I've had a couple days now to spend with my new Dell XPS 410 with Intel
Core Duo 6700... dual processors that are each twice as fast as my old
machine. It's pretty quick but I haven't really run any PhotoShop work
on it yet. Waiting for the CS3 upgrade and trying to install a zillion
other things ahead of that.
General comments. I guess I'm technologically way behind. This machine
doesn't have *any* EIDE ports (even the DVD is SATA) and also doesn't
have *any* old style serial or parallel ports. I won't really miss any
of that except for the parallel port which is needed for my laser
printer. I used to have a couple serial/parallel adapters which I threw
out last year thinking I'd never need them. Maybe just as well. They
probably weren't even PCI. But I love the flash card reader, USB,
speaker and mike jacks on the front of the box plus 1/2 dozen more USB
ports on the back. I was only slightly surprised to see that there were
no PS/2 style mouse and keyboard connectors let alone an AT keyboard
connector for my original IBM clicky, tactile feedback keyboard... my
faithful companion since 1987. A little AT -> PS/2 converter followed
by a PS/2 to USB converter did the trick. I'm still clicking away on my
faithful companion. I have a couple more stashed away in case this one
ever fails. I can't stand flimsy, mushy, $5 keyboards.
The box has 3 fans and I expected it to sound like a tornado. In fact,
it's whisper quiet. My wife walked in the other day after the power
saver shut off the monitor and asked me why the computer was shut off.
She just couldn't hear it. Another nice feature is that it can be
disassembled without tools. Mechanically very interesting and well built.
I now have a network between the new and old machine and the old stuff
is coming over as we speak. First time I've ever installed Cat5 cable
in the wall. Stripless connectors made it easy to make wall sockets.
Chuck Norcutt
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