Starting to really not like my E6400:

I rarely complain about things like this; was expected a much smoother experience when I first bought this laptop.

I cant get the darn fan to stop spinning and the base is getting extremely hot when docked (which im afraid might be frying my hardware).
Im on my second unit in one month; this one has the same problems as the first but the hard drive makes a ton of noise (at least I think its the hard drive). Its ALWAYS just ticking away!


And the Dell Control Point? What a pain in the arse...this thing never leaves me alone.
Its always asking me ambient light questions and alerting me to ethernet related issues.

Lastly, anyone like the mouse pad? Mine is non-responsive and way too small. It just doesnt work well for some reason...

Interested in hearing other people's complaints...am thinking it was a bad move buying the first of a new series.

 

Have you read anything on these forums?

There is a thread specifically titled touchpad drivers, which improves the touchpad a lot.

Can't help you as far as docking, but others seem to be having issues docking as well. Something that serious will likely be fixed via a BIOS update.

You can customize which alerts you recieve from Dell Controlpoint. I only recieve them for screen brightness, volume, and there is some message that comes up if I enable the advanced battery saving features.

If you don't use Controlpoint for battery management, security (fingerprint reader), etc, then I think you can uninstall it and install the tried and true Dell Quickset, download it from the D630 support page.

What other problems do you have?

Greg

 

I unfortunately have not been reading up enough...obviously
I will look into the touchpad thread that you have referenced.

I hope they figure out this fan situation-

As for other problems; I hear a constant ticking as if the computer is working through something-but all im doing is typing on this forum!
Its incredibly annoying.
Couple that with this non-stop fan and this is easily the loudest laptop I have ever used. Makes doing work at home very tedious.

 

Wow, that's quite the contrast.

Mine is definitely the quietest I have ever heard.

Greg

 

I recently downloaded the ALPS touchpad driver but im not sure if I have the latest one? (i have version 7.2.101.210)

 

You can easily fix the HDD ticking:
LINK
See post #7

 

Having the fan continuously running seems to be a by-product of using the docking station. The E6400 without the dock is very quiet.

See if installing the Intel Matrix Storage Manager cures the HDD ticking. Dell have also published two additional chipset drivers on the download site. I don't know what they do, but they may have something to do with SATA-related issues we have seen.

John

 

My concern with this fan issue is only partly the noise; i think this dock is not allowing for proper heat dissipation so I worry that the hardware is running too hot when docked. I worry more about hardware degradation...

How do I know what brand of HD I have?
I bought the 250GB at 7200 from DELL.

Where do I find this "Intel Matrix Storage Manager"? I saw the chipset drivers on the downlaod site yesterday but wasnt sure if I was suppossed to downlaod them.

 

The matrix storage manager is in the SATA section of the downloads. Or there may be a newer version at intel.

John

 

John-found it-thanks.
Please forgive the amatuer question, but once ive downloaded it do I have to install or run anything?