Dear E6400 owners, whats the worst / most irritating feature of your machine?

I am considering purchasing a E6400, and want to hear it from people who are actually using the machine to tell me what they find annoying / wrong / irritating about it.

Cheers!

 

1. It's heavier than I would like (and implied by the original published starting weight). However, it's no heavier than its peers except for the Fujitsu S6520 and the Samsung X460. However, both of those don't offer 1440 x 900, which for me is a requirement in this size range.

2. The ODD I received can be fussy and needs a firmware update. perhaps I'll hassle Dell to replace it when I am next home.

3. The E6400 needs more rubber bumpers to stop the display bezel and the palm rest from colliding during travel.

4. The security software is still a bit buggy.

Aside from the above, there's a lot that Dell did get right with this notebook. For me, the lovely display, very good battery life and cool and quiet operation more than compensate for the shortcomings. And the backlight keyboard means I can keep typing when the lights go out.

John

 

I have an E6400 that I am happy with except for a few issues:

1. The SATA drivers seem to be a bit buggy. This mainly concerns the DVD drive and E-SATA drives. With the version of the SATA drivers recommended by Dell it is stable most of the time, but I have had at least one problem where the computer locked up when I plugged in my E-SATA drive.

2. The palmrests are not as comfortable as on my old Latitude D610.

3. The DVD drive is very fragile when ejected. I wonder how long it will last On my old D610 it was bigger and much more sturdy.

4. The fingerprint reader is connected through some special Broadcom device making it inaccessible for standard fingerprint software.

5. The Dell ControlPoint software suite is completed bloated and some parts are not very stable, like the Connection Manager and Security Manager. I have only installed the System Manager part on my E6400 to avoid slowing down the computer.

The only issue that is causing real concern for me is the SATA drivers issue. I have not had very much problem with this but this is the kind of thing that should never have issues since even the slightest issue might cause stability problems. The other issues are mostly minor annoyances.

Örjan

 

What is ODD?

 

I find it's a pretty solid notebook; I just wish Dell would put a little more effort into the ControlPoint software, and make sure it doesn't conflict with Vista. Mine seems to be pretty tame - it lets Vista handle the WiFi connections and most other power settings, the DCP software does the rest.

Also that annoyes me (but is nothing major) is the slightly loose bottom panel and right speaker grill. Because the bottom panel is held in place by one screw (making servicing easier), one outer-corner has a .5mm gap, making a 'clacking' sound when tapped. The right speaker grill is a little loose, it bends slighty when pressure is applied but it's nothing major. Left one is like cement.

I think those are the only issues I have with the machine. The hardware, features and design are fantastic, plus I got this for an absolute bargain. I just wish there were more powerful GPU options as any gaming I can't do on a consol I have to do on my Lat. Games like Red Alert 3 are playable, but only on the very lowest settings. I'm glad older titles like Counter-Strike Source and Guild Wars play like a dream, averaging 45+ fps on highest settings at 1440x900. I'm a little apprehensive how newer RPG titles like Diablo 3 will perform though.

 

As detailed in my review: PLDS DU-8A2S with firmware 4D12. There appears to be a date code of 2008/01/17.

Dell are now using at least two other makes of burner.

John

 

ODD means optical disk drive. The CD/DVD burner.

The only thing that I would like to improve on this is probably the screen, though it isn't bad once I got used to it.

The bottom panel is pretty tight for me as well. I may put some small pieces of electrical tape under it just to prevent any possibly tapping.

ControlPoint has been good for me. I only installed the System Manager portion of it, since I don't use any of the security features and I prefer Windows to manage my WLAN.

Greg