Has anyone taken delivery of the New Studio XPS 435/8000/9000?

In terms of any potential buyers remorse I suppose this depends on what your expectations are. In my case a mini-tower PC, which the 435MT is, suits my needs because I only wanted to add one additional internal HDD to support RAID 0 & double the mass-storage with. There is also room for another internal optical drive, which is nice for the BD option. Although w/HDCP content restrictions I'm not sure what resolution is supported by the ATI Radeon 3450 graphics card.

From a bottom line perspective the Dell Studio XPS 435MT is the best value being offered by the main OEM PC equipment manufacturers: Dell, HP, Gateway, etc.

I got an i7-920 2.66 GHz PC with 6 GB of RAM delivered to my doorstep for $1024, which includes NYS sales tax. There is no way an individual can build an equivalent platform @ this price.

Optnes,

Well put, as far as buyer remorse, I'm speaking of the bigger power supply, larger area in the new case and sleek new design . I'm not sure if the new design has more potential for expansion than the MT. I would bet in may run a tad cooler given the extra area for air circulation.

I agree with you on the value of this machine. The Studio XPS 435 is definately the most bang for the buck in my opinion!

FedEx says mine is in NC and should be here on 3/14.

Far as the weight, I believe the 55lbs is for shipping insurance purposes.

The extra $200 for the 435T over the 435MT gets you:

15-1 reader included

Max 24GB ram instead of 12GB

Max 4.5TB HD vs 1.2TB

1 extra 1x PCI Slot

1 8x PCI-E Slot

Full Tower Case in place of Mid

475W PSU in place of 360W PSU

(Above is based on what Dell has posted about the 2 systems)

IMO $200 is quite a bit to pay for those upgrade, so cannot compete with the 435MT as far as best bang for the buck.

But if you want to get a i7 with a 4870 card that is under warranty and compare this instead to the high end XPS systems, this thing is a steal.

Big draw backs:

second PCI-E slot is x8 not x16

No overclocking

I don't have remorse about either of those drawbacks at this time, but the overclocking one will catch up with me eventually.  See what else I have to be remorseful about when it gets here :)

Reese,

Can't wait for your review!

I know what you mean about overclocking. I'm running at 4ghz water cooled on a Pent4 Prescott system built by me.

Also don't forget the new 435T has an audio upgrade option that the MT didn't have.

jjon90,

The thermal management issue is one of the major drawbacks that has prevented me from building a high-end PC. While the 435MT is a very powerful box, its footprint (case size) does not lend itself towards supporting a bigger power supply, high-end graphics card or over-clocking the processor...

heat, heat, heat = instability

This is not a "gaming" PC, although I'm not a gamer I have a PS3; which I recommend to anyone in the market for a gaming console/Blu ray disc player.

About the most demanding task I use my 435MT for is to convert old family Video 8 movies to DVD. Vista w/SP1 will capture Video 8, convert it to AVI format and convert that to MPEG-2 for encoding to DVD.

On my previous PC (an HP m7350n) the AVI --> MPEG conversion process utilized all of the desktop's resources but the 435MT is not stressed at all.

just got the e-mail today  mine has shipped.

OK, there has got to be more than six of us who ordered the new 435T. Please feel free to post your configuration.

mine is:

Ugh! Everyone elses is shipping.....mine is still 'In Production'  not fair! (j/k!) :emotion-7:

Ordered 3/1 --- Est. Shipping date 3/31

I got pretty barebones cept for the V-card upgrade.  By the way, I GOT IT!  Just got here an hour ago.  Going to take me a while to redo my office for this so might not be back with any more info till tomorrow.

My Components

eh - now I'm getting jealous.. :)

Mine is pretty "bare bones" as well (i.e. base configuration with only slight HD upgrade and middle video card upgrade.

Did add a new monitor / speakers in the mix - so I'm thinking that's probably what's causing the delay..

Ah well - hopefully it'll ship in the next few days.  System still states an expected ship date of 3/23

Angikay,

I feel your pain!

By the way I would like to thank you for the 1-800 number you posted in another thread. I was able to cancel my misconfigured system WITHOUT any hassle.

Thanks again!:emotion-2:

Reese,

Congrats! Take your time and enjoy it a little B4 you comment!

For anyone who wishes to upgrade their memory check this out.

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/products/Memory_Upgrades/productdetail.aspx?c=us&l=en&s=bsd&cs=04&sku=A2507433

If this is the same as the build memory, it is actually less expensive to buy and upgrade yourself.

$218 and some change for 12gb tri channel which was a $400 upgrade in the configure process.

Those of us who ordered Raid 0 configurations must keep in mind that if a drive fails all data is lost!

I personally like Acronis True Image Home for a drive image B/U preference.

Here is a reviewer's blurb from a review of Norton ghost vs True image,

While each program has certain unique features, the core functionality of both programs is essentially equal.  However, True Image’s overall functionality, reliability and UI are more robust and more understandable than Symantec Norton Ghost versions 9 or 10.  Most importantly, in my experience, Symantec’s Ghost versions 9 & 10 have proven to be unreliable and my experience with Ghost (really, all of Symantec) technical support has consistently been dreadful.  I would still choose Acronis True Image over Ghost on functionality and presentation alone; however, on quality of support alone, I cannot and will not recommend any Symantec program. 

Furthermore, Symantec has a long & sordid history of acquiring products or complete companies and then discontinuing the products.  I would not be surprised if Ghost were treated similarly in the not-distant future.  Partition Magic, which they also acquired from PowerQuest a couple of years back in release 8 has yet to be updated by Symantec.  The fact that Symantec tech support/development has been unable to isolate the regular random corruption problems I have been experiencing across two releases of the product does not bode well for the future of the Ghost product, in my mind.

I have removed Symantec Ghost from my system.  My recommendation and personal choice going forward for a disk-imaging program is Acronis True Image.

Any thoughts?