Precision M6400 Owner's Lounge *Part 2*

Yes, it's worked fine for almost a year now. But I don't use any RAID and it's only the one drive, a 250GB Seagate, so your problems are different in that regard but you do need to pin down where the problem is. And you can't do that without trying a different brand and/or type of e-sata hookup, that much I do know. There might very well be some diagnostic procedure in the OS to do it but I'm not aware of one. But as I said, I'm no technician so the first thing I'd do is try a different piece of e-sata hardware and if the problem repeats itself you at least know for sure the e-sata connection screwed up twice. It seems now all you know for sure is that either the 6400 or the Lacie is bad and eliminating one would put you half way to a solution. When you figure it out I'd like to hear what happens. And you're dealing with Vista I see and that opens a whole avenue of possible problems, especially since the Lacie specifically says it doesn't like Vista 64. That's a whole can of worms itself.

And my e-sata drive runs the same in XP and Windows 7. I've been thinking of installing my Vista Business on it just as an experiment (that's how I learn mostly), since I'm in a place where I'm considered the local computer expert. And that's one of the biggest jokes in the cosmos. The short time I had Vista I had none of the problems associated with it and I have an empty partition on the e-sata drive to put it, but if Lacie specifically says no then they're off the hook with you. And if you have no alternative take your Precision to some mega store and hook up to something they have laying around and see what happens. I paid about $30 for the box I'm using and someone gave me the drive. With your 16GB of memory you're probably not starving so maybe you could buy a cheap backup box for some drive you have laying around. It'd sure be nice if you did that and all of a sudden found Lacie was the problem all along, eh?
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Precision Covet | QX9300 | 4GB 1066 | 64GB Samsung SLC SSD & 320GB Seagate | XP Pro 32bit & Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit

 

guys,
when you're checking the dell website for updates, make sure you check the M6500 page to!
There is a newer IDT audio driver on there for example

 

Do you use the 'SRS Premium Sound' software that comes with the computer? I'm always looking to shave things down and don't understand and/or don't hear any difference. And one of the sound settings keeps changing itself back to the SRS when I change it to IDT. I normally am hooked to a nice set of Bose desktop speakers and have always wondered about the double software. Sorry if that's an incredibly dumb question, I think the last two or three Dells I've bought have/had it and I never gave it any thought, but less is more, right? OK maybe not always, but usually.

And what kind of 6500 software besides the IDT thing might interest a 6400 owner?
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Precison m6400 Covet | QX9300 | blah, blah, blah |

 

ok thats seems to be a common thought! so how would i configure the fingerprint reader?

 

For the people who have seen the Covet e2e rgbled screen is it significantly more sexy than the m6400 without?

 

Does anyone have their M6400 BIOS set to RAID and using the eSata port with no problems?

In other words anyone using two internal HD's as RAID 0 or RAID 1 and also using the M6400 eSata port?

 

For what it is worth, here is my experience with eSata on the M6400.

I had pb with a WD (my book) eSata drive (only 500Gb). I could never get it to work properly while transferring data to it (meaning it works fine from external drive to PC but not the other way around). I did upgrade the WD firmware but no luck.

I pretty much give up on this drive. I am only using it with the usb connector nowdays.
Note : I started a thread about that issue here on that forum.

I am now using a 1Gb seagate barracuda with eSata with no pb.
Note: I am in the RAID array mode but I do not have RAID 0 or 1

 

Requesting M6400 owners attention to this thread. It relates to a weird churning/grinding sound I am noticing my brand new M6400 when scrolling anything even the start menu options.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=444743
Did not want to repost.
Thanks

 

Any M6400 owner interested in a trade for the HP8730w in my sig?

Minimum would be FX3700M + WUXGA. Refurbished is fine as Dell refurbs have 3 year global warranties.

HP units don't.

 

Hello M6400 Owners, my Best Wishes to All!

Anybody who uses a TV Tuner with the M6400? I am thinking to make a gift to my lappy for its stable performance Not sure whether to use the Express Card or PCMCIA or USB port with the tv tuner as solution. I guess the Express Card would be the fastest one , but I have it already occupied with a Creative sound blaster Card. So PCMCIA could do? I found a 'PINNACLE SYSTEMS HYBRID PRO 310c CARDBUS' which seems decent.
Any suggestions?
Thank you!