No hot undocking
Technology, Work September 6th, 2005
Aaron surprised me this weekend by telling me his Dell Latitude D610 laptop, which is pretty identical to my D600 laptop, supports hot undocking. He can press the undock button and disconnect without having to put the laptop in standby mode. He and I are pretty mobile with our laptops, but use them as desktop/docked machines. I like the idea of not having to sleep the laptop and wake it back up, log back in each time I leave the desk.
So I found this flyer on Undock and Go which states it’s on all the newer laptops. Daaaamn. That’s a feature I want, and my laptop isn’t that old!
I tried a BIOS update, and a few more seemingly obvious updates for my D600 to have this functionality, but each time I press the undock button, it goes to standby. I hope that this would be a software feature, but maybe it is tied to the hardware/motherboard. I opened a case with Dell’s online support (echat) but I think I’ll take it to email.
Anyone have any ideas/pointers on where I can adjust the Undocking button features in Windows? (Assuming the BIOS and chipsets are set.)
[ Edit: After talking to Dell through their web chat, email, and phone support, it was as I feared. A chipset change between D600 and D610 allows for hot undocking -- this isn't something I can enable via BIOS or driver updates. The best I can hope for is that TSG orders a D610 and I upgrade. Until then, I'm stuck in standby -- literally. ]
[ Edit 9/14/05: Turns out Dell was wrong! While mucking around in the BIOS today for another reason, I found a toggle that controls if undocking goes to standby or keeps the system live. I set that to keep the system live, and now I'm able to undock and go as I had hoped. Yay for the features, but boo to the *three* Dell technicians who didn't know about the BIOS feature, or tell me to look there. Granted, I should have thought to look there too, but that's what you call support for. At this point, I'm just happy it does what I want. ]
About
I have the Latitude D410, I can press the undock button and go as well. It’s fabulous!
I would also recommend taking the support request to email. Eric and his staff have had better luck going that route in the past, I believe.
I’ll ask my cubbymate as there are 22 D600’s in our userpool right now. I’m not sure many of them have the port replicator though as they are in the field.
Mel, it is not nice to flaunt your fancy features in front of me. That’s bad helpdesk karma, and you know it!
I’ve taken it to email, since the chat/upgrades yesterday didn’t do much. One niggling point — typing in my service tag and info on the Dell page showed my laptop was shipped 1/15/05. The Undock and Go flyer linked above talks about this being standard on laptops shipped after 1/19/05. If those four days burn me, I’m going to make heads roll.
You are correct – my bad. I hope you don’t get boned by Dell… that’s not even cool if it’s a difference 4 days shipping.
How many times do I have to say this…go Thinkpad.
Supported on my T42 and also on my older R30 that was stolen. Tell Chuck you want to upgrade.
the university can get special pricing through cdw-g on thinkpads if you seriously want to talk to chuck.
Mussulma,
I am in the same boat as you with a d600 & some of my workmates have d610’s. How exactly did you manage to change the BIOS? I went into the bios afte hitting F2, and did not find anything I could toggle.
You’ll probably have to upgrade the BIOS to the latest version. The one I was running was several revisions behind. After the upgrade, the
option was in one of the BIOS menus (I don’t remember which.)
See if this helps its from the Dell site
To change the Undocking Method setting in the BIOS to Warm Undock, perform the following steps:
Reboot the computer.
Press the key at the Dell Logo screen.
Once the BIOS screen loads, press and hold the key while pressing to toggle to page 6 of the BIOS.
Press the key to highlight the Undocking Method setting.
Press the key to toggle the setting to Warm Undock.
Press the key to save and exit the BIOS.
I want the opposite – I want my Dell Latitude D820 to automatically go into Standby mode when I undock it. Yesterday I undocked without putting the maching into Standby first, put the machine in my backpack, went home, and then opened it up and it was still running full speed. It was hotter then hell and the fans were blowing hard. I was worried I had fried something, but all appears well today. I’ll look in the BIOS for the setting and see if I can disable warm undocking as the “warm” thing is too literal for me and my forgetful self.
I am having problem with my dell latitude D820 and i need someone to help me and and solve the problem.The problem is each time i tried to load my system it do tell me me i need to undock or redock or connect the ac adaptor to load and whenever i connect the ac adapter it load automatically.But i can load it without connecting the ac adapter.Please i need a possible best solution on for this.You can contact for the solution on zest502@yahoo.co.uk.Thanks