New M6500 Discussion Thread

I wonder if the new Samsung firmware and/or PM800 still has the built in garbage collection. I ordered mine with XP Pro 32bit and so I won't have the TRIM functionality. I wonder if I'll have SSD performance issues with the new firmware. My m6500 is still in production and won't arrive for another 10 days or so.

I'm seriously considering getting win7 64bit and going to 8 or 12GB (ordered it with 4GB) and then using XP compatibility mode or run XP in a VMs. Need XP for some of the things I'm running.

- Ben

 

Just an update on my LCD issue - service tech just left. He attempted to swap out the LCD, but he wound up stripping one of the screws that secures it in place. Offered to have it sent in for service where I would probably get refurbished parts.

Oddly enough, I just received a voice message from Dell asking if I would like a System Replacement as their Engineers would like to perform a Quality Capture of the machine in its defective state. I accepted, so they are currently setting that up.

 

Thanks for the update keithsnell. Let's see what you're getting.

 

Thats actually good. I'd rather have a brand new laptop replacement than start off with refurbished parts for your new laptop. It stinks that you have to wait to get the replacement though but at least it will be working the way it should and is all new instead of refurbished with stripped screws

 

Don’t even think twice about it replace it.

 

Although I don't have personal experience, everything I have read about the XP mode in Windows 7 has been good. From what I have read, it works the way it should, with very few issues. There is one caveat in the Microsoft description of XP mode, which is that XP mode requires "a system that has chip-level virtualization from either Intel or AMD." I would be very surprised if the new i7 chips don't have chip-level virtualization, but it would be worth verifying before ordering. (It was confirmed earlier on this thread that the 920 does, but I haven't seen any confirmation of that capability with the 820 or 720.)

I would tend to go with your second option, with Win 7 Pro or Ultimate, and more RAM. This would give you a much more flexible machine. (It seems somewhat contradictory to order a machine with such awesome potential, but then cripple it with an older operating system and a tiny amount of RAM.) It might be worth asking if anyone has any experience running in XP mode with the specific applications you are planning to use.

 

The Precision ON is already on the M6500 support site. It is listed as Reader 2.0. I will have this changed.

 

Thanks again havoctex - I noticed that but just did not associate it properly! Downloading now.

 

My understanding is all of the intel I3,I5 and I7 family have vm extensions needed to accelerate windows xp mode though im sure intel will eventually find some way to confuse the consumer with a special run of I5 chips with bad yeilds that dont have it.

What the quad 45nm I7's (see how specific i have to be now there are dual I7's) also have are some of the newer VM extensions that came in from the server chips they are based on. I believe the i5's and dual i7's are missing them but intels product matrix hurts my head.

 

This is from Microsoft website; Using Windows XP Mode This video shows you how
to use Windows XP Mode to run programs made for Windows XP.

Windows Virtual PC this link is to the website that is shown in the beginning of the video
watch the video first.

And just follow the steps on Microsoft’s website.

Step 1. Does my PC have a CPU with support for hardware Virtualization?

Download and run the Hardware-Assisted Virtualization Detection Tool

Step 2. Does my PC BIOS support hardware virtualization, and is it turned on?

See Attached Thumbnails.

You will need to enable the Intel Virtualization Technology in your BIOS
See Attached Thumbnail.



I hope this helps you