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    New XPS 1330 arrived: My impressions

    Discussion in 'Dell' started by vengance_01, Jan 11, 2008.

  1. vengance_01

    vengance_01 Notebook Deity

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    It came on Wednesday. DHL dropped it off no issues. Nice small box, not to heavy. Open it up, and and was impressed with the packaging. Now I get to the notebook and see the free Sleeve and it was decent, nothing fancy. It did look like it would protect the notebook very well. Pull out the notebook and again I am impressed. Looks much better in person then in the pictures. Its pretty light, slim, sleek looking. Fired it up with the stock install of Vista. Took a few minuets on first boot, but I was in Vista after I say 5-7 mins. With 3GB of ram, 1.5 was being used by default. There was also 73 processes running. It felt sluggish, but almost always all new Vista Installs are.

    Now on to hardware. The notebook by default makes a low buzz in the cpu area, a very common problem with the 1330's. The base was even, and there was little flex. My LCD screen was an LED type, but I got a CMO screen. It was even lit, but the colors were some what washed out, or over exposed. I was not impressed and I was expecting more from the LED screen. Also my left hinge has a gap and exposes a tiny amount of the LCD wire. The Keyboard is ok, but it has to much of a mushy feeling. The keyboard on my Dell D620 at work and my old X30 Thinkpad are much much better. One thing that I was really about impressed was the units ability to keep fan noise very low and often times the fan was completely off. Under Prime 95 Full stress load, the fan was still pretty quiet in favor of slightly higher Core temperatures, but still within limits.

    I have only had a chance to test one game and that was WoW. It runs decent, but in my eyes not fantastic and I was expecting more. Again I know this is only a 8400GS, but nearly anything can run WoW. Soloing its ok, but in cities and instances frames come way down. There is still more testing I need to do.

    Overall its not bad notebook, but I am pretty sure its going back. I really want to like this notebook, but if I am paying 1500$ for, I want to be near 100% satisfied.
     
    vengance_01, Jan 11, 2008
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  2. Gunner

    Gunner Notebook Evangelist

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    Sorry you're not liking it as much as you want to. But if you're not happy with it, return it.
     
    Gunner, Jan 11, 2008
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