Dell Dimension XPS 400 Evaluation @ [H]

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FrgMstr

Just Plain Mean
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Dell Dimension XPS 400 Evaluation

Dell's new "XPS Experience" includes bloatware bogging down your system and causing all sorts of gaming problems. Is Dell's support able to undo their mess and actually deliver the gaming system you bought?

"Even more troubling is that our Dell XPS 400 did not live up to its billing as a gaming machine that is suitable for ANY gamer. The software compatibility issues we saw lead me to question just how Dell tests their products. Certainly a serious gaming computer company would insure their solutions work with some of the most popular gaming franchises on the market. The Dell XPS 400 is a good example of how you cannot just throw a high performance video card into any computer and call it a gaming machine."
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hehehe, very nice system overview :D

That software bundle and tech support was a real kicker :rolleyes: figures..it's a Dell.
 
Hmmm... A 7/10 in Gaming when it wouldn't even install multiple games? I'd give it at best a 4. Probably lower than that.

I think the part about "55 minutes spent fixing a problem that every Dell ships with" is telling. No wonder their call wait times are so atrocious.
 
Lo, how the mighty have fallen. If this is the case with Dell these days, I definitely know not to recommend Dell to anyone. I bought a Dell Dimension 4400 in Feb '02. This was a P4 1.8Ghz Willamette that I kept until this year when I sold it. This was damn good machine. Well built, extremely quiet and easy to upgrade. Most importantly, it came with a OEM XP Disc. Yes it came with some bloatware, but damn little. It seems like Dell has forgotten about the customer. Dell sells some nice products, (like my 2405FPW monitor), but I would never buy any system that didn't come with an OS disc. Sad, really. :(
 
wow that is pretty bad. i have an inspiron 9300 with a geforce 6800 and its awesome, but i immediately reformatted and installed my own xp pro disc. i really don't dig dell's preloaded software, and honestyl when i ran 3dmark05 before and after my format/reinstall there was a huge difference afterwards.

it's been a very good laptop though, very reliable and stable, the only problem i had (which was a weird one) is when i was installing norton (it came with mcafee, which i uninstalled), when i was at the cd-key entering screen for some reason if i pressed '1' it would cause the computer to beep really loud and shut off...

anyways, good review guys. :)
 
Rori said:
Hmmm... A 7/10 in Gaming when it wouldn't even install multiple games? I'd give it at best a 4. Probably lower than that.

I think the part about "55 minutes spent fixing a problem that every Dell ships with" is telling. No wonder their call wait times are so atrocious.
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Yeah, if that was all we were scoring it on I'd completely agree with you. However, in this case we scored it after Dell was able to get our games running...and we knocked them in several other categories instead.

It all evened out in the end... ;)
 
One thing I've been disappointed with Dell about though, when I bought my laptop it was standard with a 256mb DDR2 chip. for some reason the upgrade to 1gb was $300+

... I bought 2 gigs of Corsair XMS memory for $330...
 
Interesting review and glad see my gruge agiasnt Dell is not totally bais.

Worse part about Dell is all the un-informed, non tech savy people think dell is the best and they think dell computers are a good price when they are overpriced! (specially when adding upgrades). I asked a friend if he wanted me to build him a good computer. His response was "oh, you mean like a dell system." I just wasnted to shoot myself. Dell is no better than sony, compaq, emachine's OEM comuters IMO. They are decent for a bundled OEM system, but in no way good :)
 
I also bought the Inspiron 9300 with the 6800. I had the exact same issue over the operating system (MCE 2005) as in this review. In my case I bought a 7200 RPM laptop hard drive for gaming from Newegg. I noticed there were no operating system discs, no restore discs, nothing. There was a stupid piece of cardboard that looked like a CD that forwarded me to a portion of Dell's website that explained to me that they just finished the conversion to a restore-on-the-hard-drive only method vs. a restore/OS disc. This didn't please me one bit as this was not mentioned on their website when I ordered the laptop. It also mentioned how to make a backup CD of the OS from the restore partition. Guess what? It only works for XP Home or Pro, NOT MCE 2005! I ended up calling Dell and politely chewed their butts out. Was told that because MCE 2005 is too big to fit on one CD (the OEM package is two CDs FYI), they couldn't/wouldn't/didn't make it possible to burn a restore disc set. They charged me something like $15 or so to send me the MCE 2005 on DVD, yep, DVD. Thankfully I had configured the system with the DVD reader / CD-RW combo drive! The base config was for a CD-RW I believe. Wonder how Dell would have handled me calling them back becuase the DVD wouldn't work in the CD-RW drive... :mad:

Short of that, I haven't had any issues with the system.

I feel that the scores in the review were pretty much dead on, although I think a 7/10 for the gaming score might be a little high, unless the score is weighted more for actual gameplay itself and not the overall gaming experience, ie. installing the game and such. In that case, a 4/10 as mentioned earlier seems more accurate.
 
ClearM4 said:
Interesting review and glad see my gruge agiasnt Dell is not totally bais.

Worse part about Dell is all the un-informed, non tech savy people think dell is the best. I asked a friend if he wanted me to build him a good computer. His response was "oh, you mean like a dell system." I just wasnted to shoot myself. Dell is no better than sony, compaq, emachine's OEM comuters IMO. They are decent for a bundled OEM system, but in no way good :)
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I was very surprised by what we found...mainly because I haven't used a Dell desktop in several years. I honestly thought this was going to be a positive review, just based on gut feeling...however I was mistaken.
 
Absolutely it's a wonderful laptop. It's been nothing but stable, runs all the games I play CS:S, EQ2, WoW, FFXI, HL2, etc.... Runs them all great. Not only that, but overclocking for the video card actually does very well. I turned on the omega drivers auto-overclocking and it substantally raised my fps rates, and i still havent had a stability issue. (I didn't buy the extended warranty anyways, and yeah, I know I'm a moron for that ;)

On a sidenote, I bought one of their $300 specials for a workstation where I work, upgrade the ram to 512... It didn't come bundled with much software at all, after about 15 minutes of uninstalling things, install norton and run windows updates, it's also a very good computer....

I honestly feel (IMO, of course), that Dell is extremely good for the typical end user who just wants a PC thats reliable... But I think that marketing any prebuilt PC Alienware, Voodoo, or XPS is a joke. An absolute joke... I built an Athlon64 based system a year and a half ago for probably ~1500 and it probably still hands an aswhooping to any xps system.
 
Good review!
From my 6 years experience with Dell, I can safely say that your review is quite typical for any of their computers now, and the problems you point out are why I have stoped using Dell and have turned to building my own computers from now on (execpt for servers, which have no OS.... so no bloatware there).

Too bad too, back 5-6 years ago they were a good company for a novice computer user.

The mouse pad thing was really really funny! oh boy.

~Thanks
 
Inflammatory statement, sure. What do I mean by that?

Dells are almost as "closed" as Macs in some respects. Things that I've experienced with Dell (my desktop is still, sadly, a Dimension 4550, but it was one of those "give away" specials that just made it an amazing deal - or so it seemed). My bitches include:

* Custom BIOSes on Dell-provided expansion cards (i.e., Sound Blaster). Identical hardware to the regular card, but it cannot install drivers from the manufacturer, and it required hacking drivers under Linux to recognize a different PCI id. Dell's response: run WinXP and our drivers. I finally ripped out their card and bought another.

* Their system BIOS has always had issues with things like ACPI and the like under any OS besides WinXP. It is as if they created it with that OS in mind, which they probably did.

Add in all of the issues mentioned in the article, and I'll never, ever buy a Dell again.

The bottom line is that Dells are NOT "PC Compatible". If you're looking for that, look at something else. Actually, just don't buy Dell at all :)

jh
 
I bought a Dell 8400 back in April. It came with a windows XP home CD (with tons of bloatware included.)

The very first thing I did when I got the machine, is open it, replace the hard drives and do a complete reformat of the system (with my own copy of XP Pro.) I know too well the bloatware that is included on Dell machines. After the reformat, my machine is very stable.

But after reading this review, I don't think I will ever buy another Dell machine again.
 
I own a 700m laptop that i got back over the summer. The FIRST thing i did was install WindowsXP fresh, but not THEIR install. I for one hate all the stupid shit they throw on their systems. I have not had any problems out of this laptop yet and am very happy with it, provided i was smart enough to know to install my own copy of XP and not use their bloated garbage install :p
 
I had many of the same issues with Dell and thier technical support. I ended up with a Pentium D chip and ATI X600, but the rest of my experience was identical.

I had a ton of trouble wiping the entire system. In the beginning, I would get a blue screen when trying to delete the existing Dell partition. Eventually, I was forced to slipstream my Windows XP Pro disk to ensure that it had SP2 functionality, install the OS via upgrade, then do a clean install.

I'm happy to report that my Dell [now] works as I would have expected it to from the factory. After 12 hours of optimization, it benches where it should. I admire that you guys actually engaged Dell's tech support for evaluation purposes, but I just couldn't handle it. They'll be gettin my bill in the mail.
 
Every OEM computer you buy these days has a ridiculous amount of bloatware on it. Why? It's an alternate revenue stream. I don't think that should come as a surprise, especially to folks at the [H].

That being said, as most others here, I either reformat OEM PCs or strip out all the crap and clean the registry to get them up to snuff.

Definitely enjoyed reading about your experience with tech support.
 
I will make two seemingly contradictory statements:

1) Dell makes great computers
2) Your review was 100% right

I recommend Dell almost exclusively for my clients, BUT I am almost always the one who installs and configures them. Let me make a few points.

1) When purchasing and configuring a Dell, there is now a $10 option to include an OS cd with the computer. You can check this option just below where you select your OS. I don't pick this option because I already have a Dell XP Home OS cd AND a Dell XP Pro OS cd.

2) VERY IMPORTANT: These Dell-branded XP OEM cd's are bascially off-the shelf Microsoft OEM cd's with a Dell logo on the front and a Dell logo folder inside. They contain NO BLOATWARE, just a bootable OS CD with a clean Microsoft OS inside. In fact, I have used the Dell CD's to install XP home and XP Pro on many home-built computers when I have an OEM license key. They are NOT images though, just OS CDs.

3) The first thing to do when you open a new Dell box is go to ADD/Remove programs and get rid of Norton/McAffee, My Way Search Assistant, Quickbooks Simple stuff, and anything else you don't like.

4) Then, go to regedit, HKLM and HKCU Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Run and remove basically everything. Also remove stuff from the Startup folder.

5) I have found the Dell Support Agent tool, while annoying, gives good and useful information ("you should turn on AutoUpdates", "Windows Firewall is disabled, you should enable it", etc.). I remove it for my own computers, but it's useful for less savvy clients.

6) Alternatively, you could boot from the OS cd if you purchased it and do a clean format and install with no bloatware. (you can never delete the main partition if you are installing from the CD inside windows).

7) If you order from the small business area instead of the home/home office area, you get less junk, and you can even choose to have no AOL/Earthlink junk, no Antivirus/Security "free trial", no multimedia software, etc. Works out better for me. AND it's usually CHEAPER!!! You should always compare both areas, though.

This whole process takes me less than 30 minutes, and I have a fast and stable system with GREAT, CHEAP hardware.

Now, your review is dead-on, because no one should have to do that, but it is those software subsidies that make the damned thing so cheap. You shouldn't have to spend 30 min. (that's 30 min. my time, a novice could take days) to get a great working computer, though.

I have had the same irritating problem with their defective mousepad (UNBELIEVABLE) and the optical mouse, and their support is abyssmal. Never pay for the extra support if you're a tech person. Hell don't pay at all, just get a cheap computer and pay your local computer shop to fix it.

However, if you know what you're doing, you can get a fantastic computer for really cheap. I just got a Celeron 2.53 Ghz with 768MB of RAM, an 80GB HD, CDRW, and XP Home with a 17" Monitor, SHIPPED, for $375. That's with 512MB Corsair RAM from Newegg.

Really enjoyed the review. For an out-of-the-box gaming system, that was terrible! Keep up the great work.
 
waldo22 said:
I will make two seemingly contradictory statements:

1) Dell makes great computers
2) Your review was 100% right

I recommend Dell almost exclusively for my clients, BUT I am almost always the one who installs and configures them. Let me make a few points.

1) When purchasing and configuring a Dell, there is now a $10 option to include an OS cd with the computer. You can check this option just below where you select your OS. I don't pick this option because I already have a Dell XP Home OS cd AND a Dell XP Pro OS cd.

2) VERY IMPORTANT: These Dell-branded XP OEM cd's are bascially off-the shelf Microsoft OEM cd's with a Dell logo on the front and a Dell logo folder inside. They contain NO BLOATWARE, just a bootable OS CD with a clean Microsoft OS inside. In fact, I have used the Dell CD's to install XP home and XP Pro on many home-built computers when I have an OEM license key. They are NOT images though, just OS CDs.

3) The first thing to do when you open a new Dell box is go to ADD/Remove programs and get rid of Norton/McAffee, My Way Search Assistant, Quickbooks Simple stuff, and anything else you don't like.

4) Then, go to regedit, HKLM and HKCU Software/Microsoft/Windows/CurrentVersion/Run and remove basically everything. Also remove stuff from the Startup folder.

5) I have found the Dell Support Agent tool, while annoying, gives good and useful information ("you should turn on AutoUpdates", "Windows Firewall is disabled, you should enable it", etc.). I remove it for my own computers, but it's useful for less savvy clients.

6) Alternatively, you could boot from the OS cd if you purchased it and do a clean format and install with no bloatware. (you can never delete the main partition if you are installing from the CD inside windows).

7) If you order from the small business area instead of the home/home office area, you get less junk, and you can even choose to have no AOL/Earthlink junk, no Antivirus/Security "free trial", no multimedia software, etc. Works out better for me. AND it's usually CHEAPER!!! You should always compare both areas, though.

This whole process takes me less than 30 minutes, and I have a fast and stable system with GREAT, CHEAP hardware.

Now, your review is dead-on, because no one should have to do that, but it is those software subsidies that make the damned thing so cheap. You shouldn't have to spend 30 min. (that's 30 min. my time, a novice could take days) to get a great working computer, though.

I have had the same irritating problem with their defective mousepad (UNBELIEVABLE) and the optical mouse, and their support is abyssmal. Never pay for the extra support if you're a tech person. Hell don't pay at all, just get a cheap computer and pay your local computer shop to fix it.

However, if you know what you're doing, you can get a fantastic computer for really cheap. I just got a Celeron 2.53 Ghz with 768MB of RAM, an 80GB HD, CDRW, and XP Home with a 17" Monitor, SHIPPED, for $375. That's with 512MB Corsair RAM from Newegg.

Really enjoyed the review. For an out-of-the-box gaming system, that was terrible! Keep up the great work.
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I really agree with you - there was nothing wrong with the hardware. But you say it yourself - you're not buying these computers for your home, you're buying them for clients which (I'm assuming) really kinda makes you a reseller, and less of a consumer or end-user. I'm wondering what will happen when [H]Enterprise launches, perhaps Dell might look better under that light. For us though, we look at who and what the computer is marketed to, and try to keep them in mind when evaluating the system - in this case, Dell marketed the computer to gamers and high-performance users. -- not your typical office-user.
 
tazdevl said:
Every OEM computer you buy these days has a ridiculous amount of bloatware on it. Why? It's an alternate revenue stream. I don't think that should come as a surprise, especially to folks at the [H].

That being said, as most others here, I either reformat OEM PCs or strip out all the crap and clean the registry to get them up to snuff.

Definitely enjoyed reading about your experience with tech support.
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I don't know - as we stated, Gateway's "bloatware" didn't really hurt the machines we reviewed the way that Dell's did.

I honestly don't mind preinstalled programs - in fact, I even look for a preinstalled Antivirus program (or an option for a preinstalled Antivirus program) as a plus - but what I do need is

1) Some way to either get or burn the install files for those programs (and it should be obvious) so that if you do have to reformat, you can put the programs you want back on without installing a whole bunch of other stuff,

2) That whatever software you add stays the hell out of the way of other tasks and doesn't consume massive amounts of system resources or cause instability.

One of the things that really ticked me off about this Dell installation was that the programs -caused- stability problems and were restored from the "recovery" hard drive partition disk image. It's like Dell really didn't want you to get rid of the bloatware, even if it meant that your computer had serious problems. To me, that means that they care about AOL, Intuit, and Corel a hell of a lot more than they care about the customer.
 
Nice, thurough (<--spelling?) review as always. Dell just sucks. Period. I just had quite the time with them getting my 2005FPW which i made a thread about in genmay. Dell has horrible business practices and even worse hardware. They suck, I would never buy a computer from them, and after my wonderful monitor experience, I will never consider them for a purchase ever again, and I made sure to tell a manager about that.

Nice review though. But I could have told you that :p
 
Fantastic review. But Dell does suck (have a dell laptop, and their CustServ is not exadurated in the article).
 
I must admit I skipped straight to the Tech Support page before reading the article and I wasnt surprised. You should be thankful "Arthur" spoke some English. The lack of recovery discs is at best cost cutting gone wrong and at worst deviousness to force the bloatware on the average user. :mad:

There is an "old" work around to NOT paying for the backup CD's. Without taking someone else's credit... http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=41670&t=160546&highlight=dell+recovery

The problem is it's still a hassle. Why do I need to PAY for a hassle?
 
undercoverDrunk said:
I must admit I skipped straight to the Tech Support page before reading the article and I wasnt surprised. You should be thankful "Arthur" spoke some English.
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We never had any trouble with language from any of the tech support staff we talked to.
 
I'd like you guys to include a screenshot in System Evaluations from now on. Would you consider showing a SS of the Startup tab in msconfig after the 1st boot? I know that one of my biggest pet peaves is software companies "assuming" I want their program starting with my computer. The fewer the better.
 
Major_A said:
I'd like you guys to include a screenshot in System Evaluations from now on. Would you consider showing a SS of the Start Up tab in msconfig after the 1st boot? I know that one of my biggest pet peaves is software companies "assuming" I want their program starting with my computer. The fewer the better.
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I don't see why not. We have a few articles that are already in the oven so it may be a system or two before we can start that...
 
Brian Boyko said:
We never had any trouble with language from any of the tech support staff we talked to.
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XPS support is separate from "normal" Dell support and is located stateside.

I have an XPS laptop and am extremely happy with it. I've yet to have to call CS though.
 
Wow. Ouch. You guys really zinged Dell on this one. And in my opinion, you are spot-on. You article very nicely described why I don't recommend Dell to any home user. In fact, I might just send a link to the 'conclusions' page to my family, so in case any of them are considering buying a new computer, they'll have fair warning.

One of my favorite "tricks" when doing tech support for family or friends (especially if they're running an OEM or retail computer) is to open up the task manager and show them the multiple-page process list (or the startup programs in msconfig). And then I show them the same thing on my laptop. Alternatively, I will shut both computers (their new one and my Thinkpad 600 with a P-II 266), and hit the power button on both at the same time. Almost invariably, my laptop boots faster. This is exactly why I build computers myself, or offer to do it for family/friends.

Thanks for the great review.

 
I agree with the article, I mean when a "regular consumer" buys a Dell or any other OEM, the computer to them is like an appliance. It's like Tivo or a toaster, they just expect it to work out of the box, no messing with drivers, firmware, install/uninstall, etc. So in that standard of judgement the article is right on.

But, other posters are also correct, when saying that the hardware is good, just that it needs to be configured correctly. The most important aspect is who the intended customer is: Knowledgeable PC person OR average-Joe.

I have personally owned Dells since the XPS Line with Pentium IIs (T750r, still have it, mom uses it for everything works like a champ). I have always loved their cases and silence, this is the greatest asset Dell has over any other OEM. Performance was never like a home-built, but they are good at replacing broken parts if you know what you need, couple of emails and I get the part DHL in 2 days, put the broken part in the box and send it back via DHL, of course this is not for everyone.
 
I think it would also be fair to re-evaulate the PC after it's been reformatted and brought up to date.

We all know every Dell is a piece out of the box thanks to it's bloatware and crap. It's terrible how much the bloatware can bog a machine.
 
shoman24v said:
I think it would also be fair to re-evaulate the PC after it's been reformatted and brought up to date.

We all know every Dell is a piece out of the box thanks to it's bloatware and crap. It's terrible how much the bloatware can bog a machine.
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The problem with that is that it is then no longer a Dell system...it's Dell hardware with final integration done by Chris Morley.
 
Oh big slap to dell, they just got shutdown by the [H]. Balanced and fair report boys. :)
 
Did anyone really expect anything different.
I seldom tell people to get a Dell and for many of the same reasons mentioned.
If your not going to get the CD's, might as well get a HP. I've had pretty good luck with the HP stuff.
Too bad Dell just doesn't allow you to pick the bloatware as options when ordering, then those in the know will get a clean OS install and those that don't, can have all the crap! (and then pay someone like me to come help get it cleaned up).
We need to launch the [H]Computer Company and offer consumers (gamers) what they really deserve.
 
Chris_Morley said:
The problem with that is that it is then no longer a Dell system...it's Dell hardware with final integration done by Chris Morley.
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Reformatting doesn't not make it a Dell system anymore. Every benchmark would have been better on a clean OS.

I had a Dell 8300 with P4 3.2GHz, X800XT PE and it pulled 6k in 3DMark05.... :p
 
shoman24v said:
Reformatting doesn't not make it a Dell system anymore. Every benchmark would have been better on a clean OS.
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Given that the objective of the review is to gauge the user experience for someone buying it "as is", I think Chris is right. It's a review of the package, including the software. Just think: how many people who buy Dells even know how to install a fresh copy of WinXP, let alone want to do it?

 
shoman24v said:
Reformatting doesn't not make it a Dell system anymore. Every benchmark would have been better on a clean OS.

I had a Dell 8300 with P4 3.2GHz, X800XT PE and it pulled 6k in 3DMark05.... :p
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Actually, it does. Not everyone would rebuilt it the same way, and 90% of Dell's target market would have absolutely no idea how to even complete an install of Windows MCE. And to even GET the Windows CD we had to go through THREE technicians. Even after we got it Dell failed to send the accompanying drivers disks and application disk that would have given us PowerDVD, among other things.

The point is you can buy a similarly spec'd and priced PC from PC Club (our highest rated vendor at 9.2), for instance, and have it work perfectly out of the box without having to do their job for them.
 
Beautiful just beautiful, now when I have family and friends come to me and say what kinda PC can you build me for $500.00 or less I can't say "GO BUY A DELL AND LEAVE ME ALONE" )-: However I can still say, "Go buy a PC CLUB, NEWEGG, or GATEWAY, and LEAVE ME ALONE!" hehehe
 
Good read.
Go figure....Dells support is bad.....not a news flash.
We have Dells at our business(dimensions) and they are ok. They do what they are supposed to.
That being said, I wouldnt buy one. Especially after reading this.
I do have a bunch of Dell monitors and I like 'em. They have never been a problem....from the 2405 to the 15 inch analog..... :rolleyes:
 
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