M6600 and M4600 are coming in Feb.

At least I meant the PCMCIA slot, as my M6500 features

 

FYI, M6400 and M6500 had/have both Express Card and PCMCIA.

 

I'm looking at dell's port replicators and noticed some feedback from users indicating that running a Latitude e6500 or Precision M6400 with the dock station reduces performance:

Anyone experience this or could this be due to bad hardware?

 

The E series Latitudes as well as the Mx4xx and Mx5xx generation Precisions use the same E dock.

If you were to buy an E dock off of ebay (or from Dell for that matter) with the wrong power adapter, then you would see slower performance when it was docked. It would have nothing to do with the dock itself, just the fact that you put a 90 watt adapter on a machine built to use a 210, 150, or 130 watt adapter.

The early Latitude Ex600 machines went through a lot of bios updates to adjust temps, fan speeds, processor speed profiles. The Latitudes might have been running a little hotter with the lids closed and scaling back temps with the earlier firmware - not sure. This could be some of what you are reading about. It would be a physical function of the machine itself, not the dock.

It is important to remember than the Latitudes and Precisions may share a dock, but they are very different machines. The Precisions are (over)engineered to give higher performance, be certified with many software platforms, and have manageable upgrade cycles for Enterprise users. The Latitudes are more for the business masses who don't have the same needs or expectations from a laptop (imho).

I am patiently waiting for the M6600 to be released.

 

How do folks feel about the portability of a 17" lappy vs 15". I really like the form factor of the 4500 but would like the extra screen space and real estate for the keyboard. I could also use the extra 8GB of ram, I run several servers, profilers and VMs.

I'm just trying to figure out if its going to be pain to lug around the 6600 vs the 4600. I do plan on using it on my lap most evenings.

 

You don't really want to carry a 17" laptop around. It's fine if you take it from A to B in a backpack and if you travel by car. But it's no fun to carry it under your arm or to use it in narrow environments like trains or airplanes.
Also it's not a good "laptop" if you mean that literally. This class of computers is called "desktop replacement" for a good reason.

On the other hand my literal "laptop" is a 12" machine, so my estimation might differ from yours.

 

I agree with debguy. I'm carring around a 17' M6400
[16GB RAM | 250 GB SSD | 500 GB 7200 RPM HDD | LED 1920x1200 ]

I'm using it for running development VM's (usually three at a time) and tools. From what I've read the M6600 and M4600 will both have top screen resolutions of 1920 x 1080, and both will support 16GB of memory, so I plan on downsizing to the M4600 for greater portability.

My current '17 M6400 is a "boat anchor", even without the 2lb power supply!

At the office, I'll connect it to a Dell UltraSharp U2711 27-inch Monitor 2560 x 1440 (WQHD) + USB keyboard & mouse.

 

now that i've finally bought a 12" laptop to use on the road im hoping the 17" precisions will get lighter. 4kg including charger is about the max i can take in my backpack, i move my desktop replacement when i'm going to be in a different location longer than just a few days (for example i frequently fly over to singapore for 1-3 months at a time).

what are the weight figures for the m6600? (including power brick)

 

Thanks for the great feedback. If the 4600 support 4x4GB that'll be perfect.

 

Is it more cost effective to order the least amount of RAM and then upgrade yourself?