Dell Precision M6600 quick review

specs | performance | in the box

Quick specs

• Intel Core i7 2820QM 2.30GHz
• 4x4GB DDR3 RAM @ 1333MHz
• 2x2.5" 7200RPM 500GB SATA HDDs in RAID1 setup
• Nvidia Quadro 3000M w/ 2GB RAM and Intel HD Graphics 3000
• 17.3" FHD 16:9 LED (UltraSharp) multi-touch screen (1920x1080) w/ stylus, webcam and mic
• Intel Centrino Ultimate-N 6300 802.11 AGN wifi + bluetooth
• Slot Load DVD+-R/RW w/Double Layer
• 9-cell 3760MAh 97Wh battery
• Weight 7.77lb (3.6kg)

Details

Performance
The laptop comes with windows 7 professional 64-bit. It boots from power-on to login screen in 45 sec (in a RAID1 setup with 2x500GB 7200rpm SATA disks). Shut down takes 14 seconds from clicking the button (while logged in) to power-off. Going to sleep takes 7 seconds and waking up - 3 seconds. The OS and all the bundled software take about 43gigs and the recovery partition is 752megs.

Windows experience index:

On AC power in "Ultra Performance" profile - 5.2

Super PI for 1mil and 8mil (on AC power):

CrystalDiskMark and HD Tune Pro:

PCMark05:
On AC power with Nvidia videocard in "Ultra Performance" profile - 10394
On battery power with Nvidia videocard in "Ultra Performance" profile - 8726
On battery power with Intel videocard in "Power Saving" profile - 5335 (about 64% slower)

3DMark06:

On AC power with Nvidia videocard in "Ultra Performance" mode - 14208

On battery power with Nvidia videocard in "Ultra Performance" mode - 2766

On battery power with Intel videocard in "Power Saving" mode - 2526 (9% slower)

What's in the box
AC adapter, manuals, stylus, resource media CD.

Toshiba Portable Hard Drive (HDDR640E04XR) review

I got my hands on this 2.5" 640GB USB 2.0 external hard drive and thought i'd write a quick review on it. 

Here are the main points:

• USB powered
• Internal shock sensor
• Backup software (with optional 256-Bit AES encryption)
• Size 3.19" x 0.65" x 5" (81.026mm x 16.5mm x 127mm)
• Weight 6oz (170g)

The case is glossy plastic with a mini-usb port on the side, a white activity led on the top and two rubber strips on the bottom that serve as feet.

It's compatible with PC and Mac and comes with backup software for both, though complete system backup is supported only on Windows. The software is on the drive itself, there are no CDs. It's simple and easy to use. Here's how it looks on Windows:

You can backup files and folders as well as your entire system. You do the latter either directly to the hard drive or to a CD/DVD. If you do it to the hard drive it makes it bootable which is quite convenient. Booting from the drive offers you a simple recovery window where you can select what restore point you want to use.

The actual size of the disk is 596GB and it comes pre-formated with FAT32. You can convert it to NTFS without loosing the backup software via a wizard that runs the first time you plug the drive in.

Finally, the moment of truth - CrystalDiskMark:

Overall it's a nice little disk to carry around, if it only were a bit faster.