New M6500 Discussion Thread

Wow, that is a great deal. What other major specs does the system have? I ended up getting one with RGBLED and 720QM for $1650. I'm curious to see what yours has in the other specs to make it so cheap. Was it scratch and dent?

 

Hi Adam,

I've had your issue in the beginning, where the monitors on the "port 1" would not come out of power save on resume or when docked. I'd have to power the monitor down and back up -- or change resolution (using the second monitor connected to "port 2" which seemed to kick the monitor back to life.

However, the issue got progressively worse where the monitor would flash and became a "static" mess. It would get fuzzy, with pink static and streaks! The only way to fix it would be to once again, change resolution out of 1920x1200 to something lower (like 1280x760) and then back again. It seemed like a frequency sync issue on the video port. Toward the end, even this didn't work.

After Dell replaced the main board last month, the static went away and its now stable. I still occasionally see the power save issue on my docking station at home; but I also changed my monitor to a U3011 and had to use that DisplayLink-To-DVI adapter (with the USB power port), and I think it might be more suspect because when I'm at work on a Lenovo 24 inch through a dock, it works like a charm.

 

I installed the hotfix, and have been running it for the past few days. So far so good! (knock on wood)

 

Sounds good; you will have to keep us posted if it seems to help. It would suck to think that Dell is getting blamed for all these lockups and it could potentially be a Windows issue. I'm sure Win7 SP1 will bring a lot of stability to an already great OS.

 

Might not be your M6500 -

Quote:
Originally Posted by griff_ga View Post
Have you tried this Win7 hotfix?

A computer that is running Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7 stops responding randomly - A computer that is running Windows Server 2008 R2 or Windows 7 stops responding randomly

I'm not sure if it will help you, but it is a hotfix for a spontaneous lockup issue that is supposed to be going into the Win7 SP1 when it comes out.
I installed the hotfix, and have been running it for the past few days. So far so good! (knock on wood)

 

Thanks Mumak, i may have not installed the latest version of your App so i will give it another try soon..

 

I have ordered a new M6500. I will install on it two Intel X-25 M 160GB SSD drives.

I intend to configure them in Raid 0.

Is it faster or not than not using Raid (Two independent drives)?

I have read in this forum that since the Raid 0 setup does not support TRIM the performance deterioration over time plus the software based Raid 0 overhead makes the two independent drives configuration superior.

I have an M6400 with two Intel X25M drives in Raid 0 and believe that Raid 0 is better but I would appreciate an informed opinion.

Thanks,

Antonio

 

It seems like lot of sellers of used/refubrished Dell Precision M6400/M6500 laptops on ebay&co don't know exacly wich screen the laptop has, so I want to ask you, is there any simple methode to identify if screen is RGBLED or not? AFAIK there are 2 versions of RGBLED screens, one with matte finish with bezel around the screen and other with glossy finish without bezel. Am I right? So if seller confirms that resolution of the screen is 1920x1200 and it has a glossy finish, this must be RGBLED E2E screen, right? But how to identify mate version of the RGBLED screen without opening the lid and maybe even without starting the computer? Thank you for answers!

 

Looking to upgrade the processor of my M6500 from a i5-540M to a i7-840QM.

Is this a direct replacement?
Should I anticipate any issues?
Any other thoughts?

Thanks guys...

 

man what a saga
most of the techs I have had were good although most had little people skills and were uncomfortable chatting / being around the laptop when they were working on it.
I had one guy whom was an idiot, stunk of BO and was trying to make it up as he went along. The laptop was fixed okay, but then I had to use a coat hanger to open his car door as he'd locked himself out. I didn't have it in me to leave him stuck there, even although it was funny - 5mins was enough