Owner's Thread: Dell Inspiron 7000 series

Yes same new estimated shipping date for me.
Email received today says "delayed because manufactured parts" i think they have a shortage of i7´s

 

got the 840 pro issue yesterday (last 4 day )
config: 15", A04, fedora 20
gonna return it and get the evo instead

 

My laptop was shipped last Monday (3/12/2013) and the last track was when it departed the manufacturing facility. I haven't heard anything else since. Is that cause of concern?
My estimated time of delivery was (it's not shown anymore) next Tuesday.
Is there another way I can track the package besides the walsh western website which tells me almost nothing. And how are dell orders shipped to uk, by air or sea?

 

Thanks for the reply. No one really knows what the problem is...not even Samsung or they would've came up with a solution like through update or something like that... maybe the problem is not widespread enough for Samsung to bother with.

 

Has anyone with the non pro 840 had any issues? seems like it's only the 840 pro having issues.

 

Does anyone hear a high pitched very quiet whine sticking your ear to the area of the vent under the keypad? I hear one that changes in pitch, almost like electronics are working.

 

Just see that the EVO have TLC ... very bad for the ssd lifetime

 

Do you have track number ?

 

I used Macrium Reflect Free. Was all straight forward, took about 38 mins to clone all the partitions, I think there were five in all.

 

Yes, I have a tracking number which starts with ALE.... and the carrier is WUK. If I click the tracking number it redirects me to a walsh western website where the last activity was the laptop leaving the manuf. plant Monday.

 

I think laptop is in Dell plant yet. When you get a track number is not mean that laptop has leaving already Dell factory. It can takes few days until carrier picks the package.

My advice is to call Dell tomorrow

 

I have added your use case to the spreadsheet.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...RGaW0waUg2clFjS3NNbER5TWc&usp=drive_web#gid=0

 

From that list it seems that it's only the 256GB Samsung 840 PRO version that fail constantly.

 

Looking at the spreadsheet, I dont think I had actually appreciated that there wasnt a single case of an EVO problem.

That said is the EVO really any better than the Crucial or the Kingston? Going from HDD to SSD Im sure they will all feel fast, and will happily take the more reliable and flexible model over a shade quicker.

 

MacGyver88, while you're at it, you can add Akvavit's and pma99car's cases who both have been running with an EVO SSD for several weeks now with no issues. I don't want to state the obvious, but yeah there is a pattern for sure on the PRO model. I'm just hoping we won't hear about a new case on a non PRO model, that would be scary!

 

It certainly looks that way, I still don't get why though - the drive I used was previously the boot drive in my gaming rig and worked flawlessly for a long time.

 

People said that about SLC -> MLC and yet now MLC is the standard. And the drop from MLC to TLC is not nearly as large as the drop from SLC to MLC. Last, the price to lifetime is much better on TLC than MLC.

 

Can anyone report back to me if they hear any electronic hum/whine noise in the vents underneath, those that have SSD? i bought the facotry version with ssd. I hear something but only if i have my ear pushed against the vent. should be worried?

 

Could you please link back to those posts?

 

Hi, sorry i can´t help you because i haven´t my inspiron yet

I bought SSD version too.

What SSD brand and model came with your laptop ?

Thanks ¡¡

 

Sorry to jump back to a previous non SSD related issue in the posts. I had an issue where right out of the box the CPU was mostly always 100% with the System and System Interrupt process hogging most of the CPU. I tried updating and disabling all the drivers and uninstalling as much as I could and issue was still there. The laptop was almost completely unusable. I had tried clean installation of MSDN Win8 and also resetting/cleaning Windows back to Dell shipping image.

Anyway - I have a resolution. Dell sent me fresh installation media and now after installation the CPU was only 1 - 2%. I have no idea what kind of e they had on the laptop that originally shipped but I was not able to get it to work and it should never have been shipped like this. It seems I was the only one though as no one else here on this forum seems to have the problem. I think that probably this new installation has fixed a corrupt UEFI issue underneath it all that even the clean MSDN couldn't fix. I would recommend getting Dell to send you this installation media if you can. It has none of the Dell crapware that normally ships such as McAfee and other Dell bloat/crapware. It's completely clean - in fact so clean that it doesn't have any Dell drivers either in the installation. I had to download the Wifi driver on another PC and move it over to this via USB but now I can choose exactly what else I will install. CPU as mentioned above is back to normal and CPU GHz idles down below 1GHz instead of maxed out at 2. something GHz with fan blowing hard the whole time. Hopefully now the battery life will be above an hour now the CPU has more idle time.

 

lol - I wrote "I wonder what kind of sh*te they had on the laptop" to phrase things in more mild terminology and it was censored to "e".

 

I have not had that issue, but I have noticed a ralentization on my DELL that should not be that apparent with a I7 processor and 8GB. I have updated all drivers, what the problem persists. Suggested by DELL, I made a "Hard reset" (reinstallation) on Windows 8, but everything is the same. I hope changing today to a SSD and doing a fresh install will improve things...

 

A small update on my order. I called dell to enquire about my laptop status (last activity was leaving the manufacturing plant, last monday). A guy answers me, and tells me the exact same thing I found on the website, and that he doesn't know anything else. Then he apologises and redirects me to a different line, where they might have extra information about my order. Spend more than 20 minutes, and nobody answers, at which point I decide to hang up.
Now I've got no idea where my laptop is, and when it will arrive (the last edd is for tomorrow). I'm starting to regret the order right now.
If I don't have the laptop delivered by the end of tomorrow, I will definitely cancel it.

 

My CPU rate is not high but the speed is always at around 2.8Ghz. Right now I have a video playing with about 15 firefox tabs and CPU is around 23%. I didn't check when it is completely idle but is that normal if the factory setting is only 1.8Ghz?

 

First, keep in mind that it's a ULV i7 processor. A full-voltage i5 is still going to outperform a low-voltage i7.

Second, for day-to-day tasks (web browsing, office tasks) an i3 with a SSD will feel faster than an i7 with a HDD.

 

If you're playing a video (assuming it's either HD or in a format that does not support hardware acceleration) it's fairly normal for the CPU clock to ramp up. If you want to conserve battery by restricting Turbo Boost, you can create a power plan that sets the Max CPU Clock to 99%. That will allow it to hit it's full non-Turbo clock but will disable Turbo Boost for that power plan.

 

cool thanks. I have the OS optimized using Samsung Magician tool (Maximum Reliability) so I think I will keep it that way. It's been running perfectly so far so I don't wanna touch anything else. :hi2:

 

Something similar happened to my dad once. It turns out, the carrier lost his laptop. As soon as this confirmed, Dell sent a replacement.

It was probably stolen.

 

The Samsung Magician tool is just for SSD optimizations, no? The CPU should be completely independent of that.

 

Well, it creates a totally new power plan for that with settings for all other things as well.

 

Ah, alright. You could edit the power plan it created to change the CPU frequency, but if you're not having battery life or heat issues I wouldn't worry about it.

I would question the value of something like Samsung Magician on Windows 8 (which is already optimized for SSDs) but that's a bit of a different discussion.

 

Thanks for the info. In what form was the "installation media" provided, a USB key? A DVD (needing an external drive)? And how did you install it?

 

Ok, the wireless issue was driving me bonkers. After many hours researching and testing, I think I've resolved the problem.

I quickly realized that the speeds displayed in the windows wifi status were pretty useless, so I used speedtest to test my xps l501x, the 7537 and the hp envy 15t-j100. Upload and download speeds were consistent when using wired connection. The wireless connection tests show significant degradation of speed, with the 7537 being the worst. Then I disabled WMM QoS on my router, and what a difference! The 7537 went from having the worst wireless speeds to the best. I found it interesting that the xps and envy speeds weren't significantly different.

Does anyone else find the sound horrid? It's fine when I use headphones, but the sound coming out of the speakers is truly awful. Why Dell thought putting the speakers under the laptop was a good idea, I'll never know. There is plenty of room to put them on top. Anyway, placement isn't the entire reason the sound sucks - I even raised the laptop above my head and the sound was still bad.

I've been trying to decide between the Dell and the HP - they both have their strong points and weak points. The Dell display is beautiful, but the sound sucks and the wireless is better now that I've figured that mess out. The HP wireless is a bit worse than the Dell, sound is very good, but the display sucks and I like the keyboard a bit more than the one on the Dell, but it's not a deal breaker. I guess I can do something to improve the sound, but I can't replace the display, so I think I may go with the Dell. Still have a few things to test before I decide for sure.

 

Hmm, I'll try disabling this WMM option, if I'm able to find it in the settings...

 

Remember, the setting is for the router, not the wifi card. You need the ip address of your router - you can just google ip address for the brand of your router and you'll find it. The WMM setting was in the channel section for my Belkin router.

 

ADATA SP900 120 GB

7537 i5 6 Gb memory bios 05. All ok

 

Whenever I try to connect to an AP it says taking longer than usual and then limited access.
I have tried this on 3 different wireless AP's and it does the same on all of them.
The connection does eventually work at full speed but only if I am in the same room as the AP if I move 10 yards away but still line of sight, signal strength still shows good, but speed drops from 12Mbps to under 1Mbps.

I have installed Windows 8.1, upgraded the bios to 05 and installed the new 8.1 drivers from Dell but I still have the problem.

I have also tried uninstalling the N-7260 and all the driver software all the way back to the original Microsoft one and then re-installing the latest Dell/Intel® PROSet/Wireless driver but it did not make a difference.
In fact the Dell site says the latest is 16.5.1.6, A00 but when I install that driver windows reports that it is 16.5.3.6.

Dell technical support says they think it's a wifi card/antenna issue and have a arranged for a new one to be installed which will happen tomorrow.

I hope it fixes the problem. If it doesn't I am not sure what to do. It makes no sense returning the machine for another one if its an inherent problem.

Those of you who have good wifi what drivers are you using on 8.1?

 

16.6.0.8 downloaded from Intel's site

 

nice finding, thanks...how did that idea cross your mind? There are so many possobile settings in a router!

 

Yesterday I re-read the whole thread from post #1 onwards and came across these findings...To be honest I'm a bit lazy and don't feel like doing it all over again but it was around pages 20-40 of the thread IIRC. Try looking up for their posts with a search.

 

Can't take credit for it - it was one of the suggestions I found and tried (among many, many others) while searching on fluctuating wifi speed. I tested each machine connected via ethernet to make sure the problem wasn't with the signal coming in through the modem, then tried changing channels and all sorts of things until I hit on this.

 

I can't seem to find this WMM setting on my router. I'll call Dell as soon as I replace the SSD.

 

Hello everyone,

I've been following this thread for quite some time as I was interested in purchasing the laptop. Well I finally did and I noticed that there are a couple things that come up often. Well here's my input. Firstly, in response to the keyboard having a degree of flex, it is just fine unless you really make an effort to press down on it which will obviously cause it to flex a little but there are no problems when typing thus far.
Secondly, I have just successfully cloned the hard drive onto a sandisk ultra plus 256 GD ssd using macrium reflect free edition. So far no problems but i guess I'll know in about a month of testing.
These are the scores I got using CrystalDiskMark.


Question: Does anyone use a screen protector for fingerprints and/or a keyboard skin or cover for dust?

 

WMM is related to Quality Of Service (QoS) depending on the age and firmware release of your router you may or may not have this setting.
My Netgear does not have it but my Linksys does.

 

no problems here with the space key

 

Thanks, I have tried that one too but it makes no difference.

 

has anyone encountered a problem where the screen does not turn on after hibernate/closing the lid?

 

Yes, you need to go back to 3304 of the Intel video driver, if I remember correctly. The "wrong" version automatically installs itself through Windows Update, so be safe to check every update and not install that.

 

Can you give the procedure please? Thanks