Dell XPS 700 - reviewed, dissected

Does anybody know if there's any way of getting the bare bones system in Europe? The best part of this system is the case, and with such an awesome (noise-wise) cooling system I'd be willing to overspend in getting one, even if I have to get a slightly sub-par motherboard with it. There doesn't seem to be anything comparable (looks and performance wise) to that case in the market right now.

It only seems to be available in the US site...heck, in the Spanish one there isn't even a XPS 700 available...if I wanted one, I'd have to order an entire system to UK site and get ripped with the € / GBP conversion .

Alternatively...can you order from Europe to the US site? The US prices aren't so high, but the UK prices are outrageous...The cheapest XPS 700 is 1375 GBP (or 2036€) but only 2270$ (or 1765€) in the US site.

 

Nice case.

 

Firstly, nice review. Covered all the questions I would have asked.

Second, if Dell were the people who built the 'demo' Core 2 Duo system, C2D wouldn't look anywhere near as appealing as it had before then. It beat the AMD box by any real margin in, what, two tests? But then again, I imagine it would have the same advantage if the AMD box was built by Dell, too. I guess it all balances out.

I'd not really argue about the Recommended badge, as it's definitely aimed at gamers who aren't interested in the intricasies of building their own systems.

It's nice to have more proof that good quality RAM has that much of an impact...

 

Having a play with the options on the UK Dell site and, strangely enough, there isn't even an option to spec up the XPS 700 with 2x1GB 667MHz ram - you can have 4x512MB 667MHz (for a whopping £223 premium over 2x512MB 533MHz - not great value when you can pick up 2x1GB 800MHz Corsair XMS2 4-4-4-12 for £170 inc VAT from scan!) or 2x1GB 533MHz (for £94 over the 2x512MB 533 MHz).

Similarly, you can spec up the system with a 7900GS, save £246, flog the GS and bung in a 7900GTX or X1900XTX.

On the whole, if you take the basic system (min RAM, min GFX, min HDD, lose the overpriced 3 year warranty), with a Core 2 Duo E6700 for £1,657. Ebay the RAM (£40?) and GFX card (£90?), add a proper GFX card (£250-300), some decent RAM (£170) and a 2nd HDD if you want RAID0 (£50) and you've got a pretty kick ass, powerful, quiet system in a beautiful case with a genuine copy of MCE for about two grand. Only problem is the lack of overclockability, but if you're happy to run at stock, you're laughing. Perhaps when the 590 chipset is released mainstream, BIOS revisions will come along enabling OC on this board?

EDIT: also, given the difference in Dell's price for the system with an E6300 vs an E6700 is £434, you'd be much better off speccing an E6300, dropping in an E6700 for £373 from Scan and flogging the E6300 for ~£100 (they go for £121 OEM / £131 retail inc VAT new) - another £150 shaved off the price. Personally I'd stick with the E6300 for a few months anyway until the prices of the higher end parts drop, then bag a bargain upgrade.

 

The XPS laptops are great, especially when you get one for a good price. I sold my custom built/watercooled athlon 64 last sept and managed to outright buy the same spec in a laptop. Build quality and features such as the screen are excellent. Shame they've let down the desktop side of things abit here by trying to cut corners with certain parts.

 

the case is great, the inside is the suck.

i hope dell fixes this machine.

 

It's so fugly it wraps back around into attractiveness. I like it

 

Although after flogging so much of it on ebay just to replace it means that all this works out to be is nothing but an overpriced case...

Can't say I'm a fan, and it wouldn't be something I'd give a recommended award to!

 

very disappointing

Its very very expensive (well what dell machine isn't) and lacks crucial things in it to make it worth the money

perhaps a bios update will fix some of the performance and upgradability issues, but i wouldn't count on it

Do remember though, they are using a chip that hasn't been released to the public yet

 

I read in the Dell blog that overclocking is allowed via nTune. Granted, Dell could have shipped it overclocked but still... this ought to work alrite.

# # #
http://www.direct2dell.com/one2one/archive/2006/07/20/643.aspx

"10. Can I overclock the processor on the XPS 700?

Yes, you can. The XPS700 system is overclockable via applications like the nTune application. Specifically, Dell allows users to performance optimize various key parameters such as: Front side bus speed (results in reported increase in CPU speed without changing the multiplier); system memory timing and voltage; PCI Express bus speed; graphics processor speed (when used with nVidia graphics cards); and graphics memory speed (when used with nVidia graphics cards)."

 

Hi Fireant, welcome to the forums.

Thanks for the heads up, but I think that it is a great shame that Dell doesn't SHIP the XPS 700 with overclocking software included. There are programmes like ClockGen out there that do the job just as well as nTune (on the frequency adjustment front), so I think that Dell's idea of overclocking is a little jaded. I think they're getting there slowly though. Maybe the next major XPS rehash will come with an overclockable BIOS - we can wait, I guess.

 

Dell shouldn't care to be honest. Just say it voids the hell out of the warranty, and let people do what they want. If they break something, they got to come back to you for parts anyway...

 

that case and cooling is hawt... but they skimped. they will always be dell.

 

To be honest I dont find a single thing about it attractive, cheap parts and a name as bad as dell. I wouldnt have reccomended it.

 

ya'll made it onto engadget.com with this one!!

 

Maybe we... could ehh I know it's not a place to ask for porn, but get higher res images of that XPS 700?


On 1280x1024 the image thumbnails look pretty small, and for those with higher res I imagine it's even worse.

 

A question out of curiosity...

The review says that you can't change the color of the front from Windows. Did you guys wipe the drive right away or did you use it with all the preinstalled Dell software?

I ask because the XPS notebook has a utility to change the color of the LED's in Windows and it seems like it would be a step backwards for them not to include a similar utility for the Desktop. I believe a similar utility was also included in the last XPS desktop (the large silver one).

 

The OS was left intact, although we had to remove McAfee to get the games running without issue.

 

Looks like the XPS 700 will be available with ATI as well, according to this.

 

Most of the range of Dells are quite inexpensive, actually. If you're buying an XPS expect to pay through the nose for the highest end and latest equipment that has all the usual bugs until it's refined.