Dell XPS 13 Ultrabook Review & Owner's Thread

[slopokdave]

For anyone looking to restore the 8gb hibernate partition - see this page:

Intel Rapid Start Technology - Laptop General Hardware Forum - Laptop - Dell Community

Go to the post by -Dell-terry-b and further down by Ken PC for step by step.

Basicallly you go into Disk admin and shrink your current partition by 8gb, then use diskpart to create and format this 8gb partition a special type.

I did this after a full clean install - i wiped all partitions, installed windows, installed all apps, then went back and setup this partition when i noticed that hibernated didn't work.

Thank you! +Rep!

[SoundsGood]

Some company needs to get their butts in gear and design a sleeve or case specifically for this machine.

Good point. The smaller footprint makes this an odd size.

[noced]

For anyone looking to restore the 8gb hibernate partition - see this page:

Intel Rapid Start Technology - Laptop General Hardware Forum - Laptop - Dell Community

Go to the post by -Dell-terry-b and further down by Ken PC for step by step.

Basicallly you go into Disk admin and shrink your current partition by 8gb, then use diskpart to create and format this 8gb partition a special type.

I did this after a full clean install - i wiped all partitions, installed windows, installed all apps, then went back and setup this partition when i noticed that hibernated didn't work.

Am I right in assuming from your last line that the process (of returning that 8GB partition to usable storage) can be done at any time after having already used the laptop for a while (with data and programs installed) without affecting existing data and installations?

I've looked at the page you linked to, but I don't fully comprehend what's written. What am I compromising if I remove that 8GB partition? Rapid Start? I thought it affects hibernation only, which I don't use so I really want that 8GB back. But I do like the rapid start, and that page above talks about rapid start.

Change of topic:
Re: Numpad

Just putting this out here:
There's no numpad on this machine, so I installed Autohotkey to extend the capabilities. I couldn't get my desired combination to work (RCtrl+m, …, RCtrl+9), but RShift+m etc worked, although Alt+numpad characters wouldn't appear (and I need my Rshift for capitalising stuff too, so that combination is out). Then I tried simply replacing the number keys with numpad keys, and alt+numpad characters worked, but !, @, #, … etc stopped working.

On the other hand, I don't really use the numpad other than for a few alt+numpad characters like the nonbreaking space and the macron (¯), so since I was already running PhraseExpress upon Windows start up, I decided to just save those characters I need to PhraseExpress and forgo the numpad altogether.

How you guys are dealing with the lack of a numpad? Or does it not matter to you?

[CowboyCoder]

You're confusing Rapid Start with the really fast boot you get with SSDs anyway. The 8GB hibernation partition is merely a dedicated space on the disk for the hibernation file. As such, when hibernation is used the laptop boots quicker than from a cold start - this is how normal hibernation works except the hibernation file is generally on the c drive. Dell have just given hibernation a fancy name ie: Rapid Start.

[Frenchris]

Can anyone tell me where the keyboard ambient light sensor is? I keep moving from dark to light rooms and see no difference in the keyboard backlighting.

Just to the top of the screen next to the webcam...
Check this out here :
http://support.dell.com/support/edoc...sg_dao/DAO.pdf

[sargent75]

Mine is scrolling really smooth after I went into the settings and changed the scroll rate. By default it was just, well, stupid.

Could you post your screen capture settings to share.

Thinking of getting XPS Ultrabook.

How is the fan noise? Some complains on it's loud. I don't think Dell can be that dumb not to figure it out during design & testing.

Did the Dell XPS 13 comes prebundled with the Mini DisplayPort To HDMI adaptor and USB to Ethernet Adaptor ?


Thanks.

[alphadog00]

You're confusing Rapid Start with the really fast boot you get with SSDs anyway. The 8GB hibernation partition is merely a dedicated space on the disk for the hibernation file. As such, when hibernation is used the laptop boots quicker than from a cold start - this is how normal hibernation works except the hibernation file is generally on the c drive. Dell have just given hibernation a fancy name ie: Rapid Start.

You are incorrect. Rapid Start is an Intel technology that works at the BIOS level - so it is faster and at a lower level then OS Hibernation. The end result is similar, but it does require SSD and a special partition. When you hibernate, the RAM has to be written to disk - this appears that there is always a copy of RAM on disk - so it is instant in both directions.

And yes you can restore this partition at any time later if you decide to do so. In Windows Disk Administrator, you can shrink the main partition by 8Gb without destroying the OS install. Then use diskpart to make this new 8GB space the special partition for hibernation.

[slopokdave]

I can understand his question and curiosity of taking 8GB from the main partition... I used Partition Master though and it allowed me to easily partition w/o touching my existing data. So easy!

[alphadog00]

Could you post your screen capture settings to share.

Thinking of getting XPS Ultrabook.

How is the fan noise? Some complains on it's loud. I don't think Dell can be that dumb not to figure it out during design & testing.

Did the Dell XPS 13 comes prebundled with the Mini DisplayPort To HDMI adaptor and USB to Ethernet Adaptor ?


Thanks.

It does not come with any adapters. As for fan noise - it has a high setting that kicks in sometimes - that is when it is loud. It only runs when CPU use is high and heat builds up.

[clintre]

Good point. The smaller footprint makes this an odd size.

I am on my phoone or I would post a link, but I ordered a Case Simple sleeve from Amazon that works great for this.