Just ordered my first laptop: Inspiron 6400

Well after a few months of looking around for something I finally ordered a 6400 from Dell Australia yesterday.

Specs are

Intel Core Duo T2400 1.83ghz
XP Home
15.4" Ultrasharp WSXGA TFT + Truelife 1680x1050
1GB 533mhz RAM
256MB ATi Radeon Mobility X1400 + Hypermemory
100GB 5,400rpm SATA HD
8X DVD+/-RW DL Drive
6 cell battery
Intel PRO/Wireless 3945 Dual Band 802.11a/g Wireless Card

Price: AU$1,867.80.......US$1,430.46

This was with AU$200 off.

Overall from what I've read I'm pretty happy with the specs I got and they should suit me much better for what I need it for than my current desktop ever would....

I checked my order status this morning and it has already been shipped, so it was ordered, built and shipped within 24 hours...not bad...lol.

I'm also really happy I got in on the deals that ran out on the 4th because I just checked and to get the same config today is AU$2025 and thats with a $300 off coupon.....much pleased.

Delivery estimate is the 15th of May but hopefully it'll get here sooner.....can't wait...

 

Congratulaions! There's no better feeling than waiting for your laptop ...

 

well except maybe getting the laptop...lol

 

delivery estimate is now the 10th of may...which makes it 6 days from factory to me......not bad at all considring it said it would take 10-14 to get to a regional area...

 

..or having it delivered wa sooner than expected.

I'm eagerly awaiting the arrival of my E1405, which is my first laptop.

 

Well ... that I can argue about ... it's sort of like excitement before Christmas - not the same as Christmas itself ...

 

well i'm happy to report it just arrived about 45 minutes ago....with some pleasant surprises

- for starters it only took 4 days from order to delivery
- there was no bloatware....i mean nothing....well maybe 3 or 4 minor things plus mcafee (god that annoys me)...very surprised by that...i'm thinking i won't need to do a reformat now cos the system is basically clean (i will do a bit of housekeeping regardless)

i'm presently installing star wars battlefront 2 just to test out the x1400 and will have a few more thoughts on this a bit later on....

but now back to christmas

EDIT: the only bloatware i had to remove was mcafee and two AOL things...that was it.....still shocked...

 

I wouldn't mind if mine came like this either.

 

lol...

the new lappy is goin great so far, running quiet and not that warm at all....

- weight isn't an issue as it is alot lighter than i was expecting
- battlefront 2 runs great at max settings even better on mid range

overall i'm very very happy with my purchase....might even do a full review once i sort everything out...

 

LOL the wait is the worst part one you get now thats the best feeling

 

well i'm on day two now....last night i thought i would install 3dmark05 to see what my score would come out at....

at this stage the only thing i had installed was battlefront 2 and 3dmark

i got a score of around 1,200....which was alot lower than i expected...considering most people have gotten 1700-1800 and upwards of 2,000 with OC....

i'll try it again today to see if i get anything different but can anyone think why this is the case?...remember i didn't reformat the lappy

 

EDIT: righteo...well I just downloaded Powerstrip 3.63 and clocked my x1400 to 540/430 and got a score of 2105...super happy with that....almost 1000 points up on where i was....might try and got a bit further tomorrow...updated gaming results to come

Some more observations:

- 3dmark05 showed me a score of 1153.
- just ran superPI and it takes 1min 18sec to do 2M which was what I expected
- i have noticed what i think is this 'shimmer' everyones on about...really not that much of an issue if you ask me
- i got a small amount of light leakage along the bottom of the screen but its really quite minimal and doesn't distract at all
- i was amazed with the viewing angle on the screen as well...no visual or colour distortion at all 180 degrees from left to right....andyou have to get almost vertical to the screen upright before the colours slip out
- unfortunately i do have 1 dead pixel....but its right down in the very bottom left corner on like the second bottom row of pixels....i only just noticed it...lol


Some results I've had with games:

Battlefield 2
18-20fps
Everything on medium
Res: 1680x1050

Call Of Duty 2 Demo
18-22fps
Everything on max
Res:1680x1050

Star Wars Battlefront 2
18-25fps
Everything on max
Res:1680x1050

Star Wars: Empire at War
15-17fps
Everything at max
Res:1680x1050

Some other results I've observed:

3dsmax 8 - I did a test with a few hundered thousand particles whipping around in a vortex spiralling all over the shop with motion blur and global illumination being rendered at 720p and it was taking about 50 seconds a frame...my old desktop would have blown up attempting this...100% on both cores looked nice...

Video Editing - I was editing a sequence from a movie I'm doing this afternoon and was able to render out the final sequence from Premiere in about 25 seconds for approximately 2.5 minutes of footage.....nice and quick.

I've only seen the hourglass a few times and thats when i've been accessing things on a CD.

I'll continue to post my observations over the next few days as I get more accustomed to the unit...might put some pics up soon as well showing the setup I've got....hope my ramblings will be of help or interest to someone.