Errius wrote on 2023-08-18, 16:12:Is there a list of all these machines somewhere? There are so many models, it's confusing. […]
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Is there a list of all these machines somewhere? There are so many models, it's confusing.
I think this order is correct:
Dimension XPS -> Dimension XPS P -> Dimension XPS M -> Dimension XPS R -> Dimension XPS T -> Dimension XPS B
What came before/after I don't know.
After the XPS T/B, they had the Dimension 4100. i815, socket 370, 2 slots PC133, the last machine using the traditional beige case. Then the later 4xxx/8xxx systems were all P4s in black cases. Started out with Willamettes and RDRAM, then tracked the general evolution of the P4 platform...
There was also a Dimension L - i810-based. Ewwww, the i810. I think that was a new lower-end category for Dell, I don't think they had any systems with onboard graphics before then, whereas Compaq/IBM/etc sold lots of junk home systems with no AGP and some lousy video chip (ATI Rage... what was it... on an "IBM"-nee-Acer 2137-E56, I'm looking at you) soldered to the board. The L was succeeded by the black Dimension 2xxx series, the 2400/3000 in particular with 2.4GHz Celerons seems to have been everywhere. (With some additional RAM, a great XP machine for, say, an elderly relative back in the day.)
I had an XPS T700r for over a decade; terrific machine (as I would say, my first 'good' Windows machine... and my first real Intel, the machine that made me an Intel CPU/chipset fanboy for life), and now that I have been lurking around here, I regret having e-wasted it a decade ago after I just ran out of uses for it (it had been my main desktop, then my dad's, then my secondary desktop running XP, then a server running Win2003, then... I just had no use for it in a world where I started to drown in LGA775 45nm C2Ds). Would have made a nice retro Win98 SE machine, but to be honest, the experience with 98 SE back in the day was so bad (you could barely make it through a day without running out of resources and needing to reboot...), the idea just didn't occur to me. My biggest regret was ordering it with 98 SE - I think I ended up reformatting and installing 2000 6 months later, and Win2000 was a breath of fresh air. Needed more RAM, but it could stay up for months without a reboot. I understand the appeal of 98 SE for retro gaming, but... for real world use on a good late 1990s system, boy was 98 SE a piece of trash. And it probably took at least two years for XP to match the stability/reliability of 2000... one of the greatest Windows versions ever.