Latitude E6400 Owner's Lounge

The screen flicker only happens for me when I use the charger. If I use only battery there is no flicker.

 

guys please help! I have a presonus firepod firewire external card. Yesterday I installed it for the first time on vista and my 6400 and the playback was working fine in different programs. today the playback is so slow.I can't figure out what's wrong. I have the latest drivers for the card.

 

Question about the DisplayPort. I can get the HDMI adaptor for the display port so that I can connect the E6400 to a HDTV. Does the display port support 1080p resolution, and does it carry audio? The video card is the Intel 4500MHD. Thanks.

 

Yes, you can get an adapter for this. If you have the 9-cell battery, you need a thin adapter as it could potential no fit due to the battery (as the 9-cell sticks out). Dell sells some. Yes, the audio is carried out on the DisplayPort port (I am not sure for the Intel option... but I'll be surprised that it does not)
DisplayPort is backward compatible to HDMI and DVI. However, it CANNOT be used as VGA. That is why the laptop has a VGA port

 

Your memory usage is correct.

Q: Why so much RAM is being used under Windows 7 and Vista?
A: Unlike Windows XP, Vista and Win7 actually uses your RAM. Windows XP tries it's best to put everything on your HDD rather than your RAM to save RAM, no mater how much RAM you have. This leads to a slower system, as reading/writing/access the HDD (or SSD) is MUCH slower than your RAM.
Remember that Windows 2000/XP was designed to run for 128MB for RAM (YES, Mega Bytes not Giga Bytes). Reminder: Windows XP was released in 2001, where 512MB of RAM is like our 8GB of RAM today.

Q: Are their other reasons why the RAM is so high even thus I have no or almost no program running?
A: Windows Vista and Win7, also put the whole kernel into your RAM increase responsiveness and battery life (remember that your whole RAM is always power-up at the same level, no mater how much you consume RAM). Also you have SuperFetch technology.

Q: What is this 'SuperFecth' technology that you speak off?
A: This technology is found in Windows 7 and Windows Vista. This is a process which has direct communication with the Windows kernel (Windows core) (for ultra fast, response). Which watched your RAM, and only your RAM, and sees what data is being loaded and at what time, so that it start pre-loading your application before you do. In result your applications opens 2 to 6 and even more times (visually) faster (depends on the application (size, and how the application was designed), and on RAM speed and latency). This system gives priority to YOU. So, if you need the RAM, IT WILL FREE IT. Example: look at your RAM, and open a large program, you will see that the RAM consumption will increase just a bit, OR increase and decrease right after. After several month of usage, you should see that the unused RAM that Superfetch 'rents', will diminish if you don't need that much. This is why I suggest more than 2GB of RAM. Also, people are saying that Windows 7 and Vista runs better with more than 2GB of RAM. The sweet spot is 3/4GB of RAM for both OS.

 

WOW, when I called Customer Service in Canada, I talked to Canadians. They talk both French and English pretty well. Maybe, you fell with someone English not being great. You should try someone else.

 

Yeah, I've heard it's a coin toss wether or not you'll get an english speaker.

The good news is, I ordered a new one, and they happened to be having a %15 off sale with no shipping!! I saved like $400!

Awesome.

 

I saved WAAAAY more.
If you call, and know the pure basic of negotiating. You can have killer offer.
When you call, the outsourced sales representation will ask you to build your computer on Dell website (you do it with a little less than you want.. for example a CD-Burner instead of a DVD burner, basic wireless, small HDD), on the page there is a way to send it to the sales rep... he will tell you how.

Once done, you talk about the warranty and sound interested, even thus you know all about it. Then get what you really want as warranty (I serisouly recommend NBD Support, as you will never need to send in your system, and you have a guy that comes at your place at the time/day that you want, starting from the next day morning) to do it, or you can do it yourself. Everything is paid both shipping direction. Anyway, the sale rep. will/should give you free things such as: Free shipping (that is basic offer), free Intel wireless N, bigger HDD, DVD-burner, and more including dropping the price.
My laptop cost over 2100$ and I paid ~1630$ with free shipping. I realized that if I gotten accidental damage I could get a slightly better deal.

 

are the speakers seriously so bad that they are unusable?

 

I dunno about the E6500, but I listen to music and watch anime on my E6400 on a daily basis. I don't really have anything against them; they sound fine to me. At the very least, they're better than the single speaker on my other laptop. Then again, I'm not particularly picky about my sound in the first place, so your mileage may vary.