speeds.

 

I just double-checked: you are right, the CPUs are not interchangeable. Sorry for not evaluating that more thoroughly before posting.

 

It's OK, it's an easy one to mix the odd and even series CPUs.

The CPU is the only problem with the D830, the T7100 is not only slower, but also has less cache. Definately a downgrade with respect to the CPU, and I think the difference could be noticeable.

 

For those interested, I ripped a DVD in each of the laptops. Same OS, software, same DVD. I switched the DVD burner and put the 4 GB of RAM into the laptop when I did it. The D830 said it could 'see' all 4 GB. The D820 said it could 'see' 3.25 GB. The The D830 took 43 min's. The D820 took 35 min's. Quite a difference. I'm guessing it's the CPU. (for comparison, the desktop I tried it on with a Celeron 450 CPU, 3 GB RAM and Windows 7 Premium Home took 54 min's to rip the same DVD using the same software.)

I do like the screen on the D830. It's noticeably brighter and seems (to me) sharper. But, I'm a bit concerned about the Video in the D830 and the D820 doesn't have that problem (at least, not that I've heard) and the performance of the D820 is so much better and the screen is still adequate, so I think that I'm gonna go with it.

Thanks, everyone for the info and help! I really appreciate it.

 

The video card in the D620/D820 are also affected by the Nvidia issue, although it tends to happen more frequently in the D630/D830.

I wouldn't worry about the video card issue too much though, check the temperatures and keep them around (preferably under) 140F. Using docking might increase temperatures, but just jacking up the back of the laptop will help cool it down. Replace the thermal grease on the CPU with Arctic Silver 5 as well (do it when you replace the palmrest, I think the palmrest needs to come out for heatsink removal), and I think you should be fine.