Dell Studio 1555

I ran that and it said that my wireless card wasn't in power saving mode. Any idea where to find this setting? Looked all over the place - googled and searched, and haven't been able to locate it.

 

Thanks for the responses. I found a download for it on the dell drivers and downloads page, but I think it might just be a patch. I will probably try to save it on a disk when the time comes, it'll just be up to chance whether I can restore or if it even works with Windows 7 anyway.

 

does anyone know how to shrink, expand or combine the recovery partition with my main partition? ive tried numerous times with paragon partition manager and it always gives me an error about cross-linked files even when i first formatted it.

 

Hello everyone - LTRFTW!

I'm thinking of buying my mother a Studio 1555 (with ATI graphics card) 15" laptop in its basic configuration with a T4200 processor, 4GB RAM, 320 HDD.

I was wondering if any of you had bought this with the T4200 and what your thoughts are on its performance? I know my mum wont be playing Crysis or anything - I just really want to get her something that's really competent at media playback (e.g. iplayer, DVDs, music, other internet content) and that doesn't stutter all over the place and scare her to bits - she's a total computer virgin but I want to get her something to keep her mind active and interested with her impending retirement.

So yeah basically does anyone feel this computer is suitable for this profile?

Thanks for reading.

 

If she is not gaming or using 3D applications then I'd probably say save yourself the cash from the GPU and get the intel 4500 GPU instead. It will be plenty for watching DVDs, music etc.

 

Hello Fragilexx,

Thanks for your reply. Do you think the 4500 is up to 720p and outputting on TV? I suppose the 4500 would have a bonus effect on battery too.

Thank you.

 

Really? for me and my acer aspire, i get 2 2x the battery life with windows seven than i do vista (dual boot partitions). Also I noticed that my my computer runs way hotter under vista and not so hot on win7.. Under vista it gets so hot, it shuts it self off in the middle of what ever im doing..


On a better note... My Dell 1555 comes today.. never been excited to go to work..

 

I cant say first hand that the t4200 is good/bad but i can say that my t3400 (one step under) on my acer laptop ran perfectly fine and especially for those who arent gonna do any crazy intensive stuff.

However as far as benchmarks go the 50$ upgrade to the t6500 shows the biggest jump in perfromace as compared to price..

Our default configs for work were the t4200 but i upgraded to the t6500. but all who recieved them are happy with it.

 

Hello Justinhub,

Thanks for your reply also. I'm in the UK so the upgrade runs me a little more than $50... I was hoping that the cheaper combination of the 1555 with ati, 4gb ram but lower spec processor would equivalize to the base model with a processor upgrade (slightly more expensive, perversely!)

Thanks for your input.

 

If you double click the battery icon in the task tray and adjust power properties you can change the properties of your current power plan. Do this and select advanced settings. There should be a menu of options you can change down the left and wireless card is one of them. You can select from a few settings such as no power saving, minimal and maximum power saving. I don't have the laptop in front of me at the moment but I think that is the navigation. If you go into the properties of the wireless card in Device manager, I think there is an option there to enable power saving too - I can confirm that when I'm back at my laptop this evening. Let me know how you get on.

 

The T4200 without a discrete GPU will be fine for watching movies, using iPlayer, listening to music and browsing the net.

 

Is there an easy way to configure the F keys so that you don't have to press Fn first to use them? Like, you would press Fn if you wanted to alter the brightness or change the volume, but F1, etc. work as normal?

I googled it a few times but I was finding different solutions for different laptops, and some of them seemed to involve installing extra software. I'm thinking there has to be something really simple I'm missing.

 

I believe you can change this setting in the BIOS.

This was my one concern should I choose the 1555 -- I use F5 often for browser page refresh. I did read however that you could modify the default settings for those key in the BIOS -- no additional software required.

EDIT to add...

from the 1555 support docs found here....
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/studio1555/en/SG/H101KA00MR.pdf

Media Controls
The media controls are located on the keyboard.
These keys control CD, DVD, and media
playback.
You can toggle between Multimedia key First
and Function Key First in BIOS setup under
Function Key Behavior.

Multimedia Key First – This is the default option.
Press any multimedia key directly. For function
key, press <Fn> + the required function key.

Function Key First – Press any function key
directly. For multimedia key, press <Fn> + the
required multimedia key.

NOTE: Multimedia Key First option is active
only in the operating system. During POST,
press <F2> or <F12> directly.

 

You can also change this in the latest version of Quickset, at least the Windows 7 version. Not sure if you can under Vista seeing that I can't test that as I went all out and use Windows 7 as my sole OS for all of my machines.

 

I know folks have issues with intel IGPs, but the 4500MHD is spec'd for both 1080p and blu-ray playback, so 720p should be no problem.

http://www.intel.com/cd/products/services/emea/eng/chipsets/398562.htm

I have an two year old Dell XPS m1330 with x3100 graphics, and its perfectly fine with 720p content. I am currently using the Windows 7 RC with some very recent Intel drivers for the Intel GM965 and its x3100 graphics with no issues at all. I do update my IGP drivers often as Intel tends to improve them over time.

The 4500MHD graphics IGP significantly outperforms the older x3100 generation.

Perhaps consider spend for a higher performing CPU instead (I think HD decoding runs on the CPU primarily anyway).

 

Thanks again Fragilexx.

Out of interest do you know when the 1555 will likely be updated, think this one has been round for a few months now? Also, do you know if Dell will have any deals on the studio laptops (beyond what they currently have) over the next couple of weeks? They seem to have different deals on each week esp. with the back to university crowd?

Thanks.

 

The Studio 15 will not be refreshed for quite some time, if they do it again. This is already the third rendition of the laptop, going from the original 1535 (Intel Santa Rosa platform), which was updated just a couple months later to the Intel Montevina platform, aka the Studio 1537. And just a few months ago they released the current 1555.

If anything, they're probably going to update the Studio 17, as it hasn't really been updated at all since they went from the 1735 to the 1737, well over a year ago by now.

 

when will the windows 7 drivers for 1555 go on dells site?

 

Ask Dell; they are the only ones who can answer that.

The Inspiron 1545 drivers are on there already - well some of them are.

 

Thats the one

 

A quick question - does anyone know if the Dell audio driver is required to have the subwoofer function? I don't have it installed and haven't noticed much in the way of even decent midrange sound from the 1555.

 

YESS.. my 1555 is finally here...

Im at work so I havent even started it up but I did open it and man am I glad I got the Edge to edge display.. it just looks beautiful compared to a co-worker who ordered the non edge to edge.. midnight blue isnt bad at all looking but i do wish they offered edge to edge in black chank link. ohh well.. cant wait to fire this thing up..

 

The subwoofer should work anyway.

To make sure, start playing some sound (music, movie, whatever), and lift the laptop up so you can see underneath. Put your ear up to the subwoofer grill, which is the small square grill under the right side of the palmrest.

 

Windows 7 64-bit drivers for 1555 is available at the website ..

 

need 32bit drivers

i know you can use vistas 32bit if im correct?

 

Patience is a virtue.

The ability to wait for something without excessive frustration is a valuable character trait. The proverb has been traced back to 'Piers Plowman' (1377) by William Langland and is similar to the Latin, Maxima enim..patientia virtus (Patience is the greatest virtue)

Give Dell time, it took them a week or so to put any Studio drivers up in comparison to the Inspiron drivers, they'll get there in the end - hopefully before the launch in October.

 

Just a heads up. Anyone having the Caps Lock Quickset pop up icon not working problem and who is also running Vista64, can download the Win7-64 version of Quickset and use it. Something Fragilexx posted a few post back gave me the idea to try it. My Caps Lock popup and tray icon are now working like they should.


VVarwick

 

I used to think most dells are made in Malaysia or Ireland, mine was made in china though. I got mine on saturday .. Photos here ... Details in signature http://picasaweb.google.com/hdplus.hdplus

 

Yes most Dells are made in their factory in Penang, Malaysia. What gives you the impression it was specifically made in China?

 

Does anyone know if this laptop will support a 12.5mm high hard drive instead of the 9mm high one it comes with? I'm thinking of throwing a 1tb or 750gb Western Digital Scorpio Blue in mine, but I'm not sure if the form factor will fit. Either that or the Scorpio Black, I'm not sure which one i want yet. How much of an improvement in speed would a Scorpio Black be over the Scorpio Blue that came with mine?

 

Thanks - found it. Now to see whether it actually extends battery life at all.

 

Indeed it isn't easy waiting but I think the years of using Amazon's slow-but-free delivery are helping!

I'm going to be installing Win7 straight away so which drivers will I need? I'm sure most of the Vista drivers will work fine but if there are Win7 drivers available, they will probably be better.

 

You wont need any, from the sounds of things all the Studio 15 drivers are found automatically by Windows 7.

You may need to re-install FastAccess (if you bought it with your machine), the Xfi software (again if you bought it), webcam central and quickset; but these are not essential.

 

I swapped the Scorpio Blue out for the faster Black version although I also upgraded from Vista to Win7 in the same move so I can't say how faster the Studio 1555 is but the Black was noticeably quicker on my previous laptop under XP - Mostly boot time and large file transfers. I would recommend the Black.

 

Maybe the label on the bottom of the laptop saying Made in China, as well as the label on the box?

 

Ah yes I forgot about their plant in Xiamen, China. The vast majority of Dell notebooks are made within that plant and the one in Penang, Malaysia.

This is different to desktops, where they tend to manufactured at different locations. Not sure if the Raheen plant is still operational, or that it's just a paper office now; but I do recall that Dell wanted to move all of the European manufacturing to Poland.

 

Can someone help me? My laptop (1555) hates wireless connections. I will connect to a network but it will only work as local, without internet. When I got the laptop we did get a wireless router for my home and my dad worked on it and eventually got it to work, but he also had access to all the settings. I can't even use free wifi because my computer doesn't work with them, and I can't ask my dad for help because I'm off to college. I'm wondering if anyone has some common things I can check/change that might get internet working!

 

These are my results from HD tune. My HDD is a 320gb 7200rpm 16mb cache Scorpio Black. Maybe you could post a capture of HDTUNE on your drive?

 

Hehehe...Dell should start paying me commissions. In the past few months, I've convinced no less than 8 friends and family members to buy the Studio 1555.

 

What about plastic around the screen? Is it collect fingerprints? Thanks

 

I have Windows Vista Home Premium in my 1555. I want to upgrade it to Windows 7 Professional in future. Is this possible without doing a clean install?

 

The upgrade paths are limited by version:-

Windows Vista Home Premium to Windows 7 Home Premium
Windows Vista Business to Windows 7 Professional
Windows Vista Ultimate to Windows 7 Ultimate

 

It is glossy and collects fingerprints if you touch it. It's pretty easy to clean, though; just wipe it down with a soft cloth.

 

Just moved into delivery preparation. I hope it doesn't take the full 8 days like it says it might do on the site!

You can purchase Windows 7 Home Premium and upgrade to that. Then you might be able to use Windows Anytime Upgrade to move onto Professional from there. I haven't tested it of course but that should work.

 

What about scratches? Before I had HP DV6 with glossy plastic, after I cleaned it with soft cloth I scratched it. (I meant many small scratches).


Thanks

 

Microfibre cloths are designed not to scratch like that; hence they are often used to clean spectacles (like I do).

 

After a few weeks of use I kinda hate my edge to edge display. The vertical streaks on the display from it pressing against the keyboard are a real downer. You pretty much need to wipe off the screen with a microfiber cloth every time you open it up.

Otherwise I am loving the system so far. Great machine.

 

I tried to look for the answer, but everyone is giving me different result.
Anyway, I want to buy a Studio 1555, but I am wondering does the HDMI output can support BOTH video (1080p) and audio (5.1) output? or just the video?

If it is just the video, how do I get the sound? Are there any way to solve this problem?

P.S.: does it worth to spend another $100 to upgrade the video card to 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570?

Thanks!!

 

I believe it does support video and audio by changing a setting in the Audio output options.

As for the video card, would be worth it for output of 1080p content.

(I am not sure on the audio bit but I believe it is that!)

 

Easy fix, put largish microfibre cloth in between keyboard and display when you close notebook.

Only if you intend to do any 3D work (design work) or gaming. Otherwise, not massively. Some HD content you might notice some stuttering with the Intel GPU, but most will be fine.

For me, it's worth the money.