Dell XPS 15 R2 - L502x - Owners Lounge

thanks destefpr =D
Guys do i need to set up a backup they keep prompting me too?
is the back up like dells factory restore? or all my existing files? really confuse as my previous dell came with a D drive partition for fac recovery.
And I already see a restore your entire system to factory state in dell data safe why would i need this set up a backup by windows. or will the factory state disappear over time and become previous date?

Also my hard disk has 385/446 GB and I haven't really installed much.. if i rmb correctly came with abut 400-395 GB. Is this normal? to have so much space or already used?

 

With the i5's, you get a better bang-for-buck ratio, they are best value. As for the quadcore's, this one seems to be best value.

I'd get the least amount of ram possible, and buy it separately. Dell lets you pay triple or more for these kinds of extras.

Wouldn't get it without that.

Pointless, it's the same core as the 525, which will overclock to 540 speeds should you need that. The double VRAM on the card won't make any difference.

I think the i7 QM isn't much different heatwise from the i5 2410 (which I have here in a latitude). Put them to the test, and you will hear the fan running and feel the heat coming out of the side, but other than that it runs pretty cool when surfing and doing office stuff.
The backlit KB is very nice. What helps here (on the Dutch Dell website) is to add &vw=classic at the end of the weblink, it shows us a few more customizable options, including the backlit keyboard. If you don't see it, call dell to place the order, they can add it for you. It's a nifty feature.
Optimus works great. The nVidia card is powered down when not used, and when it is used, it seamlessly integrates with the onboard video. Haven't found any glitch there yet. Also seems to be no difference in decoding HD video using either the intel HD3000 or the nVidia card, but for 3D games the nVidia power is a must.

Anything else to consider is whether or not you need the DVD/RW drive. If not, you could take that out and put in a caddy with an SSD to speed up things even more. Oh, and you may want a sleeve or bag to put it in if you're going to carry it around.

 

Appel, thanks for the info. I was considering the i7 only because, after configuring the above, it came out to the same price I paid for the Vaio. Same price, i7 over i5. 6gb ram was included with the XPS, couldn't even go for 4gb lol. Same with the 2gb card. Maybe I didn't see the other configurations on the site. I have an SSD on here already, with a platter HDD in the optical bay

 

thanks for the reply...
by the sound of he woofer i mean that the speaker really showed that its flawed but after that i ran the speakers for around 4 hours and nothing happened so i am relieved.
as for the overclocking part i am concerned that the laptop gets REAL HOT even under light load so what will happen if i overclock it and wouldn't it be better to use MSI afterburner ???
and can you tell me why is the nvidia gt 550m slower than amd radeon hd 6750m in running crysis 2 as both are ranked together on notebookcheck????

 

thanks for the reply...
by the sound of he woofer i mean that the speaker really showed that its flawed but after that i ran the speakers for around 4 hours and nothing happened so i am relieved.
as for the overclocking part i am concerned that the laptop gets REAL HOT even under light load so what will happen if i overclock it and wouldn't it be better to use MSI afterburner ???
and can you tell me why is the nvidia gt 550m slower than amd radeon hd 6750m in running crysis 2 as both are ranked together on notebookcheck????

 

The graphics card is not user replaceable, overclocking is madness. I overclock desktop systems, but no way would I overclock a laptop that already gets hot!

 

by the brrr sound i mean that the speaker was really flawed (atleast that appeared at first) but after 4 hours of continuous music i was relieved that no such problem exists and you are right i am using Win7 SP1 and WMP and i did the DPC latency check and my score went to 4600 maximum .???.
and there is one more problem i want to discuss with you : no application is occupying the full space on the screen on the laptop every app leaves a 1cm line empty at the top of the screen and i don't understand why??? help???
thanks for the reply...

 

It ships with an SSD?

Most I hear just get the cheap HDD and put it in themselves.

 

10 characters.

 

Question: what temperatures should I be aiming for, and has anyone come up with a reliable way to control the fan? I don't have that whole fan cycling problem (or at least don't notice/care), but when I open speedfan (which i have yet to be able to control the fan with), I see flames and high 50's - mid 60's temps. I'm plugged in usually, so I was wondering if there was a way to make the fan more aggressive.

 

I don't expect it to be very cool, but I'm just worried about overheating issues. Nothing like that with the XPS so far?

 

I wouldn't call mine "overheated", I'd just like to satisfy my paranoia/want to keep this laptop for a few years and tell the fan to be a little less conservative. It does get a little hot on the bottom, like more so than it used to but I think that's because the summer wearing on means the air around the laptop is a little warmer than usual. Have I seen anything that would say "laptop heatstroke" like visual artifacts, random shutdowns...no. Its normal temperature is a bit warm for my liking but under stress that fan can really move some air.

 

1. No issues with heat, although with gaming it does get hot naturally.
2. You can get a backlit keyboard and it is well worth getting!
3. Unlike AMD's pos drivers, Optimus from nVidia actually works. No issues with games, so long as you update from nVidia's site. Couple that with great compatibility and physx, nVidia is far superior in every way to an AMD card.

 

Hi, I recently bought the XPS 15 L502X. The Laptop was working great, but after two days from receving the laptop, I turned on the laptop and was about to go on the internet, when suddenly the laptop screen started showing a blue tint and all the colours looked like they were in 16 bit. Anything that should be black on the screen is showing as blue. After this happened, I immediately shut down the computer. When I turned the computer on again, the problem went away. However, after 3 days the problem returned and since then problem hasn't gone away. The issue occurs in Windows 7 and when the computer is starting up. I have renstalled the video card driver and updated the bios but that hasn't fixed the problem. I connected the laptop to a external monitor and everything was normal on the external monitor. If I move the laptop around, the screen sometimes goes back to normal for about a second or two. Can someone please help me? Thanks!

Below are pictures of my laptop screen:

 

always scary to be in a "something changes if I shake it" situation since that's usually a physical problem rather than a software one. Have you tried using just the nvida card?

 

Delightful laptop, considering I was on a budget, very happy with the spec.

i5
720p
640GB hdd
4GB ram
525m
Backlit keyboard

all in for £400. Which compared to other £400 laptops of today is bloody marvellous. Of course it would be lovely to go 540m and 1080p, but that slaps £200 onto the price tag.

Build feels solid, just like my old m1530 and the sound quality is surprising.

One question:

Where is the best place to pick up drivers for the 525m? I remember going to laptopdrivers2go ages ago but the site does not appear to be as easy to read as it used to be. Can't tell what I'm grabbing there.

 

Hi, Yes I have tried using just the Nvidia graphics card, but I still have the same problem. I connected the Laptop to a external monitor and everything shows up properly on the external monitor. I am starting to think my laptop screen has gone bad.

 

Most likely. the shaking bit makes me think it would be worth a try to take a look at the connection between the display and mobo (i have 0 experience with that sort of thing but it's the next logical step before getting it replaced.) I had an old laptop whose wifi card was poorly seated - it would drop out until i restarted whenever it got shaken a little too much. I opened it up, gave it a nice, firm pop back into its slot and it was fixed

 

ok that annoying gap at the top between the browser window and the top of the screen. What is up with that? How to fix it? I plan on doing a clean reinstall of windows this weekend. Will that help? thanks.

 

It's the toaster.exe file in Dell Data Safe bloatware. I haven't heard of a fix except to disable or remove it.

 

Was told by dell tonight, after 1.5 hrs on support chat , that they have a fix coming this month for it. Also, I thought we could d/l and burn win 7 as they don't give us the CD. They told me no. Kinda pissed at that as I want this bloatware gone asap.

 

@gtrain
Temporary, just stop SoftThink Agent Service in service
Disable it thru msconfig-->Services tab--> SoftThink Agent Service--> Untick
Hopefully helping

 

this worked for me haven had that prob since

 

=/ I cant access dell smartsource. keep getting this error: An Application error has occurred. Please contact customer support if this problem persists.

 

Just got my xps15, anything I should do? Except for remove bloatware and all that?

 

Sorted the driver, went on the laptopvideo2go forum instead. My business application graphics have gone DOWN funnily!
3D gaming is up, I’m sure, to 6.6. Will be playing Mass Effect 2 at lunch

 

hey guys i'm having problem with my duplicate screen =/.. when i go to nvidia it shows 3 screens.. when im only connected to 2.. How do i run both screens on nvidia? instead of lappy screen on intel and tv on nvidia..

 

I got mine yesterday and had the missing space at the top. Thanks to this forum it's fixed. I disabled the service that was responsible.

My other problem is that when I try to upgrade the Intel HD 3000 graphics with the download from Intels web site, I get an error and it won't install. I've tried safe mode and everything else I can think of. Anyone else have this problem?

 

____bump____

 

Hi,

Can anyone tell me the battery life with the 9 cell for:

Idle
Surfing with WLAN
Load

Thanks.

 

This should do it:
(Original Quote from my post in the xps-forum.de)

Kinda translated:
Hardwaremanager->right click HD Graphics fam.->Settings->new driver->Search on my pc->(DONT Choose the subdir) bit instead choose "choose from a list of drivers"->Have disk and then navigate to your downloaded driver dir.

i HOPE that is the translated Version of Windows I never worked an an english Windows.

MFG Jubeltrubel

 

Just got a Kingstone Ultimate G2 USB 3.0 stick, it is crazy fast and recommended! It transferred a 1GB iso to the stick @ over 60 mb/s!


image upload

 

I have a couple questions about my xps 15 that I just got yesterday. 1. What should I do first upon setting it up? 2. My hard drive is 750GB but when I look at my C drive, it says I have 645GB available out of 649GB. Is this normal? 3. Do I use the driver disk that was included with my Xps to
update the drivers or should I get them offline? 4. Is there anything else you guys would reccommend?

 

Only driver you should bother updating is the wireless and the gpu. Rest of them is on a "if it works, don't fix" basis. As to the HDD I recommend you partition it for 150GB for windows and the rest for everything else. Then move your documents / music / pictures / videos / downloads to the second partition. Doing this will mean you can reinstall at will only have to put the apps back on.

 

No that does not work!!

 

The system recovery will most likely restore Windows to its state when the recovery was made, so that would be including the crapware. And yes, you will also get the drivers that were on the machine at that time too.

If you really want it clean, I suggest using a Windows install disc. You can either download one with the dell OEM license on it, or use a generic one and install the Dell license certificate and product key manually, that's very easy, and legit since you paid for the license to use the software anyway.

 

Do you have some links where I can download the updates from?

 

I got only 2 hours just by browsing the Internet before I found a fix for my fan cycling problem (disable any sidebar gadgets that monitor CPU/memory levels -- I know that sounds random, but it works). After that, I have not actually run the battery down, but the battery meter indicates about 8 hours with the 9-cell battery at 100%, but after several minutes it constantly jumps around 1-2 hours at a time. I am estimating that I would get about 6 hours of normal use on power saver mode, and 1-2 hours of gaming on high performance mode. Also, I have heard people say that they can get 2 more hours of use after running a 2-hour Blu-ray movie.

 

What is a good anti glare screen protector for this laptop? I am looking for an anti glare screen protector that won't ruin the quality of the pictures and fits perfectly.

Just curious what does the R2 in "Dell XPS 15 R2" stand for?

 

Here is the reason I do not like screen protectors: anything you put over a screen is going to make it appear less sharp because light emitted from the screen is filtered through yet another layer. Also, there is a huge risk of trapping one or more air bubbles underneath the screen protector, which can get annoying to look at.

R2 stands for Revision 2, although it is not technically part of the name of the model. L502X is more precise.

 

Just wondering if I do a clean install.. where do I find the waves thingy? is it this driver Realtek ALC665 Audio, v.6.0.1.6312?

 

Yeah, the wavemaxx audio is built into the driver, but the realtek original driver may not have it, better download it from dell...

Or you can copy the audio driver directly from C:\drivers before formatting/clean install, as that folders usually contain most driver required.

CMIIW

 

I would also advise to steer clear of anti glare foil, especially if you have the full HD panel in your machine. As it also scatters the light coming from the display, it will make it look blurry and you lose a lot of sharpness. If reflections are bothering you, just turn up the brightness.

I've read one review of a person trying such a foil on the XPS 15 with a full HD panel, and he removed it within minutes after putting it on because of the poor display quality as a result. I've had similar experience with a smaller (7") display and it's anti glare layer - image quality improved dramatically after removing it.

 

Photodon is an online store which deals with stuff like this. They had an anti glare sample you could buy-- five bucks for 4 or 5 little squares you could slap on your screen to test. They have one, and I don't remember all the names now, that was supposed to cut glare a moderate 25% (unlike the 60% or so that the heavy-duty anti glare films do.) It was very thin and I really couldn't detect any increased grain or degradation of image. So I decided that this would be the anti-glare film I'd buy if I bought one. Go to the Photodon store and look at the various options and you'll see which one I'm talking about.

However, I should add-- after having the computer for a few weeks my ambition to get anti-glare faded. I'm OK with the gloss. Not really worth the 25 bucks or so, in my case.

 

Can anyone help me with this. Basically I have the older L501X with a 1080p screen and im considering upgrading to a L502x but what I wondered if anyone knew was possible would be to buy a L502x with the standard 1366x768 screen and transfer the 1080p screen from the L501x to it and put the 1366x768 screen in the older L501x?


Any ideas if this is possible?

Codman

 

I'm inclined to think that should work just fine. Very little design changes were made, and the panels used are most likely very similar if not the same. You'll need to swap out the display cable as well, as the HD panel has a superior cable to the regular one.

I'm curious however why you should want this. Is the sandy bridge and the chiclet (backlit) keyboard so much more appealing?

 

@Appelsap, No its not only about the speed increase but my dad is after a new laptop and likes mine so Im thinking id get the new one and he could have mine, really. Im not sure we get the backlit keyboard as standard in the UK anyway.

Thanks for you help though.

Codman

 

Hi, been browsing this thread for a couple days and just ordered my XPS-15.
Hopefully the processor upgrade will help speed up the transfer and processing of large RAW files.
Here's the specs,

Processor: Intel Core i7 2720QM" 2.2GHz (3.3GHz Turbo Mode, 6MB Cache)
8 GB DDR3 SDRAM 1333MHz (2 DIMMs)
750 GB SATA Hard Drive (7200 RPM)
Blu-ray Disc Combo (DVD+/-RW + BD-ROM)
NVIDIA GeForce GT 540m 2GB graphics
15.6 inch FHD (1080p) B+RGLED Display with 2.0 MP webcam
Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium
Microsoft Office Starter
6 Cell Primary Battery
Internal Backlit Keyboard - English

 

Damn. I totally forgot I registered 5 years ago, thought my previous post was my first... It even let me register as a new user.... Weird!

Anyway my old P-30 still works great except the power plug is intermittent and causing it to randomly shut down, gonna operate on it and hopefully save it.

 

Hey guys, I was watching a music video on youtube on my new L502x, and it looked and sounded great, except for one problem. Every few seconds, the audio would sorta freeze and make a loud kinda buzzer noise. What's up with that?

I got the exact same specs. I love it!