Dell Latitude D830 Review

[bswp]

I wish my D830 had a brighter display. Is there anything to be done to make it less dim? The ambient sensor is not active, I just have it at max brightness, which is less bright than my old D600.

Specs are Mobile Intel 965 Express chipset, driver v6.14.10.4831

[MoExius]

Hi there,

Nice review there!

No i have an issue with this laptop. I am using this laptop in a dual monitor setup. I have a docking station and a 19" monitor plugged to it. To manage both screens and resolutions, I use ultramon.

I have different wallpapers for both screens. This was working fine until recently. Now, even though i have setup different wallpapers for both screens, the one from the primary screen overlaps on the secundary. For instance. My primary screen is the 19" one (1280x1024) and the laptop screen is the 2ndary (1680x1050) . So, the wallpaper on the 19" screen will appear on the 2ndary with the resolution from the primary. When i drag a window from primary to 2ndary and maximize it, the window will not maximize the whole screen, it will use the resolution from the primary.

Could anyone of you help me out? It would be much appreciated.

Thanks in advance,
Francisco Moix

[grenada]

I'll say again I was really close to getting the M65, but like the D630 the lack of an s-video output tipped the scale in favor of the D830. I believe the M4300 has fixed this? On a cosmetic level I also prefer the D830's lid to that of the M65 XD



Yeah, I'm just a hardcore otaku at heart; I'm watching StrikerS at the moment and I wish the fansubbers would really pick up the pace!



I wonder about this myself, quite a number of reviews I've read have had machines getting lesser 3DMark scores getting higher Aero scores... my old desktop (2.3GHz, 128MB GeForce FX 5200) is pushing 3.0 and from what I've read the FX 5200 was a pretty poor GPU in it's day.



Yes, I have the three year completecare package.



Yes, the optical drive can be removed. It can be replaced with the media bay battery on the fly. I was also pleasantly surprised to find that the optical drive and the media bay battery are reverse compatible with my 500m and should probably be compatible with other Dell machines from the time period.

I have a WUXGA screen. The maximum resolution is 1920 x 1200. I'm using 1280 x 800.

Hi Commander Wolf!

Installing a fresh copy of XP was a pain. My XP installation CD cannot recognize SATA drivers. I had to switch the HDD controller to ATA mode, install the OS, install the SATA drivers and switch the HDD controller back to its default setting. Dell's resource CD only included drivers for Vista so I downloaded XP drivers for the D830 from Dell's technical support site. Some of these XP drivers did not want to work with my machine and I had to use the corresponding Vista drivers. All in all the installation process took a full morning, but I eventually got the system in working order with Windows XP.

Thank you for sharing the problem regarding installing XP. I have nearly exactly the same issue. I can initially boot a Windows XP CD but it will exit with various irrelevant errors (such as lack of disk space etc.).

I attempted to "switch the HDD controller to ATA mode" as you suggested but cannot find where in the bios exactly how this can be done.

In my bios, the closest option I can find is in the section Onboard Devices -> SATA Operation:

Select ATA or AHCI

This field configures the operating mode of the intergrated SATA hardrive controller.

ATA = SATA is configured for ATA
AHCI = SATA is configured for AHCI

The factory default setting is ATA.

--

But maybe I have a different bios altogether. Can you perhaps be a bit more specific as to how your solved the problem?

Also, where can I find the SATA drivers you installed?

Many thanks for any suggestions.

Paul

[grenada]

Installing a fresh copy of XP was a pain. My XP installation CD cannot recognize SATA drivers. I had to switch the HDD controller to ATA mode, install the OS, install the SATA drivers and switch the HDD controller back to its default setting. Dell's resource CD only included drivers for Vista so I downloaded XP drivers for the D830 from Dell's technical support site. Some of these XP drivers did not want to work with my machine and I had to use the corresponding Vista drivers. All in all the installation process took a full morning, but I eventually got the system in working order with Windows XP.

Thank you for sharing the problem regarding installing XP. I have nearly exactly the same issue. I can initially boot a Windows XP CD but it will exit with various irrelevant errors (such as lack of disk space etc.).

I attempted to "switch the HDD controller to ATA mode" as you suggested but cannot find where in the bios exactly how this can be done.

In my bios, the closest option I can find is in the section Onboard Devices -> SATA Operation:

Select ATA or AHCI

This field configures the operating mode of the intergrated SATA hardrive controller.

ATA = SATA is configured for ATA
AHCI = SATA is configured for AHCI

The factory default setting is ATA.

But maybe I have a different bios altogether. Can you perhaps be a bit more specific as to how your solved the problem?

Also, where can I find the SATA drivers you installed?

Many thanks for any suggestions.

Paul

[TexasEx7]

Wow you just necro'd a 5 month thread and hope for a response

[pitz]

Good review, Lim. And good choice within the Dell family. My daughter went off to college with a promise that they would support Dell and Apple. Her classmates all bought Inspirons. She had a Latitude. None of her classmates had a working Inspiron ay graduation. The Latitude is working three years later.

The build quality of business laptops is superior to the consumer stuff. It may look like a Russian tractor, but it runs forever.

Pete

Yup, excellent analogy. I've had my D830 for 2 years now, put it through absolute hell, >100 times through airport security, dropped on concrete, used 10 hours a day, 7 days a week. Aside from minor issues with the keyboard, and needing a new external PSU, its been rock-solid.

Can't imagine an Inspiron or an XPS surviving the sort of abuse I've subjected this laptop to.

[The_Real_Slim]

hello,

I have a problem with my latitude D830. Everytime we switch it on, it just turns off =/. I tried to remove it from its docking, the same happens. I tried to remove the battery too, it just turns off =/. I also pressed F8 at the start of the machine, guess what ? Same happens =/

The computer switches off a few seconds after it's been truned on.

Thanks for help

[TSE]

I really miss these revisions of Dell laptops, the way the old D600, D610, D620, D830s, etc. looked. They were so basic, but they were sturdy as any other laptop on the market and they were made of matte plastic which didn't look terrible after three days of use.

[wearetheborg]

Eh ? The E series is not as sturdy ?

[f4ding]

hello,

I have a problem with my latitude D830. Everytime we switch it on, it just turns off =/. I tried to remove it from its docking, the same happens. I tried to remove the battery too, it just turns off =/. I also pressed F8 at the start of the machine, guess what ? Same happens =/

The computer switches off a few seconds after it's been truned on.

Thanks for help

Try the Dell forum. You might get more help there.