Dell XPS M1210 with Core 2 Duo Review (pics, specs)

Hi angry mob, I just want to know does the warranty work in canada even if you bought it from dell HK because I also live in canada and i am considering buying the m1210 from dell HK.

 

To arnoldleung26:

All of Dell's 3 Years Next Business Day (NBD) Onsite Response (and above) are supported internationally (in North Amercia there are options for up to 4 Years NBD Onsite Response). This is what Dell Hong Kong said on their site:

The Dell International Service Program provides service and support for your Dell portable computer while you are traveling with it outside of the country in which you purchased your computer.

How The Program Works:
- On both Latitude and Inspiron products, the Dell International Service Program is available when 3 years of Next Business Day (NBD) On-site service is purchased.
- When a customer travels outside of their home country and experiences a problem, they can request international service in any country that supports their particular line of notebook.

Requesting Service:
There are three methods for engaging technical support when traveling internationally:
- Customers may call the call center of the country they are currently in.
- Customers may call the call center of their home region from abroad.
- Customers may call the International Queue. Phone number is 512-728-7407 (toll call). If in the US or Canada, the toll free number is 800-822-8965.

You can find more details from Dell Services' Hong Kong page here.

However, the CompleteCover accidental coverage program is regional, therefore, if you purchased a Dell system in the Asia Pacific region, then you can only claim for CompleteCover service within the region your system was shipped from - in this case, a XPS M1210 purchased in Hong Kong will only be covered in Asia Pacific (which Dell currently lists as: Australia, Brunei, China, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Korea, Macau, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Thailand).

I have purchased both the 3 Year Next Business Day (NBD) Onsite response and 3 Year CompleteCover with mine. In most cases the NBD part should cover most warranty issues you may encounter. The CompleteCover mainly deals with accidental damage to the LCD screen and you can always ship it back to Hong Kong and have a warranty claim on it should you need to. They won't ask where the notebook was damaged and they will just as happily fix it for you.

(I have had my Axim X50v's LCD screen damaged while here in Canada, all I did was ship it back to my relatives in Hong Kong and have them help me get a CompleteCover claim on it, and Dell HK replaced the unit for me within 2 business days)

 

Great review and it sounds like a fantastic notebook!

 

Very nice review thank you!!!

I got the almost same config last week! And I am just returning it to DELL...

Mine is T7200 Dual 2 Core, 1gb Ram, 60gb HDD, DVDRW, NO A/V and INTEL GMA950 video...

My problem was with the microphone input, i was not able to use IM programs, (skype, msn) My voice was cutting down randomly, it was disgusting...

Even I had 4 year warranty from DELL... but they did do nothing, I was offered to change motherboard... for a 1-week brand new laptop

Now I am just returning it...

Have you tried mic port? Do you have such problem?

Thanks!


P.S Mine was total $1390.00 includes everything (tax,shipping,4 year premium warranty) Should I accept a replacement system or just return it?

 

DON'T RETURN IT BEFORE TRYING THIS:

Right click on Logitech Video (task bar)

Configure Audio

Headset

UNselect Enable AEC (even though it says recommended)

Solved my problem, now it works fine!

Hope it helps,

Antonio

 

To knightfall:

Sorry to hear about the problems you have. I have tried both the built-in microphone on the webcam, and using the microphone port with a very basic ($10) headset. I didn't encounter any problems with any VoIP programs.

Perhapes you should check that under the microphone adjustment in Volume Control, in Advanced setting, that "Microphone Boost" is checked and enabled.

With that 4 Years of Permium warranty (I am assuming NBD with CompleteCover), they should give you a replacement with no questions asked. Just be a bit more firm and ask to speak to the supervisior and insist on getting a brand new unit.

 

Firstly, great review.
I've posted posted a problem I've encountered on the original m1210 review, but I'll raise the question here as well as I also have the core2duo version ) ); has anyone experienced occasional audio skipping and/or if anyone has picked up and any audio quality problems when playing games like HL2 (ie, there is a lack of surround sound with stereo headphones [throw a grenade, turn to the side, and see if audio comes from both sides equally]).
Also, has anyone experienced problems with closing and openning the screen too quickly, whereafter the screen stays off?
Finally, how stable is your extended battery? Mine seems to move and jitter a small bit.

Thanks
- lor

 

I use the onboard graphics, so I don't play games with it, but I've used both the built-in speakers and headphone and haven't experienced any sound issues while listening to MP3s/WMAs/WAVs/videos, etc.

As for the battery, I have a regular 6-cell battery and it is perfectly snug. No leeway for moving around.

 

My extended battery moves around a bit.... grounds for a recall? Over time I can imagine it getting looser and looser.

 

I just ordered one with the exact same specs as angrymob.
I am curious if Dell is planning to come up with media bay batteries for the inspiron/xps laptops. Is the dvd/rw removable? I wonder if the necessary connections exist in the connector, so we could just get a battery and stick it instead of the optical drive, which I rarely use.

 

Hi Angrymob,
It is a very impressive review. Thank you. I am also thinking about buying M1210, or any laptop similar to it.

I plan to do some photoshop / autocad with this laptop. I am not into PC gamesl. So I think 256MB memory should do the job pretty well. (better than my old laptop with integrated on-board graphic chip)

But there are 2 things that hold me back:

1) The high price if I want to configure some high performance add-ons, like graphic cards, 9-cell battery, webcam, 2.0GHz CPU, etc; I agree with you that Dell should also give some discount coupon for this laptop!! But this may be due to the very low profit margin they can obtain from the XPS series. If I want to buy it, I may have to buy it from other country, like Taiwan, and have someone ship it to me later.

2) The quality of the webcam's audio recording. Everyone has been saying that this is a very good webcam. I am sure it is good enough for Skype, MSN messenger, etc. But is it good enough to record some live seminar? If I would want to use it to record a small seminar (20 people in a class), and the lecturer sometimes moves and turns around, and do some talking while writing something on the white boards, is this webcam's audio recording system good enough for this purpose? Do you ever try the webcam with a situation like that?

Thank you.

 

MahirAydin:

Unfortunately, the optical drive in the M1210 is non-removable. In fact, ever since Dell moved to a completely saperate design between their consumer (Inspiron/XPS) and business (Latitude) lines, there have not been a removable device bay for the Inspiron/XPS. (the last series to share a common chassis and feature a device bay would be the Inspiron 600m/8600 which uses the same D-series chassis design as the Latitude D600/D800).

ngudaniel:

The integrated Logitech webcam is in fact very nice and high quality as me and other owners have found. For long distance recording however (like in a lecture hall), I'd like to find out as well, although the highly directional microphone seems to do quite well with filtering out background noise and just focuse on the source directly in front of it.

 

The more I read positive reviews of the M1210 the more I want to get it. Darn it Dell, when would there be a 14" model? Arghh..

 

There are two options with the 1210:

1) Dell Wireless 1390b/g (54Mbps),

2) Intel PRO/Wireless 3945a/g

Apart from whether I want to connect to 802.11b, does anyone have recommendations as to which would be more sensitive or better if I am using "g"?

Thanks.

 

im about to buy a like new m1210 but with the integrated 950 graphic card , so i called dell canada this morning asking for pricing for possible upgrade to the nvidia 7400, i was told that i also have the option to upgrade it to the geforce go 7800, is it possible or the guy didnt know what he was talking about ???

tthank you for a quick reply

 

Twaddle:

I don't think there is much difference in terms of throughput, and sensitivity between the Intel or Dell (Broadcom) WiFi cards. 802.11g is very mature by now with both the hardware and the drivers, and since the antenna setup is the same (around the LCD screen), the sensitivity will stay the same.

The Intel card does offer the added 802.11a (5.4GHz) band, so you would be able to connect to more WiFi APs or get a cleaner/better signal when the "a" band is avaliable (not to mention you gain the "Centrino" branding as you are getting the complete Intel CPU+Chipset+WiFi package).

snooop5:

I would say the sales rep was either looking at the wrong config screen, or he is just a complete idiot . There is no GeForce Go 7800 option on the XPS M1210, and there never will be. It generates too much power, heat, and takes up too much area to be able to integrate into a 12.1" widescreen package. There are only the Intel Integrated GMA, or the GeForce Go 7400 options.

 

thx that's what i thought

 

Hi There,

I have been following this thread and these forums and decided to go out and buy a Dell XPS M1210. I am actually typing this post from my lounge listing to some music!

I have posted up a mini review on my web-site www.michael-fraser.com if you want to check it out.

Basically the main reason I went for this laptop is because it is small and powerful.

I program in visual studio 2003 for work, so wanted something I could still use for programming. I have just installed VMWare on my machine with windows 2003 server, sql server 2005 and vs studio. I have 2gb of memory so I have allocated 700mb to this image. It runs fine.. nice and fast. THe only thing I have been having difficulty with is the graphic display support for the resolution of this screen in vmware.. i.e. I cannot configure to 1280 x 800 which is a bit of a pain.

I paid under 3k AUD for this laptop. I am not a fan of the glossy screen as it is very hard to see in a bright environment, and the viewing angles of the screen are not the best. Sound is pretty average as well- but what can you expect on a notebook of this size. I have not yet had the chance to test out any games. I was hoping someone could recommend some to me that are good for this lappy?

Overall, I think this laptop looks rad and performes very well. Has anyone tried OSX under VM ware on this? Would be interested to know how it performs.

 

Just after reading some more of this thread, I noticed that a user commented about sound cutting out / skipping in game play. I have just installed Civ 4 and am experiencing the same issue. Has anyone found a way to solve this?

Oh, my extended battery wobbles as well... and there is slight flex in my keyboard around the arrow keys. Doesnt seem to be a major issue though.

 

well it looks like I am the only person posting in this thread at the moment. I need some help. I am trying to get the spdif output working on my laptop but can not seem to get any sound out. Yes I have ticked the option under advanced sound setting to enable this. Does anyone have any ideas as to why this would not be working? I really want to see if I can hook it into my surround sound system.

 

I have one for sale with the following specs:

intel T2300 1.66 duocore 667 mhz cpu (easy upgradeable)
1 gb ram 667 mhz
nvidia 7400 gforce GPU
intel proset/wireless a/b/g
dvd-rw 8x DL +/-
integrated logitech 1.3 mp webcam/mic
60gb HD 5400 rpm
9-cell extra power battery
3 years extended XPS warranty
5-1 smartmediacard reader
4 usb 2.0
and all standard stuff.
Read all about this fantastic laptop in different reviews.

It's brand new in original box with documentation, disks, cables, adapter. I opened the box once to look at it, it's a really really beautiful laptop, but the screen is a tiny bit too small for my goals. So lucky for you !!!

my fixed price 1600 euro, shipment and handling costs for buyer (paid 2389,50 euro in september 2006, packing slip invoice will be included and ownership name will be transfered for warranty).

I am located in The Hague, The Netherlands
if interested PM me and I will contact you, msn/skype with cam available!

 

Hi guys,
I wonder how much improvement in performance if M1210 is configured to use 7200rpm hard drive instead of the standard 5400rpm? How about the battery life? Has anyone got the 7200rpm that works so much better than 5400rpm?

Thanks!

 

I'm experiencing precisely the same problem with the mic input. Mine is a Core Duo, not Core 2 Duo M1210, and this problem is annoying me too much, because I use Skype professionaly, to talk with people all over the world. Eventually I'll end up selling this notebook, if I can't return it, what I guess won't be simple, since I live in Brazil and bought it abroad.

By the way, I didn't find "Logitech Video" in the Task bar.

 

Lor,

I have the same sound problem you describe. I encounter skipping in a few games like Half Life 2 or Command Conquer 3 (demo). I haven't figured out what causes it yet.

I did notice when I used bluetooth audio, the skipping went away.

--Wesrubix

 

SOUND SKIPPING:

I belive I read on the forum in another thread the sound skipping is caused by the integrated mic. I belive the poster disabled the mic and the problem went away. Try it and only turn it on when recording.

OR

It had something to do with the wireless a band. disableing it is supposed to solve the problem.

One of those two is the answer, i will try it later. Think its the second.

 

I'm getting the skipping sound too. Especially over the microphone on msn webcam calling. very annoying. Anyone contacted dell over this?

 

ok my first post here
the sound cutting is caused by logitech software, try to disable echo canceling, see if that helps