XPS 15 (Haswell) Owner's Lounge

thanks really much so the comment, I am one of those guys who is thinking about returning the dell and go with MBPr, but again, if heating is the problem like you said, I rather stick with dell.

Anymore comments regarding your decision?

 

Is there anyone else that ordered before November that hasn't received theirs yet? I getting frustrated. The ship date is 22/11 for 7 day shipping. It's still in production, therefore, I most likely won't get it before Friday. My old Acer is really slowing me down lately and I'm really impatiently waiting for my XPS. Ordered it on 28/10.

 

Hey guys, about the audio jack... my speakers when plugged in are humming, whether I play any audio or not. This only just happened today or I would've noticed before.

My old Dell didn't have this. Any idea how to stop it?

 

Anyone tried running Windows 7 x64 on it yet ?

 

Hmm, pretty much EVERY laptop I've used has caused headphones to buzz or hiss when connected, and it's because onboard audio circuitry doesn't have good noise isolation from the rest of the electronics in the machine -- which is why I've used USB headsets whenever possible since their audio circuitry is outside the laptop. But speakers are usually better about that. If your speakers have independent volume controls, you can try lowering the volume in Windows somewhat to reduce the work the internal amplifier does and then raise the speaker volume to compensate. Otherwise, check to see whether the cable from the laptop to the speakers is near any power cables or other potential sources of electromagnetic interference? And of course sometimes just fiddling with the connector (including just turning it around inside the jack) can reduce/eliminate that.

 

thanks for the reply

- my volume in Windows is very low, I keep the speakers' audio level high
- it wasn't buzzing before, I just noticed it a few hours ago
- the speakers sometimes get interference (like when I get a text message) but they're not new, they never buzzed when connected to my SXPS
- Beyerdynamic headphones have no buzz when connected
- yes I tried unplugging and turning the cable but I wouldn't normally have to if it were properly connected

I noticed this happened after I left the thing idle. could it be that it somehow "turned off" and that made it buzz, and then even when I played audio it continued buzzing?

Also I can't understand the fix for the touchscreen turning off that you posted... do you mind explaining how to switch it back on? Isn't it weird that the touch screen doesn't wake up like other components?

 

Hmm, not sure what else to suggest with the speaker buzz then, that's very strange. Does it continue buzzing after a reboot? If not, I too would wonder if there was some power saving measure that was having that unintended side effect.

As for the touchscreen, that fix isn't designed to make the touchscreen start working again if it's already stopped responding; it's supposed to stop it from becoming non-responsive in the first place. So after you go into Device Manager and uncheck the option to allow Windows to put it to sleep, if it had already cut out you'll probably need to restart the computer to get the touchscreen back, but after that point it shouldn't become non-responsive again if the fix works. PM me if you have more specific questions about implementing the fix.

Yes it's strange that it can't be woken back up, which is why I'm thinking either a firmware update to the touchscreen or an update to the generic Microsoft driver would solve this problem once and for all without any preference changes; the former would allow the touchscreen to enter and exit sleep state correctly, or the latter would default to not allowing the touchscreen to sleep if there's some reason the touchscreen CAN'T sleep and resume properly.

 

This question is to all the owners of XPS 15 9530,

This has been asked but in 118 pages i havent seen the answer.

Battery life 61Whr vs 91Whr?

I am trying to decide between models, If i get mid tear model, and upgrade mSata to 512 i'll have 1TB for storage (Dont ask why someone would need that much in laptop) But i would.

But battery life is also important to me. So if i get extra few hours on 91Whr then i rather go with that and use external drive.

Also has anyone had luck getting 11hr's as advertised on dells website?

Thank you guys.

 

An extra few hours is almost guaranteed.

Assume the 61Whr gets 5 hours, then simply by capacity the 91Whr will get 7.5 hours (or more). The hardware is identical, the only difference is the larger one doesn't have to power a mechanical hdd so it probably uses a tiny bit less power.

 

I said earlier: If you want both storage and battery, ALWAYS get the version with the larger battery. mSATA capacities will continue rising; I'd bet 1TB mSATA drives aren't more than a few months off given that Samsung is already getting 512GB onto a single-sided mSATA card (the PM841) and the mSATA spec allows double-sided cards -- and if you need more storage before then, use an external drive in the interim. The battery, on the other hand, will not get any upgrades. If you pick the 61WHr battery, there will never be a higher-capacity battery that you'll be able to install in that space. So maximize the non-upgradeable components and upgrade the other components later as upgrades become available and needed.

The only exception to the above would be if you really needed 1TB of internal storage and weren't willing to pay what it would cost to get 1TB of storage in SSD form, since obviously it's much more expensive than 1TB of spinning storage (using the 840 Evo as a reference for a 1TB SSD).