Dell XPS 15 R2 - L502x - Owners Lounge

I meant Dell outlet on refurb systems !

 

Yup, same here. I'm dying to try this thing out. Have read every little detail, hack, fix, problem, and pr0n story associated with it. Wait, did I say that out loud?
-joe-

 

Yea well I ordered 5/18 and I should get it 6/6. But I'm pretty sure we will get it sooner than that. They are putting the max time it could take like a worse case scenario.

Anyways, like you guys, I'm reading everything about this notebook hehe.

 

Does anyone know if there will be a XPS 14 Gen 2? I searched everywhere and couldn't find anything.

So I figured to post in this thread and ask, thanks.

 

Just read the service manual to get to the heatsink. It says it requires removing the screen assembly. Has anyone done it and not have to remove that?? What's the easiest way to get to the heatsink for repasting.

 

There is no XPS14 Gen2......

 

Oh ok. Well do you know which dell lineup would have the gen 2 cpu/SB with at least 1600 x 900 display with hybrid graphics that is 14 inch or smaller?

Thanks.

 

I had an xps 14r1 and after much back & forth,a Dell VP told me they have a 14r for lower end a few 14 business machines the new Alienware m14x,and now Dell is going to make a very MB air like xps14.I have option of trading my xps 14r1 for any of those available.All are out now except the new xps light? In which he stated will be available by Q3 2011.

 

Thanks for the info, so Q3 2011 ok.

 

I've been browsing around a little trying find out which driver to download for my DVD drive from dell's website, as they list 3 for my service tag. The drive is called HL-DT-ST-DVD+-RW GT32N in device manager. The drivers listed:

PLDS DS-8A5SH 12.7 SATA Trayload DVDRW
&
TSST TS-L633C 12.7 SATA Trayload 8X DVDRW
&
TSST TS-L633J 12.7 SATA Trayload 8X DVDRW

Does anyone have a clue as to which I should use?

Also, as you can see, I'm not incredibly versed in hardware, so I need to ask you guys this. I'm having second thoughts about not ordering a BR player instead of DVD w/ my unit. Are there any aftermarket BR players of decent quality that would fit my unit or does Dell sell them?

 

what OS are you using? you shouldn't need to manually download your dvd driver in windows 7

 

Those are not drivers, they're firmware upgrades for the drives. Your unit probably doesn't need a firmware upgrade. That's why there isn't one there.
-joe-

 

Thanks guys.

 

Just as a point of curiosity, does anyone know how the new HP dv6tqe FHD 1080 screen compares to the l502x quality wise/visually? I see they just had a nice coupon combo with a similarly speced system for that HP model, undercutting the price I paid for my l502x by a couple hundred bucks (and of course with a slightly better gpu + blu-ray). I think I'm having some buyer's remorse so someone needs to set be back on the right track!

 

It seems I was barking up the wrong tree with my assumptions here. It turns out it is a vsync problem rather than shaders. When my system runs over 60 fps constantly in game w/ vsync it produces a a stutter, quickly going back and forth b/t 59 and 60 fps according to fraps. Does this sound like a problem with the l502x hardware/drivers or a game coding ssue?

 

My temps dropped 15 on the CPU after repasting with ic7 . 95 to 78-80

 

Hi,
I want to buy an XPS l502x with i7 and 540M. The question is how can I be sure that the display is B+RGLED? Is it marked somehow on the box or elsewere? Maybe in the specs code...
Could anyone post here the exact code of the model with B+RGLED display.
Thanks

 

Is it from a retail store? most likely the mediocre 720p screen, but that's not 100% certain.

If you can see the entire list of cryptic order-page specs, do you see "15.6HD TLF WLED" or something similar in there? If so then it's going to have the bad screen and won't be worth buying. You would see something relating to B+RGLED or at least "FHD" rather than "HDF" if it had the good screen.

 

It s a retail store.
That's what they say
"1920x1080 WXGA++"

or just

"15.6(1920x1080)" with no reference to B+RGLED...

I checked dell's website - it seems like the only 1920x1080 display available is B+RGLED. Doesn't it mean that if the display is marked 1920x1080 it is automatically B+RGLED?

 

It's funny. I'm having second thoughts about having gotten a blu ray player in mine. A hundred dollar upgrade is a lot for something that reads, but won't burn, blu rays. If I were you, I'd buy an external drive with a burner, so I could rip and burn disks, or just copy them to my HD.

As for your comment about whether you should have bought a HP-- I think the XPS is a very sexy machine and almost certainly has better speakers and a nicer screen. HP has among the lowest customer satisfaction scores. I wouldn't sweat it.

 

i honestly think the speakers are way underrated compared to the screen. The screen gets talked about the most but the speakers are more impressive compared to other laptops

 

I feel better already! Coincidentally, a friend of mine bought an Envy 17" a few weeks ago and it has already had a defect with the display and a motherboard failure.

The speakers are definitely great. I use them often when I don't have my laptop docked and sometimes forget they are laptop speakers.

 

I just swapped out the 500GB HDD for an OCZ Vertex 3. I'm very happy with it, but here are some probably obvious pointers:

Remove the CMOS battery during the install process, or at least before you boot for the first time. The OCZ forums mention this, but not the manual that comes with the drive. I didn't, and didn't have any major problems, but my Windows Experience Index never changed form the 5.9 from the HDD.
When I repasted the heatsinks, I did remove the battery and let it sit while I repasted. When I reran the WEI, the Drive score jumped to a 7.9. Other than that, the clean install was painless. Just use the recommened order posted somewhere else in this forum (post #735 or near there.)
Check out your SSD manufactur's forums for tips on getting your SSD up and running properly. OCZ's forum has a sticky called something like "The ABCs of SSDs" that I found usefull.

 

I just repasted my heatsink. What a pain in the butt. The Dell service manual doesn't mention removing the optical drive, and I was having trouble getting that one little screw out that holds it in place. I almost stripped the phillips head slots on the screw. The original paste didn't look as bad as someone else's who posted here a while ago, but it was on the heavy side.

Make sure you have a new, sharp #1 Phillips screwdriver available! (magnetic is best, as some of the screws are in little wells.)

Just like the palmrest, the two halves of the computer are hard to separate.

I wanted to lap the heatsink surfaces, but the copper parts ( the parts that actually touch the procs) are embedded in an aluminum surround, so you can't get a nice, flat lapping because the copper heatsinks are lower than the aluminum. Bummer.

But I didn't have any extra parts, and the computer still works! Unfortunately, I didn't benchmark the CPU and GPU temps since I got to Iraq, and the environment in my CHU is significantly different than it was back home. Now my air conditioner blows right onto my computer, so it stays cool anyway.

 

I was thinking about re-pasting some of my gpu/cpu components, as I subject it to a lot of heat when I game (I'm look at you BFBC2). I haven't checked my temperatures yet (going to get around to it today), but as someone who has never re-pasted laptop components before, is it worth it to fiddle around with opening this model to get a few degrees less resistance heat?

 

That's a tough call, Jest. I wouldn't have done the repasting alone, without another reason to go into the computer. Since I was also swapping out the HDD, once I had the Palmrest off, the rest wasn't too bad (except for the optical drive screw almost stripping.) In fact, since my unit lives on a desk, I haven't even snapped the palmrest back down yet. If something goes wrong with the SSD, I don't want to have to deal with getting the Palmrest off again.

My idle temps are now 34-39 deg. C. (with the AC blowing over the top of the unit, so, yes, I'm cheating)

 

i decided to change thermal paste on the next day after my purchase, cause i've spent the first doing benchmarks and OC) yeah, that was a pain in the to get to the heatsink (not so easy as with Sager i owned before)! but it was worth it... the next few things to change is HDD to SSD, IBM 12.7mm SATA 2nd HDD Caddy Bay, 1866Mhz Ram and of course my stock 1366x768 screen to FullHD one)

 

the original paste were dry as hell. I put my finger on it and it wouldn't even rub off.

 

After a clean install, adding only Skype, Power DVD 9.6, Sound Blaster X-Fi MB, and NOT installing Dell Diagnostics Distrobution Package, but installing all the other drivers and utilities, Task Manager is showing 65 Processes, verses the 90 processes right out of the box.

 

Just put in an order for one a few minutes ago. Anyone know how set the build date really is? Anyone get theirs before the estimated date?

If I would sell the BD drive that it comes with, would that void the warranty at all if I would have to send it in sometime? And is the HDD easy to get to?

Attatched is what I got.

 

^^ Just ordered one as well! This is going to be my first laptop and I'm quite ecstatic.

Here's what I got:

 

We got the same thing aside from the wifi card.

I have a two year old ASUS with a T6400 and 9300m GS. It did ok with gaming, but not really worth trying with newer games. This should be a nice upgrade for sure.

This makes three Sandy Bridge quads that I have now lol (one in my daily gamer, and one in my HTPC).


Ordered a Samsung external DVD-RW and Microsoft Sidewinder X8 for it, $75 shipped for both on newegg.

 

If anyone needs it, here are deals for single 4Gb 1333 ram for $33, or 8Gb for $66.
Super Talent 8GB DDR3 SO-DIMM Laptop RAM Kit for $66 + free shipping, more

 

I got mine two weeks before the estimated delivery date was a nice surprise. The HDD seems to be a bit of a pain to get at. I had to do it tonight under the worst of cicumstances; my hard drive failed on me (reinstalling it didn't work). The whole damned Palm rest has to come off as previously mentioned and it is in pretty tight quarters.
Dell tech support was great however, in fact I didn't even have to call them and settled the matter in a 15 min chat session. 2-3 days and I'll have a tech at my door. Hands down the most painless tech suPport session i've ever had. Maybe i can convince him/her to repaste my internals while they're in there! I'm hoping a transition to SSD memory picks up the pace and brings the price down soon.

 

I got through the clean OS install and reinstalling all drivers (big thanks to Rogo for this post . I haven't done any windows updates or installed any software yet, but attached is a look at what my startup looks like from msconfig. When installing drivers, I did the complete software installs instead of using the device manager to just install the drivers as Malifiss suggested here. Wondering if that was a good idea now and if anything can be removed? Is there anything that can be removed either completely or just disabled at startup? I'll probalby remove the Turbo Boost monitor since I use the cpu meter widget anyways and may also uninstall the my wifi software. But not sure what else can be removed. Thanks in advance!

 

Omg I havn't been here for a while...hows everyone's XPS 15 doing?!!?!?!

 

My xps 15 L502x got shipped yesterday !!!!!!!!!!

Can't wait to get it in my hands !!!

Need to download windows 7 for a clean install, buy a new mouse and a carrying case!

For the info, my laptop was supposed to ship this friday but shipped 4 days earlier so yea... I'm satisfied!

 

Forgive my ignorance-- I've not heard of the brand. Is there much difference? Tried to look up reviews on Newegg and didn't see it. Also, is it so incredibly easy to swap RAM on these that even a bonehead can do it?

 

Ram is ram, all the companies do is pick what ICs and PCB to use. So all Corsair, OCZ, Gskill, etc... is, is another companies ICs (Micron, Samsung, Elpida, etc...) on a PCB they choose.

Super Talent is more focused on selling to OEMs and servers, so they arent really on newegg much anymore. But its good ram non the less.


Though newegg has an 8gb set of Gskill for sale now for $65,
Newegg.com - G.SKILL 8GB (2 x 4GB) 204-Pin DDR3 SO-DIMM DDR3 1333 (PC3 10666) Laptop Memory Model F3-10666CL9D-8GBSQ

 

Just received mine in the mail yesterday. Very happy with it as compared to the SXPS16, except Dell "forgot" to load some included and some paid for software on it. So far I'm missing the facial recognition, sound blaster X-Fi, Dell support center, Skype and the DSO software.

 

Ahh, thanks. I'll ask another stupid question: Is there a difference between PC3 10666 and PC3 10600? 'Cause I thought the XPS took the latter kind. Also, I read that it's best to have the same kind/brand of memory in both slots, but perhaps that's overstated too.

 

Hmm. Well, on all the internet forums people are saying there's no difference between 10600 and 10666, so I'm going to take STM Audi's good word for it. Thanks sir.

 

Is the Creative X-Fi sound card ($20 or $40 premium) worth it? Or does it muddle up the clear sound of the normal speakers?

 

Nope, no difference. Take the rate, and devide it by 8 to get the effective speed. Its 1325 vs 1333, which doesnt matter cause its the BIOS and platform that picks the speed. Which is 1333 on these. Hope a BIOS update comes out soon to allow at least 1600.

From my understanding, the only audio "upgrade" is for software. The X-Fi sound card is already in there.

 

Hey does anyone in here have the ability to get into the quickset program and change the presets for the Fn keys, to F1 - F6 as function key first and F7 - F12 as media keys first?
Or how would you even start to try and do this?

 

Do you think you could maybe post some side-by-side photos of the XPS 15's screen next to your SXPS16's screen, with similar things onscreen? I've wondered exactly how the B+RGLED screen compares to a true RGBLED screen, and if there's a very noticeable difference.

 

YouTube - ‪Dell XPS 15 L501x vs Studio XPS 1645 comparing HD video, sound & battery‬‏

The XPS 15 seems to have noticably better blacks.

 

That's the SXPS 16 with the WLED screen. grimreefer's SXPS16 has the RGBLED screen.

 

I'm wondering whether to purchase this bag -

Catch Of The Day - One Deal, Everyday, Midday

I like the price-point and product, but I'm unsure whether it will be suitable for my XPS 15. The manufacturer suggests device compatibility dimensions, but I'm unsure how flexible they are (sometimes there is additional padding which can expand). Does anyone own this Targus bag (or a similar brand and sizr Hughes bag). Will it cater for the XPS 15's thickness (with the 9-cell)?

Thanks in advance

 

I don't think thats an actual option from what I know. Someone suggested voting for that on some wish list.