Dell Precision m4400 - latency problem - already read all proposed solutions

Nobody has any clues given this behaviour?

 

I did have the exact same issues, updated to IMSM 8.8 and still noticed some few cracklings when starting Windows Vista and sometimes during playback. But I returned my old model as I found an even better specificated one on the outlet with a huge price-discount of over 50% (allowing me to ignore any build issues of this kind).

As I needed to reinstall it my recovery-partition was partly missing and I needed to manually install Vista and it's drivers. Well that said using the old drivers (IMSM 8.2.2.x.) every problems were gone even without disabling such things like eSata, USB, disataching my DVD-Drive or switching off WLAN and Bluetooth.

What you could try if this doesn't help you software wise:
1. Remove the DVD-Drive
2. Check if that helps
3. If it doesn't replace the WLAN-Card.
4. Check if that helps
5. If that doesn't last but not least get an PCIMIA- or USB-Soundcard and be free of any kind of this problems!

 

Unfortunately, nothing of the above helps in my setup. My m4400 (just two months old) frequently cracks while playing music. The tool "dpclat" occasionally measures very high latency peaks. I am not a newbie, it is my 15 or 16th system (and I have been into computer tech privately and professionally for 25 years), and I have tried all tricks on it to make it work - with no success. I think the m4400 has a basic hardware design problem that won't go away. Sad, Dell quality seems to worsen with each year

 

I know that you have probably tried this, but I was having some performance lags. I haven't used a software 2 check or measure latency, but I was having a lot of trouble with my wireless network in my house and just by accident noticed the "Dell Wireless Application" was continuosly running trying to do something. I uninstalled it and used Windows to manage my connection and found a "Broadcom" driver which made a substantial difference in my performance. This applied to both Vista and Windows 7 for me. This probably isn't all of your problems, but it may help some.

 

Try the new AHCI drivers. It's called Intel Rapid Storage Technology instead of Intel Matrix Storage Manager now.
I don't have any latency issues and i'm doing lots of Cubase 4 with loads of audio streaming from my external eSATA drive and pluigns running so i'd definetly notice.

following config:
-SATA operation to AHCI in BIOS
-Running AHCI driver 9.6
-NO Dell control point stuff except for system manager
-When doing audio i switch to Pro Audio / Video power settings which disables Aero and shortens latency
-All the latest drivers from Dell, also GPU, not from nVidia
-Use powermizer switch to switch it off completly

that's about it i think, no need to disable wireless, LAN or even the DVD drive.

 

Yes, definitely should you install the 9.6 AHCI driver. I just did, and (almost) all of my red dpc latency spikes disappeared. I took mine from the Dell web site, whether XP or W7, it's the same package. Seems like a *big* improvement...

Thansk for the tip, LPTP.

 

Hey guys, are you completely free of yellow and red bars? I installed the Intel rapid storage drivers however I still get a yellow bar every 10 sec and red spikes sporadically.

 

All gone here....with all the latest drivers en powermizer completely switched off using NvGPU pro all is between 100-600