I'm not impressed !!!!!!!!!! Update

Ok the problem is somewhat sorted.  If I read between the lines correctly it seems that most of the problem is a software thing and there is no real fix as of yet due to these laptops only being released for 3-4 or so weeks.  Something about the mother board registry getting too much info ???  I have NO idea what that means so it could be complete and utter bullshit.  But the dude I spoke to seems pretty confident that updated software would soon be available.  Unless you use a magnifying glass I personally think the resolution SUCKS.  I think I may have insulted him at first when I said I used to own a Commodore64 that was quicker than this brick ;D ;D ;D  

Anyway just thought i'd post back what i've found out so far just for those who are interested.  And thanks for all the help with it also, i'm hopeless with this stuff.

Morepower - dump that POS back where you bought it, and WAIT to buy it then. IF it is true, all you are out is a little bit of time - if he is jacking yer chain then you are screwed if you hang on to the laptop. Most places have a return policy - no qustions asked type of thing....check it out !

Thanks Senkat, I totally agree with you. As a matter of fact I told them that they have 15 days to sort it out to my liking or I will be sending it back, to which they replied it was my right to do so. My biggest problem is that i'm kinda between a rock and a hard place in that I use this Laptop to run the business and the Website. And it took me SOOO long to set this thing up to where I need it to be. I suppose they have sorted out the major issue of the typing slow and it is pretty quick now. Maybe I was expecting too much from it, I just wish I knew more about these bloody things. For those of you considering buying the XPS 1730 I would recomend waiting for the upgraded software to come out.

Ok, it's done. They are picking it up in 2 days but now I need to buy another Laptop. I have aroung AU$3200.00 to spend, would prefer less though, what should I get ??? It has to be QUICK and have at least a 300GB HD. I was looking at this one from Dell(yeah I know but they have been really good about the problems i've had) see pic. Unless you guys think this one is crap ? The price is good however. Any suggestions would be appreciated.

I'm not a laptop fanboy...but If it were my money....

http://www.shopping.hp.com/webapp/s...1=Brand&v1=HP+Pavilion&series_name=HDX_series

I have to give HP credit here...Nice laptop!!!!


The ONLY other laptop I would even suggest would be something by:

http://www.lenovo.com/us/en/?cid=USPIYH0001

These are the laptops that used to be sold by IBM as Thinkpads...

This is the laptop I bought..and I had a lot of them to choose from!

I do this for a living.... :-[

Make Mine a Desktop.......Or even better a SERVER FARM...

Morepower - that Dell looks pretty damned sweet there ! I used the IBM's at work - reliability and toughness are their forte....I own a HP/Compaq because it was dirt cheap at the time Wish my work had decided to GIVE me taht IBM, I woudla liked that Seriously, look ONLY at laptops that have seperate graphics cards...don't go in for the "shared memory" shit....it REALLY degrades performance in the long run.

Dell all the way from my personal experience... just not the XPS systems (well, not most of them at least). Get a regular laptop and you should be fine. Have had mine for a couple years and still runs like a charm! ;D (I even keep it on 24/7! )

--DDL

I can think of possible fixes for these two problems, although you may have already tried both.

Firstly about the resolution. There are two possibilities. The simplest one you should try first is just to right click anywhere on your desktop where there isn't an icon or anything and go to 'properties'. A window titled 'Display Properties' should appear. Click on the 'settings' tab along the top of the window. There should be a 'Screen resolution' slider on the left half of the window just under half way down. The slider should be set to maximum for your screen - anything less will look low res and blocky. The only potential problem here would be if for some reason dell hadn't installed the drivers for the video card properly. If there are any problems such as you set the resolution to maximum but this is too high for the monitor to support then the screen may go black. Either wait 10 seconds or so or press escape and it should go back to the previous resolution and you can then try going up in stages until you hit the right resolution. Don't press enter if the screen goes black or you'll be stuck.

If this doesn't work then you need to try reinstalling the video card drivers.

Secondly about the laptop running slow. I've noticed that dell (and other computer manufactorers) have a tendancy to load up their systems with so much antivirus software set to run scans on the computer and hard drive all the time that this actually slows the computer down more than most viruses would. You need to look into the options in McAffee or whatever antivirus software they have installed and set it to not scan automatically all the time. This means turning off all the 'resident scanners' or 'resident shields' or whatever they describe it as. As long as you have a firewall running (which may also be in the same options so don't turn that bit off) and as long as you either schedule an at least weekly scan or else remember to manually start a virus scan at least once a week this is more than good enough (unless you frequent dodgy pron sites) to keep you protected. Antivirus software really can be worse than some viruses so it is not worth crippling your system just for a little more protection. These options will likely be accessable via your taskbar (bottom right of screen next to clock). You'll need to look around through all the various options and sub options within the antivirus software as there will probably be quite a few things that need changing or disabling.

My dad recently bought a dell desktop system with dual processors and a pretty good spec. It ran slower than my mums pentium 3 600mhz system (which i had just reinstalled windows on) because of the antivirus software.

Obviously there is the chance that it is either some other problem I've not thought of or else the computer system is just broken somehow. If neither of these fixes works you might be best sending it back.

Any questions feel free to pm me or ask in this thread.

Edit - woops just realised you'd already sent it back after typing all that. O well. 'Something about the mother board registry getting too much info' does sound like the kind of bullshit used by a sales guy to confuse a customer into accepting something they shouldn't though.

Good advice there Telsahed about the anti-virus setup, i'll look at it when I get my new one.

 They have picked up the XPS and I just ordered this one from them http://dellstore04.dell.com.au/public/cart/configurator.jsp?prd_id=605843&sr_no=1   They assure me there are no problems with this setup, if there is I told them it'll be going straight back !!  Should be a quick little machine.  And nearly $1K less !!!  Unfortunately the HPs were out of my price range for the one I wanted.

EDIT: Link dosn't work for some reason so I took a screen shot

You know, I'm normally right in there with the vista bashing. But I hate to say it, I have been running (and am now) Vista Home Premium, and it runs a f.k lot better than XP ever did on my machine. 1GB ram 2.6Ghz 100GB. and a crappy AGP Radeon graphics card.
And it manages Firefox x 3 windows totalling 98 tabs = 315MB, shareaza, openoffice and Halo 2 at the same time.
I did have my share of problems but fixed a LOT of them by clearing up some of the shit that Microsoft has you run on startup. try sysinternals' startup manager thingo, helped me out.