Precision M4500 Owner's Lounge

Can you add the minicard later, like in a few months?

 

I can't imagine why not. Although, I haven't been able to find the SKU off of the Dell site.

 

I hear you, I was in the same boat. For what I wanted (except for Dell's lack of a USB 3.0 port) Dell wanted about $2600 (after they offered by $50 off ). I could get an HP Elitebook 8540w in indentical specs at ~$1600, while the Thinkpad W510 with the same specs except for a faster CPU in the W510, also at about ~$1600. Dell Canada really is dreaming about their pricing these days.

 

i own a precision m4500 with de i7 620m and it's runnig a little slow, anyone with this problem?
should i make a fresh reinstall of windows 7??

 

matalachancha: what does the Windows Experience Index show you?

 

Not sure where you are looking but at the HP Canada site they want $2749 for the Elitebook 8540w with the same spec machine as my Lenovo W510

 

I was comparing i7 620M notebooks as I wanted something with more battery life than the Clarksfield CPUs. Of course W510 doesn't have a 620M option so the W510 I was comparing had higher priced CPU.

In Canada HP doesn't offer CTO notebooks so I was looking at the prebuilt models (I actually have it on order right now) it's price is very reasonable at many retailers.

With the Thinkpad, Lenovo Canada has EPP pricing anyone can get, plus a semi permanent discount (right now it's 20% off the EPP pricing for the W510). So basically, for the same price I've ordered the 8540w for I could've ordered a W510 with a i7 820QM, 4GB RAM, and 500GB HD. It's actually the best deal, it's increasing use of plastics that is turning me off.

Personally I do like the Dell M4500, but with even the Latitude E6510 being $250 to $300 more (and with a NVS 3100 at that) than the Thinkpad and the Elitebook I couldn't really justify it.

 

If you're only using 1 core, is an i5 faster than an i7? It seems that the real benefit from an i7 comes when running multithreaded apps which can take advantage of all 4 cores.

 

be7: my Windows Experience Index is
processor:6,8
ram:5,5 (i'm now with 2 gb)
graphics:6,5
game graphics:6,5
HD:5,9

 

The WEI seems pretty typical for a 620M. Usually that number is 6.9/7.0 area. As for the rest of the WEI numbers, they're also quite typical. It's probably something you're running that causing you to think it's slow.

be7: If by i7 you mean the Clarksfield then yes perform better if you're running a multithreaded app capable of utilizing the 4 cores. While the Clarksfield does have some difference like more cache and an on-die memory controller, the high end i5 like the 540M will probably perform better on single and double threaded processes, simply as a virtue of it's large gap in the clock. Personally if you're considering the Clarksfield 720QM, I would also consider the dual core Arrandale i7 620M rather than any of the i5. The two benches quite closely with the edge going both ways depending on the number of cores used. Plus CPUs the 620M does have the additional advantage of using less power and pumps out less heat, which are always nice things in a notebook.