Precision M6400 Owner's Lounge

ok.........

The first obvious question is did you do a clean install of win 7 x64?

i wouldn't advise installing any dell software unless you need a particular feature!

LESS is definitely MORE when it comes to Dell drivers

I've probably installed 10 diff builds of win 7 x64 on my covet before the RTM came out and they've ran fantastically well( for beta software)!

i haven't used a 32 bit OS since XP! lol
Even vista x64 ran perfectly!

As for a good graphics driver, I'm using this :-
http://forums.laptopvideo2go.com/topic/24736-v19056-windows-7vista-64bit-nvidia/
( make sure you use driver sweeper to nuke your current drivers or you WILL have problems) (see my post at beginning of this page)

As for .net .....
version 3.5 is already installed, why did you install the older versions lol?

 

Thanks for answering. I dropped your name in there hoping you might. I almost know what I'm doing but being almost totally self taught the one thing I do know is clean installs. I must of done them hundreds of times as I crashed systems then figured out what I'd done wrong, usually deleting or corrupting something. One of the more memorable lessons is always format a disk before any installing anything. Another piece of common advice is only change drivers if somethings wrong with what you have. Might be bad advice but it works for me.

And the only Dell software I almost miss is the Control Point almost 1GB program that has all those nice graphics for stuff. But of course I ditched it, even if my reasons were less tham totally informed. Probably.

And getting back to the subject, just like my installs of 32bit Win 7 I didn't install any drivers at all. On the 32 bit 7 it went out and apparently found them all by itself and installed them. It only asked me one question that made me realize what happened. At the end of the install it asked if it had my permission to change the driver for the 3700FX card. I've only really booted into the new 64bit install twice for short tests to see if it could find my router and external drives and such. But it's so incredibly slow that something is wrong for sure. I just don't have any idea what it could be. So far all I can think of is reformat and reinstall and see what happens. I just wish I knew the why part now because I'm pretty sure I did everything right.

Now to the most important item (to me), the Net Framework thing. Like I said earlier I've reinstalled XP at least a dozen times playing with trying to get the perfect install and although it's XP SP3 it's from January so each time I do a clean install it has an increasingly long list of updates it needs to install. I'm sure if the update page said I needed them I would have checked the box and let it install. So I guess the odds favor it being my own fault but it must have told me I needed it or I wouldn't have installed them. I listed them in order and all the correct names. Now can you tell me which ones I can uninstall without screwing something up? I haven't tried Googling it yet because it's sort of a confusing mess. Take a look at the screenshot I'm enclosing and see if you can make any sense of it. If you can, exactly what can I get rid of? And notice they all installed on the same date, which is part of what makes it a mystery to me.

 

ah
you never said the .net thingie was for xp,lol....

just Google-ing

http://www.google.co.uk/search?client=opera&rls=en-GB&q=do+i+need+to+install+previous+versions+of+.net&sourceid=opera&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

it would seem that your fine just installing the 3.5 version, but you may need to install 1.1 if you have an old app that requires it (i wouldn't install 1.1 unless necessary)

it also seems that there is an upcoming version 4 that will encompass all of the various versions, but that is still in beta!

 

I fcukin knew I should have left Vista x64 on my laptop...running perfect gaming for over a month...took a chance and installed win7..10 mins into BF2..bloody BSOD again...oh well..back to vista

 

dell have put up windows 7 stuff in the downloads

windows 7 X64.......
http://support.euro.dell.com/support/downloads/driverslist.aspx?os=W764&osl=EN&catid=-1&impid=-1&servicetag=&SystemID=PREC_M6400&hidos=WLH&hidlang=EN&TabIndex=

windows 7 x32.....

http://support.euro.dell.com/support/downloads/driverslist.aspx?os=W732&osl=EN&catid=-1&impid=-1&servicetag=&SystemID=PREC_M6400&hidos=W764&hidlang=en&TabIndex=

 

nice find...of course the only video driver they have is the ATI one..

Who's using Win7 and what driver version?

 

What are we all using to keep the m6400 cool, especially around the area at the back? Do you have special pads that go underneath or something to keep it raised? I'd like to keep mine cool, but im not sure of the terminology to start looking for these pad things and to choose the best ones.

Veni

 

I stick the 2 weight boxes from my G9s underneath them at the back so raises it about 1/2 and inch or so..does the job

 

i dunno.. i really did not do any hvy gaming but it seems that it's doing a decent job at staying cool...

just to compare, what are your CPU and GPU temps?

iirc, my cpu temps were 40's normal, 60's running prime...

 

Working again now perfectly so far on win7 once i downgraded to 185.85 drivers from Nvidia site.