E6410 Owner's Thread

[GoodBytes]

Hi guys, its been a while since I've been on the forums. I have an e6400. Wondering about the differences between the E6410 and E6400. I know the E6410 uses the newer intel Chipsets and i5/i7 CPU's, but are there any other differences to the design?

Minor changes:
- New Nvidia solution which is much faster.
- Ambient light snesor has moved next to the web cam.
- A little bit better speakers.
- Dual microphone for noise cancelation (option)
- eSATA port is not well cut like the E6400.. its just cut rectangularly showing the metal part of the plug
- more pads has been added to protect the screen.
-Redesign SD card reader to make it easier to put/remove teh SD card (but frankly I have no problem with my E6400 card reader, and frankly, the new deisgn is ugly.
- The cover has been changed from black to gray.

[smp501]

Hi! I just got an e6410, and it's great! I maxed out everything but the cpu (i5-540m). Just wondering, would upgrading to the i7-760m void my warranty? I got the 5 year pro support and completecare/accidental coverage. Would the upgrade even be worth it?

[John Ratsey]

Minor changes:
- New Nvidia solution which is much faster.
- Ambient light snesor has moved next to the web cam.
- A little bit better speakers.
- Dual microphone for noise cancelation (option)
- eSATA port is not well cut like the E6400.. its just cut rectangularly showing the metal part of the plug
- more pads has been added to protect the screen.
-Redesign SD card reader to make it easier to put/remove teh SD card (but frankly I have no problem with my E6400 card reader, and frankly, the new deisgn is ugly.
- The cover has been changed from black to gray.

I would add:
(i) The Intel HD graphics is also much faster than the previous version
(ii) The facility to charge accessories from a USB port has been removed
(iii) Some changes to the chassis and cooling system

John

[poddie]

Hello, wondering if someone could help me decide what RAM to buy...

Given current pricing, 4GB sticks are too expensive for me to buy 2.

The premium for the single 4GB stick over two 2GB is about $100 ($220 for 1x4GB vs $114 for 2x2GB at Crucial). I know that performance will be better with 2 sticks, but buying a single leaves me open for adding another 4GB stick down the road when prices fall.

So I guess my questions is how much of a performance penalty is there for running only one stick of RAM? Is this a bad idea? And does anyone think RAM prices will be falling anytime soon?

Thanks!

[hugohansen24]

Hello, wondering if someone could help me decide what RAM to buy...
!

I don't think that the 4 GB modules will be cheaper anytime soon, especially DDR3...

I run my E6410 with 2x2 GB and that's more than enough. The question is, do you really need more than that? I do a lot of Photoshop and Indesign work, and I never get to the point of using more than 3 GB of memory.

[GoodBytes]

I recommend 4GB of RAM if you plan to use Vista/Win7, to ensure that you don't use pagefile and maximize battery life. BUT if you just web surf the net, than 2GB is plenty.
As for XP, any amount is fine, as it will use the page file in any case (it act if you are low in memory no matter what... it's because it was designed for 128-256MB of RAM, and not touching the 1000MB and up. It should be of no surprise, XP was out in 2001.)

[HerrKaputt]

Hi! I just got an e6410, and it's great! I maxed out everything but the cpu (i5-540m). Just wondering, would upgrading to the i7-760m void my warranty? I got the 5 year pro support and completecare/accidental coverage. Would the upgrade even be worth it?

It's likely that it will void the warranty. But you can always call Dell, maybe you can work a deal where they send a tech to do it and you pay labor only (after buying the i7 separately of course).

As for being worth it, it depends on your uses. If you do a lot of CPU-heavy tasks like scientific calculations (I do it and every MHz counts), then yes it might be worth it although the gains are small.

For all other uses I can think of (typical office usage, e-mail, games, etc) I think it is not worth it. i7 CPUs use more power so they tend to reduce battery life.

[shaunspp5]

Hi Guys.

I've always owned XPS m1220 & M1330 laptops and have been very happy with them. I have just taken delivery of a new E6410 laptop with the highest specs available (on the UK Dell site Over totalling over £2000).

My concern is that the quality of the WLED screen is quite poor in comparison to my other XPS M1330 laptops. The E6410 is slightly brighter but has a nasty yellow tinge to it and the greys seam faded. I have attached a picture of the two laptops side by side for comparison. Before I take Dell to task over this can any make any comment about their own screens? I have only read one line out of all these pages about it and I would have thought it would have been a bigger issue.

Cheers guys, Shaun

[John Ratsey]

Hello, wondering if someone could help me decide what RAM to buy...

Given current pricing, 4GB sticks are too expensive for me to buy 2.

The premium for the single 4GB stick over two 2GB is about $100 ($220 for 1x4GB vs $114 for 2x2GB at Crucial). I know that performance will be better with 2 sticks, but buying a single leaves me open for adding another 4GB stick down the road when prices fall.

So I guess my questions is how much of a performance penalty is there for running only one stick of RAM? Is this a bad idea? And does anyone think RAM prices will be falling anytime soon?

I suspect that the performance penalty for using one stick is small but I have no firm data about how the new Intel chipset performs in this respect. You also have an intermediate option: 4GB + 2GB. This would (probably) run in pseudo-dual channel mode. This works quite well on the previous Intel chipset.

My concern is that the quality of the WLED screen is quite poor in comparison to my other XPS M1330 laptops. The E6410 is slightly brighter but has a nasty yellow tinge to it and the greys seam faded.

What is the monitor code? (Device Manager > Monitors > Properties > Details > Hardware IDs. Dell uses monitors from several sources.

John

[welt]

Hi Guys.

I've always owned XPS m1220 & M1330 laptops and have been very happy with them. I have just taken delivery of a new E6410 laptop with the highest specs available (on the UK Dell site Over totalling over £2000).

My concern is that the quality of the WLED screen is quite poor in comparison to my other XPS M1330 laptops. The E6410 is slightly brighter but has a nasty yellow tinge to it and the greys seam faded. I have attached a picture of the two laptops side by side for comparison. Before I take Dell to task over this can any make any comment about their own screens? I have only read one line out of all these pages about it and I would have thought it would have been a bigger issue.

Cheers guys, Shaun

Hm, when I compare the white of your screens on your photo to my white (WLED, WXGA+, AUO Screen, calibrated): your XPS seems to be to blueish (typical for notebook screens), when I got the E6410 it was similar. But your E6410 screen is way to yellowish.

Have you tried to fix it in the settings? If you`ve got the NVIDIA, there`s a menu where you can change brightness/contrast/gamma for the RGB Channels and there is also something called Digital Vibrance which - if activated - boosts the colors (and most makes them worse..). I Don`t know which options you have if you`ve got the Intel HD card.