Latitude E6400 Owner's Lounge

Yeah, you had me worried there for a little while. With the latest powertop I had some pretty good results:

 

So the Dell backlit keyboard showed up today. I changed the trackpoint and wasn't really interested in replacing the keyboard originally. But then I did.

Both backlit keyboards. The new one has softer mouse buttons and the trackpoint position is lower than the previous one. The softer mouse buttons are a pleasant surprise as it is easier to use. The key materials are different between two backlit keyboards.

 

After owning an E6400 for two days, I feel it is lighter than my Thinkpad T61. So I put them a digital scale. It's not the most accurate scale in the world but it showed 4.8 lbs while T61 (6cell) is 5.6 lbs. And my Mini 9 is 2.4 lbs.

It is 0.8 lbs lighter than T61. My Latitude has P8400, Intel 4500HD, Ultrasharp LED, 6cell, DVDRW, 1510 WiFi, 160G 5400rpm HDD, 3G RAM, no modem, no BT, no Fingerprint, no WWAN, no Webcam. I have the slim power supply.

 

My E6400 with a similar spec, except for including finger printer reader and webcam, weighed in a 5.1lbs. I'm reasonably confident about the accuracy of my digitial scales. Either your scales are reading light or Dell have managed to shave off some weight on the more recent production.

John

 

I just got a new E6400 from the outlet and am quite impressed. I've been spoiled by having two ac power adapters for my thinkpad the past 5 years so I've been able to leave one at work and the other at home without ever needing to carry one with me unless I'm going away. I'd like to do the same for my new E6400, but these power adapters are quite expensive. I've got a couple old dell 65W power supplies, but the laptop complained when I plugged it in last night. I've noticed that there are at least two different 90 watt versions that will work with this computer-- a slim series PA-3e which came with the laptop and a thicker brick- PA-10. I can get either for about $30 on Ebay, but I can't help but feel like I'm getting ripped off here. Google searches aren't any better. Can I trust the cheaper unbranded chinese and hongkong products? Do I consider some 3rd party universal ac adapter? I'm sure there are others who have purchased a second ac-adapter, what did you do? Maybe I'll just have to get used to carrying it around with me every day.

 

just have them send you a new computer and keep the power supply when you send it back

 

The 65W PSU should work OK with the E6400 + Intel GPU, but I think it doesn't like E6400 + nVidia GPU. The D series PSUs work fine with the E series. My early model E series came with a 90W D series PSU. Fortunately, I had also ordered the 65W PSU and, after about 4 months, Dell changed the BIOS so that the 65W PSU works properly with my E6400 (with Intel GPU).

Or you can look to alternatives such as Kensington / Belkin.

John

 

Hey John,
I read you saying that somewhere earlier in this thread or another one. My fiance has an old D600, and I found the PSU for that and it looks identical to an old mostly broken inspiron that someone gave me and both look like they are 65W. Both are P-12 PSUs. I believe I tried the old D600 PSU and the E6400 complained about not being 90W. The output amps are lower on these than the 90W one that came with the E6400 as well. Also, I should say that I've got the Nvidia GPU so my laptop will be a bit hungrier for power than yours.

As for returning it: Well I told my brother about the deal I got today and when I went to take a look at 'previously ordered new' inventory this morning, they had 5 e6400 listings. I think there were 7+ pages of 20 or more last Friday when I placed my order. I think I'll keep this one and at worst, eat the $30 for a second PSU.

 

Yeah but do you have remote ring and remote answer features working without the need for the supplied dongle? Or does it work fine with just the stanadard bluetooth that comes with the laptop?

Also what OS are you using? XP/Vista/Win7?

Thanks for the info to, greatly appreciated

Yeah our standard operating platform is XP, so we have no choice in that matter, but I might take a look at these new features that are available for vista and see if there is anyway of "turning" them on in XP.

Thank you too, all this is very helpful!

 

My E6400 works correctly with the 65W Dell charger, and I have Intel graphics. There was one person who said that his 65W charger would not charge his Nvidia based E6400 except at very slow rates, so YMMV. But your laptop should not complain, though. Do you have the latest BIOS?

If you need another charger, and you have a Fry's nearby, you may want to check out their refurbished Kensington universal chargers. I picked one up for less than $20, and it is a 90W charger. Runs very cool.