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Thoughts on 700m new bios A02

post #1 of 45
2/7/05 at 11:56pm
Thread Starter 
any thoughts?
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post #2 of 45
2/8/05 at 12:22am
Thread Starter 
well, for all of you who wanted to see time rather than percentage remaining, bios A02 allows both the windows xp to show time remaining (hours) and if you are using speedswitch, time remaining function now works as well (minutes remaining). on my 8 cell it looks like the time remaining is about 5 hours with wifi on and display full power.

my wife's 700m had standby/hibernate problem, so we'll see if this new bios fixes it..as it is supposed to resolve that problem. it also is supposed to resolve bios password issue, but i didn't have that problem.

i flashed through windows without any problems.

also supposed to have added support for intel CPU, don't know if it does anything yet..
dell also posted a driver reset tool file to analyze if you have bad drivers

also new synaptics driver which i haven't loaded yet so don't know what it does

and finally updated intel integrated graphics driver..

i'm hoping that from what it sounds like, this bios version may improve battery performance...i
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post #3 of 45
2/8/05 at 12:51am
I'll wait for the more brave to play around with this new bios...I hope it improves battery performance but I highly doubt it...only way to find out is to have feedback so those of us who are more tech savvy please have fun with this update and let us all know the results...off to update my intel gpu driver...
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post #4 of 45
2/8/05 at 12:52am
I couldn't get the dos-based version to flash. Kept telling me it couldn't load in with memory drivers like 'himem.sys' present. I was booting from a raw dos image with no autoexec or config.sys file, so I don't know what that's about.

The battery time thing is working for me, too. Definitely more optimistic than what I've experienced. I don't know if they've improved battery life, or if it just takes a few cycles for the timer to get in sync with reality.
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post #5 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:02am
Is the video driver worth being upgraded? The driver listed on the Dell website says version 6.14.10.3889 whereas the latest available driver on the Intel website is 6.14.10.3943

I had no problem flashing my BIOS using the Windows installer and the "battery time remaining" seems to be working (2 hr 30 min left on my fully charged 4-cell battery).
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post #6 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:04am
Thread Starter 
i ran the flash through windows..tried it in safe mode first, but got the same error as you did running in dos-based. anyways, i didn't have any problems flashing through window...

don't know how handy the time feature is, since i'm use to percentage.
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post #7 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:04am
[quote=drsky]Is the video driver worth being upgraded? The driver listed on the Dell website says version 6.14.10.3889 whereas the latest available driver on the Intel website is 6.14.10.3943

QUOTE]

where do you find out which version is installed?
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post #8 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:09am
Thread Starter 
[quote=whoot]
Quote:
Originally Posted by drsky
Is the video driver worth being upgraded? The driver listed on the Dell website says version 6.14.10.3889 whereas the latest available driver on the Intel website is 6.14.10.3943

QUOTE]

where do you find out which version is installed?
don't use the intel based graphics driver...i've run into some problems with that one on my wife's 700m...plus, if you do windows update, it will show you need updated dell version. i think the dell version is written more specific to the 700m, whereas the inte version is generic, so don't go off of the build, b/c it's sort of comparing apples and oranges.

don't know what the updated graphics driver will do, but since the bios version is new, it may (i say MAY) have some better performance with it. also, whether you need it or not, the new graphics driver allows you to rotate the screen display (for whatever reason you'd want to do that, well if you have external monitor it would be nice)....haven't used s-video feature, but people were having problems, so it may resolve that...it looks like the new driver has a different output function as well.
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post #9 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:12am
Thread Starter 
if you right click the desktop and go into properties and select setting and graphics driver you can get the build number. or just right click the desktop, select graphics options, and graphics properties
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post #10 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:13am
[quote=whoot]
Quote:
Originally Posted by drsky
Is the video driver worth being upgraded? The driver listed on the Dell website says version 6.14.10.3889 whereas the latest available driver on the Intel website is 6.14.10.3943

QUOTE]

where do you find out which version is installed?
To check the version currently on your computer:
go in the display properties >> settings >> advanced >> adapter >> properties >> driver
You can see the driver version in that window.
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post #11 of 45
2/8/05 at 1:16am
I never had any problem with the Intel driver. On the contrary, I actually had less issue using the S-video out as compared to when I had the original Dell driver.
Anyway, if you guys notice any improvement with the new Dell driver, keep me posted
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post #12 of 45
2/8/05 at 2:02am
I just flashed the BIOS in Windows (no floppy drive!) and updated both the touchpad and video drivers. So far, so good. SpeedswitchXP now displays the time remaining (in minutes) when the laptop is running on DC. I'd like it to display the time (in hh:mm) at all times, but I'll take what I can get. I also tried installing Quickset again, but the installer still says that the program is incompatible with my system.

Baby steps...
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post #13 of 45
2/8/05 at 2:12am
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by meljs123
I just flashed the BIOS in Windows (no floppy drive!) and updated both the touchpad and video drivers. So far, so good. SpeedswitchXP now displays the time remaining (in minutes) when the laptop is running on DC. I'd like it to display the time (in hh:mm) at all times, but I'll take what I can get. I also tried installing Quickset again, but the installer still says that the program is incompatible with my system.

Baby steps...
if you enable windows power meter icon in sys tray, it gives you hours and minutes in the balloon..better than nothing.
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post #14 of 45
2/8/05 at 2:16am
Oh Wow. someone please try it and let us know your results. I would love for the battery to display time remaining and not percentage. I've been so jealous at my friends 8600 because of this.


EDIT: Just did the windows flash update, peice of cake. got my remaining time showing and i couldn't be happier.
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post #15 of 45
2/8/05 at 2:29am
I tried the "new" synaptics driver. It actually looks like it was released by synaptics back in May 2004. Anyway, the driver had this annoying behavior when scrolling. Even if you disabled coasting, it would still coast when you lifted your finger off the pad. It seems a little better with the new driver, but it still coasts ocassionally even with coasting disabled.

Am I the only one who finds this annoying?
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post #16 of 45
2/8/05 at 2:56am
Hey, anyone know how accurate the time remaining feature is? My Batt is at 80% and it says 4hrs remaining. Doesn't make a difference whether the screen is dim or bright.
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post #17 of 45
2/8/05 at 3:03am
Quote:
Originally Posted by poolek
I couldn't get the dos-based version to flash. Kept telling me it couldn't load in with memory drivers like 'himem.sys' present. I was booting from a raw dos image with no autoexec or config.sys file, so I don't know what that's about.

The battery time thing is working for me, too. Definitely more optimistic than what I've experienced. I don't know if they've improved battery life, or if it just takes a few cycles for the timer to get in sync with reality.
Maybe the DOS flash does not work due to insufficient conventional memory. The memory that resides in the 640 boundry. You could try this and I bet it would work.

Format your floppy disk with system files to make it bootable. Create a config.sys file and open it up. Put in these lines

device=himem.sys
DOS=high,umb

save the file to the floppy and then copy the himem.sys file to the floppy, and then boot off the disk. This will give you quite a bit more conventional memory.

You will have to get the himem.sys file from the same version of windows that you created the bootable floppy from. I think that is the case. It has been ages since I have dealt with DOS memory management. You can get around this issue by using the setver command in the config.sys file.

Geez, that stirs up some old command line memories. Those were the good old days!!!
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post #18 of 45
2/8/05 at 9:43am
Quote:
Originally Posted by poolek
I couldn't get the dos-based version to flash. Kept telling me it couldn't load in with memory drivers like 'himem.sys' present. I was booting from a raw dos image with no autoexec or config.sys file, so I don't know what that's about.
http://www.images.lunarpages.com/uxg...s/700m_A02.zip

Dell Floppy-based 700m_A02 BIOS flash repackaged to run from bootable CD. Used to flash my 700m up to A02...worked just like it was meant to...from DOS!

BTW: I will always go out of my way to flash desktop/notebook BIOS flashes outside of windows in DOS when I can!
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post #19 of 45
2/8/05 at 12:25pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by dellbert
I tried the "new" synaptics driver. It actually looks like it was released by synaptics back in May 2004. Anyway, the driver had this annoying behavior when scrolling. Even if you disabled coasting, it would still coast when you lifted your finger off the pad. It seems a little better with the new driver, but it still coasts ocassionally even with coasting disabled.

Am I the only one who finds this annoying?
#1 Thanks for the tips on how to find my video driver version to everyone who posted about that
#2 I get this coasting too and it really bugs me. I too have disabled coasting in the synaptics configuration.
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post #20 of 45
2/8/05 at 12:51pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Bmr4life
Hey, anyone know how accurate the time remaining feature is? My Batt is at 80% and it says 4hrs remaining. Doesn't make a difference whether the screen is dim or bright.
I got an offset of about 30minutes from initial time left to actual battery time...so at the start, i registered 5 hours, but actually ended up with about 4 1/2 hours.
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