Dell E1705 still kickin...inspiron 9400

Anyone else out there?

Stats are in my sig.

This machine is still doing well today, despite me buying it in 2006.

 

I had one of these.... These were awesome laptops back in the day. You could overclock the 7900 fairly well. One of the best laptops I have ever owned

 

After 5 years of faithful service, I just retired mine.

In the last few months, the wifi would disconnect after 30 minutes after turning on the computer. The only way to reconnect to the internet was by restarting the computer. It's strange though... after the 30 minute mark, if I was watching streaming content such as justin.tv the stream would continue to work. However, I would no longer be able to open any new web pages. I tried many things to fix it but could never figure it out. The only thing I didn't try that would probably work is to buy a new wifi card.

Instead, I bought a new computer last week. An Inspiron 17R with an Intel Core i5-2410M processor, 8GB of RAM and 750GB hard drive. It's a pretty good computer for my needs but I'm still having separation anxiety...

I've actually started to research about giving my E1705 (aka 9400) a number of transplants to bring her back to life. These include:
An Intel Core 2 Duo T7600 (2.3Ghz) processor, 4GB RAM, battery, wifi card,750 GB hard drive and Windows 7 installed. I'd change the Graphics card too but I think it's integrated and can't be replaced (I'm not too sure though). The cost? Roughly $500. Is it worth it?

 

You could probably buy a new, comparably spec'ed machine for that same $500. I don't think it's worthwhile. I don't understand why you don't just buy a new WiFi card and see if that fixes your problem(s)?

 

I will if I decide to update the ol' E1705... aren't they like $20? My computer was hooked up to the internet via an ethernet cable so wifi wasn't a big concern. Even if I bought a new wifi card, the computer needs some serious updating. It just gave me an excuse to buy a new and faster computer. I hope this Inspiron 17R lasts as long as my E1705...

 

I have the XPS variant (the m1710). Got it as a replacement to an XPS GEN I that had a battery explosion. Received it april 2007. Even after the purchase of a Sager NP8662, once in a while when I need a program that is XP-only, or too outdated for the Sager, I put the m1710 back to work. It serves as my archiving computer, and will continue to until it physically falls apart.

IMHO, these are the last of the truly great XPS machines. The m1730 was a bloated cheapie AW, and the new XPS's have become degraded to "dell studio-plus rigs" with the onset of purchasing alienware resulting in mid-range laptops, booteek laptops a la adamo, etc. Additionally, it's a bit flimsy but at the end of the day I can still play RCT3 on it and be happy.

I love my hotrod 1705.

Specs in Sig.

 

I've still got my 9300. The 2.13GHz CPU and 6800Go GPU still handle just about everything. I do like the design, but it's impressive the new 17R's pack more power in a lighter package. Sad about the 1600x900 16:9 screen though.

The wifi cards are a snap to replace, just about as easy as memory. Pop the bottom compartment door off, pull the card, replace. You can even use an Atheros card instead of the Intel, with the right drivers, of course.

I had another 9300 with intel wi-fi that was being flaky, and I thought the card was toast. However, just re-installing the driver fixed it. You can even update the driver with newer ones from the Dell site, or they often have the same version that came with it for download too.

You can get the cards pretty cheap now, but the software fix is at least worth trying. No point in replacing a perfectly good working card if you don't have to.

 

I bought mine in August 2006, and I still use it regularly, in fact right now, as my daily Internet system.

Stats are:
* Intel® Core™ 2 Duo processor T7200 2 GHz
* 2 GB RAM
* ATI MOBILITY™ RADEON® X1400
* WD 160 GB SATA HD
* Windows 7 Ultimate x64

It's experienced intermittent BSOD throughout it's life (every couple of weeks), but other than that it's been a great system!

 

I tried updating my drivers dozens of times... using both the Dell and Intel driver download sites. Nothing worked!

Strange thing though... After removing all of my important files, I just did a clean install of (32 bit) Windows 7 on my E1705. Windows 7 installed all the drivers for me and the wireless is working perfectly.

This has given me the motivation to start upgrading her components... She ain't dead yet!

My Wishlist: An Intel Core 2 Duo T7600G (2.3Ghz but can be overclocked to 3.2Ghz!) processor, 4GB RAM, new battery, 750 GB (7200RPM) hard drive.

 

Early on in my E1705's life I replaced the Intel wifi card with a Gigabyte GN-WI01GT (Atheros AR5006EGS) wifi card I got off of eBay, and it has worked great for many years so far.

 

Has anyone used their expresscard port for anything? The only interesting thing that I have seen is an expresscard ssd with your OS to improve the computer's boot time. Any suggestions?

 

Save your money and buy an SSD for your new computer.

 

I don't know how buying a ssd would save me any money... it's pretty expensive to buy one with a decent size of memory. My battery is dead so I need one of those and RAM is cheap. The only real expensive thing to buy is the new processor... Are you saying that a ssd will make up for the extra speed of a new processor?

Although, similar to my expresscard idea, a ~100GB ssd in the DVD bay for booting up Windows sounds pretty good... Or do you switch it around? the 750GB hd in the optical bay and the ssd in the main hard drive bay? Does it matter?

 

I know it's really outdated, but I wanted to answer that one... Specifically for the question below

My Inspiron 9400 is still my main computer today... Has been repaired a few times by myself, upgraded with XPS 1710 components, has a few scratches, but everything inside is still going strong, every features still functioning like new after 6 years!

Current specs:
Intel Core 2 Duo T7400 @ 2.16 GHz
nVidia Gefore Go 7950 GTX
4 GB (3.25 usable) DDR 2 @ 667 MHz
Original WiFi from Interl Wireless G
Original Bluetooth Dell 350 module (with Toshiba stack -> Mouse and keyboard)
Blu-ray burner

So, over the years, I had to replace graphics a few times (famous nVidia defect) until I eventually bought the best graphic card it can take (and the first notebook card ever to support HDCP for blu-ray), the 7950GTX.

Had problems with drivers for bluetooth in Windows 7... Fortunately, Toshiba stack fixes that problem!

Over the years, new synaptics drivers added multi-touch functionnality, 2 finger scrolling, 3 finger swapping... cool

Used a converter box to combine S/PDIF output (hidden inside S-Video out) and DVI to create HDMI output driven directly by laptop hardware... Complete HDCP chain from laptop to TV for blu-rays!

Added a blu-ray burner, never used the blu-ray burning capability (was used, cheaper than a new reader-only).

A month ago, screen died (Light gradually declied, until it wouldn't light anymore... Replaced the screen with the one from an identical laptop I have laying around... Still considering replacing inverter/light bulb!

Opened it very often for dust cleaning... Quite the dust collector this laptop!

I've used it with a Parrallel port Expresscard... I needed to run some peripherals with true parrallel port (where a cheap serial USB printer emulator wouldn't do)... Only Pci-express type chip could provide a real parrallel port, necessitating the use of an expresscard. You can't have a real parallel port over USB. For example, used it to plug a JTAG programmer, used in programming a FPGA!



So although it's still my main computer... I see it's time to replace it... It's been worth the money ten times over, but now I'll have to part from it... It'll be a sad day, been through a lot together.

Currently looking to replace it with the new XPS 15 L521x... I know I will never have a better laptop, but I really have to move on! The Inspiron 9400 really was a king.