Precision M6400 Owner's Lounge *Part 2*

[rearkou]

I succeeded in getting Dell to cancel my order for the m6400 and now I will get my m6500 with the latest hotest i7 cpu! Delivery 16 Dec.

cool, let us know how it performs...
looking at your signature, you'll have the FX3800M i think its the same exact card as the 3700 but a bit more overclocked...and I'm really curious to see the real performance gap of the i7-920XM with respect to the QX9300.

[Thomas Dilts]

cool, let us know how it performs...
edit your signature, you'll have the FX3800M i think its the same exact card as the 3700 but a bit more overclocked.

Oops. You're right. I missed that. I thought it was the exact same graphic card but when I now looked at the order it is as you say, 3800

[larsv]

I succeeded in getting Dell to cancel my order for the m6400 and now I will get my m6500 with the latest hotest i7 cpu! Delivery 16 Dec.

I looked at the M6500 config pages at dell.se - compared to a quadcode M6400 config, the M6500 with a base Core i7 is attractively priced. This is in line with what is happening on the consumer/gaming laptop side - Core i7 systems seem to be a better value and more energy-efficient than Q9100/QX9300 systems. QX9300 might still have a performance edge though, we'll see when the M6500s get benchmarked.

[LLavelle]

I bought a 4TB Lacie 4big Quadra to configure as a RAID 5 esata backup but I have had problems with only 1.7TB being recognized by my M6400 (see specs below).

Lacie has shipped two replacement units as their tech support (several phone hrs) came to the conclusion their unit was defective. New 4TB arrived last week and it has the same problem.

Today I decided to search online and this is what I found at Tom's Hardware review of the Lacie 4big Quadra:

"Controller Limits
In addition to the partitioning issue, many controllers may also not be able to support large partitions. We first used a Promise FastTrak TX4310, which sometimes only displayed 1.7 TB, and sometimes didn’t recognize the 4big Quadra drive at all. Clearly, it is important to use a modern mass storage controller to be able to handle large partitions. We switched to an on-board Intel ICH10R, which is part of the test system we used for this review."

Looks like the M6400's (and M6500's ?) have a controller that is not up to spec.

Suggestions?

[Tanis64]

I bought a 4TB Lacie 4big Quadra to configure as a RAID 5 esata backup but I have had problems with only 1.7TB being recognized by my M6400 (see specs below).

Lacie has shipped two replacement units as their tech support (several phone hrs) came to the conclusion their unit was defective. New 4TB arrived last week and it has the same problem.

Today I decided to search online and this is what I found at Tom's Hardware review of the Lacie 4big Quadra:

"Controller Limits
In addition to the partitioning issue, many controllers may also not be able to support large partitions. We first used a Promise FastTrak TX4310, which sometimes only displayed 1.7 TB, and sometimes didn’t recognize the 4big Quadra drive at all. Clearly, it is important to use a modern mass storage controller to be able to handle large partitions. We switched to an on-board Intel ICH10R, which is part of the test system we used for this review."

Looks like the M6400's (and M6500's ?) have a controller that is not up to spec.

Suggestions?

The Intel Matrix Storage Driver is a Software Raid also known as Fake Raid

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Matrix_RAID

It's no Hardware RAID

This definitely has it limitations.

Regards
Christopher

[gulfstreamtec]

I looked at the M6500 config pages at dell.se - compared to a quadcode M6400 config, the M6500 with a base Core i7 is attractively priced. This is in line with what is happening on the consumer/gaming laptop side - Core i7 systems seem to be a better value and more energy-efficient than Q9100/QX9300 systems. QX9300 might still have a performance edge though, we'll see when the M6500s get benchmarked.

I'm not sure what you mean when you say 'attractively priced'. But you certainly don't mean compared to the 6400? I customized both the plain silver and the Covet and with only the processor and the OS (Win 7 Pro downgrade to XP & Vista Business downgrade to XP) to differentiate them, the silver 6500 came out at 1100 dollars and change more than the 6400 and the Covet was $1400 more. Only an i processor and Windows 7 different. To me that's hardly attractive, more like downright exploitive. But that's not with the 'base' processor, who'd want that when you're buying this class machinery? They just have a base processor so the base price sounds lower. Both estimates are with the top of the line processor, the QX9300 and the i whatever the priciest one is.

And by the time my pretty maxed out Covet is far enough behind the curve to justify replacing it so will the m6500s they're selling today. After doing that little price check and if I were buying today, knowing what the next couple of years promise I'd probably still go with the m6400 and buy a couple of high end SSDs with the change.
_________________
Precision Covet | QX9300 | 4GB 1066 | 64GB Samsung SLC SSD & 320GB Seagate | XP Pro 32bit & Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit

[larsv]

I'm not sure what you mean when you say 'attractively priced'. But you certainly don't mean compared to the 6400? I customized both the plain silver and the Covet and with only the processor and the OS (Win 7 Pro downgrade to XP & Vista Business downgrade to XP) to differentiate them, the silver 6500 came out at 1100 dollars and change more than the 6400 and the Covet was $1400 more. Only an i processor and Windows 7 different. To me that's hardly attractive, more like downright exploitive. But that's not with the 'base' processor, who'd want that when you're buying this class machinery? They just have a base processor so the base price sounds lower. Both estimates are with the top of the line processor, the QX9300 and the i whatever the priciest one is.

And by the time my pretty maxed out Covet is far enough behind the curve to justify replacing it so will the m6500s they're selling today. After doing that little price check and if I were buying today, knowing what the next couple of years promise I'd probably still go with the m6400 and buy a couple of high end SSDs with the change.
_________________
Precision Covet | QX9300 | 4GB 1066 | 64GB Samsung SLC SSD & 320GB Seagate | XP Pro 32bit & Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit

Sorry if I was unclear - this was specificallty for the Dell Sweden site. M6500 with base Core i7 CPU and RGBLED screen is priced about the same as M6400 with T9600 and RGBLED screen. Pricing in the US might differ, of course.

[Pirx]

The Intel Matrix Storage Driver is a Software Raid also known as Fake Raid

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Matrix_RAID

It's no Hardware RAID

No, it's not software RAID at all, and thus not "Fake RAID". It's Firmware RAID, as described in the Wiki article you linked to. As far as I am concerned, I fail to see any difference between firmware and hardware RAID, but maybe someone can clue me in. In any case, this is very different from software RAID, which typically comes with a noticeable performance penalty, and means that your RAID volumes are only readable after loading the appropriate drivers. In contrast, Intel's Matrix RAID as implemented in the M6400 appears as a regular SATA disk to the OS (any OS).

[rearkou]

Sorry if I was unclear - this was specificallty for the Dell Sweden site. M6500 with base Core i7 CPU and RGBLED screen is priced about the same as M6400 with T9600 and RGBLED screen. Pricing in the US might differ, of course.

In Greece, configured without the rgb led (choosing the white led at 1920x1200) with the i7-920xm and the sames specs as mine below, the M6500 comes something like 600 euros more...

[Tanis64]

No, it's not software RAID at all, and thus not "Fake RAID". It's Firmware RAID, as described in the Wiki article you linked to. As far as I am concerned, I fail to see any difference between firmware and hardware RAID, but maybe someone can clue me in. In any case, this is very different from software RAID, which typically comes with a noticeable performance penalty, and means that your RAID volumes are only readable after loading the appropriate drivers. In contrast, Intel's Matrix RAID as implemented in the M6400 appears as a regular SATA disk to the OS (any OS).

Belive me it is no Hardware based Raid Controller

You can also call it Host Raid, because it will be loaded before the OS
(ok here they talk about Soft Raid in coherence with the OS).

When you install or update the intel Matrix Storage Drivers the host / Firmware part was flashed on the Intel Chiset (I/O).
When System was started the RAID was implemented by the firmware (this is software) lateron booting an higher OS the driver takes control of the RAID. This makes a simply standard disk controller chip acting like a RAID Controller with that special firmware and drivers.

Main difference is:
It is using the CPU and RAM to do that. A real Hardware RAID has its own Controller and Memory.

See Firmware/driver-based RAID
at
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RAID

Regards
Christopher