13.3" Laptops

The Asgard said:
Make sure you update the wireless drivers. The preinstalled have all sorts of issues.
Click to expand...

Update to the latest on the Dell's site right?

Also thought I'd contact both Customer Services and Technical Support about the 64bit media - the responses were quite funny.

Tech Support (India) - will have to pay to upgrade. My system may be incompatiable. My processor may not support 64bit.

Customer Service (UK) - 64bit media on its way to you, I'll email you once I see the order has been delivered to check how the upgrades goes.

I just can't wait to reformat and get all this junk off. It's running like 70processes at startup.
 
Got my Studio 13 yesterday. What an awesome piece of kit this is!
Screen is amazing, nice solid keyboard, nice speakers and a fantastic spec. No complaints at all at the moment.
I like my M1210 before this, but by comparison this is in a different league or quality.
I've tried out COD4 and UT3 so far, COD4 is flawless and UT3 is better than expected.

I've got the 2.4GHz 3mb cache, 4gig DDR3 ram, nvidia 9500M with hybrid SLI and the White LED screen :)
 
I just got the Samsung Q320, its only just been released and i'm really happy with it compared to the Dell Studio 15 which i'm selling. Check out some reviews for it (there aren't many but are a few)
 
Herojuana said:
I just got the Samsung Q320, its only just been released and i'm really happy with it compared to the Dell Studio 15 which i'm selling. Check out some reviews for it (there aren't many but are a few)
Click to expand...

Which version of the Q320 did you get?
3GB or 4GB of RAM? I have noticed that some places have started including 4GB rather than 3GB which it was previously but the model number hasn't changed (AS02UK)
 
I was looking at the q320 too, bit put off by the cpu specs though to be honest, as well as the weight. For a relatively underpowered laptop, it sure is pretty heavy.

Looks good though.

What is it like to lug around?

Personally, although I'm not a mac-fan, I'm thinking about going for a Macbook Air Rev. C when the June refresh comes around. Probable specced up to 4gb, 2.13ghz, 256GB SSD, with improved battery and of course the LED screen.

Pricey I guess though. But seems to tick all the boxes. You need 4gb of ram these days.
 
I picked up an HP 13.3" laptop today - DV3-2050ea

Intel T4200 2.0GHz
320 GB Hard Drive
4 GB Ram
GeForce G105M 512MB Graphics

First impressions are good, the keyboard is a pleasure to use and the touchpad very responsive. The Acers I tried had great specs, however the keyboard and touchpads let them down. My last 3 laptops were from Dell but I don't like their new range much.
 
Adrianr said:
To those who have been living with the Studio XPS13 for a little while, how are you finding it? :)
Click to expand...

Really nice looking laptop, really fast and well made. It gets fairly warm when in low power mode (the second card in the hybrid SLI stays off) when it has been on for a while (but can't say whether it is any worse than other laptops) and in full power mode it gets hot very quickly - but your unlikely to be using the full power mode on anything but a desk I would have thought.
I've not taken it out of low power mode for a while as I have had no need to, it copes fine for all desktop use, light gaming (Deus Ex / UT) and runs 3dsmax fine, COD4 even runs pretty well :). Turn onto Performance mode so the second card kicks in and I was running UT3 nicely and Supreme Commander ran great too :)

Negatives for me are how much heat it kicks off (but I expected as much with the spec) and the fact it only has one usb port :/ - It's annoying that it has 3 different graphics out ports, firewire and esata - yet only 1 usb. I would happily swap displayport and firewire for extra usb ports.



BIIIIIG EDIT - well thats my main criticism gone. I've just read that the esata port doubles as a usb port. I now feel silly - but extremely relieved! That'll teach me for not looking at the specs properly, didn't even realise they were basically the same port.
 
Last edited:
I was half tempted by one of these but have been put off by the heat issues - if it gets hot does that mean there's a fan blowing and making noise a lot of the time?
 
In power saving mode it gets warm to the touch (and temps inside are around 60 on the cpu+gfx) but the fan isn't spinning.
Temps go up by around 10 in full performance mode (the noticeable difference to the touch is the back left corner - the power supply I believe) which is then hot! Fan is spinning up here and pulling a lot of heat out of the back.

I've not found it problematically hot, it's just not a cool machine. As far as I am concerned you have to expect a bit of heat for such a high end spec machine in a small sleek case.
 
Thanks for the info! Fan noise would probably concern me more than the laptop getting hot as I don't often have it on my lap, so as long as it's not on for the majority of the time that's a good thing :)
 
I can't recall the fan ever kicking in in power saving mode, and if it did it couldn't have been too loud at the time.
It kicks in straight away in performance mode - but the chances are your going to be playing a game or something with sound anyway so less of a bother I'd imagine!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom