New XPS M1530 - heat; audio jack line noise; docking station?

Just got my XPS M1530 and am generally pleased. I have three issues though:

(1) Heat is generally not a problem...except for when I play games. Then the left palmrest gets extremely hot. This happens almost right away, a few minutes into the gaming session. If it were the right palmrest, it would be no big deal, since I use a mouse with my right hand, but of course it's right under the WASD keys, which are most often used in gaming. Is this unusual? Is there a fix? I guess one solution would be to get a notebook cooler, but I'd prefer to avoid that since it really kills the portability of the notebook.

(2) I'm getting line noise from the audio jack. It's loud enough to be noticeable, but not so loud that it's driving me crazy. If there's some way to reduce the noise, I'm all ears (haha)!

(3) One way to approach the heat problem would be to hook the notebook up to a docking station, but apparently there's no Dell brand docking station for the 1530. I've searched around and the third party solutions (Belkin, Kensington, Targus) just get slammed in customer reviews. Am I missing something? This is supposed to be Dell's elite notebook, but there's no satisfactory docking solution? Seems odd.

Any help with the above would be highly appreciated. Thanks.

 

There is no docking station for the xps from dell. You will need to get either a latitude or precision computer for that. The third party ones are terrible and nothing like what dell delivers.

 

Keep in mind this is Dell's CONSUMER line of notebooks, not their Business line and that is why there isn't a specific dock for the m1530. The demand isn't there like it is from the Enterprise market.

 

Ok, so no docking station. I guess I can always make do with a USB hub and a HDMI cable.

Any advice on the heat/line noise issues? The line noise I can live with, but the heat is a little out of control.

 

Isn't the hard drive under the left palm rest?

 

Yep, the left palm rest houses the hard drive. Mine barely gets warm during the heaviest gaming sessions, so I'd say your solution is to switch out the hard drive to something that runs cooler.

I'm running the 200gb 7200rpm Hitachi drive, very happy with the temperature.

Laptop coolers are a waste of time, space, and money IMO - this laptop in particular has an excellent cooling solution which renders such devices virtually useless. I'm running my system fairly well overclocked and heat is still not an issue. Same story for docking stations. Like you said it ruins the portability and again a waste of money.

As for the audio jack noise, I don't have a solution for that. It's only really noticeable with earbuds, external speakers don't really seem to pick it up that much (no more than any other laptop I've owned anyway). I did notice the left jack has less noise than the middle one, but you're probably using the left anyway.

 

Ummmm, notebook coolers are not even close to a waste of time/money/space. I am not even going to finish this part, I cannot believe I just read that.

Look into Undervolting to help with heat. It may not help with your situation, but it will help keeping the CPU cooler underload. There is a great How-To in the hardware forum.

And the line noise could be a number of things. From bad grounding, to bad headphones, to a badjack. But I could have sworn I have read about this problem before on this model. And someone here came up with a fix.

 

I've decided to live with the line noise. As for heat, I don't know that undervolting would help if it's the hard drive that's my problem. I have the Samsung 320GB 5400 RPM drive, model no. HM320JI.

I'm intrigued by the Thermaltake iXoft notebook cooler. It gets pretty good reviews. Anyone had any success with this on their XPS M1530?

 

Well at least TRY the undervolting, it is free, easy, and did I mention free?

Everything is on the left hand side of the computer, the CPU/GPU/HD etc.... I have noticed that my entire computer is cooler after undervolting and gaming for a few hours.

Oh and I have a 320 WD hd.