D630 Owners Thread

No, it happens regardless of whether it's plugged in or not, even in the docking station. I'm going to try putting the old fan back in. I don't understand why the fan doesn't kick in full steam until after it reaches 75 and starts throttling, and then runs full out constantly while the thing is around 40 @ 800mhz, yet the machine won't ever recover from the reduced state until a reboot, which starts the whole cycle again.

Okay, just put the old fan back in.. and the system works fine. It still reaches 75 before the fan kicks on, but now the fan kicks on and just cools down to 67 or so, but it never throttles. So something is up with the replacement fan. It does this stop/start stutter thing before it runs constantly and I think it's making the system think the fan is broken, since the system would throttle with my old fan when it wouldn't spin either. I'm hoping giving the old fan a solid cleaning will keep it from seizing up again, since I'm a bit skeptical of getting a working replacement fan now.

 

I have an update. I dropped a Broadcom Crystal HD BCM970015 into my D630 to help with HD content decoding. it works flawlessly if installed into the second MiniPCIe slot where the cellular card is supposed to go.

A word of advice for anyone using this card, it may be of interest to you to thermalcompound/superglue a pre-1982 penny that's been lightly sanded with 400+grit sandpaper to the main chip-- it will help to keep it cool. It is unknown to me if this is enough of a shim in that regard to make contact of the chip to the keyboard bottom, to help dissipate some heat which is very abundantly thrown off this decoder. but it is definitely in your best interest! it lowers the temperature of my Quadro 135M by a LOT while watching even 720p content on sites like youtube and vimeo, standard flash content (.swf files) and any HD video files (mostly AC-3 and beyond matroska files as well as some H.264 content.)

so that's a win for D630 owners looking for an HD decoding solution, both Intel/nvidia wielders! I'm about to purchase a 970015 for my D830 which I recently acquired for the price of $25. I'll be posting about that in the appropriate thread when that time comes.

 

That is quite cool. If I decide to hold off a bit longer on replacing my D630 I may give this a go as the computer is still serviceable but is starting to choke on HD Flash video.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

I was just given a D630 (Intel GPU) from a client. Wonderful machine. This one has the extended battery that sicks out of the front. After using it for a few weeks, I have been able to track the battery levels more accurately. On an average day, I am getting between 3.5 to 5 hours of life from the battery. I am very impressed with that. I also took a few days to read all 84 (at current count) pages of this thread. Mainly to learn about the machine more and also just to use the machine. I have a stack of Dell laptops (E6500, M4500, D830, E6520) and am still searching for the perfect one in terms of CPU power and portability. This D630 would be perfect if it had a built in SD reader, backlit keyboard, and a faster CPU with dedicated GPU.

So that leads us to it's replacement machine. The E6400. Nice looking unit. But the D630, there is something about it that makes me want to pick it up and use it. Sure it's not the fastest machine I own (by a longshot), but it has....a quality to it. Just looking at makes me want to pick it up. Does anyone else ever have connections like that with their computers?

Anyway, I digress. I would like to take a moment and talk about the keyboard on this unit. This keyboard is probably one of the easiest one's to use that I have ever had the pleasure of typing on. It only took me a few moments to get acclimated to it. The feedback and travel are very nice and the slight inward curvature of the keys makes my fingers slip right into the perfect spot for typing. It just begs me to type on it. Whether it's an e-mail, a forum post, random musing in word, whatever. It's just so nice. I used to be a die hard Thinkpad guy, but this keyboard is really well put together. It was the build quality of the Thinkpad's and their excellent keyboard in the T4x and T6x lines that made me happy. But now that I have had a chance to play around with some Dell's, I think these keyboards are a notch better than what Lenovo has to offer. The keyboard on my D830 for instance is simply awesome. I can type for hours with very little fatigue and I have carpal tunnel, so that's a lot of praise for that keyboard.

I just kind of wanted to throw my thoughts out there for others. I did notice a poster mentioned adding the Broadcom HD card to their D630, I have been wanting one of those for a while, might grab one for my D630. I was thinking of selling this unit and getting an E6400, but this machine has grown on me so much that I know that I won't be doing that. It's built like a tank, is very easy to toss in my laptop bag for work and handle's everything I throw at it. But like a lot of users there are some upgrades I am contemplating. I'll list them below:

Intel T9300 CPU to replace my T7300. Yes, I could do a T9500 but the price difference between the 2 is about $50.
8GB of RAM. I have 4GB of DDR2 800MHz RAM now. The price is a little on the high side, but worth it to me for VM's.
Broadcom HD card - to help with youtube and whatnot.
HD - SSD maybe. I have a 500GB 7200RPM HD right now and it runs very fast. So the SSD would be nice, but not necessary.
LCD - I have the 1280x800 LCD, so moving to the higher res screen would have obvious benefits. That being said I am quite happy with my current LCD, so this would be one of the last upgrades I would perform.

After reading the entire thread, I feel like I have gotten to know some of you. Some people here are very knowledgeable about these machines. I'll throw some of my background out there. I work in IT and have been using computers for over 20 years. I have repaired hundreds of laptops. Currently I do IT admin, play around with big SAN toys and other things I cannot afford. But I love laptops. Ever since my first laptop which was a Toshiba Satellite 405CDT (yes, I still remember the model #). Hope I didn't ramble on too much, like I said, this keyboard makes me want to type.

Happy computing!

 

Excellent! Glad to see someone else discovering the D630's charms. It still looks good compared to other systems and has a decent balance of performance!

That high resolution screen is a worthwhile upgrade, you'll love it.

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

If you want to be fancy, get a Precision M2300 LCD back cover.

New Dell Precision M2300 LCD Back Cover Top Lid w Hinges Assembly TN178 0TN178 | eBay

 

I am looking forward to the LCD upgrade.

I understand that this isn't the most powerful machine, but it does what I need it to do just fine. After using my E6520 for work stuff, it's so nice to just sit down and grab the D630 and enjoy computing. I am not happy at all with the E6520. It's very powerful, but ugly. I greatly dislike the typing experience on it as compared to my D630. I do wish the D630 had a back-lit keyboard, but that's not going to happen. I could get an E6400 and a back-lit keyboard for it. But I have never seen one in person, so I don't know if I would like it or not. I do have an E6500 that I really like though and from what I gather the E6400 is a smaller version of the E6500.

With regards to the aesthetics of the machines, I was always attracted to the design of the D830 (which I also own) and the the D630 machines. Very nicely done in my opinion.

Getting back to the LCD upgrade for this machine, is it a simple replace the LCD procedure or do I need to swap inverters as well? I am very comfortable working on laptops and not afraid to get my hands dirty at all. As a matter of fact, I actually enjoy working on them.

It's good to see people still use these machines. I fallen in love with mine in the few short weeks I have had it. I used to think a 14" widescreen laptop was too small to be practical for me. How wrong I was in that assumption. It's the perfect blend of size and weight for me. I am really impressed with this machine. I don't do anything CPU intensive, minus a flash game here and there, so it runs just fine. A smidge more power with a T9300 will be a welcome addition plus the other upgrades I mentioned. I tend to use machines for 5+ years and considering how I am feeling about this slightly older unit, I'd love to hold on to it for as long as possible.

 

For the LCD, you'll need a new LCD cable as well. Avoid Samsung panels.

 

Also, I have noticed a few people mentioned using an ATG screen with red LED's to light up the keyboard. What does this entail and are there any pics of the mod?

EDIT: I looked up some pics of the D630 ATG. I love how the red LED's work to light up the keyboard area. Looks very slick and based on the pictures would seem to provide more consistent lighting than the ThinkLight found on Thinkpads.

 

The ATG display assembly will "just work" on a standard D620/D630 chassis, along with the lights and everything. There isn't any modding required.