My new M1530 .... WSXGA+/SSD/3GB

I received my new M1530 this week. I thought I would throw this out there since I enjoyed reading other people's impressions when I was shopping for mine. I've worked in IT for ~15 years but I am not a professional desktop/laptop reviewer:

- I bought the SSD hard drive. After the recovery partition and media direct stuff, I have about 46gb remaining for a C: drive? Ugg. Might have to rebuild or at least blow away the recovery partition.

- My fan barely runs. I have to really listen for it to even tell it is on, and that is in a semi-quiet work environment. At home with kids, dishwasher, TV ... no way I can hear it.

- Slot load DVD is not quite noisy as others have claimed (just my opinion) - not really a problem for me. I mean I do not know how quiet it is supposed to be. It isn't any louder than my other tray-based optical drives.

- I have good angle viewing on my screen, no dark edges or spots except at extreme angles. No dead pixels. I definitely have the dreaded Samsung screen and I understand why. I guess it is a grain but I do not know what else to call it. The problem isn't as sharp as I would think a "grainy" problem would be ... it seems more like a fine, grey dust sprinkled over my screen. It is not a deal killer but I'm not happy with it. At first I thought I would just try to get used to it but after a few days it is still bothersome. I don't rip people other way for their thoughts, I can see how some people are fine with it and others are not.

- Touchpad is nice - no problems there. Fingerprint reader good as well. I have not tried the headphone jack yet.

- The media bar buttons are a little hard to press? Probably just the design. Too bad they couldn't be touch sensitive instead of presure sensitive. I have to really press hard.

That's all for now!

 

SSD for like 250 bucks would be in my range, but the upgrade price is out of that area!

 

Yep, I will not disagree with you. Over the phone, it was a $630 upgrade compared to what I had in the system, and I do not remember what it was. I am noticing the quiet side of it but don't have battery life to compare to. Apps do seem a bit quicker, but again I do not have something to compare to well.

 

you can aways upgrade when ssd's come down in price, they are still new technology in the notebook world!

 

nice review, got my 1530 3 days ago, i thought you had to push quite hard on the touch buttons but then i realized that there was a protective film on them maybe thats yours still have the flm on them?

 

Actually, I was just being stupid. I only have to TOUCH my finger to the button, be patient, and then it works. I thought they pressed and I was having to press too hard. Hell I probably came close to breaking the things! Works great now that I've stopped man-handling it like a caveman.

 

I really want an SSD!

Congrats on your new system. BTW, the media buttons on the m1330/m1530 are TOUCH sensitive. No pressing required.

Though, messing with the Best Buy models, the increments in volume change are VERY small and I found myself machine gunning it to change the volume at a decent rate.