M4800 Owner's Thread

I will be waiting for your experiment.

 

FYI to all: some new drivers were posted for the trackpad and the Dell 1601 wireless card.

The update process went smoothly for me (the trackpad driver did restore all the settings to default though).


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Does anyone know, when an M4800 is ordered from Dell, which "SSD Drive - Manufacturer/Brand" does Dell use for the:

256 GB SSD

512 GB SSD

 

While most are Samsung and LiteOn, it varies depending on their supply. Large OEM's usually have a couple brands and models in each size to prevent delays.

I usually tell folks unless they plan on running benchmarks, they'd never be able to tell the difference between a particular model SSD anyways.


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omegafiler,

I have not heard of the brand LiteOn. Are they produced in china or tawian ?

 

A quick google or Wikipedia search would get you that answer - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lite-On - "primarily Taiwanese."


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alexhawker,

1.... Your right, I should have thought of doing that myself.


alexhawker, omegafiler,

2. I would like to get your expert opinions about something. I am novice when it comes to this and I sure could use your expert advice about the following:

... So, Dell has recently set up a full customizable option on their shopping page, but I realize now that their asking a quite a bit for their ssd's options.

So, suppose I just got the M4800 with the standard 500GB - SSHD (hybrid) drive that their offering.

..... Is it easy for me replace the SSHD myself with an SSD that I buy myself ???


So here is what I am also wondering ....

1. Could I use an Imaging Pgm (currently I use paragon on my old pc to make backup images, so I am use to it.) to make an Backup Image of the 500 GB SSHD - Hybrid Drive.

2. Then replace the 500GB - SSHD Hybrid drive with a new 512GB - SSD Drive.

3. Restore the Backup Image (of the "SSHD Hybrid drive) Drive onto the New 512 GB - SSD drive ?
.... Will this work with them being different types of drives ? (image of an SSHD Hybrid being restored to a New SSD drive).

4. How would I make the New SSD the Primary Drive ?

5. Would the New SSD Drive need to be SATA3 or an mSATA ?

6. When I restore the Image onto the New SSD Drive will Windows need to Re-Activated because I replaced the Booting Drive Hardware (i.e. replacing SSHD with SSD Boot Drive) ?

... If windows needs to Re-activated does that meab just Re-entering the windows license key ot do I need to call microsoft to re-activate windows ?

 

Yes, it's quite easy - look here for instructions: ftp://ftp.dell.com/Manuals/all-prod...on-m4800-workstation_Owner's Manual_en-us.pdf - Basically you need to remove the battery, take out two screws, slide a panel aside, and swap the drives after removing a couple more screws. Very easy.

I personally bought mine with the HDD rather than SSHD, and put my own SSD in. Later i bought a hard drive caddy for the optical bay and put the HDD back in as a data drive. I would not waste money on the SSHD, personally.

As to your other questions, I would just do a fresh install. Opinions very on whether it's advisable to move an image from a HDD to an SSD, due to fragmentation/alignment/other issues. I'm not saying it won't work without a hitch, but why not just fresh install. Note you will get Win 8 install media, not Win 7, but you should be able to install from an ISO found online, using the key beneath the battery.

If you're doing a simple drive swap, you don't need to worry about which is the "primary". You can get either a regular SSD (2.5" SATA III) or a mSATA (which is also SATA III), both should work fine. The mSATA will technically be a little lighter, but because it lacks the housing of the larger drive, so at the cost of physical ruggedness/durability. mSATA drives also tend to be a hair slower than the 2.5" counterparts, and about $10 more.

 

It turns out that Dell no longer offers a plian HDD option in the configuration choices, so the cheapest choice would be 500 GB SSHD,

Note you will get Win 8 install media, not Win 7, but you should be able to install from an ISO found online

1. Do you mean online from the Dell Support Site ?

2. The fully customizable dell m4800 shopping page option has two choices for getting the M4800 with Win 7 Preinstalled on it (whic I am interested in only running Win 7 at this point)
... So, what do you think is the difference when its configured with one vs the other option listed below for having win 7 Preinstalled on it ?

Windows 7 Professional English 64bit (Includes Windows 8 Pro license) [Included in Price]

Windows 7 Professional, English, 64-bit (includes Windows 8.1 Pro 64bit License) add $0.00

 

No, you will need to find the ISO elsewhere (i.e. digital river offers legit downloads). You could also try asking Dell for a recovery CD with Win7 - they may charge you for it.

It looks like one option includes Win 8 install media (USB drive), and one has media with Win 8.1 (so you don't need to do the upgrade from 8 to 8.1 yourself).