I’ve had my Dell studio 1555 for about 3 days now and I thought I might tell my experience I’ve had with the laptop and Dell as a company.
I was in the market for a new laptop for about 2 weeks nothing suitable had come up, looked at a few Sony’s and HP’s and nothing was in my price range, the ones I wanted were £1000+.
I never considered dell after hearing all the horror stories that people have had, however I decided to look at them with an open mind, you know the phrase never judge a book by its cover. Anyway I was considering getting a relatively small laptop that I could carry around university, but at the same time I needed something with a little power to handle all those graphic intensive applications and decided to go for the Studio 1555 (price at £800 was great value) , I chose the high end model and because it had a built in blu-ray drive I thought I might as well upgrade the screen to 1080p, I ordered and that was that.
Being the impatient person I am, after the 3rd or 4th business day it was shipped I was wondering why no one had called to arrange a delivery, so I called them and they said “we can deliver it tomorrow morning.” Was really happy, and felt like an excited kid again.
Next day delivery man came and I signed for it with a big smile on my face. I opened up the box to find a shiny laptop inside, anyway I power it on to find some bloat ware that I didn’t want or need, so I thought I would start uninstalling the programs, MacAfee trial uninstalled no problem, same goes for the office trial, however when I tried to uninstall the Data online backup software it kept on giving errors, so I said full install of vista it is then… After the vista reinstall I loaded up all the correct drivers and everything was good to go.
Playing with for a first few hours I thought it’s a fast and snappy laptop and was really happy with the product. One thing I did notice every time I powered on the laptop on the vista welcome screen had horizontal lines running through it; I thought ill address that problem a bit later.
I put a Blu-ray disc of Spiderman 3 to test out the gorgeous screen and that it where all the problems began, first of all it didn’t recognize the disc, I thought it might be a faulty disc so I pressed eject and low and behold nothing came out, I tried pressing eject on my computer and trying it from the bios all to no avail, I know there some people out there that are going to say it’s a easy fix, but I am not going to take apart the laptop after a few hours of use.
That was the final straw basically have just got off the phone with them after being passed around their telephone lines like a piece of meat and being put on hold for the best part of half an hour, lol they first said they will call me back for a cancellation , i was having none of that and i said i needed sorting out today, to give dell credit they put me straight through. The delivery man will pick up the laptop on Monday and I am going to get a full refund within the next week or so….. Sorry I know this is a bit long but I had to get this of my chest, it’s such a shame because I really did like the laptop. It’s just a case of starting the whole process of buying a new laptop. Im thinking the studio xps but dell has really put me off...
this my first and probably last post. I just want to make you aware of my 3-4 months drama with this system and Dell "Phillipindia".
Here it goes... around 4 months ago I decided to replace my 3 year old Inspiron. I look at what dell has to offer and was immediately attracted by the look and specifications of their studio XPS 16.
So I choose one, max it up almost to the top, slide $2k and waited In about 20 days the system arrived... new, nice and shiny... first impressions where more than good... amazing screen colors, crazy performance, backlight keys, stylish design, burns bluray, amazing speakers... only downside at time what that the laptops was like a magnet for fingerprints... I remember that this little thing upset me in way at that time .....
I've had my Studio 1537 for over a week now, and I have two questions.
1. Do you experience sound crackling? If so, what Wifi card do you have? I have the Intel Wifi 5100 card, which does occassionally cause some crackling.
2. The headphone jack has some line noise which is present all the time. Do you have this as well?
Can I get folks who have the Studio 15 w/ATI post their WEI numbers? I'm concerned the Studio 15z from Best Buy is actually beating the 1558 and that disappoints me.
Processor - 6.7 RAM - 5.9 Graphics - 4.9 Gaming - 6.2 Hard disk - 5.9
If you're just gonna tl;dr, read the first two and the very last paragraph, and look at the specs in sig.
I searched pretty thoroughly through the forums when I started my completecare process, but found no info, so I think this might be helpful for other people wondering what the Complete Care System Exchange / Replacement Warranty process is like.
So I've had a number of parts placed on the e1505 I purchased in summer 2006, every single component and plastic at least once except for the screen itself, a wsxga+ 1680x1050 - they literally don't sell these in laptops anymore.
It took a catastrophic spill outside my house on April 21st (i think), I tried to save it, but couldn't - screen had shattered, back left corner had bent up about an inch (heatsink assembly included), right hinge torn apart, but it still booted! I could plug in an external monitor and get somewhat though the boot phase (never bothered to fully boot back into windows after that)
Called in on the 22nd, they next-dayed a box, and i shipped it out on the 23rd.
Depot got in on the 28th according to FedEx, but I hadn't heard from them so I called in on the 29th to find out that the depot had in fact found there was fatal damage, and they were waiting on approval for a System Exchange .....
I've been reading the threads for a while and wanted to get some more opinions on the 1555 vs SSE. I know the SSE is basically the 1537 with the edge to edge monitor.
I placed my order for the SSE last week with an estimated delivery date of 6/15 I could cancel my order and go with the 1555 with an estimated ship date of 6/01. what do you think. I have ~$1000 to play with ......
I am about to order a Dell Studio 1555 tomorrow. It is a graduation present and I plan to be using it (hopefully) for all of college..........................
I got it in November, sometimes when i go to ANY of my browsers to view pages with flash. The whole browser freezes and crashes, so i start it up again and go to the page, and crash again.. so i try to use another browser (i literally have chrome, Firefox, safari and IE) all of them do the same exact thing.. and once it crashes there's no way to get it back up unless you restart. It gets very annoying having to restart my laptop about 5 times a day. I've done everything, uninstalling flash player, reinstalling it, reinstalling browsers.. I've even reinstalled my OS because nothing else would work. I don't understand why this laptop has so many issues. Randomly freezes, crashes etc. Its basically brand new and i shouldn't have these issues. My old Compaq presario cq60-215dx NEVER ever did any of these thing this Studio laptop does. This laptop is about 400 dollars more than my Compaq.. Also, i dual booted Vista and Windows 7 and Vista is a hell of a lot faster, it boots up faster and never crashes.. It just seems as if Dell did something to this OS to make it a piece.. help?
I just received my new Studio 1555 with Core2 P8600, 4GB RAM, Windows7 64Bit.
It freezes up on me at lease twice daily. I can't spot the problem, it has froze once when using excel, many times watching youtube videos and once using a tax software.
Everything just hangs and freezes. Can't do anything, have to hold the power button down. A few times when youtube froze, the sound stayed but in a frozen state.
What can it be?
Dell sent me some additional ram to upgrade to 8GB but that hasn't helped.
I have updated all drivers.
Please help. I'm tired of waiting on the phone and going through with Dell for hours and hours.
On first look i found that the build quality was better than expected, I had read a fiew reviews by owners that thebase was flimsy and so was the keyboard. I have found this to be quite solid and i can see no flex at all. The keyboard is very responsive and a pleasure to use, although i find that some of the keys give a slight squeeking noise when pressed. I intend to get a backlit keyboard sometime soon so that should fix the squeeking problem. I bought this from the outlet as refurbished but it looks brand new and i saved nearly £300 this way instead of self configuring the system. What's in the Box: Dell Windows Vista Home Premium 64 Bit installation dvd, Works 9, Driver and Resource Disk, 90w Power Supply Design Nice design and a sturdy construction, has a kind of wedge shape. Screen: This WLED 720p screen is far brighter than anything else i have ever seen, the picture is nice and crisp and colours are very vibrant. There is no ghosting at all and HD movies are a pleasure to watch on this, its a 15.6" 16:9. There is an option for a 1080p screen but i did not have that option getting this from the Outlet. Under sunny conditions the screen is quite reflective but i plan to use it indoors 95% of the time so it will not be an issue. Keyboard The keyboard is a pleasure to use, I did not get a backlit version but i intend to as soon as I can get dell on the phone, I find the keys very responsive and well laid out. The multimedia keys are on the top of the keyboard along with the F Keys, to use the F1 Keys ect you have to press the Fn key. Touchpad At first i did not like the touch pad as it has a textured feeling and not a smooth finish like im used to , after a while i have got used to it and its not as bad as i first thought, there is a scroll pad on the side although the touch pad has no indication of this, when playing games this area gets quite hot. Features: Multimedia Keys The keys are on the main keyboard and shared with the "F" Keys. LEDS One of my main complaints abot this machine is there are no LEDS for hard drive activity or wireless ect. The only light is on the power button on the side of the screen hinge. Wifi – My system has the Intel WiFi Link 5300 AGN card and the signals are strong and i have not suffered any drop outs or interference. Just a pity this laptop has no Wireless LED. Speakers The speakers are of a decent quality, i had read about the previous Studio 15 which had poor sound quality but this is more than acceptable and a subwoofer is included. Input and Output Ports Front There are no ports on the front of the machine Webcam Pictures The screen has a 2.0mp camera in and the quality is very good, the best i have seen in a laptop. Pictures are good with no noise or distortion. Right Side: 1 x USB 2.0, Slot loading DVD-RW Drive 8 in 1 media card reader, ExpressCard 34 and Power Adaptor Left Side: VGA, HDMI 2x USB 2.0 (1x USB/E-SATA combo, 2x standard) IEEE 1394a/Gigabit NIC (no RJ11 – via dongle for USB External Modem) 1x Stereo in, 2x headphone speaker out. Rear: There are no ports on the back. Bottom: There are 3 ventilation grills and the usual opening for the memory and Hard drive access. Benchmarks I have had time to do 2 benchmarks, 3dmark06 and Super PI 3dmark Vantage would not run with the resolution on this laptop. 3DMark06 Scored 4193
and Super PI took 48 seconds to do 2 million count. Size and Weight The laptop is light about 2.61 kg and is easily carried around so its very portable. Heat and Noise Under general use the laptop does get warm but nothing to worry about, when gaming it gets quite hot so it will be uncomfortable on your lap if you game alot. The fans are quite quiet i have found and do not cause any disturbance when on. Battery Life Under general use with a 6 cell battery i get around 3 hours 30 mins, I do not feel that a 9 cell would of been benefical to me. Software The software that came pre-installed was Roxio CD Creator and Windows Live. Accessories All that came was the power supply (it has a nice blue led on the power jack) Pros: Great Screen Fast Processor Light and Portable Long Battery Life Cons: No Activity LEDS Gets quite hot under Gaming Backlit keyboard not standard. Conclusion: A great all rounder laptop that should full-fill the needs of most, Not to over priced and has some good choices when configuring to buy.
When configuring each machine as closely as possible, is the only real difference form factor? Is 1920x1080 on 15.6 vs 16 that big of a deal? Are there features in the 1640....
I am still having problems with FPS drops in games, I have tried everything and have come to the conclusion it must be heat related.
By running HWMonitor I can see the sensor for my GPU has reached 94c!!! I think at this temp its downlocking and causing my FPS drops.
Could anyone else with a 1555 run hwmonitor (its free) then play a demanding game for a while and check the ACHI temps? http://www.cpuid.com/hwmonitor.php
You can see my temps in my other posts regarding the poor HS and Fan Dell Studio 1555 Pics Mobo/Heatsinks/fan/GPU
I will be performing the following hardware upgrades in the system:
1. HDD 320 GB 5400 rpm -> HDD 320 GB 7200 rpm
2. Intel Wifi 5100 card -> Intel Wifi 5300 card
Now my question is since I will be doing these upgrades myself, will doing this void my warranty in any way. I have 1 Yr Ltd Hardware Warranty, InHome Service after Remote Diagnosis.
Also, if tomorrow I have 2 send the lappy 2 the Dell Service Centre for any reason and they find out that I have upgraded the machine, then will it have any effect on my warranty?
i recently bought a Dell studio 1555, i have been using it for 10 days now and just yeterday i installed tom clancy's HAWX on it, after 5 minutes of playing the game it froze (crashed) and the screen turned from white to purple to other colours untill it went back to white... i thought it was the game so i tried playing COD 4, COD 5, Rainbow six V2, GRAW 2 and Far cry 2......they all run smoothly on high/medium graphics settings......but after a couple of minutes like 4 or 5 it crashes and the screen goes white and then fades from white to blue to purple then white.
the specifications of my laptop are as follows -P8600 2.4ghz core 2 duo -3GB RAM -512mb dedicated ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4570 -320GB 7200rpm HDD the problem only happens whenever i play games for a few minutes!
Wondered if anyone had experienced anything similar...
I got a studio 1555 about a month ago and for the most part it works great. However....
Occasionally the computer stops responding - i.e. I'll be browsing the internet in Safari/Firefox and all of a sudden it will hang - I have to go to task manager to quit out of it. When I go back to open Safari it wont open, nor will any other application. I can double click on them but nothing happens.
Also, when this happens, Windows Vista refuses to shut down - I have to turn the computer off manually - i.e. hold the power button down for several seconds.
Also, and perhaps this is unconnected, I've noticed that when I go to the control panel, Windows Explorer crashes the first time I access it and I have to go back to the control panel to access it again.