Dell XPS 17 (L702x) Thread

[Joel87]

I would assume so as well, this is getting to be quite ridiculous.

Ridiculous is an understatement. Can they REALLY be that clueless? It seems as thought they're just flat-out lying at this point.

Which one is better when it comes to screens? Tru life or AG ? I have a 3d and it's perfectly fine. I mean it's not like I use it in the bright sunlight or anything so I dont see why glare is an issue..even though I have none...albeit not being AG ? lol

I personally perfer Trulife, which is glossy. Some perfer matte (AG) because colors tend to be more accurate for printing. It's simply a matter of what you like.

[Freakish123]

Does anyone know if the XPS 15/17 Can boot from the SD Card? (Live Linux from SD?)

[corylee]

When did you place your order?

Hello Cory. I am in the same boat as you.. did you get the right screen from dell. I noticed on my detail oder that they pushed 17.3in FHD WLED AG (1920x1080) when I wanted the same resolution with TrueLife WLED instead of AG(antiglare)....

all i remember is i ordered the 1080p screen without facial recongition. im just hoping to get the glossy screen...

I ordered in on 4/28

[electrosoft]

Kingston HyperX 8GB 1866MHz PnP Memory Kit For Notebooks - Sandy Bridge Notebooks Get HyperX Treatment - Legit Reviews
Kingston again announced something interesting 1600 or 1866 MHz memory without the need of messing with BIOS.Just put the ram in the slot and go.But i think thats not resolve the problem with locked BIOS 1333 mhz speed or it does it ???

This is the exact same memory I tested in the L702x, and the L702x will force it to default to it's Jedec DDR3-1333 SPD profile versus the DDR3-1600.

[Scott_RC-TEK]

...But i think thats not resolve the problem with locked BIOS 1333 mhz speed or it does it ???

No, the XPS will not enable any speed above 1333MHz. As mentioned before, however, the faster memeory does allow for slightly faster CL times since you are operating the devices below their normal speed.

So I'm looking at purchasing an XPS 17: (Today!)

Can anyone tell me what speed they get with the Intel 1000 WiFi card, and is the WiFi card easily accessible, if I wanted to upgrade to the Intel 6300 myself?

Does the 1000 card only have one antenna connected? And does the 6230 have two antennas inside the laptop?

Welcome to the club! The 1000 series is a single 2.4GHz band card and you will get solid 54MBps speeds. The card is a 1RX/1TX antenna device so you will use both antenna leads. The 6230 and 6250 cards use two antennas too, but they are dual band (2.4/5.2GHz) WiFi cards with 1RX/1TX on EACH band so you get some sold performance out of these as well. I see solid 54MBps on 2.4GHz and 270-300MBps on 5.2GHz.

The 6300 is a dual band MIMO (multiple in, multiple out) card with 2RX/1TX on EACH band so you can very good coverage with speeds "up to" 450MBps if you have a supporting access point, but you need to use the card's three antenna sockets. All the 3D compatible L702x systems I have seen have the needed third antenna lead, but most of the non 3D compatible L702x systems I have seen only have the standard dual antenna leads. This doesn't mean you can't add a third antenna on our own, which is cheap and easy.

Which one is better when it comes to screens? Tru life or AG ? I have a 3d and it's perfectly fine. I mean it's not like I use it in the bright sunlight or anything so I dont see why glare is an issue..even though I have none...albeit not being AG ? lol

I think on this specific model (L702x), the TL is much better than the matte finsih. In my opinion, they over did it on the matte coating so the sharpness and clarity suffers.

Does anyone know if the XPS 15/17 Can boot from the SD Card? (Live Linux from SD?)

From the SD slot, no.... from a USB 2.0 slot, yes.

The SD slot is on a daughter I/O board and needs the driver loaded before it will function. I have not played with it enough to see if I can get it working in a non/pre-Windows environment.

Hope this info helps.

Scott-

[Freakish123]

I see solid 54MBps on 2.4GHz and 270-300MBps on 5.2GHz. Systems I have seen only have the standard dual antenna leads. This doesn't mean you can't add a third antenna on our own, which is cheap and easy.

From the SD slot, no.... from a USB 2.0 slot, yes.

The SD slot is on a daughter I/O board and needs the driver loaded before it will function. I have not played with it enough to see if I can get it working in a non/pre-Windows environment.

Hope this info helps.

Scott-

Thanks dude, much appreciate the information.

Yeah i ordered the 6230 in the end, I thought about getting the 1030 and adding the antenna and 6300 Ultra myself, but just figured the 6230 will do instead. My previous laptop had a Intel 5100, I'm amazed that the base model now is only 2.4Ghz when my 3 Year old laptops base model had 2.4/5ghz. Sorted now anyway. I would like the 450Mbps, perhaps one day.

The SD card issue, does really annoy me... Same issue on my previous laptop, however my Hanvon 10.1" tablet boots directly from the inbuilt SD, and it's so convenient, especially for loading Windows 7. Grrrrr!

But i appreciate the info, saves me much stuffing around when i get it. I will also be ordering a Crucial M4 64 or 128Gb SSD to use as boot, looking forward to my delivery, thanks all.

[steviek]

Hi All

Well after reading this thread I bought a L702x, arrived and typing on it the now.


Item Description
Base 2nd generation Intel® Core™ i7-2630QM processor 2.00 GHz with Turbo Boost 2.0 up to 2.90 GHz
Memory 4096MB (2x2GB) 1333MHz DDR3 Dual Channel
Keyboard Internal UK/Irish Qwerty Keyboard
Video Card 3GB NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 555M Graphics Card
Hard Drive 500GB (7,200rpm) Serial ATA Hard Drive
Microsoft Operating System Genuine Windows® 7 SP1 Home Premium, 64bit, English
Optical Devices DVD+/-RW (DVD, CD read and write)
Wireless Networking Intel® Centrino® Wireless-N 1030 (1x2 b/g/n+ Bluetooth Combo Card)
Cables UK 250V Power Cord
Shipping Documents English Documentation
Gedis Bundle Reference N02X7M05
Standard Warranty 1 year Collect & Return Hardware Support included with your PC
Enhanced Service Packs 1 year of coverage included with your PC
Integrated Mobile Broadband Mobile Broadband Not Included
Order Information XPS L702x Order - UK
Primary Battery 9-cell 90Whr Lithium Ion battery
Carrying Cases No Carrying Case
Dell System Media Kit XPS L702x Resource DVD
Color Choice Silver Anodized Aluminum Cover
Accidental Damage Support No Accidental Damage Protection
Online Backup DataSafe Online Backup 2GB - 1 year licence
TV Tuner and Remote Control TvTuner Not Included
LCD 17.3" HD+ WLED True-Life (1600x900) with 2.0 Mega Pixel Integrated Camera
DataSafe Datasafe Local 2.3 Basic
Microsoft Application Software Microsoft® Office Starter: reduced-functionality Word & Excel w/ads. No PowerPoint or Outlook
Protect your new PC McAfee® SecurityCenter 15 Month Subscription
Power Supply 150W AC Adaptor
Operating System Recovery Options OS Media MUI Windows® 7 SP1 Home Premium (64 BIT) Resource DVD


I am gonna add a SSD and was looking for some advice

Do i just put the SSD into the 2nd HD spave , clone my HDD and change the boot order in bios .....OR

Put HDD into position 2 SDD into Position 1 { if you know what I Mean }

Gonna get some more memory...Thnkfully after reading this I will not order 16gb for my 2 slot MB :-) although crucial memory advisor says I have 4 slots !!!! could have got messy ....lol

Many thanks for all the great info on buying this laptop

[batmemo]

This is the exact same memory I tested in the L702x, and the L702x will force it to default to it's Jedec DDR3-1333 SPD profile versus the DDR3-1600.

Thats disappointing.If i buy this memory kit, i wont control my self,and will make one bios flash.

[terranmn]

can-celled

[adi9]

Thanks dude, much appreciate the information.


The SD card issue, does really annoy me... Same issue on my previous laptop, however my Hanvon 10.1" tablet boots directly from the inbuilt SD, and it's so convenient, especially for loading Windows 7. Grrrrr!

But i appreciate the info, saves me much stuffing around when i get it. I will also be ordering a Crucial M4 64 or 128Gb SSD to use as boot, looking forward to my delivery, thanks all.

The fact that SD is on a board (PCIe) is an advantage as USB 2.0 is slower than current SD cards.You would need a USB3.0 connection to get the full speed. The SD slot on XPS17 is SDXC and it's fast (tested it with SDXC cards). The fact that you can not boot (did not try it...) is because the BIOS must include support for the SD controller (which I think it does not). You can allways buy an USB card reader (2-5 $) plug your SD card on it and boot the install of Windows from it (I did this) so not big deal.I prefer to do ths but have a fast SDXC reader after than a slow USB reader allways but be able to boot from it.This works, as your reader is seen as a standard USB mass storage device (which is supported by BIOS).When you need to transfer 64GB or 128GB from the SD card, you want to do it fast not at USB 2.0 speeds, believe me.

I have Crucial M4 128GB SSD as the boot drive and works fine.I just replaced HD drive 1 (boot) with the SSD and keep HD 2 in place.I did a clean install W7SP1 after.I installed the newer drivers downloaded from DELL site. I remember that for SD card I did not have a setup install for the driver ,only the folder with the driver and inf file so I needed to use Device manager and manually point it to the location of the driver (did not want to use Dell CD to install original drivers as many are older than the ones you download now).I suppose you can use the CD to install everything first and update the newer drivers only, and you will not need to use devmanager.