Dell XPS M1210 Review (Pics, Specs)

Introduction:

I am not a big desktop fan, and I love the untethered feeling one gets with a laptop, especially small & light laptops.

Having said that, gaming is 1 area where laptops lose big time over desktops. I am not much of a gamer, but I do enjoy the occasional frag fest on UT or love dabbling in racing games like NFS-MW or RPGs like Dreamfall. That is where laptops would let me down.

So far, there were very few laptops available which have a decent GPU built in and nearly all of them were 15.4" or above in size and weighed over 6-7 Lbs, and that for me made invalid the very reason I prefer notebooks.

However, when I saw the Sony Vaio SZ series followed soon after by Dell's XPS M1210 (13.3/12.1 WXGA respective and both weigh below 4lbs) , my interest in a laptop for occasional gaming got fueled again as both run a Go7400 GPU which though (Obviously) not in the league of the big-bad boys, are good enough for a casual gamer like I .


Decisions, decisions

Both the machines were almost similarly priced, around the $1600-1800 mark, the configuration was pretty much the same
The Sony had a marginally bigger screen in its favor, but the Dell was smaller in size.
I was like totally and utterly confused.

After a lot of deliberation, hours of research and inputs from a dear friend in the US who agreed to go down to a store to take a look at the Vaio SZ , here is the conclusion I came to:

Sony:

Pros: Sleeker looks, thinner shell, slightly bigger screen, Slightly lighter
Cons: Questionable build quality (Apparently the SZ feels quite flimsy), slightly bigger form factor

Dell:

Pros: The sweet sturdy build, 1 year complete cover (incl. accidental damage), slightly smaller form factor, true-life screen

Cons: Bland looks, slightly smaller screen (12.1"), slightly heavier

Since the build quality is something I could not compromise on (I am a rather sloppy person, and am incapable of taking good care of my stuff ), eventually decided in favor of the Dell

On a side note, here is a big note of thanks to a friend who helped sweeten the Dell deal by quite a bit

SO I finally ordered the Dell on the 12th of August, and got the delivery on the 27th

The package:


Configuration:

* Intel Core Duo T2400 1.86 Ghz
* 667 MHZ FSB
* 12.1" True-life WXGA LCD
* 1 GB 667 mhz 512X2 running in dual channel
* nVidia GeForce Go7400
* 80 GB 5400 RPM SATA Hard Drive
* Integrated WebCam & Mic
* 3945 a/b/g wireless + BT
* 4 USB Ports, 1 Firewire, VGA out, S video out
* Memory Stick/SD Slot

Design, Looks & Build

The first thing that struck me when I opened the box was the size of the machine, or rather the lack of it
It has the size of an A4 sheet


(A4 sheet placed on top)

Add to it the fact that it is a 2kg notebook and what you have is a fairly portable machine that you can actually hold on one palm and work with the other hand.

The Black/Silver color combination looks nice though the Blue LED buttons on the front side for Media direct look a little tacky

The good: Very light, Sweet screen with nice wide viewing angles
Very sturdy Mg- Alloy case with no hint of flex on the screen and the body, the rotating webcam is a nice touch

The bad: fingerprint stain prone, keyboard a little cramped,

Build


Rating: 9/10

The Screen

Since the resolution is a sweet 1280X800, the small screen is not a bother at all. In fact the crispness of the display makes working on this 12.1" a little more than effective the 14.1" on my Compaq
Absolutely no issues while doing regular work on it.
However, movies (esp. non widescreen ) look a tad too small on it.

The backlight is really bright, and I need to keep it two-three notches below the max most of the time.

The integrated webcam is OK, nothing great. Takes very decent pics in good lighting but pales out if the lighting is even marginally bad.
The directional Mic on the Cam is pretty good though.
The viewing angles are very decent (Auo screen) and overall, the screen looks a lot better than my older Compaq V2000 and IBM R51.
I would rate it at par with my Fujitsu s2110 (though XGA) but the viewing angles aren't anywhere as good as that on my Sony HS95 LCD monitor (Desktop)


The screen at medium brightness


Rating: 9.5/10

Peripherals and connectivity:

4 USB ports, 1 firewire, modular DVD drive, Wireless a/b/g, card reader. This is
One department I can't complain about

Heat, noise, other irritants

The fan is usually off or running at low speeds most of the time, and is barely a bother

However, while running games, the fan comes up at full swing and though it is still silent, is my left palm is next to the fan vent (which it usually is, as my left fingers are on the w-a-s-d buttons while gaming, the warm-hot breeze can get pretty uncomfortable. If only they had kept the cooling fan on the back side

Thankfully the palm rest area runs cool all the time


Rating: 7/10

Speakers
The speakers have decent clarity but absolutely lack bass but can't really crib as it would be foolish to expect decent bass on a laptop
There are three 1/8" stereo jacks. Two for the L/R, one for mic. The two L/R jack is a good to have thing if two people are watching a movie.
The Internal Audigy(?) Sound card can be switched to 5.1 in which case all the 3 1/8" jacks work as audio outputs for the six channels.
There is also a digital SP/DIF out though no TOSLINK optical out

Performance:

The first thing I did after getting the machine was to run a full system diagnostic from UBCD and the Dell diagnostics utility
Next, I formatted and partitioned the Drive to 20/60 followed by a clean Windows & drivers install.

Boot time: Windows fresh install with just the basic startup items:
Press-On to POST -> Windows startup screen: 6 seconds
Startup screen to complete loading: 21 seconds
Total- 27 seconds

Super-Pi:
2M- 1 min, 16 seconds

3dmark05

2059 Total

NFS- MW:

After the registry tweak to eliminate choppiness,
Medium detail settings, I get 40-50 fps consistently
Very fluid game play

GTA-SA

25-30 fps
And 15-25 with 2XAA
Funny why the FPS figure is so low here
However the Game play stays pretty fluid being a Third person perspective game

HL2
Medium details
50+ fps

Battery Life
I ran the notebook from full charge to 100% charge to 10% . I kept using the notebook all the while with LCD brightness 2 notches below Max with iTunes running and browsing on firefox while downloading some stuff ....Total time: 3:10 mins

Conclusion

Finally a laptop that will keep me happy for a while now.
It is a difficult task to get a portable machine that is realllyyyy portable , still feels sturdy and yet has enough grunt to admirably handle the latest games.

I had almost stopped PC gaming altogether because I hate gaming while slouched on a chair.
I can happily curl up on a beanbag or lie down on my couch now yet manage to dabble in the latest games

Also, the nice size and the weight of this lappy enable me to quickly tuck it away in my backpack, and take it traveling with me.

Actually, there is nothing much to crib about on this puppy!
And I for one, am definitely loving this toy!!!



PS: If anyone wants more Pictures or Benchmarks, I'll be glad to post them

 

great stuff! I'm like jealous

 

Good review! This laptop is good and seems that has good performance.

 

Nice Review! Did you mean July here?

 

uh-oh..Thanks for pointing that out
Ordered on the 12th of July and delivered on 27th of July

 

What kind of battery did you use ? 6 or 9 cells ?

 

6 cell....AFAIK, 9 cell gives over 4-4.5 hours, but didn't opt for it since it juts out of the back

 

what registry hack?

 

NFS MW by default uses only 380 MB of memory or so which is why so many people face stuttering issues with NFS MW even on a 1900XT.

However, you can change this value to a higher one (say 700MB if yor system has 1 Gig of RAM) HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE>Software>EA Games where you'll something called Memory cache size . Edit that to a hifgher value and you are good to go

 

Update:
There is this weird hi pitched whine I noticed coming from the notebook when running on AC power..Not very loud, yet enough to be irritating in a silent room

 

Update:-> Whine fixed after Dell replaced the Motherboard on the laptop