4th Vostro 1400 trying to get away from grainy screen and other assorted problems....

Well on my 4th 1400 now and while it's far from perfect, I think Dell finally got me to where I am not going to hassle with trying to fix it anymore...

The main issue has been a continuing run of grainy screens from Dell... 2 LGs and an AUO both grainy and sparkly.

Finally I get my replacement yesterday and the first thing I notice is that the DELL on the BIOS screen looks noteably smooth... and low and behold once into windows it actually has no grain!!!

It actually made my eyes feel weird how smooth and even the pixels were... I know it sounds weird but after hours and hours of using my other 1400 with the sparkly screen it's literally like stepping out from behind a screen door to a clean clear window.

Sadly it's not all happy as the colors are a bit washed out and the backlight bleed is either rediculous or it's just a matter of the panel... what I mean is that it would seem that at normal viewing angles the backlight bleed actually covers 9/10s of the screen... so either that's how gray it' supposed to be (certainly not black) or the bleed is HUGE.

At this point I am going to stick with it as it's by far the easiest on the eyes of the 4 I have had and it's definitely useable in windows... I will pay for it in games and movies but they make up such a small percentage of what I do I will cut my losses.

So chalk one up to an AUO being at least decent for a 1400... and a customer who is not actually satisfied but satiated enough to just deal with it at this point...

On an upside the video card in it seems to clock rediculously high RAM settings pushing 975 with recent overclocks.... still testing that one out but so far looks promising.

 

which screen do you have WXGA or WXGA+?

 

Sorry, WXGA.... which it seems should have kept me out of the whole issue anyway but I got unlucky for sure....

Oh and incidently it came with BIOS revision A02... looks like they are burning through 1400 BIOSes....

 

Were they truelife screens?

 

Yup, sorry, all 4 WXGA TL screens... 2 LG that were both bad (one less than the other) and 2 AUO one of which was horrible and one of which is decent.

 

what you are seeing is prob caused by the lcd itself. most likely its the viewing angle of the screen you are noticing. what screen is it?? does it appear to either have more or less bleed if you move the screen slightly while you are looking straight on to it?? some of the lg screens if thats what you got had a great picture to them but really bad viewing angles which i would have lived with over the nasty grain on the screen...

 

Yeah it's an AUO screen and I haven't noticed significan't change in light bleed moving right to left... I am not convinced it's light bleed in the normal sense of the word either... I think it might just be poor light blocking from the LCD which makes blacks gray and when I tilt the screen back far enough it really does look black but only because I am way outside the normal light reflection angle.

I had two LG screens and I am not convinced the 14 inch LGs are any good even though the 15 inchers are but they definitely seemed to have better color saturation... but yes bad viewing angle...

Fortunately the viewing angle on this AUO seems better than the LG also... that is I see gray black but I can tilt the screen quite a few degrees without having that weird darkness creep in from the bottom or top. Not as good as many I have seen but not bad.

BTW I forgot to mention that this one came with BIOS AO2... so seems they are burning their way through BIOS revisions on this thing... first on I got was A00 then got an A01... on the website still lists A00 only for download...

 

ARGGHHHH noticed there is a dead pixel or something... it's pretty small, doesn't even look like a pixel (looks like a little line or hair in front of the pixel as it's not an actual square dead)...

This is exactly the kind of thing that will totally piss me off in the long run... it's small enough you can't really see it if you don't look but damnit if I don't look all the time now that I know it's there!

Why does it have to be like this... why!??!?!!!??

And no it's not a stuck subpixel... ran flashing colors for hours and rubbed it just out of hope but nothin... seems like the world is against me.

 

how many of your 4 had headphone jack noise?

 

I have the 1400 and theres no headphone jack noise (no beeping) but it sounds like the sea when i plug it in.

 

I only tested 2 for headphone jack noise (because 2 were setup for replacement within hours of receiving them anyway) and neither of those two had headphone jack noise.

 

I agree that it seems that LG 14-inch panels aren't not the miracle LCD like the case for 15-inch LCD owners.

The SEC I have has the same angle viewing issues you're talking about. I don't think it is so much light leakage as it is just bad viewing angles, tilting the screen around either minimizes or maximizes the seeming leakage, but I've also just learned to deal with it as my computer is rarely on a black screen anyways.

Considering the past two replacement I've received are grainy, I don't believe I'll get an amazing non-grainy, great viewing angles, no leakage LCD, and I'll be satisfied with my non-grainy SEC. Sorry to hear about that pixel, hopefully it isn't in the center of the screen.

 

gah! Why does Dell do that? Everything else about the PC's are a home run especially for the price, but their screens are actually a deal breaker. Why don't they go with a little better quality control and/or screen vendor. I'd rather pay an extra $50 which would still make their lappy's cheaper than most still.

 

SEC (Seiko-Epson) is the screen to have in the 1400.

I, too got a replacement 1400 with A02 BIOS. I noticed it's not even available on Dell's site yet. However, this 1400 is going back for another replacement. THe headphone jack sounds like the sea (my original one has no noise) and I think the bluetooth antenna is disconnected, as my bluetooth mouses' performance is horrendous.

Thing is, both of mine had SEC screens. I can only pray my 3rd one does too.

Tom.

 

Devedander were you're #2, 3, or 4th laptop refurb or new ones? I am in a similar situation. I just received my #2 laptop (Vostro 1400) the screen is a lot better; however, now the battery does fit right. I am afraid if I ask Dell for a 3rd replacement machine they will send me a refurb one.

Please advise.

 

SEC is by Samsung not Seiko Epson. This has been clarified last month in this forum. My Vostro 1400 SXGA+ is SEC4457 and it looks great.

 

The bad pixel is way off to the right and not visible unless you look for it on a light colored area. And you can believe every time a light colored area comes up I look for it

Other than that I think it's run through it's paces and will probably end up being the keeper. The bad pixel really is pretty minor in the big scheme, just pisses me off that it's >.< that far from being "perfect".

I did not receive any refurbs that I am aware of. I asked specifically if the first replacement would be new and was told it would be. I don't have a refurb sticker on mine and didn't see refurb on the invoice anywhere so I am assuming it's new. Any replacement within the first 30 days (or 21 depending on your return policy, but vostro should be 30) should be a new unit, not refurb.