Just bought a refurb, need to make sure its working ok. Please help.

I bought a refurb but I really need help trying to figure out if this thing is ok... otherwise can still return it. I come from a experienced computer background but its mostly in DESKTOPS and I have literally no experience in laptops. the specs are:

2.4 core 2 duo 4mb t7700
3 gig DDR2 667
320gig HD
256 Nvidia 8600m GT
intel 4965AGN
DVD RW slot load drive
SIGMA TEL HIGH DEF AUDIO
Bluetooth
windows vista ultimate


I was hoping since you guys own the same laptop if you could answer the following:

the static in the headphone jack... i read on these forums that it pretty much cant be fixed and its a crap shoot. is this still the case or can I actually get it fixed by dell?

After updating my windows lastnight and booting the laptop today, I noticed that the bios screen took much much longer than usual to boot upto the hardrive password screen prior to booting to windows. probably about 30 seconds before it finally loaded completely.... normally its much quick.

I crash alot when it comes to Team Fortress 2 running on Half-Life 2 engine. I only get this AFTER it conects to a server... and its a looping crash. Valve says it has to do with the page pool memory but I checked it out, its not. My guess is perhaps it has to do with the crappy built in sound card.... is this sigma tel card problematic? or is this another issue?

lastly, when I boot the computer and it goes to the hardrive password screen, and if I leave it unattended for maybe 3 minutes or so it shuts the computer off by it self. is this normal or is this computer fried?


thanks for the help in advance... like i said i am very new to laptops and I would like to get this returned ASAP while under the warranty if this thing is a toaster. any and all help would be appreciated.

 

This is why you don't buy a refurbished computer
roflcopter...

 

Inspiron or M1530?

I don't think they can fix it without replacing the motherboard. And that would still be another crap shoot. You might consider trying to get them to send you the X-Fi Xpress sound card, which has its own headphone jack and has better sound quality than the built-in sound.

Are you talking about the time to boot to the Windows logon screen? or is this a password screen that appears when you set a password in your BIOS?

I'm not much of a gamer, but I remember having to reduce audio acceleration to keep some games from crashing. Also check the game options to see if there's an option to turn off 3D sound.

 

its certified by dell... i am trying to figure out if this is a hardware issue or if this is a software issue caused by windows vista or half-life 2.

will do.... going to check now.