Precision M6400 Owner's Lounge

I've been following this discussion for several days, but this is my first post. I have had two (2) M6400 Covets sent to me, and both have been returned to Dell. Dell is currently building the 3rd. Frequent hard lock-ups made each of the 1st two unusable.

Each of those came with XP installed, but Vista 64 was installed on each before installing software. The next one is coming with Vista 64 pre-installed by Dell.

My intent is to use the machine for video editing and production. In the short time I have had it, it shows a great deal of promise (between lockups). I use Adobe CS4. Ironically, it has never locked up when "pushed" by the software, but rather in just everyday Windows tasks.

I wouldn't expect a $5000 notebook, and Dell's "flagship" product to have so many problems, but I remain optimistic the 3rd will be better.

 

I recently recieved a Covet system. This is a very preliminary post for me, some thoughts, and comments (not really a review, so I didn't want to post in the review thread). I hope it is helpful to others considering their purchase.

Overall, the build and look of the laptop is georgous, there is no doubt there. The few people who have seen it have commented on how professional, 'nice', and powerful (I think they equated the size of the laptop to the power as I hadn't mentioned that prior to the comment!) it is. I really love the color, I was soooo concerned with that based on the comments I saw online.

I am happy to say that other than 2 BSOD's (one of which referred to 'display driver'), I have (knock on wood) had no problems.
In fact, I am more and more inspired with Dell, both from the build of their systems to their technical support. This is based on my own experience and is the main reason I went with Dell for my personal system (as opposed to buying the Lenovo version)- yes I have had better luck with Dell than Lenovo...

My primary use for this system is for photo management/editing. Primarily this will be with Adobe Lightroom (64bit version) and entail light Photoshop CS work when necessary. I also use VMWare quite a bit and intend to run multiple VM sessions at the same time (Linux and a few Windows XP).
I am working almost exclusively with RAW images (from Nikon D70 and Nikon D700). Images are ~6MB and ~15MB (both compressed) respectively. I did not expect the system to have any problem with these, and indeed does not appear to be even beating an eyelid when making adjustments to images in Lightroom. Who knows I may be inspired to look into 3D animation... or some gaming...

One of the biggest 'draws' was the Adobe 100% screen. The colors are very vivid, almost 'Fuji Velvia' vivid (to be very clear - I do not mean the colors are shifted more to red/green etc, just that they are vivid)
Matte or matte with glass?... I pulled my hair out and even decided I did not want a new Mac Pro because of the glass. I saw a matte M6400 briefly, it looked great! Somehow (despite my concerns) I purchased the Covet. The screen so far is no problem. (Why did I then not buy Mac? Macbook pro's do not have Adobe 100% screen, they use W-RGB screens, they do not support more than 4GB RAM, nor do they handle eSATA/2 RAID'd hard drives...)

The major point here is: "Most" (or "many" or "a lot", I do not have statistics.. maybe we can agree on "best practice says") professional photographers will tell you that if they are working with color they will work in a room that is neutral with no colored objects and they will use calibrated lighting. So I do not see a big concern (with glass reflections). Any other situation would not be considered a valid setup for color critical work.
My work is certainly not that critical, I do calibrate my screen, I do try to work in areas that do not have a lot of different lights, but that is about it - atleast for now; if I need more then I would likely purchase an external monitor for those occasions.
For me, I can get what looks to me, really accurate color (enough to proof photos with) and I can show clients portfolio/their photos. The WOW factor there I expect to be huge (and help to fund this beast).

I *do* want a system that is somewhat portable, even if that is being able to sit at the coffee table downstairs to edit a few images so that I do not feel locked away in my office. Maybe I will visit a coffee shop and take the laptop.. can do, just not every day

I see a lot here about buying hard drives from other retailers.. or memory etc. My initial idea was that this is a great idea, buy minimal system and upgrade, save some $ for sure... then I realized: I am paying for 4 years of warranty and I can buy the option to "Keep your hard drive" as well.. If you are not aware of this option, it means that the hard drives I buy are under warranty and if they fail I can have Dell replace them under warranty and still keep the bad drives (this is important because I do not want the possibility of the data being accidentally found by a new owner of the refurbished drives I just returned to Dell)
If I buy online and have a problem with my laptop, I have to deal with returning bad components to multiple vendors, deal with Dell forcing me to return my system to the state I bought it in (to be sure it isn't a 3rd part component at fault)...

For me it is just too much hassle for any small amount of initial $ saved.

The only different thing I would change is the memory: I would buy 12GB of RAM using 3 slots so that I can easily expand to 16GB later. Now I have 8GB of RAM using 4 slots - no easy way to expand - oh well I don't imagine needing more than 8GB (famous last words...)

Here are the system specs (a bit snipped from order form):
Precision M6400, Intel Core 2 Dual Extreme Edition QX9300 2.53GHz.....
8.0GB, DDR3-1066 SDRAM, 4 DIMM for Mobile Precision
1GB NVIDIA Quadro FX 3700M Mobile Precision M6400 Covet
320GB Free Fall Sensor Hard Drive 9.5MM, 7200RPM, Dell Mobile Precision MX300,FactoryInstall
INTERNAL FINGERPRINT READER for Mobile Precision M6400
17 inch Wide Screen Edge 2 Edge WUXGA RGBLED LCD, Blood Orange.....
Dell Webcam Central Software for Dell Latitude/Mobile Precision
Vista Ultimate 64-BIT Service Pack 1, with media, English Mobile Precision
Dell Wireless 410 Bluetooth 2.1 + UWB Minicard for Latitude E/Mobile Precision
No Modem for Mobile PrecisionMX400
8X DVD+/-RW slot load for Mobile Precision
Intel WiFi Link 5300 (802.11 a/g/n 3X3) 1/2 MiniCard for VPRO Latitude....
320GB Additional Hard Drive 9.5MM, 7200RPM FFS for Mobile Precision M6400
All Hard Drives RAID 0 for 2 Hard Drives, Dell Mobile Precision M6400
Extended Battery Service for Years 2 and 3 of System Life
CompleteCare Accidental Damage Protection, 4 Year
DisplayPort to DVI (Single Link) Adapter for Latitude E-Family/Mobile Precision
DisplayPort to HDMI Adapter for Latitude E-Family/Mobile Precision
Keep Your Hard Drive, 4 Year

I hope this helps!

--- Bruce

 

You don't know how bad I want this to swap out with my T9400! You're very fortunate

& to expand your RAM, not that you need to, you can just swap out the old ones with higher density 4GB DDR3 sticks.

 

of course your right! I would have to pull all 4 sticks and replace with new, instead of just 1 stick -- but we can all say "if only" right?

 

Why all four sticks? You can do it one at a time lol. You're @ 8 right now, you can move to 10, then 12, then 14 and then 16. If only...

 

No - in the M6400 the RAM sticks have to be put in in pairs.

 

Hmm, so only 4, 8 and 16?

 

I think the rules are if memory is DIMMC then it must match the memory in DIMMB and if you add memory to DIMMD then it must match DIMMA

So you could have

4GB
A: 2
B: 2
C:
D:

6GB
A: 4
B: 2
C:
D:

8GB
A: 4
B: 4
C:
D:

12GB
A: 4
B: 4
C: 4
D:

Etc

 

12GB
A: 4
B: 4
C: 4
D:

won't work, missmatch of B and D -->

12GB
A: 4
B: 2
C: 4
D: 2

 

I don't think it matters if D is empty - just if a module is in there then it must match B - but I could be wrong.

I'm gonna have 8Gb (4x 2GB) - if only cos I can't find any cheap suppliers of 4GB SODIMMS in the UK.