Thursday 1 November 2007

Firefox Screen Real-Estate

Save screen space by auto-hiding the Bookmark toolbar in Firefox - thanks Lifehacker.

WooHoo Dell XPS 710


Looky what the postman bringeth - course I did order it and I still have to pay for it sometime.

I got home to find the usual enormous Dell box, but was rather shocked to find that there was very little packing and it was mostly full of an truly enormous aluminum XPS case. When it comes time to de-commission maybe I'll convert it to a kennel for Fido.

As usual I trawled Dell Outlet and yes - this is the 710 model that has very recently been superseded by the 720. But its Quad Core and 4Gb and when it boots it growls and then quietens down to a slight purr. The dual drives have been striped with an Nvidia Raid card - not sure if I want stripes (or how I'll roll it back if I decide I don't).

After sitting through the Vista set up it was too late to play with it much - but I had to boot it as the badge said Core Duo and I wanted to check the CPU spec. I can see the Vista learning curve is going to be frustrating.

In other pictures it is often shown with a garish red fascia - this is the effect of four LEDs mounted under the front cowling which thankfully can be turned off (or colour changed) from the Bios. A bit bling but it will impress the neighbours should they stroll round, or the kids friends. It even has a light at the back to illume the connectors.