===> The Official Studio XPS 1640 Owner's Thread<===

@ all from Europe !!!

Who has a studio xps 1640 delivered??
Who has it at home ??

I had ordered it 10.01, and it was still in production

 

Is there really no substantial downgrade in materials or construction on the BestBuy model? The discount seems too good to be true. If they stocked the 1080p display (and the quality was confirmed as equal to the Dell ordered models) I would definitely purchase from them. Has anyone seen a model in store or ordered?

 

The web site said online only, I think. I mean it claims it's the same thing, I guess, although lately many laptops at Best Buy seem to be custom models (not that that's actually bad in a lot of cases!)

Doh! I am so tempted, but...ATi

 

Sure you can, but (obviously) not built into the machine. There are a few external bluetooth adapters that are relatively cheap, though it takes up either a USB or an expresscard port, something to consider especially with a USB adapter, since there's a grand total of 3 ports built in.

 

Yeah that stinks. I was kinda hoping to be able to open it up and add something like this: http://accessories.dell.com/sna/pro...l.aspx?c=ca&l=en&s=dhs&cs=cadhs1&sku=430-2935

 

I know from past expierience with my inspiron units thta I could just add a internal bluetooth chip.

like this one BT 355
http://cgi.ebay.ca/Dell-Wireless-35...14&_trkparms=72:1215|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1318




But I think the Studio XPS uses the BT 370 which is a differentform factor such as this one

http://cgi.ebay.ca/Dell-Wireless-37...14&_trkparms=72:1215|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1318

 

I also noticed the CPU in that Best Buy model is 2.4 ghz. Taking a quick look it appears the default CPU from Dell.com is 2.26 Ghz. That's another $50 difference. They don't really give any details on the exact screen though.

 

If I order one with the Best Buy specs from Dell, it comes out to $1419.

 

Hey man, how you liking the RGBLED screen thus far? I love it! The only issue I have with it is that the screen is a little thicker than regular led screens, at least I think so...

 

The BB 1640 does come with Bluetooth. They just somehow didn't present that information.

 

That sounds about right, 'cause that's about what mine was with the next speed grade up CPU, but with EPP discount.

Geez, this thing is so tempting, but...ATi

 

Well I got mine and everything's fine. Did all windows updates. Couldn't get to Dell Bios update because some internet error from Dell. No BSOD whatsoever.

The speakers are TEH LAME! I don't know if I've been spoiled by $200+ headphones/amps and full surround speakers, or it's just these... but they SUCK. My Nokia 5800 has better soundstage/detail/volume than that, without the muddiness and the shrieking of the SXPS 1640s.... but oh well.

 

Can u hear the sound from both speakers???

 

Are you using the default sound settings? You may have to tweak the setting for the speakers and subwoofer before they start sounding right.

 

the factory settings for the speakers are no correct, you have to change the audio settings to prevent the muffling. it corrected mine a lot, but in the end these are just laptop speakers and are no replacement for detached speakers with a real subwoofer.

after using the 1640 for the past few days i have only one complaint that i know will soon be resolved, and that is the battery life. it last just long enough, but no more. i definitely would prefer a 9cell battery over the 6 cell that came with it. the battery lasts about a good 2:15 minutes when using it on full performance. it might run longer in the dell power save mode but ill never use it.

has anyone outside the us received their 1640 with a purchased 9 cell battery? i am guessing the 9 cell is the exact same size as the 6 cell. it has no room for growth. the battery is only on one side of the computer and couldnt stick out the back without hitting the screen.

i am waiting for the 9 cell to be available in the us for purchase.

lastly, dell finally billed me last night, over two full weeks from when i ordered the computer. that is strange policy, especially since i had the computer for several days first.

 

Weirdly they billed me a good week BEFORE they shipped the system (a week and a half before I got it).

 

Dell Studio XPS 16 2.4Ghz 4GB DDR3 Laptop at Bestbuy.com for $999 + shipping and tax

link

 

Silly question here but if I order from Best Buy and then have an issue where I need to return the laptop does anyone know if I would replace the laptop through Best Buy or Dell? I've ordered pc's/laptops through Dell before but never through Best Buy.

 

Thanks for the info about the IDT settings. I hadn't gotten a chance to look under there, and it's pretty cool I can set up the positioning of my "head" so that the speakers will sound correct spatially. Also I think my subwolfer must have been cranked down by default so i'll have to play around with that.

This far I've had no issues with my laptop, heat or otherwise. The only game I've been playing lately has been Left 4 Dead, highest settings at full resolution, about 1-2 hours at a time. No heat issues at all for me.
What's a good temperature app? I'll do some test on my cpu/gpu temps and see if I have any vent problems. the vent placement doesn't seem to be the greatest for me but neither have I had any heat problems.when the screen is open the air tends to blow up the screen and it gets warm there. The air also partially vents from the bottom in that case, so I just make sure I have a flat surface to work on when doing somehting cpu intensive.

So far everyone's photos illustrating the vents have been crap =) I'll take some and post them up later.

But 1920x1080 is a great resolution, and I can't get over how great the RGBLED screen looks. A longer batt life would be nice though!
Bluray works great, and I've only seen one blue screen which was once on wakeup from sleep. not sure why.

Does anyone know if there's a way to temporarily disable the touch buttons across the top? I find myself often forgetting and wiping dust or crumbs from that area and accidentally turning off my wireless, or ejecting the bluray drive.

I've had no mushiness on my keyboard, and I've yet to bother learning the gesture feature of the trackpad.

Very solid all around.

I might pick up an sxps 13 as well for its portability.

 

Best Buy. Dell is not responsible for any support or repairs to the system if you buy it from Best Buy. I was talking to Dell sales the day the offer showed up on Best Buy and I asked her about it.

 

Stupid Dell customer service called and told me there was a problem with the configuration. The problem is the bluray drive can only be bundled with dvd-rom and also dvd-rom is backordered. And clearly she has no idea what that means. I made a big big mistake. I should have ordered on the web and payed 75$ more. So I wouldn't have to deal with that kind of stupid things. The sales agent is supposed to call me tomorrow and book the order by speaking with me. I don't know what to do. Should I cancel the order and order it online? ESD was 02/11 and now it is probably going to be March something. I have full classes tomorrow. How am I going to be able to answer him when he calls.

 

Any heat around the touchpad after gaming for an hour? Do you keep your hands on the keyboard while gaming? I'm hoping the bad video card on my first system was causing at least part of the heat on the palm rest.

I love the touch buttons but I found myself wondering why I lost my internet connection a few times!

 

Call now and talk to someone else. Or use the chat. If you change the configuration then it is the same as placing a new order so you should do it as soon as possible. You might have better luck with a different person, too.

 

according to BB: http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...45569785&ref=39&loc=01#tabbed-customerreviews this xps does not have Bluetooth. It States under the specs page the following:

Bluetooth Enabled: NO

Is this wrong? Can anyone confirm? Btw has anyone dealt with geeksquad b4 for warranty repairs? from what ive seen thy look like 17 yr old children who may know a little about computer components but dont know jack about the difference between DDR2 and DDR3 memory. i guess what im trying to say is that with this new model and all of the bugs and problems that may arise from it, will i be better off burning the lappy in a bon fire vs. taking it to bb for repair? If yes id rather just dish 1400 dollars @ dell vs 1k at BB.

 

Ordered on the 23rd (1640, 4gig, RGLED, BluRay, SSD, all the trimmings) ETA was Feb 11th.

I've checked it twice a day every day, no change, its been in 'Build' status forever it seems.

Tonight I check my order and :

Order Status: Changed

No ETA, no notification to me nothing just my order looks like it is dead weight now. I am too stunned to call them right now.

 

That's bad news. That usually means starting over. But if you didn't initiate the change, then something is up. You need to call them and find out what's up. The good news is I ordered yesterday and have a ship date of the 11th, so even if you start all over you shouldn't be delayed much from what you were expecting.

 

Dang, I am so tempted to get a Best Buy model...seems like it's worth dealing with maybe for the price.

That's what their support info says in the warrenty book too. I don't really understand that...I mean I guess you bring it in physically to Best Buy for ANY problems, rather than ever calling Dell? I'm not actually sure if that would be good or bad. It would be kind of nice to be able to just drop it off there rather than having to deal with foreign tech support over the phone, but then as others have mentioned they might not know anything, so who knows.

Does she mean PowerDVD? How on Earth can THAT be backordered? And I wonder if they're going to include the actual correct version for Blu Ray playback, or just a version for DVD as a bunch of us have gotten. (I'm STILL getting contacted by Dell people who are clueless that I just need/needed PowerDVD with Blu Ray support to play Blu Rays...)

And I ordered on line, and didn't have any luck getting it...

 

what s the difference between DDR2 and DDR3??? seriously

 

Yep they canceled my order but 'recreated it' because they SAY they called me and couldn't reach me but because my voicemail had my name they 'kindly' recreated the order. So I have gone from being in build for a week to now being in 'pre-production' for absolutely no reason whatsoever.

It is no wonder this company is loosing sales and market share. Guess who just called back in to REALLY cancel his order.

 

Doesn't Best buy charge a large % restocking fee for returned items?

 

I don't blame ya.. and I live in Nashville!

 

"Restocking fee
A restocking fee of 15% will be charged on opened notebook computers, projectors, camcorders, digital cameras, radar detectors, GPS navigation and in-car video systems unless defective or prohibited by law. A restocking fee of 25% will be charged on Special Order Products, including appliances unless defective or prohibited by law."

^From Bestbuy.com

I hope you don't buy a $1000 laptop at bestbuy and then get stuck with a $150.00 fee for them to put it back on the shelf.

 

They are probably ordering PowerDVD software for Blu-Ray and changing every order that comes with a Blu-ray drive. Unfortunately it is night but I will call tomorrow and tell them that I don't want the PowerDVD. I hope all the hardware is built and tested and ready. I just want my laptop. I really don't care now even if they don't put Vista DVD.

 

I can't figure out from their site if it has ANY warranty without you buying it. You have to pay for the Geeksquad warranty. But the price is good. I added one to my cart and checked out the waranty. You get 2 years for $180.

The site does say that you can return it within 14 days. If it is defective there is no restocking fee.

I like being able to send Dell an email and them overnighting a part to me so I can get up and running faster. I really don't like strangers working on my computers. But I might consider it if the new one works and we decide to get another.

 

Yeah, it says it's 15%, so that's not real great. Not sure if that includes if its defective, or what the deal with the warranty is.

EDIT: Bukket already said more!

 

Did you return yours???


Cin.

 

My first one, yeah. I'm being tempted though now that the price is at least $300 less! (Plus if I had a longer return period, or hadn't had physical damage on the unit, I would have messed with them about the discs longer.)

 

Depending on how hot it gets, they might count it as an appliance. [stove] lol

 

LOL! :laugh:

 

Well if you get no warranty and the cheapest BB plan is $180 that changes things up a tad. You could be looking at $1180 vs $1400 now.

The BB offer still looks good though. A buddy of mine used to work for Geek Squad back in the day I'll get his thoughts about the whole returning/restocking stuff. I had no plans of getting bluray but the customized setup I had from Dell.com was around $1264 and that was without bluray so according to BB I can get bluray (with warranty) for under $1200 that's still decent.

I'm pretty close to making the purchase on this laptop and if this BB deal works out it appears I would save myself a couple hundred dollars.

 

Does the ExpressCard Sound Blaster X-Fi Xtreme Audio Sound Card take any load off the CPU?

 

Ooh, OOh I think I know this one...Is it "1"?

 

The software (ie. CPU) audio processing isnt on the same level as the Expresscard solution.. its also very minimal to begin with; ie. you shouldnt worry about CPU usage with software audio processing in 2009 with P8xxx or higher processors.

The reason for the dedicated card is for better processing and dedicated audio board/chip.. eg. should be better for recording via mic, i think it has optical in/out as well (not sure), the headphone out should be cleaner.

 

that's funny but i still don't know what it means i'm not hardcore into computers yet but i'm learning....slowly

 

I think there is little benefit currently. DDR3 uses less power [I think], faster clock speeds [I think], but also has more latency [I know].

Googling the topic brings up some good sources [try to find the most current ones]. Here's a video link [ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZAQ4Y0tjts] but I'm not sure how reliable that information is and it might be more than you want.

 

I'm sorry that happened. But I personally wouldn't give up yet. I've owned about 20 laptops over the years and about 10 of them have been Dells by choice. I've experience imperfect customer service from everyone, Apple, Toshiba, Sony, Sager, HP, Asus, Gateway, Acer, Alienware and Dell (Uh, maybe it's been more than 20.) It's a minor thing, it happens, most of the time it doesn't happen. The thing I've found with Dell is that if you are firm and persistent, you will end the end get good value for your money and 9 times out of 10 you won't really have any problems. You just got your 1 early in the game (assuming this is your first Dell encounter.)

On the other hand, I had something like this happen the on my first purchase with Toshiba, and I canceled my order and am resistant to Toshiba, but that's mostly because I don't think it's as good a value as a Dell.

 

I would definitely agree with that. Some people talk about how bad Dell CS is but I think that all company's CS is bad once in a while.

[Almost like playing Russian Roulette... play it enough times and you'll eventually "win" ]

NOTE: I would not recommend playing Russian roulette... just throwing that out there.

 

Hey all!

I have created a new thread:

The Official Studio XPS 1640 Order Thread, and it's Located Here

This thread is for Order Status, to post when you ordered, updates, etc.

Please follow the format, makes a easy read!

Now, I'm wishing I ordered either one!
oh lulz.

If you have any q's about it, let me know!


Cin

 

Hi 1640 users,

May I know what program you are using to monitor the temperature of your CPU, GPU, and HDD?

Thanks.