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

Has anyone in the UK got anything other than samsung screen so far? I have a samsung screen with some light leakage, its not too bad, but I noticed another slight problem so I might try and get it replaced at the same time if there is a chance of getting one of the better displays.

 

PLEASE TELL ME THIS IS WHAT WE WERE ALL WAITING FOR

8800 GT

Stream Processors - 112
Core Clock (MHz) - 600
Shader Clock (MHz) - 1500
Memory Clock (MHz)- 900
Memory Amount - 512
Memory Interface - 256 Bit
Memory Bandwidth (GB/sec) - 57.6
Texture Fill Rate (billion/sec)- 33.6

 

idk if it is, but ummm yummy!

 

Got this info off the nvidia website.

had the caption: "the wait is over. 8800 GT. awesome power. awesome price"

 

I haven't received anything yet - but I have specified at time of order that I will not accept anything other than an LG panel (which I confirmed in writing with the sales guy) - so lets see how far that gets me - the sales guy also said he's going to chase it right through production for me to make sure it happens - again - lets see how much thats worth in reality.

I'm also interested to know if any other UK owners actually have the LG or Sharp panel?

 

You're looking at their new low-temperature 8800 GT desktop part. The mobile page still shows the 8700 as being their flagship notebook product. So, no, that's not exactly what we've been waiting for.

However, that same GPU might be used at lower clocks as the M8800. Just, don't all excited quite yet.

 

im hoping for the lg to be honest if the screen is not perfect in everyway im sending it back for a replacement also recived this email today

Dear Peter Scott,

Good afternoon .Hope you are well .

This is with regards to the email sent to Dell Customer Care .I would like to bring this to your kind notice that as the order is in production now , in order to make any amendments ( adding or removing an item from an existing order )we will be required to cancel the order .Please advise .

The item number 510-10173 relates an intergrated sound card compatible with vista.

Please do not hesitate in responding to this mail directly in case of queries.I will be glad to assist you further.

Regards,
Hema

so looks ok to me???

 

Yeah and the Targus Campus XL (which I've ordered, should work good as well)

 

Well guys, I got more than one surprise today from DELL. Though on the issue of the 8800 it does not look so good (at least in the UK).

Earlier today i got a phone call from some supplier on behalf of DELL, they are delivering my laptop on the 31st of October... it went from Production to Delivery in less than a day. Quite strange, since the estimated date was still the 28th of November.

Unfortunatly this kind of makes the email i sent them on Saturday (for Monday) to change my order pointless. But more on that in a moment... you will all remember (well if you have been reading the thread a few pages back) i sent an email to DELL about the 8800 situation to get their support on it. A quick reminder on what i sent them...

To which i got a reply this evening....

Ok, umm what? "unfortunately we cannot offer any service after the delivery of the order". What the heck is that supposed to mean?

Anyway just sent the following reply...

I will keep you updated.

 

I don't quite see how you can from your reply from Dell, understand that they will NOT be supporting an upgrade (free, with lower price or to the market price of 8800). Wether they themselves offer to come out and replace the GPU or you have to do it yourself isn't a huge deal for me.
But other than that, congrats on your updated delivery!! The same thing happened to me. Getting my m1730 tomorrow!

 

hmm - am really tempted to cancel now and hold on for the 8800...

 

No one seems to read my posts...

If you want the 8800 after you already have received your system, just ask for a refund to your sales representative and have him send a new more expensive system with the 8800 graphic chip. You have 7 or 14 days (depending on the country) to do so.

Dell will call you to organize a pick up date for the previous system. Set this date after your new delivery date, for uninterrupted lapatop availability.

If this is dragging on, just ask for a non-8800 related replacement. By the time you receive that replacement, the 8800 will be out and you can then reorder and have your second replacement refunded and picked up by Dell (or cancelled if it hasn't shipped).

Either way you won't miss on the 8800 graphics.

 

Guess dell Uk just got their act togeather I recieved a phone call at 16:55 today from dell my hard drive has arrive and will begin testing tommorow I have been told that i can expect to recieve the system before i leave for Canada and that if i don't cancel the order and place one with dell.ca they will give me a good will gesture equal to the price difference between here and canada!!!!
I'll not hold my breath over any of this, just wait and see.
PS price difference between here and canada including tax on my sysytem is around £200 from what i can see on the ca site.

 

just buy the thing and use Dell's upgrade route at a later date!

You know the 8800 wont release on time...

 

i can really understand everyones conserns about theas new cards but up to date we are getting the best cards out there

plus iv got a feeling since everyone who lives in the uk and has recived there 1730's has gotten the samsung screen ill be requesting a new one to be built with the lg screen so that gives me time to see how the card situation turns out

i also want to see what i can find out about the new alienware i know the support is not supposed to be as good as dell but im still realy interested in seeing what they have to offer

 

You misread me. I wrote LCD TV panels cannot play such resolutions. Obviously monitors can, but my point was they are too small for such high resolutions to be useful at all. You need a big LCD TV, but unfortunately there is no LCD TV available with that resolution. 46 inches seems a minimum.

It is not only the extra resolution that pleads for an LCD TV: it is also you only get an immersive feeling from 40 inches onwards while giving you some freedom to sit more than 80 centimeters away from your panel.

Also the new LCD TV's (Philips, Samsung and Sony) or lower resolution monitors won't limit you to 60 frames per second, as they support 100Hz. So far the high resolutions monitors don't supports over 60 frames per second so any benefit you get from your system is cancelled by the monitor. On the other hand, those new TVs are capable of interpoling frames so that you are never below 100 frames per second. In particular the Sony does this beautifully (the Samsung implementation shows some artefacts and blurs).

Personally I would save on the tiny monitor and buy a 40 or 46 inches LCD Panel from X3500 from Sony or chose a monitor with slightly lower resolution and get 100Hz. If you find a max resolution 40 inches one with 100Hz please let me know. This would make me ponder the purchase of a desktop system in addition to the XPS M1730 (I need the mobility).

I can undertand your need to improve performance while saving money. Just how much more performance you get versus an SLI 8800M M1730 is a question that will be answered soon. What 3DMark score are you targeting with your system?

 

Downloading Crysis. im 2.4ghz 2gb 200gb 7200rpm 8700gt sli alt frame rendering 1 stock drivers. stock clocks.

will let you know how it works out. im probably going to be 1600x1200 no AA

 

All I got to say is anyone looking forward to playing crysis, you paid 5000 dollars to put the computer on your lap. I had to turn the res to 1280x and all settings on low to get 35fps.

 

Lucky I didn't pay $5k...

 

Can I ask for some assistance?

I just got advised that I have an XPS M1730 on the way. Its fully loaded with every option imaginable and Im wondering... are there any RAID experts here?

I need to learn real quick for my review. I plan on testing the SSDs in both RAID configurations.

Tx in advance for the help.

Specs attached.

 

lol. me neither.

 

The price for my config was $4500. However, I sold my 1710 for $1700. Plus, I get a tax deduction because I declare my system for business use. That makes my net cost about $1600 :-;

 

just ran 3dmark06

my score was 6541.

 

FYI - you can improve the performance of your HDD I/O by setting disk policy

right click on your computer icon, select manage

Storage/Disk Management

Right click the primary disk and select properties.

Choose the Hardware tab and select the disk (in my case it's name is Array).

Choose the Policy tab and check "Enable write caching on the disk" and "Enable advanced performance"

You can also set external drives to run in performance mode instead of the "quick removal" mode.

I have an external drive that I use for development. In "quick removal" mode, an ant build of my software project took 26 seconds. In performance mode, it took 10 seconds!

EDIT - oddly, choosing the extra performance options for the Disk Array didn't remain selected when I checked again... weird... However, the external disk did retain my choices.

 

I did find some information about this. The currently installed Intel Matrix Storage Manager is 7.0.x whereas the latest is 7.6.0.1011. I downloaded from Dell

http://support.us.dell.com/support/...eid=R162583&formatcnt=1&libid=0&fileid=217975

and was able to enable the write-back cache on the Array.

I didn't benchmark before doing this.

Perhaps someone else can gather pre and post results? I read online that this can dramatically improve performance.

 

Not quite sure why you said I didn't read your post - I did, but I think we're talking about different issues, im talking about if the card comes out say 30 days after I take delivery, and for some reason Dell don't offer upgrade discounts or returns (just because of the card change), then im going to have to take another hit to get the upgrade, thats the point im making here - of course i'll take the hit and buy the upgrade, but common sense says if I only have to wait another month or so after waiting a long time to replace my current machine already - then it would be prudent to do that, not that it matters - i've slept on it now, and I'm not going to cancel.

 

I wouldn't worry just yet, I've been reading all kinds of problems with the Crysis demo and vista. I also spoke to a friend at EA and he said the demo is not performing as it should. Apparently it's only using 1 core of the CPU too so that's a problem!

 

They are having trouble with the 8700m SLi running well, I would imagine that they are going to be having tourbles with the 8800. Anyway, I'm going to give Dell XPS support a call some time this week to see if I can get a replacement LCD and the lights in my speakers fixed and while i'm at it I will ask about the 8800 and what's going on and if there will be a discounted upgrade for owners like us who just bought the damn thing.

 

That seems really low compared to most review benchmarks that i have seen which show low 8000's before the system is OC'd.

 

thats what im getting stock from the factory. to get 8000+ I have to install those drivers.

 

As I said in previous posts. Just ask for a replacement of your system (because of the cover color) to bridge the time between delivery of your system and the introduction of the 8800M. When the new card arrives you can then do second replacement (the card won't be your only reason, but your sales rep will let you add it to your config, see my previous posts)

 

Thats an great spec list whats the forecast on delivery for that system?
Raided ssd's where not am option when i placed my order in the uk(still don't think they are) another reason to cancel and order from dell.ca i think. Thanks for reviews on ssd's it was one of the things that help me make my selection.

 

The French have already obtained over 10,000 on the 3DMark06 on the M1730 with overclocked 8700GT and Xtreme 7900 using modded drivers. It seems we havn't seen the full power of the 8700GT yet and drivers could be improved further. Of course the 8800M should allow to do even better if it isn't juste an overcloked version of the 8700GT.

 

Cool, you have any links to what the numbers were in ntune or riva?

I know for a fact as soon as a proper set of new WHQ drivers come out the 8700GT will fly!

It was the same when Vista first launched and the 8800GTX.

 

Harry,

Im told next Monday as it is a special order but will believe it when its here. Im the guy who waited 2 plus months for my M1330s.

 

My Dell account manager confirmed that he would upgrade my system through replacement if the 8800M were introduced before December because he understands that the delivery of my system has been delayed.

Dell have the most customer-friendy support. That's why we love them.

Having said that, he was not aware of a start before Christmas. If the new graphic card gets integrated only next year, then I don't mind mounting the new graphic card myself at a later time.

I am happy with the 10,000 3DMark score of the 8700. I am going to ask the guys to test crysis with their settings.

 

Have you got any links to the French sites puremind? i'd be a tad interested to read about it.

 

Nice to see a prompt delivery as for the raid I don't think you will have any probs setting up the raid as once its enabled in the bios the machine just treats the drives as one, striping the data across the two drives (Raid 0) . Its just a case of formating and installing the OS. The only draw back i have had with raid in the past is when a single hard fails you lose everything, hence my current desktop runs Raid 0+1( 4 drives not very practical in a laptop). I was hoping raided SSD would be more reliable and not run the risk of losing data (in the last 9 years i've lost around 5 hard drives). But when i ordered at the begining of the month i was told it was not posible to fit 2 SSd's in the 1730 I have sent them another email asking how dell.ca can provide this and they can't, The usual prompt reply from dell has gone silient as i wait for a reply. I look forward to reading your review on the raided SSD's if i can be of any further help feel free to pm me.

 

Mine was somewhere in the mid 7000 no OC/SLI/PhsyX. That was on my current system chaulk full of problems. I'm getting my replacement later today so will re-test.

 

Well, my Dell backpack had arrived back home but unfortunately I'm not there. Should be back Friday so I'll take some pictures and post them on here so people can compare or check whether it's the same as the old one.

 

Only a few hours before I get my system! Really hope there aren't too many problems with SLi and Vista, or that they at least get fixed soon. And hope I got the LG screen as well, since I havn't heard of any Scandinavian customers.

 

Hi All,

I have been having an email conversation with customer care reps from Dell UK concerning the LG Panel and any guidance from Dell UK on the thorny 8800 question. I haven't had much luck here is an excerpt from an email I got a few minutes ago:

Y our order is in production and should receive the order on or before 16 Nov
2007.

Further to your e-mail regarding the LG display panel and the Impending release
of 8800 mobile GPU, As we in customer care are not technically trained, I am
sorry we would not be able to assist you with this issue.

However we can contact our technical support once the order is delivered.

Regarding the part which is holding the order, we have mailed our order
management team to advice on the same and are awaiting for a reply from them.

I have quite rightly gone back to them and said why do I need to wait until I have got the laptop? I have asked if I can be contacted by an account manager as the customer help guys seem to have difficulty in calling their collegues in the tech department (most likely a different continent!!??!!)

Will keep everyone updated, veering between wanting the M1730 and saying to hell with it and getting a desktop, my wife has softened her previous hardline approach to allowing a new desktop to sit in the corner of the bedroom.

 

Just recieved the following e-mail

I really am worried as to what is going on yesterday i'm told alls well now its in production but could be dellayed till the 14th !!!

 

I too have been told my machine is in Production but won't get it until the 16th November. It seems every territory but the UK gets their machine within a week! It looks from your info that you won't even be in the UK when they deliver it maybe your better off getting it from Dell .CA??

 

Ooooh he is good. Except..there is no priority shipment within Canada. The closest you can get to that, in the US, is next day shipping but we can't even get that.

Smooth though.

 

I only wish that were true! My order was placed on 10/06/2007, esd 10/28/2007....Got the dreaded e-mail 2 days AFTER the esd with a new date of 11/06/2007. Plus, the equipment is now $181 plus tax, LOWER than when I ordered it. I am in the USA, but that doesn't matter much. I did get all the bells and whistles, but very disappointed with the wait time. My sales person and his supervisor are out on vacation until noon tomorrow. We'll see what happens. At least the revised date is only a week away.

The lazytexan!

 

My XPS Specialist told me the culprit is not Bluray, it is the next gen Intel Wireless n card, which they are expecting in 4-5 days. So we have to patient until next week in order to receive our systems.

 

Here is the link to the French forum.
http://forum.hardware.fr/hfr/Ordina...unique-topic-m1730-sujet_41553_11.htm#t821169

 

That is dell uk that told me it was priority i have yet to order from dell canada.

Yes you are right i order the machine from dell uk because i wanted to have all my data backed up and a machine ready to roll before i reach canada. However due to the 1 month delay in my order it will most likely reach here after i have left. I have contacted dell canada and been told i can expect a machine at my house in canada by the 12th of november!! if i order from dell.ca (the raided SSD Flamenko). I will give dell UK till the end of the week then I'm just gona have to bite the bullet and wait for the refund which i've heard can take forever.
At the end of all this its not hte delay as such that anoys me but the fustration of not been given accurate shipping information, if i was told on the 21st of september that my order would not reach me before i left i would have just waited till i arrived in canada.

Nice find, though they seem to be getting those results in XP

 

What preinstalled software did everyone here with the XPS 1730 remove?