CES 2006 - Day 1: Dell's 30" Display, Quad SLI, WUSB and more
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 6, 2006 4:20 AM EST- Posted in
- Trade Shows
Intel Centrino Duo, by Dell
Dell also showed off their Inspiron E1705, their first and currently their only Centrino Duo based notebook. As the name implies, the notebook features a 17" widescreen display and an Intel Core Duo processor (single core versions will also be available). It is currently offered with either a T2500 (2.0GHz) or a T2400 (1.83GHz) Core Duo processor.
Although Dell is supposed to be shipping immediately, their online store doesn't have a preliminary ship date listed when you go to configure a machine.
Dell gave us a demo of the Inspiron E1705 with its new Dell MediaDirect 2.0 instant-on feature. Basically within 12 seconds of starting MediaDirect 2.0 you have full access (via a pre-OS environment) to any device connected to the notebook. That includes USB drives, media cards, the DVD drive and even the entire internal hard drive (as well as any external drives). With access to all of these devices you can view pictures, watch movies (any format that is supported by Windows Media Player) and listen to non-DRM protected music.
The MediaDirect 2.0 interface is very media center like and designed to minimize the amount of time needed to get your notebook up and running to a state where it can function as a portable media player.
We are expecting to have our review sample of the Inspiron E1705 in the next week or two.
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VooDooAddict - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
I forgot to add that I would sertiously consider something like that for purchase ... right now I build all my own PCs. Something like that is NOT something I could build on my own.The only thing that might keep me away is Dell's comsumer software load. The buisness PCs (Optiplex) have a much cleaner load.
Xenoterranos - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
Has no one here ever tried to build a briefcase PC? The only thing I couldn't get working in mine was a battery. The second one I built worked fine off a battery, but being powered by a VIA Eden CPU didn't make for the best Counterstrike:Source play in the world.s2kpacifist - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
The Dell Transportable is a very nice idea, probably influenced by modders (suitcase mod anyone?) While appealing, I think they can take one step further and make a barebones system in addition to the version they showed at CES. Having the option of installing and upgraded your own vid cards/RAM/cpu would be a huge draw...and provide fierce competition for shuttle/SFF/Viiv/HTPCs. This would also be a godsend for LAN gamers everywhere, as someone mentioned above.I'm not sure if that wireless rechargeable keyboard is necessary. Most gamers would be using a nicer one, regular users would be lazy enough to not charge their keyboard, and media users would probably be using the remote when afar, rather than the keyboard. As for the battery, it can be good and bad, I can't really decide.
LoneWolf15 - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
It doesn't say, but if the Dell Transportable has a TV tuner in it, then it'd rock. As a college student, you could buy it as a all-in-one dorm solution. As an adult, it'd be a fully portable DVR/HTPC.UzairH - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
ONE GTX 512 is a beast, imagine 4 of them. And the 4.26 GHz 955 Presler isn't so bad - I'd say it should match the 4800+ in most apps - remember the recent AT review of the 955 - at default clock speeds it was slightly slower or sometimes faster than the 4800+. Of course the question is how much does this monster rig cost?Xenoterranos - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
Well, overcloked like that, it would easily match and exceede a 4800+'s performance, but in a simillarly configured AMD system, there'd be no comparison.OCedHrt - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
What are the other specifications for this? How come this information is never available from Dell when they release a new laptop. Screen size? Weight? Etc.keitaro - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
The Quad-SLI thing is rather interesting but would this actually be beneficial in any way? The games probably won't show much of a big difference in framerate given the CPU but one has to wonder what games can truly push the GPU enough to really need 4 to see any benefits from it. I'm all for overboard and extreme stuff but I question the practicality of it. Expensive, high heat output, and high power consumption, three things that don't go together very well...Unfortunately, I would sell off the CPU, motherboard, and RAM... only to have it replaced with X2 4800+, 2x1GB RAM, and the best SLI motherboard one can get. At least with that setup, the system would perform better and won't eat up as much power.... tho I ponder if that'll make a difference in the end considering quad-SLI. Ugh...
grank0 - Sunday, January 8, 2006 - link
I know why you need 4 CPU cores--it's to handle all the crapware in the background they preinstall. Did you see the HardOCP review, which was linked by slashdot? They reviewed an XPS400: http://hardocp.com/article.html?art=OTI0LDg=">http://hardocp.com/article.html?art=OTI0LDg="The Bottom Line – 4/10"
"The system itself is a decent gaming platform and the hardware was well built."
"But we couldn’t even install one of the most popular games on the market, Sims 2, and trying to play other popular games would lock up the system and gaming sessions, when they would run, would get interrupted."
"The pre-installed programs that Dell chose to include on its computer were almost certainly the cause of all these problems"
poohbear - Friday, January 6, 2006 - link
dude, if u're gonna drop cash on a sys like that, u could care less about heat output, price, and electricity bills. It's like ppl who buy hummers are'nt concerned about gas prices, it's pennies to them.