Dell XPS 420
I finally decided to buy a Dell XPS 420 desktop computer this weekend. Dell is running a great deal for Mother’s Day; $350 off XPS 420 systems. I’m not a mother, but who cares right? I can get the configuration that I want cheaper than I can get with my Employee Purchase Program discount mainly because I don’t have to take the 3 year warranty on the Mother’s Day deal.
This system is configured with the ATI TV Wonder Digital Cable Tuner. I really want to start recording digital/HD TV content including Premium stations with Windows Vista Media Center. With my current system I’m only able to record the analog stations and the quality leaves a lot to be desired on a 46″ LCD HD TV.
I went down to Charter Cable yesterday to talk to them about Cable Cards. They were not very helpful. Both the woman at the front counter and the technician that I eventually talked to really couldn’t answer my questions. The reason is that they haven’t hooked up that many cable cards in PCs before. They did say that I would be able to get the digital/HD and premium stations. But, I could have a problem with voltage feedback into the cable lines. After further questioning this could be an issue with any TV tuner card hooked up with a coax to the cable company.
Here’s my configuration:
- Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Processor Q9300 (6MB Cache,2.50GHz,1333FSB)
- Genuine Windows Vista® Home Premium with Digital Cable Support
- 4GB Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM at 800MHz – 4 DIMMs
- Dell USB Enhanced Multimedia Keyboard
- 22 inch E228WFP Widescreen Digital Flat Panel
- Radeon ATI HD 2600 XT 256MB
- 750GB – 7200RPM, SATA 3.0Gb/s, 16MB Cache
- Dell Media Card Reader included in Dell Bluetooth Package
- Dell Optical USB Mouse
- Blu-ray Disc Combo (DVD+/-RW + BD-ROM)
- Integrated Sound Blaster®Audigy™ HD Software Edition
- Dell 19 in 1 Media Reader with Bluetooth
- 1Yr In-Home Service, Parts + Labor,24×7 Phone Support
- Single ATITV Wonder™Digital Cable Tuner with Remote
- McAfee SecurityCenter with anti-virus, anti-spyware, firewall, 24-months
- Adobe® Acrobat® Reader 8.1
- Included 3 GB DataSafe Online Backup for 1Yr
- No speakers (Speakers are required to hear audio from your system)
- No Productivity software pre-installed
- No Modem Requested
I have the same configuration. Charter was at my house for hours. Was on the phone with Dell for hours. Could not make it work.
The issue is Media Center could see the tuners until I put the cablecards in & then they just disappeared in the software.
Did you have any luck?
Ed
Ed
May 22, 2008 at 11:10 am
I haven’t gotten the PC yet. It’s scheduled to arrive this Friday, but the tuner won’t be in until sometime next week. I’ll post about my luck with Charter and the tuner.
Drew
May 22, 2008 at 2:44 pm
Charter is coming to the house tomorrow. I have a Dell tier 2 tech lined up at the same time. Better work or I am RMAing it. If I learn any tricks or what the problem was, I will share, to save you some pain.
Ed
Ed
May 23, 2008 at 6:52 am
I got my XPS420 in on Friday, but haven’t had much time to mess with it yet. Still don’t have the cable tuner. So, not much to report yet.
Ed… How did it go with Charter yesterday?
Drew
May 25, 2008 at 8:19 am
Did you try updating the firmware?
http://ati.amd.com/support/drivers/vista32/ocur-vista32.html
Drew
May 28, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Did you guys ever have any luck with this? I am looking at this configuration and have charter as well.
Erik
August 6, 2008 at 9:56 am
Yes,we finally got it to work. In my area Charter hadn’t done very many of them, but they kept at it until they figured it out. They need to get the experts involved when they are doing these cable cards. The issue was on their end in the provisioning of the cable card in their system. Works great now!
Drew
August 7, 2008 at 8:10 am
do anyone know how to run java or jdk in dell xps 420? thanks! or it would not work al all!
lee
September 12, 2008 at 7:30 pm