Dell XPS 13 2015 Broadwell Infinity Display Owners Thread

And what about the charging? Is the FAN quiet while charging?

My laptop is still at the office, can only check it tomorrow, so need to inform myself, so I don't do anything wrong

Also, do I need to update to A01 first, before doing A02 update?

 

no, you can go from A00 straight to A02.

 

Silent or just barely audible, depends on your CPU utilization. Temps are up though.

 

Hi all, I am planning to change my one-week new Macbook Air 13" for this Xps 13" as I prefer Windows. I would choose the FHD version with i5, 8GB Ram and 256 SSD. But I have been reading the latest 10 pages of this thread and it seems it is crap! Fan issues, touchpad issues, standby issues. Is it really that bad?

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Compared to Apple, every single PC has a crap touchpad. That said, Dell's precision touchpad is the best-in-class. There are no standby issues. The fan was loud (on certain CPU/screen combinations) but it's been addressed in the latest BIOS update. Battery life is far from what Dell advertises, unless you underpower your CPU, dim the screen and use Chrome or any other CPU-intensive applications. Some did have build defects but Dell is quick to send a replacement.

To sum up, the only 2 real problems are as follows:

1) Light leakage in the bottom left/right screen corners
2) Battery life is not as advertised

There's also an adaptive brightness control issue and while I haven't experienced it, this is something that Dell can fix by pushing a BIOS/driver update.

 

Thank you for your reply.
I have read dozen of reviews. What I got is that Qhd models make 6-8 hours and FHD 9-11 hours in a web browsing and office scenario. That would be ok for me. Does it match with reality?

Touchpad was reported to be "laggy". I have read that is one of the best tp on windows. I found myself ok with old Asus trackpad. Is it possible to set tap with two fingers for right click?

Fan was reported to be noisy (maybe only on i7 qhd?) and somebody here tells that bios update won't fix.

Standby: sure no sleep of death and unexpected battery drains?

In general, 1149 euros is not a few money. I have a good piece of portable computer and would change only to have a more compact and Windows based PC with no significant issues



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1. Yes
2. Touchpad lag was addressed in the firmware update. Yes, 2 fingers perform a right-click action.
3. A02 BIOS update fixed the fan noise issue
4. No battery drain during sleep (~2% every 8 hours is normal)/"sleep of death". Mind you, my experience is with a clean install of Windows 8.1 without any Dell software/drivers.

 

The A02 bios fixed any noise I had . However it seems to be stuck in silent mode and I am now reaching mid 90's and the fan never goes into high mode.

My CPU is not stuck at low values either, I reach 3000 on the i7 but yet the fan will not kick in high like in A01.

 

This is a screenshot after A02, at these temps fan was about half what it was before A02 and my temps never reached over 87 before.

It does not bother me much as I do not do a lot of high intense computing, but I would like the option that if I do? I can turn the fan on high and bring temps back under 90.

 

I had the sleep of death and standby issues and I followed up my post to report it was a 3rd party app, CoreTemp causing the problems all along. After removing that app I have not had a single problem with sleep or hibernate.

 

What about the content adaptive brightness issue?
Has this been solved?

 

You're right, I forgot to mention it. While I haven't experienced it, it's a software issue and can be fixed (while battery/light leakage can't).

 

What are your windows power settings ? I think you can specify to have more 'active' cooling (fan runs faster) or 'passive' cooling (cpu runs slower). Its not exactly what the dell power utility offers, but I think its close. (My opinion is that the dell utility is actually just a frontend for some parameters you could set in the windows power plan).

My CPU went up to the low 80c, but only when running a benchmark in turbo boost. I don't think that normal use (even some light gaming) will stress it as much. 75c should be fine for a cpu.

Question for others: do you know if the Intel xtu utility will support broadwell / this laptop ? I'd love to be able to undervolt the CPU.

 

I have active selected in profiles when plugged in so the fan should go full at high temps but this is not the case.
I don't think any game I run will push it to 95 like skydive benchmark does even on borderlands now I stay mid 80's.
Still for graphic users would be a nice option for full fan speed like a FN+key to enable disable?

 

FYI, this Content Adaptive Backlight Control issue has been reported to Dell way back in January and its already late March but Dell is ignoring the issue. I have service ticket about this on Dell tech support and is already a month old and no progress whatsoever until now. Its frustrating how Dell did not address this on the just released BIOS update.

 

I found something new about the content adaptive brightness/contrast issue. If you actually turn on the setting on your Advance Power Setting -> Display -> Enable Adaptive Brightness, the effect is less noticeable. It's still there but way less to point that it doesn't actually bother me that much anymore.

 

Hmm. I think I may hold off on flashing A02 for now. I don't think the fan has ever got loud enough to bother me yet, and I'd rather it be a little cooler if that's the tradeoff. Do we know what effect the Intel microcode update has?

It's refreshing to see these updates rolling out at a decent clip.

 

That's interesting. The Adaptive Brightness on Advanced Power Settings though senses the light surrounding the laptop rather than the display's content, which CABC does. But if it does lessen the annoyance then better than nothing I guess. Although I think whats reallly happening is that 2 sensors are fighting each other and might cause battery drain.

 

I feel the same. I had A02 downloaded and launched but I chose to abort. I don't notice my fan on A01, but I WOULD notice if my lap got more hot on A02. Right now I have no complaints so I'm going to let it ride.

 

Why would you assume the keyboard driver is the touchpad?

 

happy that a02 came out. will install when i get home. BTW, I noticed my i5/qhd is slightly slower than i5/FHD. Is this normal? boot time is slower. There are slight lags when opening IE/Chrome while it didnt on the FHD model.

 

I'd like to echo the comments of mrcasual. I use a lot of PCs for work and own use and am also a regular Mac user. The XPS 13 is by far my favourite laptop for use on the go. I have seen some degree of light leakage on every single QHD equipped XPS 13 I have seen and almost always with the same pattern (search on light leakage in this thread). I don't notice it in normal use but it is present if you look for it. I should also say that if this bothers you, this might be a reason to consider the FHD screen as it seems far less noticeable on the FHD XPS 13's I have seen.

In terms of the other issues reported, I only experienced one which is the trackpad delay with two finger scrolling which I seem to have adapted to. This is very similar behaviour to other Windows laptops I use. Given the accuracy of the trackpad I believe this could be fixed in software.

In short, I would buy the same laptop again without hesitation. If Dell can find a way to minimise or eliminate the light leakage and further improve the trackpad then this laptop would be as close to perfect as you could purchase today. The only hardware that I think compares is the MacBook Pro 13 but that is also heavier, larger and lacks a touchscreen (I won't get into OSes as each has pros and cons!).

 

I just wanted to chime in on my return experience.

I returned the laptop because of the adaptive brightness issue. I wasn't charged a restocking fee. It's likely because I contacted tech support to find a solution.

Anyway, after I confirmed I wanted to return the laptop, they emailed a return UPS slip. Dell warned me it could take up to 30 days to receive a refund. Dell uses ground shipping so it can take about 1 week for them to receive it if your in the U.S.

Dell sent me a confirmation email that they received the laptop and approximately 2-3 days after that email, I was refunded the full amount. I paid for the laptop via Paypal. The money is directly refunded to the debit/credit card tied to your Paypal account. So you don't have to worry about a Paypal balance to transfer.

The return experience was great. Since Dell couldn't resolve the issue, they offered me a partial refund of $120 to keep the laptop, but it wasn't worth the frustration.

Final note, I haven't found a replacement for the XPS yet. The truth is, I will buy another XPS if they get the brightness thing sorted out. Otherwise, I'll wait it out and see what comes out with Skylake.

 

Hi submachine, I should have said I guessed the P/S Keyboard was the touchpad, I am kind of new to this and would be very happy if you could tell me how the touchpad is listed in Device Manger

 

I think its under Human Input Devices

 

Hey guys. Also switching out my 2011 Mbook Pro for a Dell XPS 13. What I'm wondering is about the battery and it's charge cycles. How does it stand up to this years Macbook Pro edition?

 

Close, but no cigar

 

Well, the old XPS 13 had 300 charge cycles whilst Macbook is on 800. Is this years XPS any closer to that?

 

Sorry don't know I'm on 3 cycles now. But you can replace the battery on the xps

 

Oh, right.. but that isn't free, unfortunately If this gets anywhere close in longetivity I'm getting it

 

Just to confirm, no one hears any weird noises from their system? Like during cold boot, no short, high pitch squeals, or scratching noises. Or when the display goes to sleep (laptop still on) there's no high pitch squeal? Very faint so the room has to be very quiet.

Just working through an exchange for this issue + bezel defects and wanting to know if I'm likely to get this again. (so far one other person has reported this that I've seen)

 

I have scratching sounds from the fan when i tilt my laptop. There a burst of high rpm fan sound when i restart after trying to turn off the fan just from chrome browsing. Hopefully A02 will fix this issue. BTW, do you get like 1 sec lag when opening any browsers?

Mine QHD replacement is noticeably slower than the FHD model. Slower boot time by 3-4 seconds. Kinda pisses me off knowing that my original laptop i sent was faster. Also, i get lags from keyboard strokes. any idea how to fix this issue?

 

My scratching noises aren't from the fan, they're from what I assume to be poorly isolated inductors in the power supply circuits. The scratching changes with CPU load, and especially GPU load.

 

i

Static like sound? I haven't noticed it too much because it hard to hear unless i put my ears next to the computer because my fan is so loud. I'm going to have to check that when i get home.

 

Negative on this end. Just humming and whirring during heavy loads.

 

That's correct. The fan on my unit only ever comes on in benchmarks so it's a bit audible. I can kinda live with that though, it's mainly the high pitch noise when the screen is black that gets me.

 

I just checked. I do get static sounds but its not that noticeable. I installed A02 just now and my laptop still sounds like vacuum. Tmr is my last day for refund. Should i just stick with this n try to have the tech fix it? or just return it. I'm already on my replacement laptop which gave me the same problem as the first one.......

 

Anyone notice that with the newest bios update, Intel smart connect technology now flashes a yellow triangle in the notification area? It says: Intel smart connect agent is not running.

 

I got this fixed by a Dell technician coming and replacing my fan.

 

Hi,

- both got running with same energy management (sorry don´t know word for, they´re running on same power-management like "performance" mode), both plugged in power adaptor ?
- may they contain a different kind of SSD (size/manufacturer)?
- same drivers & BIOS and updates on it?
- both on UEFI mode?
- both on AHCI mode (SSD´s) in BIOS?

Out of my perspective the FHD version should perform slightly over the QHD+ as they should have similar mainboard / chips / revisions and CPU.


Btw, i even shopped an i7/8GB/256/QHD+ and it will get delivered in 15th april here in germany .. long time to wait ^^

Question: anyone running a LINUX on this thing? I´m wanted in to put the windows off directly (full wipe) and jump into any kubuntu but not sure if there´s support for all the QHD+ and Touch stuff. If so, scaling works?

Regards,
aVa

 

It's not, there is no way to adjust the touchpad sensitivity or settings.

 

Just ordered my system: XPS 13 2015 FHD version with 8 GB Ram, 256 SSD + 2 year on site assistance + 2 year accidental damage protection. All for 1.298 euro. Expected delivery date 16th April (so a loooong time to wait!)

 

Anyone having issues with Intel Smart connect after the Bios update?
Can someone check if there is even a setting for this in the bios?

 

Thanks for the reply. I cant confirm that all are the same but the last two because i dont know what that is....

Can you care to explain UEFI mode and AHCI mode?

I didn't know you could change modes for SSD

I did manage to get my QHD screen faster by disabling mcafee scanner thing. Now my boot time is 3.6 sec. Before it was almost in the 7 sec.

 

did u get your motherboard replaced too?

 

Hopefully Dell will work through some of the issues reported in this and other threads in the coming months. It looks as though product QA is falling behind the demands of this new design. And perhaps there may be some design issues also.

It would be interesting to see a Skylake XPS 13. Wireless charging is one thing that I am looking forward to which it seems like Intel will be pushing manufacturers to adopt - just got to hope the Rezence standard becomes widely adopted. Multiple wireless 4K monitor support will also be nice - hopefully Windows 10 will be able to do something useful in terms of scaling!

Other than wireless charging the other thing I would love to see is a laptop with an OLED screen. My Blackberry Z30 is OLED and I love the true blacks!

 

Assuming you are comparing the QHD XPS 13 to the Broadwell MacBook Pro 13, I think the Mbook would be a winner and possibly by a fair margin - 2 or more hours? The Mbook Pro has a lot of battery in the shell (which is both heavier and larger) and Apple has always done a great job of teasing the best battery life out of their laptops. Note that this would only be true for OS X. Run Windows on a MacBook Pro and I think you will see most of those efficiencies disappear.

I actually think the Mbook Pro is a great computer if you can get what you want done with OS X. My experience with Apple build quality and QA has always been very good - better than most Windows manufacturers. Partly that comes from being in control of both the hardware and software platforms.

 

Aye. I might have been a bit vague.. What I meant was the charge cycles. So the total lifetime of the battery. A Macbook is around 800 total charges before it starts wearing down to about 80%.. I'm wondering if it's the same with the new XPS 13 which seems to have a better battery than the predecessor.. but I can't really find any info..

Can't afford to pay a hefty amount every year to exchange the battery.

 

Ah, gotcha! Afraid I can't offer anything other than anecdotal evidence, my own experience with a MacBook Air (the battery life was the biggest disappointment) but it is a couple of generations old. I'd be interested to see any statistical comparisons if you come across any.

 

You might wanna think about it a lil bit more cause the MacBook Pro 13 2015 is a different beast compared to the Dell XPS 13 2015. (but of course much more expensive!)

*74.9 watt hour battery --that's huge 44%more on the 52 watt hour on the Dell.

* 28 watt CPU vs the 15 watt CPU

* Iris 6100 graphics

The MBA 2015 specs competes more directly on the XPS 13 although in my opinion, the FHD XPS 13 destroys it almost completely, taking aside the touchpad since OS X drives touchpads much better than Windows.