E6420 Owner's Thread

[Dreamliner330]

No quad core makes the E6410 a non-starter for me.
E6420 = fast enough to replace my work desktop.

Only other options were 15". Had Lenovo produced a 14" model with an i7-2720M (or higher), Dell would probably have lost a customer to them.

On paper the 2720QM is a screamer. I mean, 4 cores/8 threads, rock 'n' roll. ...but the 640M has 2 cores/4 threads, and honestly, I didn't see a difference in my daily activities. I don't do anything 'heavy' like video editing, but Photoshop, office stuff, etc, it seemed extremely similar.

I was completely willing to move to the e6420, but ultimately, build quality issues resulted my first ever laptop return. This is the first time since 2005 I have not had the 'best model available.' It had nothing to do with price, it had everything to do with product quality.

[gspencer]

It had nothing to do with price, it had everything to do with product quality.

qft, my opinion exactly.

[John Ratsey]

No guarantee of how accurate my wife's scale is, but:

E6420 w/ 6 cell and DVD-RW: 5lb 7oz
E6410 w/ 6 cell and DVD-RW: 5lb 1.25oz (w/ 9 cell and DVD-RW: 5lb 6.25oz)
D630 w/ 6 cell and DVD-RW: 5lb 6.25oz (w/ 9 cell and DVD-RW: 5lb 12.5oz ...)

Those weights look plausible. My E6410 + 9 cell etc weighs 2.42kg / 5lb 3.3oz so between us we may be up to 3 oz different. However, the key data is that the E6420 with 6 cell battery weighs about the same as the E6420 with 9 cell battery.

On paper the 2720QM is a screamer. I mean, 4 cores/8 threads, rock 'n' roll. ...but the 640M has 2 cores/4 threads, and honestly, I didn't see a difference in my daily activities. I don't do anything 'heavy' like video editing, but Photoshop, office stuff, etc, it seemed extremely similar.

More cores / threads doesn't mean faster unless the user is either running many programs concurrently is is running programs which are multi-threaded. 2 cores / 4 threads are plenty for most users. Some months back I had to run a single threaded CPU-intensive program on my E6410 (i5 540M). While it was running (a couple of days) I was able to run all my other normal programs (Word / Excel / internet / email, etc. without any noticeable slowdowns).

John

[benamar]

Just a heads up, the Dell Wirless 5550 *IS* compatible with the E6420.
Just ordered one from eBay, and the driver is available to download from Dell's website (along with compatibility list)

Drivers and Downloads

[Bokeh]

On paper the 2720QM is a screamer. I mean, 4 cores/8 threads, rock 'n' roll. ...but the 640M has 2 cores/4 threads, and honestly, I didn't see a difference in my daily activities. I don't do anything 'heavy' like video editing, but Photoshop, office stuff, etc, it seemed extremely similar.

I was completely willing to move to the e6420, but ultimately, build quality issues resulted my first ever laptop return. This is the first time since 2005 I have not had the 'best model available.' It had nothing to do with price, it had everything to do with product quality.

The new M's will be here soon. Maybe the M4600 will better meet your expectations. It should definitely be a best model available.

[mvalpreda]

New gripe. This laptop is not level. It's like a table with one leg shorter than the other three. I put my hand down on the left side to type and the machine bounces. It's going back. I'll save my $1200 for a E6430.

[linuxwanabe]

New gripe. This laptop is not level. It's like a table with one leg shorter than the other three. I put my hand down on the left side to type and the machine bounces. It's going back. I'll save my $1200 for a E6430.

Well, if you can't wait until next year, there's always the Elitebook 8460P.

[mvalpreda]

Be hard for me to jump ship from Dell. My company resells about $1M a year in Dell equipment and just about nothing else. I'm comfortable with Dell, have nothing but Dell at home.

May as well tell a Chevy guy to buy a Ford.

And holy mackerel! Configured the same way the HP 8460 is $900 more than I paid for the E6420. HP? I thought I may have been on Apple's site!

[BurtaN]

Does anyone know, if the E6420 support pci-e 2.0 and Port Multiplying on its E-SATA Port?

[gspencer]

Be hard for me to jump ship from Dell. My company resells about $1M a year in Dell equipment and just about nothing else. I'm comfortable with Dell, have nothing but Dell at home.

May as well tell a Chevy guy to buy a Ford.

Here's the other side of the coin. Our company got set up as a dell partner about a year ago. Now, they are saying we can't return this company machine because of it.

I'm going back to HP.