E6500 initial impressions and minor issues

So I just got my E6500 and only have used it for about 4 or 5 hours (just getting all my usual software installed). So far I am a little indifferent about it.

The construction feels good. But definitely not the same quality as friends Thinkpad and MacBook Pro that I was able to use. Though I would say it is better than average based on other laptops I had recently used.

The keyboard feels a little mushy to me. Almost like I am expecting more feedback. Though this is probably something just to get used to and isn't necessarily worse than another laptop. Just a different feeling. The back-lit keyboard is VERY cool and actually comes in very handy when hacking at a friends house in his dark projector room I had to disable the automatic back lighting though as it was constantly flickering between brightness.

I got the WUXGA screen because I like and am used to a larger resolution. No dead pixels as far as I could tell so far and it is crisp. However in all 4 corners it is noticeably dark and on a black image the light is darker in the center and fades out. The corners though bother me a little. It is about a half inch into the screen from the corners where it gets much darker. Could the LCD just need some use and this get better in the first week or so or is this a bad screen?

The track pad feels really small compared to my other really old laptop. But it seems responsive. I like the Trackpoint nib to. Different than the Thinkpad and older dell Inspiron one I had been using. But I think I can get used to it (just a different feel). I DO seem to be having a freezing / jerky problem though that I posted another thread about which is very annoying. Hopefully it is just a software issue.

I am reading a lot about DVD burner issues. But have not tried using it yet. Other than these things it is pretty nice. It is thicker than I had imagined. But it is light for it's size and features. The finish is nicer than a plastic. But still seems somewhere in between an aluminum and plastic to me. I also ordered the 7200 RPM 160G drive and though it would come with one of the newer Seagate or Fujitsu 16MB cache drives. But it came with the older 8MB cache Fujitsu.

For a business laptop though I think this meets my needs and will prove to work well in the long run if I can get some of these minor issues worked out. Dell has been very pleasant to deal with so far.

 

I felt the same way about my D830 when I got it, especially concerning the WUXGA. It takes a while to get used to, and you will probably have to tweak the colour settings.

The light sensor is just a gimmick.

I wouldn't say your screen is bad; most laptop WUXGA screens have quite a bit of bleed because they must use very powerful backlights turned up full blast to produce a legible image. This is due to the nature of the fine dot pitch and the light attenuation more than anything, and probably not, in your instance, due to a manufacturing defect.

There is no 'break-in' with LCDs, so what you see, is what you're ultimately going to have to live with. But once you've accustomed yourself to WUXGA, its very unlikely that you'll ever want to use anything else on your laptop.