Precision M4600 - Dual Core - 4 DIMM RAM???

So I am trying to upgrade to a quad core. my machine shipped with a duo core.

I contacted the tech support and they are saying that there are two types of motherboards. And that my motherboard might not take the quad core processor.

On the site, it says that the chipset is only QM67. According to intel, that chipset supports all type of sandy bridge from i3 to i7.

Has anyone upgraded their duo core (shipped with) into the quad core (aftermarket)?? I also need to know if all 4 dimms of ram would be supported.

Thanks

 

The M4600 should only come in one motherboard flavor. If you check your unit and see you got 4 RAM Slots in your laptop, then it is safe to say that your motherboard is universal for all M4600 configurations. Therefore, you should be easily able to upgrade to a quad core and also utilize that extra 2 DIMM Slots on the motherboard.

 

yes the physical slots are there and i just had to remove the plastic piece that was in place of the empty slot.

i tried to put my ram under the keyboard slot and did not even boot. I guess i need the quad core to do that.

Well the tech support said in their dispatch system there is really two different options: for duo core and quad core. I guess that is just more of a company bureaucracy than actual part difference.

Anyone actually have any experiences with ES quad cores from ebay? anyone swapped duo with quad?

 

They did that for the Mx500 series but as for the current series, no they haven't. I know this because I had a M6600 that was a dual-core for a while and that too had 4 DIMM slots on its motherboard.

 

How is the CPU heatpipe on your particular unit? Is it dual pipe and can handle a quad? The M6600s come standard with that pipe.

 

i am going to check. will m4600 have different heat sink and fan for the duos and quads?

 

If you put RAM under the keyboard with a dual core - it will not even post. Once you have a quad core installed, it will see all 4 slots.

On the M6600 there is only 1 motherboard. This was a change from the M6500 that had at least 2 motherboards.

I think I remember reading that the M4600 only has one motherboard now as well.

I took a lot of pictures when I upgraded the CPU. I just have not gotten around to posting them.

Also, the heat pipes in the M6600 are exactly the same on dual and quad core machines. They are also massively over specced.

 

Are you overclocking the GPU when you do this testing? Is the battery fully charged? What power mode are you running? Is the M4600 on a hard flat surface? I am going to try and repeat what you are seeing.

 

1) GPU is overclocked when running both furmark+prime95. Only when gpu is overclocked it seems to throttle so easily
2) Battery is fully charged and running on ULTRA settings with max fan level
3) Standard desk surface. but there really isnt heat issue. Besides, when it throttles, the heat of the cpu goes down quite a lot and therefore should not result in cycles of throttling. This is the reason why I think it is more of a power issue.

I havent tried what is the maximum gpu overclock that it can tolerate without throttling, but still, my cpu is a duo core... There seems to be some fundamental power problem or a bios update is needed.

Please try on your laptop if you are willing. Hope to figure this out soon. Thanks!

 

Thank you for the information. I guess dell would overall reduce the cost that way. But without having had anyone in the forum actually swapping, there would be considerable amount of risk...

so the FAN is essentially the same for the 35w processors and 55w extreme processors?