General Dell FAQ Please read FIRST!

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With this FAQ I intend to give quick consice information in regards to the most commonly asked questions.
This is work in progress and any input from any one will be appreciated.


1) What model do I want?

Dell offers a complete line from ultra portable machines to hulking gaming destroyers, with everything in between and spanning a broad range of budgets.
If your looking to buy a new machine, you should always check here first. http://forum.notebookreview.com/forumdisplay.php?f=16

2) How much Ram do I need? Speed? Dual channel? Where to buy?

1GB is the bare minimum you want in a new modern machine. Right now 2GB is the sweet spot for both XP and Vista users. If all you intend to do is office tasks, surf the net, browse pictures and video, 1GB is all you need. If you are a gamer and or a heavy multi tasker, you need 2GB.

DDr 533 and 667 are presently equal in performance, 667 has a higher latency period nullifying the bus speed increase, there are lower latency modules appearing in the desktop market, however I havent seen any for laptops as of yet. I'll try and keep updated accordingly.

Dell overcharges for ram, you can typically find quality 2GB 667 kits from online vendors such as Newegg.com , Zipzoomfly.com and Tigerdirect.com for as low as 1/2 of what dell presently charges to go UP from 1GB to 2GB 667.

If you get a system with 2x512MB dimms, you can upgrade just 1 module to a 1GB and get 1.5 GB dual channel operation for all current Dell models using the intel 945 chipset, if you you mix DDR 533 and 667, both modules will run at 533.

3) What hard drive should I get? Will a 7200 RPM drive improve gameplay?

Your choice is between quicker load times vs. overall capacity. 7200 rpm drives spin faster thereby decreasing the time it takes to access data, the price for this is diminished capacity, 5400 rpm drives can be presently found at capacities up to 160GB, opposed to 100GB for 7200 rpm drives, 7200 rpm drives also consume slightly more power.. High end game play is uneffected by the drive speed, levels will load quicker, but gameplay will remain uneffected

4) What screen? Truelife/ultrasharp?

The screen resolutions break down as follows,

WXGA= 1280x800
WXGA+= 1440x900
WSXGA+= 1680x1050
WUXGA = 1920x1200

The higher the resolution, the more information can be displayed on the screen, for example, A M1210 with a 12.1" WXGA (1280x800) screen will display the exact same amount of inforamtion as an E1505 with the standard 15.4" wxga screen, images will be larger on the 15.4", but the amount of data is exactly the same. The higher res screens are ideal for viewing multiple windows on screen at one time, and very useful for photo and video editing.

The ONLY way to know what resoltion is right for you is to try the various types out, there are many posts by people getting the ultra high res screen, then complaining about text and images being too small , then they try and run in a lower resolution, which does make things larger, and blurrier, you should ALWAYS run windows at your native resolution, any lower and everything will distort. Gaming is is another story, often times you have to game at lower res as your hardware cant keep up, the screens scale very well for that and its a non issue.

Truelife= The glossy coating on the screen, it gives you better contrast, deeper blacks and more vivid colors, drawback is its highly reflective and can be bothersome around overhead light sources, sunfilled windows, and outdoor use in general. Dell forces Truelife on all higher resolution screens for their consumer class notebooks, Matte screens are still high res options for Dells business class notebooks.

Ultra sharp= Increased verticle viewing angles.

5) What video card should I get? Can I upgrade my card? Why does my 256 MB card only have 64MB/128MB?

Video cards can be complicated, a good performance breakdown for all current laptop cards can be found here http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html another good resource is found here http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=39568

While you can sometimes techincally upgrade some dell video cards, its seldom never worth the cost and risk. You should always buy what you need and not even consider upgrading a possibility.

Upgrade rules, if you start with integrated graphics, you are stuck with it, the motherboards come in two types, integrated and discrete, dedicated cards run on the latter, and can be changed, but ONLY for Dell branded cards that have been offered for the EXACT model you want to upgrade. There are some slight excpetions to that rule, I wont go into them here, try a searching an extreme hardware modding site if you really need to.

Pretty much all lower and midrange cards share system memory , your 256MB X1400 only has 128MB on the card, the other 128MB is shared from your system. The NV 7400 only has 64MB dedicated and 192MB shared, however NVidias "Turbocache" sharing scheme is hardware based, and much more efficient than ATI's "Hyper memory" which is a software based solution, even with only 64MB dedicated, the 7400 performs very similar to the X1400 with 128 dedicated.

6) What battery do I need?

That depends on how you plan to use it, if you primarily plan to use it on the go away from power sources, get the largest capacity, if you mostly plan to use it anchored to an outlet, the standard size should more than suit your needs.
the following link will tell you all you've ever wanted to know about batteries http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=91846

7) What wireless network card is the best choice? My wireless network is sluggish, connection keeps failing, what do I do?

8) My Media Direct wont work after format, how do I fix it?

http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=88032#media

Please keep in mind that this is my first ever attempt at such a project, so please bear with me. I'm asking for volunteers to handle sections 7 and 8, as I'm not very up to speed on networking, and I find media direct to have no use for me personally.

 

I applaud your efforts. This will be useful for those who are seriously considering Dell notebooks.

 

Iceman great start .Bravo

 

This is a great and usefull thread. I can't belive it wasn't thought of earlier

 

Kudos ice man, 2 thumbs up on ur effort

 

my input:

i purchsed a e1505 back in sep'06

w/ the WSXGA+= 1680x1050
and that might be great for games...but its murder on the eyes just surfing the net...the text and fonts were the smallest things ever...and even after bumping the settings to increase the sizes of everything (by reading this forum and the dell forums)...the resolution was unacceptable and i have 20/20 vision...

i use photoshop all the time..and the fact that all the pixels were really tiny made my designs messed up..like i would make graphics on the laptop and then view them from my 19" 1280x1024 monitor..and i would see how much worse my designs were since i couldnt see the detail that larger pixels (like on my desktop monitor allowed me)

(the 17" was too big for me to tote around on a daily basis from home and work thats why i stuck w/ the 15" e1505)

my advice is..if u do graphics alot...and u must get a 15"...do not get the 1680x1050

 

Actually most find the exact oppisite,including myself, with current hardware you usually cant game at 1680x1050, but for viewing multiple documents and web pages, WSXGA really shines, and is usually preffered for photshop work.

 

well i dont really game so i dont know i just thru the game idea out there..

but i would make stuff in photoshop..and think it looked great..then view it on a larger resolution monitor...and im all about details when it comes to graphics

and on the 1680x1050 i missed so many things that i normally dont miss...cause of the compact pixels and i went on line and googled my issue to see if i was the only person and actually there was alot of people just like me who hated that high of a res. on a small screen

but i guess good advice would be to test out the resolution in person to see if u like it or not..before u drop all your money..and that higher resolution doesnt always mean better

but def. kudos on this dell faq topic

 

really useful, i've been asking alot of questions lately and this is really good for anyone thinking of purchasing a dell. Thanks for this FAQ and for the answers on my previous questions.
p.h.

 

Thanks guys, any takers on the media direct and wireless cards?

 

My Media Direct wont work after format, how do I fix it?

After much research i found this.

**This is a collection of guides from around the net, none from notebookreview because i would of nicely linked it to that user **

When you are Installing Windows XP and partitioning your hard drive - YOU NEED TO LEAVE AT LEAST 1450MB UNPARTITIONED AND UNALLOCATED - NOT 1308MB LIKE THE INSTRUCTIONS TELL YOU.

Then when you finish installing Windows XP make sure you install all your drivers - especially the latest video drivers and the latest DELL QUICKSET - DELL QUICKSET IS REQUIRED!

Then REINSTALL mediadirect with the Dell MediaDirect reinstallation CD - the CD does not come with all new DELL laptops - you will have to call tech support to have them send you the CD for free.

If you formatted your hard drive and deleted all the partitions on it, or installed a NEW HARD DRIVE you will need to REINSTALL mediadirect NOT repair it - DO NOT USE THE REPAIR METHOD if you need to reinstall it. - as this will totally mess up the Windows XP partition and cause you to have to reformat!


If you need to repair the DELL MediaDirect (AND NOT REINSTALL IT!) then you can download the DELL MEDIADIRECT repair utility from DELL here:
http://support.dell.com/support/dow...&typecnt=1&vercnt=1&formatcnt=1&fileid=148039

You will need to repair the DELL MediaDirect if it stops functioning properly or fails to load - ONLY IF YOU HAVE LEFT YOUR ORIGINAL DELL HARD DRIVE ALONE by not messing with the partitions and not formatting the hard drive - OTHERWISE follow the reinstallation instructions below.
THE DELL MEDIADIRECT REPAIR & REINSTALL INSTRUCTIONS CAN BE FOUND FROM DELL HERE:
http://support.dell.com/support/top...ent?dn=1093823&l=en&langid=1&c=us&cs=19&s=dhs

MediaDirect will install with these instructions with 3 TOTAL partitions before the MEDIADIRECT INSTALL is run. So when you run the Windows XP setup you can create a MAXIMUM of 3 PARTITIONS(not more). MAKE SURE YOU LEAVE THE 1450MB UNALLOCATED, UNPARTITIONED, AND UNTOUCHED!
SO THE FINAL STEPS TO FOLLOW ARE:
1. Install Windows XP by booting from the Windows XP CD/DVD - when XP installation is run, make any changes you want to your hard drive, delete all the partitions if you want.
2. CREATE a partition UP TO A MAXIMUM OF THREE TOTAL! - Subtract 1450MB from the TOTAL MB you have to work with on your hard drive. Then divide the partitions up how you want. IN THE END LEAVE 1450MB TOTAL unpartitioned!
3. Install Windows XP


Note:
***You can ask Dell for Dell MediaDirect reinstallation CD. Ask for v2. Chat with them at

http://support.dell.com/support/topics/global.aspx/support/gen/chat?c=us&l=en&s=gen&redirect=1

then ask them to send you the Application CD - For Reinstalling Dell MediaDirect’***

Note:
The 10% mark on MediaDirect installation is where it formats the parttion it needs and will appear to hang at that point. You need to wait. If you get a copy file error then the partition is not big enough.


ADDY:
Here's a short list of torrent sites that carry mediadirect V2....

V 2.0
http://www.mybittorrent.com/software/bittorrent_166369.html

http://torrentspy.com/torrent/1015609/Dell_Media_Direct_2_0

http://www.mininova.org/tor/542092

V 3.0
http://www.mininova.org/tor/564142


p.h.