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

That is funny. I have seen them turn orange, I think when the battery was low, but other than that, no other colors.

 

they glow red when your battery is low lol

it also says there is an s-video port on the computer.....

 

Oh okay. I guess I have to drain my battery to low level for once, just to see that one for myself.

Still, it makes me laugh wondering how they came up with that "different colors while gaming" stuff. Maybe while they are doing the gaming benchmarks, someone noticed the ring turn white to orange/red and kept blinking, and assumed it was like those LED effects from other gaming laptops.

 

Maybe they were testing it and the crappy power over there kept dropping below desired levels for the power supply and the battery kept draining.

 

Just got my replacement laptop delivered to my house. (At work so can't mess with it yet) - it was a replacement for my current 1640 which once the battery drained it fails to charge my battery while on AC power. ( tech says its a motherboard problem)

Aanyways..I called Dell on March 27 about my issue and today March 31 my laptop arrives! - same custom specs as before.


anyone know how many days i have to return my broken 1640? i recieved a ups return label on the 27th of march, havn't had time to whipe it clean and ship it back.

Can someone recommend best way to whipe my data before sending to Dell? ....will a factory restore using the Dell recovery CD work just fine?

Please advise,
Thanks

 

To anyone on the fence about performing a fresh OS install to wipe the bloatware, I installed Windows 7 on a separate partition last night in under an hour and it runs an order of magnitude faster than the factory fresh vista. I will definitely be reinstalling vista when i get the chance (if not simply reformatting and running just the 7 beta)

 

Yeah, I did it as soon as I received my replacement unit. What a difference it made. I was actually having problems with programs crashing with no error until I did it.

Let me ask you this. Is there a way to get a copy of Win7 Beta still? I'm guessing I can find them on the torrents I'm just not a big fan of them.

 

You can still get a key, but not the iso from Microsoft. I nabbed a coworker's disc of build 7000 which worked no sweat. I would say try to grab from a friend if you didn't want to go the torrent route.

 

does doing a fresh install and whiping out the recovery drive voids the warrenty? or the 21day return policy?

 

press f8 on startup, go to repair my computer--reformat to dell default.
its a build in restore feature.

 

Anyone know how to replace or install a Bluetooth?

 

No, because once you return your laptop they meaning Dell loads the OS image file for the person who buys your laptop on the Outlet Store.

 

I was wondering if anyone has used the NZXT Cryo LX cooling pad on their 1640 or other laptop.

http://www.nzxt.com/products/cryo_lx/

Those using the Zalman... has anyone done a test of actual temp reduction? Do you feel that the vents are well suited to the vent profile of the 1640?

 

You could always punch a few holes of your own

 

That's your SIM card for your WWAN.

Edit: Never mind. It's not the SIM.

 

It is the WWAN radio if you ordered a built in aircard.

 

I'm looking for a laptop to buy and I'm not planning on playing games or using any demanding applications/programs on it.

An Inspiron 1525/45 will be adequate but then I saw the Studio15 and now the Studio XPS 16!! WOW!! (The Original XPS looks good as well but I'm put off by the GPU problem.)

Is it so wrong to buy a laptop for the LOOK? The backlit keyboard... the 1080p screen... the sleek black internal design, face recognition software, the unique leather/shiny black lid... Everything looks so perfect! Except the heat seems to be a bit of a concern, although the way I use it for perhaps it won't be an issue.

BTW, I won't be using it for Blue Ray dvd either...

Will I be out of my mind to buy this instead of the Studio 15(what I decided on initially)giving the price difference?

 

well the studio 15 is a nice machine, but you could always think of it like this, if you have the extra money and like the looks f the sxps16 then by buying it now your are future proofing yourself just in case you need the extra power alittle bit down the track, as well as that watching movies on the 16" screen os a real pleasure. So basically if looks are important then no problems, i personally wouldnt buy it just because of its looks, but thats just me, but you can valitate it by knowing that it is powerfuland you will get everything you need out of it and more.
Goodluck in your choice.

 

Just get it. You'll be so happy once you do. The heat issue is not that big of a deal, and I play games on mine a lot. It's a great machine for the money, very hard to pass up.

 

If you want a good computer that saves you a few bucks then get the Studio 15. If you want a computer that has the newest technology and an added "Wow" factor then go for the 1640. It all depends on what you are looking for in a laptop and what you can afford.

 

I've had my XPS 16 for a good few weeks now and no major problems at all, I love it! Are there many people using Face Recognition tho? I've been using it, more as a bit of a novelty than anything else, but while it works fine on bootup, closing and opening the lid and trying to log on again is really really slow. It seems to take the camera and software ages to initialise, when I could have just typed in the password about 10 times before its ready.

Is this normal? Seems to work fine on boot just not on coming out of standby/sleep... Also if I'm impatient and just log in Vista kicks me out again when the face recogition is ready and asks me to log in again. It's the standard Dell build, haven't done a reformat.

 

I did reformat, but I only use the Facial recognition on initial log in. I haven't tried it for the lid opening and closing, I'll give it a whirl tonight and let you know if I see the same thing after I dual boot it with Win 7 64.

 

no its definitely not

 

If you make a claim like that, you better back it up with some information.

I THINK it is for the WWAN but does it really matter?

 

yes, it does matter, because somebody asked a question about it smartass.



if you take a look just above the chip in question, you will see the label for the WWAN, and the wires that would connect to it if it was installed, and the port just to the left of the sticker where it would plug in, if it was installed. the arrow is clearly pointing to a chip, and the OPs question clearly uses the word chip. The WWAN is not a chip built in to the motherboard, but is itself a board that plugs in the the slot, gets connected to those loose wires, all just above the chip in question.

you can think what you want, but you are wrong.

pwnd

 

I bought 2 XPS 1640's (one on 3/18 and one on 3/19). They were both basic with not a lot of aded features such as the 1080 screen (antivirus application was excluded). I was give 4/1 and 4/13 respectively for receipt dates.

Dell actually called me as asked if I really wanted 2 laptops. They then offered to email the status as they went through the build process (which they have).

Laptop number 1 was received on 3/30/09
Laptop number 2 is out for delivery from FedEx on 4/1/09

I installed Avast and ran all Windows updates with no problems on laptop 1. WOW runs great with no heat issues.

Very pleased

 

As much of a pleasure as the keyboard and trackpad are to use, I plugged mine into my 46" Samsung via HDMI and used my bluetooth keyboard. Its pretty glorious, though I cant seem to figure out if I still run it with the laptop closed.

 

I think it will work closed as long as you set close the lid to do nothing in the power options.

 

But will the laptop screen automatically turn off regardless of what you set in the power options if you close the lid?

 

Magnificent pwn, Cleric. Well executed

 

It should but if it doesn't press Fn+F8 (CRT/LCD).

 

knock on wood i have had little to zero problems with my XPS 16 and i've had it for just under a month. I love this things. Movies look absolutely gorgeous. I dont use it too extensively, but its got enough power to multitask what i do use it for with any issues. It is a fingerprint magnet, but i also have an iphone which is bad in itself so i've learned to cope with the glossy black and i usually wipe it down every few days.

Is there a way to temporarily deactivate the trackpad and buttons? I wish it had the convenient button the HP's have for this

 

Yes, just right click on the synaptics icon in the systray and it's an option to disable it if another pointer is plugged in.

On a side note, I installed Win 7 64 tonight and love it. My question is this. I only made the partition 20 gigs and now I would like to make it bigger. Problem is, when I shrunk the large volume it would not let me make the 20 gig partition bigger. Can anyone tell me why? I really don't want to do this again if I don't have to. Thanks.

 

Didnt know if anyone had posted it but the 9 cell battery is down to $79.99 (USD) in the dell store and on the phone. I used this coupon to get 15% off dont know if it will work more than once the code is: SG7BTR8Q1X$FF6.
Someone let us know if it will work again. Dont have time to test it.

 

please post how long you get on a charge with the nine cell battery when you get it.

 

Ive had my sxps16 for about 2 weeks, and its been running great! That is all.

 

is anyone experiencing a false positive virus on faservice.exe its part of the fast access software but Nod32 keeps quarantining it

 

I think without gaming or movies it was around three and a half hours with my nine cell.

 

There is a special on the Studio XPS 16 until 4/4/2009 @ 5:59am Central for free upgrades to the RGBLED screen and 500GB 7200RPM hard drive plus instant system savings of 18!

 

So I'm not sure if anyone saw what I asked before, so I'll ask again.

I installed Win 7 64 on my machine last night and love it. Everything is working except for the BluRay playback because it balked at the update for the BluRay player software update, no biggie. My issue is that I only made a 20 gig partition, which should have been much larger obviously in hindsight. I tried to decrease the main partition, which I was able to do by 40 gig's, and expand the Win 7 by that amount. The problem is the Win 7 Partition isn't expandable. Can anyone tell me why? I can remove the partition and start over, I just really don't want to. Is there a 3rd party software that may help? Thanks in advance.

 

This is because the W7 partition is at the "back" of the HDD. Your Vista partition is occupying the beginning of the harddrive. You can only expand the partition if there is free space after the partition, not before.

|vista partition|W7 partition|
|smaller vista|free space|W7|

what you want is

|vista|W7|Free Space|

Then it can work. As to software that can do it...maybe partition magic or such? It's been a really long time since i used that kind of software

I hope you can understand what i'm getting at

 

Totally got it.

So when I'm using the program that Vista provides, is there a way for me to make the W7 Partition next to Vista? I didn't see that option when I was making it. I'm not sure how much I'm going to use W7, but I'd like to play around with it a little more but I only have 3.5 gig's free as of now. Either way, if I have to reinstall W7 it's no big deal, just hoping to take the easy way out.

 

I don't believe that Vista's(or W7's for that sake) partitioner is that advanced, for that you would need some kind of 3rd party software. They can be used for basic operations but nothing like that.

Rather than messing around with the partitions i would recommend a reinstall of the W7 install - this might be the optimal choice if you plan on migrating from Vista to W7 but Vista(for the time being) is still your primary system. If you play around with the partitions you might end up with 2 useless installs rather than one

 

So the hard way it is! Thank you very much.

 

I've been using Partition Magic for years ever since it was a product of PowerQuest. It's now owned by Norton/Symantec and is often available for free as part of a software bundle from Frys.com. I've never had a problem with it. It should handle any type of partition reconfiguration you want to try.

It's not currently on sale at Frys but a competing product is available for free after rebate.

http://shop3.frys.com/product/5515500?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG


Mike

 

So I got a copy of Partition Magic from a friend and tried it. It's not compatible with 64 Bit Vista. I tried it anyway and corrupted my drive beyond repair. I had to completely blow all instances of Windows away and reformat. Not really a big deal as I didn't really have anything I can't get back, but still a long night. I now have a 50gig partition for W7 and the rest for Vista. Funny thing is, Vista doesn't work properly until I install all of the drivers. W7 fires up and runs perfectly from the start. I think I may actually purchase my first copy of Windows, without it being included with a PC, since Win2K when it's released.

 

Has anyone downloaded ATI Tray Tools? I just downloaded it and when you are installing it it gives an option to enable auto fan settings for the HD3xxx series. Since doing this around and under the touch pad seems much cooler.
When installing it gives a warning about an unsigned driver doesnt seem to be affecting anything though. Here is the link: http://majorgeeks.com/ATI_Tray_Tools_d4569.html

 

to xps 16 owners .. can you comment on the portability of the machine? .. not like always moving it around but just in general .. im looking at it as a college notebook for this fall .. and also hows it when using it on your lap? (the heat issues and such) .. does any one run photoshop or cad programs like 3ds max on it?

input will be appreciated

 

New issues I'm having with 1640:

1. If I do a dual monitor setup thru HDMI and have a movie playing, the audio will get killed if I get a UAC prompt. Audio won't come back even after the UAC prompt. My workaround for now is to unplug-replug the HDMI cable to reset the audio.

2. The "Windows Audio Endpoint Builder" service at times consume a lot of CPU resources. It could easily eat more than 50% of the CPU resource for minutes. This is even when there's no audio being played back by the laptop.

 

I bought it to bring to and from work with me every day. With the 6 cell battery it's 6.5 lbs which isn't THAT bad. The 9 cell brings it to about 7 which is a little on the heavy side. I'm still waiting for FedEx to deliver it but once I get it I'll update this with some real life info.