-->*OFFICIAL: Dell XPS M1730 Owner's Lounge*<--

Well If Dell are going to not bother with the 8800m's then I will cancel my order. I am on the edge of my seat for a reply RobHague.

My order should arrive in 5-6 days now, It will be a shame if I have to cancel it.

 

Sounds like a good idea to me, Who is everyone's contact at Dell in the Uk? Mines:
Kavit Abrol [email protected]
Senior Sales Representative
Dell UK Home Sales
Dell Computer Corporation

Ph : 0870-907-5128, Ext : 74459

 

I just noticed my order seems to have gone from "Pre-production" to "Production" on Saturday. But it has Friday, October 19, 2007 as the date, which is impossible.

 

dont have just one spoke to a few different people at dell lol sound like "Kavit Abrol" mite be having a realy bad day at work sometime soon lol

 

They are probably building your system in a timezone that is a day ahead of yours, making their status show as Saturday instead of Friday.

It's Saturday right now for me (and has been for 19 hours), I don't know about you!

 

Nice looks like dell are turning back time in ther efforts to get us theas laptops now thats customer service

 

Yeah well the thing is that "Friday, October 19, 2007" was the date it went into Pre-production. Which is how its stayed until today (27th) Now its turned to Production, and the date still Friday, October 19, 2007......

I hope they dont screw it up XD I can imagine getting a phone call saying the order got lost in the system and i need to re-order. Though its kinda hard to get as excited as i was knowing that there could be possible 8800's around the corner XD

 

8800's i live in hope Rob

 

Yes well i await the response to my email, and hope i get someone competent replying to answer my questions. I have gotten the impression that DELL support staff seem to vary from "In the know" to "What's a PC again?" .

 

well im still in preproduction from the 3rd so no change there

 

lol they just read from a list of non answers on a screen mate dose my head in

 

off to bed mate ill check in tomorow with the results from my email if i get a reply

 

On the Dell support website I type in my service tag and the site says my system is out of warranty, wtf. I emailed customer service because I can't be bothered calling them.

BTW will DDR2 800MHz memory work in the XPS m1730 at the proper speed because I can get 4gb for less than what Dell was charging to upgrade to the 4gb 667MHz ram.

I also found this tweak guide and it says there is a way to enable windows vista to read all 4gb of ram if you install it.
http://www.tweakguides.com/TGTC.html
Its in PDF format so you need to download it, there is heaps of info for vista tweaks.

 

I just checked Dell's website for the latest options on configurations. They are offering free 2nd business day shipping across the board on the configs. When I ordered mine, they only offered free shipping for 3-5 day. I'm going to email them and see if they will upgrade mine.

Also, I am getting the blu-ray drive with mine. I clicked on the "this may delay your order" link for a new one and now it only says 2 days. It used to say 14! I hope this means they are getting caught up on the drives and hopefully that means mine will ship sooner then 11/12! As you can read, I'm grasping for any kind of hope for getting my laptop sooner!

CNET reviewed the m1730 last week. Here's the post. It had good results. Plus I think benchmarks are only going to get better with Vista 64bit OS (assuming all of the drivers are available) and I'm sure NVIDIA is going to keep improving the video drivers.
http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/dell-xps-m1730/4505-3121_7-32687269.html


Thanks for everyone posting their experienses with their laptops. I living vocariously through you! It sounds like it is going to be worth the wait!

Mike

 

Ahh thanks for that link! Good review!

And everyone, don't be discouraged about the 8800M problem... just know that RIGHT at the moment, you have the most powerful DX10 gaming laptop available in the market. (Besides the outrageously priced Falcon Northwest laptop with 2x512MB 8700M GTs if you customize it that way)

Also, as someone mentioned before, Dell allowed free upgrades for updated motherboards for Dell XPS 700 series owners announced in August (see Direct2Dell under the What You Need to Know tag).

 

Just finished the Crysis SP demo on my main system and it was amazing! Leaves you wanting more, that's for sure!

My main PC's specs as follows:

E6600 @ 2.4GHz (Stock)
OCZ Gold 2GB DDR2-800 SDRAM
eVGA GeForce 8800GTX 768MB
7200RPM 160GB SATA 3.0Gb/s HDD
SB Audigy 2 Sound

Highest settings, 4xMSAA (DX9, WinXP) around 30-40FPS average, I'd say looking at it occasionally.

Highest settings, No AA (DX10, Vista) around 20-30FPS average

Quite unfortunate really... I was hoping this title would scream on DX10 with this card, for what I paid for it. However, still runs at a playable framerate, so that is satisfying and makes me want to buy it even more! DX9 is still beautiful none-the-less!

 

But what really makes you think they'll do so for their flagship XPS notebook?

Dell is in this to turn a profit.

What I'm really curious about is how Crysis is running on peoples' XPS M1730s, is it even playable in DX10? I had similar results on my desktop, which is similarly speced to yours but has 4 GB of RAM and I ran it with 2x AA on High. It's very playable, but there's always framerate drops while you're getting shot at/motion blur/e.t.c. Kind of frustrating given that my desktop is basically the best configurable on the market short of a quad-core with an 8800. Seems unfortunate, but reminescent of when Far Cry came out with how demanding that game was back in the day.

Makes me wonder whether the game will even run at medium settings on the 1730. Unreal Tournament III as well.

My order has been delayed basically for forever. If I got the thing and then they announced that the 8800 launched, I'd be very steamed...

 

This didn't work for me

The command was

BCDEdit /set PAE forceenable


From what I understand, physical address extension allows for 36bit addressing; however, 4gb RAM is still only 32 bits worth, so the only way this can work is if the OS remaps the stuff occupying the upper part of the 32 bit space to above that. But, again from what I understand, some PCI devices simply get memory mapped to the upper portion of the 32 bit space, for which remapping is not supported outside of windows server at the present time...

Can someone who understands this better confirm?

 

Yeh Vista 32 bit can't see 4GB's. You'll need 64 Vista for more than 3 and a bit GB's.

http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/archives/000811.html

 

For anyone that wants to see videos, I have made some of the light effects with and without music but without the lights in the speakers because the left one doesnt work, I will upload them to Youtube when I have time and I will post the links here.
They will be under www.youtube.com/wogstaa
I will give the exact links when they are on.

 

You're right on the money there Rob - with regard to the upgrade path - it definitely has been promised, by several program managers at Dell - so whoever spoke to the guy and got the "no upgrade path reply" was speaking to the tea lady I think.

And it's another reason I want to try and get in touch with the people "in the know" regarding the 8800 release timescales and get some real information.

I ordered the HD Audio as well and am not too bothered (although I get the principle) that it's not actually a card. I'm more bothered about getting the dreaded "delivery date slipped" email, the 8800 card(s) coming out just after I take delivery - and ending up with a non LG panel...

I'll post the contact details for the guy who told me about the 8800 problems on Monday - he seemed to know what he was talking about - maybe if enough of us hassle him, or try and get somewhere via him - we might get some concrete info on the 8800s.

As for delivery date slip reasons - I have no idea where to start - though your email looks pretty good Rob - I guess we'll see what comes back...

Thanks for the videos wogstaa - and everyone else that posted pics and vids - regardless of all the stuff above - i'm still v.excited

 

I'm with nerdtalker, where are the overjoyed M1730 users after playing Crysis, the silence is a bit ominous and I have found myself looking at a replacement desktop system instead. I really wanted a laptop as I currently have my desktop rig set up in the bedroom etc but unless I am convinced that the beast is actually a beast that can play the most eagerly anticipated game since HL2 in at least a decent framerate with good looks (I am not expecting desktop performance) Then Monday looks like D-Day for Dell with a cancellation most likely. This is what happens when customers get let down by the supplier, they question the whole purchase and that allows the rational part of the brain to take over from, shiny case, pretty lights!!!

So a plea to all M1730 owners on this forum, what is the real news on Crysis on the M1730, silence just leads to speculation, speculation leads to negativity and negativity leads to cancelled orders!!

A fast deflating pre-owner of a M1730, HELP, HELP, the fear is taking me over .....

 

hey lee whow it going mate did you get anywhere with your search for a replacment laptop

 

doove71 i feel your pain mate but im sure that it will all be worth the wait i to looked at desktops and yess for this kind of money you could get an amazing system but having your setup in another room is a pain thats why its a laptop or nothing for me hope someone posts results of crysis to put your mind at ease!!!

 

Yup, I looked at some of the desktops as well on DELL, but knowing that I'd wan't my rig with me a lot of places, I opt'ed for the laptop. And guys, have a little faith, the m1730 WILL be amazing, the hardware is fine. What we're looking at, from my perspective, is a shortcoming of the drivers which ALWAYS get updated.

IF the 8800's come out just after some of you guys get your laptop, be sure that Dell will do what they can to make you not regret your purchase. If that means they'll replace your rig with the 8800's in it (maybe for free? ) or give you a discount, I don't know. But Dell does more often than not, give good support for their customers.

 

I know, I know, I just want someone with an M1730 to give a real no bull assessment of performance with Crysis. I understand I am probably being a tad unreasonable with Dell but as I said this is what happens when you disappoint a customer, they start doubting the purchase. I finished the DX9 Crysis demo and whilst really enjoyed the gameplay the visuals didn't make me go wow! like the did when I first booted up HL2 or Far Cry. So much has been made by Crytek of how awesome this thing is meant to look and play in DX10 that I am concerned that loads of people (myself) included are going to be left ultimately disappointed. Crytek have to shoulder any negativity after the demo as they themselves have been hyping this thing to the max and beyond. I also don't want to get too focussed on Crysis, I have finished Bioshock in DX9 and really enjoyed it and WAS blown away by the visuals. If any M1730 owners have played Bioshock, what sort of framerates and performance were you getting, also the DX10 version is meant to ramp up the visuals even more, is this true.

I'm really looking for some owners to come on and help me justify the expenditure and not just ooohh isn't it shiny and how cool is the backlit keyboard, to me these are just value added as the real reason for my purhcase was the 'grunt' of the machine. I seem to have bought into hype myself, once I see some good news on gaming performance (the whole point of this machines existence after all) then I am sure all this stress will be forgotten.

 

sva988 I see that your spec is the same as mine, any gaming benchmarks you can provide would be much appreciated!

 

I'm recieving my m1730 on tuesday, and Doove71 I'll be sure to do a lot of benchmarks after I get it up and running. Will see if I can get Crysis downloaded, and then I'll give you a detailed description of how well it runs. However I'll mainly be testing the system on FLight Simulator X (which by they way is the most performance hogging game/sim in the world so far), and will let you guys know how it performs with CPU stock vs CPU OC'ed, and GPU stock vs. GPU OC'ed.

I remember a while a go, a guy with an m1730 trying Bioshock on it. He wasn't extatic but again: drivers! The new 167.26 drivers that came out not long after his post, seemed to dramatically enhance the gaming performance of the two 8700GT's. I just hope to see that when the 8800's come out, it won't just be an OC'd version of the 8700 GT, but will have a 256 bit bus and enhanced DX10 hardware.

 

Cheers sva988, by the time Dell responds to my queries, I will have probably chilled out a bit and one our US bretheren will have posted a report on real world M1730 gaming experience.

 

I cant upload the videos, I left it for like ten minutes and nothing. I will have to wait until the start of next month coz i went over my download limit and my download speed and upload speed are capped now. Sorry,
I'm suffering too lol no Crysis demo

 

Too bad, wogstaa. Thanks for trying though. Wanna get 1 thing confirmed: When I OC my GPU's (and initially the CPU as well) my m1730 won't go hot all the time, right? Only when I play games, not when I work in Office?

 

Oh and the m1730 just got up on 9th place as the most popular Dell laptop on this site Look to your left and a bit up.

 

Yeh I would hope so.

Does anyone know of a good application to read the temperature of both the cpu cores and both the gpu cores and possibly the physics processor?

 

The Crysis demo worked better with the DX9 version
The DX10 had serius problem and my GPU kept failing at it.
Try the DX9 version and the medium setting.
It would work better

 

did you remember to d/l the latest game driver (169.xx i think) at laptopvideo2go.com? It is said to help a great deal.

 

There's a lot of negativity here regarding (likely) DX10 framerates, the onerous 8800 issue, driver support and delayed delivery times.

Let's get some perspective here guys!

For those of you who have already ordered this machine, remember you're paying for something that's at the forefront of technology. This will inevitably mean:

a) There will be teething problems related to the M1730 which may take time to sort out due to a limited user base - BUT they should be overcome in the fullness of time. Vista suffers similarly with issues at the moment - BUT the platform is strentghening in line with an increased number of active licences.
b) Nothing stays ahead of the game for long - especially computer technology. Yes, your M1730 will be superseded and probably sooner than you like, but that's the trouble with bragging rights. Did you really believe you were buying into ongoing exclusivity? Ok, the worst that can happen is your 8700 suddenly doesn't look so shiny, well, if not today then you know that'll be the case within six months! If this bothers you then you really shouldn't have paid premium for a top of the line model when there are extremely worthy laptops significantly cheaper. That said - you will have a sterling piece of technology that will remain ahead of the majority of the pack for some time to come. This means software developers have to keep you in mind lest they ostricise those with less powerful hardware.

For those (myself included) who are holding off their order just yet - my advice is to continue to do so for a little while longer. So far there has been nothing to truly test the M1730. DX9 software is an unfair analysis given this machine's OS and GPU's are squarely aimed at DX10) This is due to change in the next few weeks, once a signed off Crysis is available (don't always trust demos - the Far Cry demo was released prior to final optimisation remember, hence many were pleasantly surprised with the final edit)

I raised the 8800m release issue a few days ago. At the time I could find little pertinent source info on the web - now google for yourself and see what's appeared in that short time! My guess is we WILL see the 8800 in November/December to coincide with DX10 software and christmas.

Sit tight a while longer - watch for benchmarks/experiences from those who have already bought (be grateful they have) and then make an informed decision before spending such a large sum of money. I still have faith in this machine, and in a few weeks time I will either put my order in, or look elsewhere. Either way I will be happy that I did all the research I could.

 

mrbuk1, well said!! The M1730 may or may not be the end all for laptop computers. BUT, not only does it represent close to the best you can do today, it is upgradeable. That is amazing to me for a desktop replacement laptop. My esd is tomorrow! Yeah!!! If they come out with the better graphics card in November, I can upgrade or wait until next year, or the next....What Dell has done with this unit, is what we have done with our desktops for years. At least for most of the components. We already know that the hard drive(s) will be replaceable, the graphics cards will be replaceable, the optical drives replaceable, memory can be added (up to 4gb), and a host of accessories will be coming.

In short, you can always wait, but if you do, there will come a time when you have to get on board, because there will ALWAYS be better things just a few weeks away from your decision. I bought the 80gb Ipod and 8 months later here is the 160gb for the same money!!! Well, guess what? I have been enjoying my Ipod for 8 months and don't regret buying it at all. And I can't upgrade the unit I have, I will have to buy a new one to get the capacity increase. I won't have to do that with my M1730.

If you have bought one, congrats! If you are waiting to buy, you will get a better machine. But I will have already been using mine and upgrading to what you have waited for. To each his own! I really hope the delays for all the Brits will not be long! My wait has been from 10/06/07 until now. Hopefully, the beast ships tomorrow as planned. BTW, the tv tuner is digital.

 

Wow with such beautiful speaches from mrbuk1 and (the) lazytexan, one would almost fear that this thread has come to it's end However, realistically, that is far from the truth, thankfully! Because as the two have so rightfully stated, there is still a lot to be done with the m1730, and for those of us who have been waiting for the m1730 it feels like the system has been out there forever (waiting time is twice or three times that of real-life time), but facts will have it that this system hasn't really come out of it's shell yet. When it does though, it will blow our minds!

So as Sir Lancelot said to the Black Knight in MontyP:HG, I say to whatever comes after the m1730: "Have at you!!"

 

all true mrbuk1 im not reciving mine till late november so even though i have my order in im still on the look out canceling is only a phonecall away after all ill not be botherd till iv had mine for a few days then ill have to make a final decision weather or not to keep it

 

Oh yes tomorrow is D-Day for me they have my money and i have no computer, out of interest the money left my account the day after i first mentioned i was thinking of canceling.

On to a happier subject has anyone seen any 3dmark06 results with the CPU OC? Thought there was some here but had a look through and find em now. Just wondering as i have seen the quad D901's hiting 8542, we can't be lagging that far behind that.

 

I just noticed on Direct2Dell ( http://direct2dell.com/one2one/archive/category/1016.aspx) at that url some info on the M1730s 8700's...

Makes me feel a little better to see sometehing in writing. Though that 10 days delivery is kinda funny heh.

 

I have good experience with Dell so let me comment on your items:
1- Dell will agree to to refund you. You need to contact XPS sales instead of customer service for this. They will rewrite your order, and let you keep your existin order until you have received the new one.

2- I think you shouldn't cancel your order on that account since this will make you lose some time. It is more clever to wait until you have received your initial order and only then have Dell replace your order with a system with the new card. Again, you will have to go through XPS sales, customer service can only replace orders with same configuration systems. If you complain about the delay, Sales may even grant you a good discount on the new system or even give it away for free (for a similar complaint on the M1710 I was able to reorder a system with bluray at no additional cost versus my original order without bluray).

3- If the graphic card is due to be released something like 1 month after you received your order, you can theoretically have Dell exchange your system regularly until the new graphic card comes out (the time preriod within you are allowed to exchange gets refreshed every time). Because of the shipping time you will probably find that 1 or 2 exchanges are enough to bring you to the time of the 8800 release (I had a similar case where the overclokable 7700G processor became available 2 months after my initial XPS M1710 purchase of the non overclockable version and due to Samsung screen issues, I was able to get the new processor at no additional cost after 2 exchanges).

Of course, you should have good reasons for exchanging your system, such as "you don't like the color of the cover", or the panel quality is not the one you expected or you had greater expectations from the SSD drive.

Dell may have some initial shipping issues, but they will also go to great length in order to please customers, to the point where you are the one feeling guilty, not them. Don't overdo it, and your account manager will keep being fair to you next time you order.

Dell are well aware of their high margins on the XPS systems, and so they are quite accomodating.

 

"To accommodate all these hardware options, this machine is big. It's thick too, and that's because the NVIDIA 8700M GT card can be swapped out for the next-generation SLI card later this year"

This is not something in writing from Dell, this just spells out that Dell can easily upgrade the M1730 when the 8800 comes out. This makes perfect sense as Dell want the minimum cost to them when the 8800 comes out. I have made the earlier point that Dell UK do not always follow what Dell US do, they may be part of the same corporation but they are in different territory markets so make minor changes to their core offering.

Many posters here make salient points, I may just cancel the order, see what dust settles around the 19th Nov and then move on from there.

 

For those that have received your laptop, does it come with a DX10 game? I was re-reading the direct2dell link from above and noticed this line. It didn't say anything in my order about this.

 

So wait, did you play the DX 10 version of Crysis, or just the DX 9 version, on the XPS M1730?

I played the DX 10 version on my 8800GTX-based desktop with 4 GB of ram, and was blown away, on High settings. The bar has been set, honestly, and it's been set really really high. Visuals are amazing, from the depth of field to motion blur, to the shading of weapons, character skin, expressions, and physics integration.

I'm honestly amazed by the game. I set it on Very High, just to see what it looked like (granted I got about 15-20 FPS, even lower in-combat), but I was simply blown away. Remember the much-hyped Killzone 2 PS3 demo? That's what came to mind when I saw it, that's what it's like, and it's out right now (and not a pre-render).

 

doove71 i still dont understand why you are thinking canceling if it was me id at least want to see this thing for myself im in uk and have already checked that we have 7 days from the day we get the laptop to ring dell and get a full refund thats enough time for you to make your mind up to keep it or send it back

 

guys, its prob been asked, but can we upgrade the graphics cards in the 1730 or are we guesing?

 

soz, i meant upgrade

 

I totally support your view. Even if I would receive my M1730 tomorrow, I know that I can get the newer version with 8800 graphics when it comes out as a replacement.

Having Dell exchange my system just once (because of bad panel or cover color dislike) will bring me into mid December (tomorrow+7 days+4 weeks shipping), Assuming 8800 graphics become available in December, I will still be able to get Dell exchange my replacement system (mid December+7days) with a new 8800-based system and get the 8800 card for early January (mid-December+7 days+4 weeks shipping).

You guys are stressing about the 8800 for nothing.

Even if the card would come out only in January (which is very doubtful, why would Dell miss the Christmas mark?), there is still a good chance you will get the 8800 graphics by having your system replaced a second time (you still prefer another color, but by the way, you noticed there is a new graphic card out). Any Dell account manager will be more than pleased to sell you this system twice with a higher price on the second time (for the enhanced graphics), this increases their year-end bonus!

What does the trick is that with each replacement, your 7-day (14-day in Germany) refund (and hence replacement) time window gets refreshed.

Those who cancel their order only succeed in delaying the moment when they will get a more powerful machine. That's a sub-rational decision considering the above.

Those who don't will eventually get an 8800-based replacement, irrespective of whether Dell offers an an upgrading programme or not. All the while, they will have been able to play on an 8700 machine, thereby increasing the overall effective warranty time by a couple of months...

I strongly believe Dell are determined to offer the absolutely best gaming laptops in the market, I don't think Alienware can beat a 8800-based Dell (simply because no existing hardware will exist to top the Dell). Even assuming they get slightly better using the same first-class hardware, Dell support is not something you want to miss.

Dell are making a strong point of being best-in-class - all around. They are one big powerful giant, and they will never let you get disappointed with their gaming machines.

 

I played the demo in DX9, I was trying to make a point that Crytek have stated that DX10 is the best way to play Crysis. Dell make the point that the M1730 is built for games. I am just waiting for a few more hands on reviews from M1730 owners. Drivers are always an issue and I am sure Nvidia are working like mad to ensure a steady stream of optimised drivers are available. mr greenfingers I am a fickle lad and I know once I have it in my grubby little mitts I will probably blank out for a few days lol