Dell XPS 13 2015 Skylake Infinity Display Owners Thread

Thanks. I had tried that before with some slightly different instructions(save as .cmd, put in startup folder, etc.) but it didn't seem to work. Had to do two restarts but now everything's nice and crisp even when scaled up.

 

Sorry, I know I missed this, but I had yesterday the XPS 13 for the first time in my hands and loved it. One thing though was the screen. It was the FHD, and set at maximum brightness it was very dim for me. Can someone confirm the QHD is brighter (I believe I understood that from previous posts, but would like to confirm)?

Thanks.

 

I had the FHD screen. It was so dim that I had to return it to Dell for refund. It was definitely not usable. I have since seen one with the QHD screen and that was fine - I'd say "normal" brightness when I compared it to an Asus and Toshiba in the same store. I haven't yet seen another FHD one so don't know if mine was faulty. I think it was faulty otherwise more people with FHD screens would be complaining.

 

No with th new firmware the screen is much more bright by defautl the content brightness contrôle is working better and do not dim to screen as much as When a receive it! Now its no more a problem i Can barely see it!


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What firmware update, specifically? Thanks.

 

1.0.4


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Is this a BIOS update? Thanks.

 

Hey there,

did anyone try yet to play smaller games like world of warships etc on the XPS 13? I searched for the HD 520, but unfortunately most tests just said you can play it with mid range settings at 720p - i´m more interested in playing it with low settings in FHD - would this work on the XPS?

Cheers

 

Quick question: has Dell changedthe power port? My local Dell reports the Dell Power Companion is not compatible with this generation of XPS products. It looks impossible to me!

 

pretty amazing stuff;

for anyone interested, you can grab an older 9343 refurbished model on dell outlet for a hell of a price.
after the discount, $979 for a qhd, 256gb, 8gb ram, core i7.

i'd dive for it in a second if i wasn't out of the game for so long.
transitioning from a four-year old p150hm.

regarding the new model, have we answered any of the following:
-possible to replace the 128gb ssd on the qhd model with a the samsung 950 pro pcie 3.0 nvme ssd?
-has the onboard graphics stabilized with the most recent drivers?
-does either the w10 update or the synaptics fix provide a long-term solution?

i recall someone saying that it is unlikely that such a new product will get the benefit of a sales deal around the holiday,
but i'm holding out hope nonetheless. that is, unless someone tells me i'm completely naive for waiting.

 

This worked for me for the hdmi connection - works in all modes (duplicate, extend, etc)
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0116YDRZI?ref_=pe_823600_114105210

 

Yes the last one.


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There are hardly any computers out there with Skylake. You will see tons of deals for Broadwell computers to clear stock.

 

Wow, that is a heck of a deal. I am currently XPS13-less, ended up returning mine due to the display driver crashing and then dead pixels in the 2nd one, MS store was all out so I didn't exchange further. I would also jump on this in a second but after using the improved touch pad on the 9350 vs 9343 plus nvme possibilities I can't go back to the old model. Also don't like that the 9350 drivers are now gone from Dell's site, don't know what to make of that.

 

FWIW the 1080p screen on mine is plenty bright, even back on the 1.0.0 bios. I have upgraded to the 1.0.4 bios already though.

No graphics driver issues either.

By the way, did dell remove their drivers and bios from their site? I can't seem to find downloads anymore.

 

The drivers have been gone for several days now, I have no idea what's up with that!

 

Yeah they were, but they have been reposted again maybe 8 hours ago.

 

What continues to puzzle me is the mismatch between the app & driver versions on the Dell support site and what came preinstalled on the XPS 13 or has been installed by the Dell Update tool since.

Most of the ones on the site are lower versions than what's on my XPS, even though some show very recent dates, e.g. even the Dell Update Application itself is v1.7.1007.0 ("Last Updated: 18 Nov 2015") on the site, but v1.7.1015.0 is installed on my XPS. Others - like the Intel Graphics or Thunderbolt driver - are higher versions on the site but Dell Update didn't pick these up and instead I've had to update them manually.

It's quite confusing to me how Dell manages these things.

 

My 1080p display is really bright, especially at bright scenes when the CABC is turned off. It gets dark a little at dark scenes due to CABC (really stupid IMO. How would dimming a screen at dark scenes supposed to increase the "perceived" brightness?? Whoever invented CABC needs to die a slow death) but other than that its relatively bright.. if not the brightest out there.

As far as I know, only the new Samsung 12 inch laptop is the brightest at 700 nits. Contrary to what Notebookreview said, my 9350's display brightness is exactly the same as my previous 9343. What's different though seems to be the color calibration that comes default. Colors are very warm and seem more pronounced this time around with the 9350.

 

Just looked up the Samsung ATIV 9 you posted about, and this will be my new laptop rather than the 9350 that I was about to re-buy, haha. 2560x1600 will scale perfectly to 1280x800, 16:10 ratio, plus non-touch matte screen FTW. Enough of this 16:9 glossy touchscreen nonsense! Thanks for this post!

 

Samsung ATIV 9 is a 12.2" laptop with intel 5th gen, without: USB-C, non pci-e capability, 6.2 hours battery life, etc.
I don't think is a Dell Xps 13 9350 competitor.

 

Correct sir. And also the display isn't truly matte. Should've known better than to fall for Samsung's marketing hype. For only a couple hundred more I realize I'm getting much more for my money w/ the XPS. Just hope I can get one without dead pixels this time.

 

I'll join the convo here...have had my XPS 13 now for a little over a week or so.

This is one heck of a sweet little machine. My specs are QHD i5 w/touch and 256GB drive.

I returned my Surface Pro 4 purchase in favor of this Dell.

Dell XPS 13 screen is incredible, one of the best I've ever seen. Extremely uniform backlight and absolutely no edge backlight bleed of any type (Surface Pro 4 had some bleed on the bottom middle oddly). I would say this screen rivals my Plasma Pioneer Kuro display for black levels. Even in near darkness (no ambient light), on the lowest brightness setting the screen blends in with the "bezel".

The machine is much quieter than the Surface Pro 4 as well when the fan is "in use".

Battery life for me has been about 6-7 hours with browsing/youtube, MS office apps, and probably a few other apps open. But that is NOT scientific at all.

 

Oh, one other comment, my XPS is near flawless, except for on thing.

Several keys on the keyboard exhibit and odd resistance to being depressed, almost like the edge of the key is clipping the actual cutout for the key itself, but I can confirm that's not what's occuring. I'm not sure what's going on though, and I don't feel like popping any chiclet keys off to find out. Right now it's annoying, but not "broken". Has anyone had an issue like this with their XPS 13? On of those keys for me is the X key, and since I'm a fan of the XPS and the Xbox, and my brother and wife both have X's in their names, I think I type X more than your average consumer. LOL

 

My FHD screen is really bright. I just turned it up all the way and it was insanely bright. I keep it just one level above the lowest setting and it's totally fine.

 

I just want Dell to release a decent BIOS firmware like I had on my previous 9333. I had a BIOS start up time of 1.5 seconds. Now it's 18.6 seconds on superior hardware. WTF? Yes, I'm running 1.0.4. At least this can be fixed. Dell pull your finger out.

 

Just got back from Microsoft store and finally got an XPS 13 with no dead pixels. So glad I stuck with my gut and didn't get the 12.2" Samsung, which was also pretty sweet. I have no such issue with the keys on my keyboard. Maybe it will get better once you break the laptop in?

 

Where did you buy it from. Thanks.
.

 

Exact same here, one, maybe two steps up from the bottom setting is where I keep mine, in an "average" lit room.

Bought mine through the Microsoft Store.

 

Do they kind of "squeak" when pressed? My A key, most notably, seems to maybe barely clip the edge of the key's cutout. The general feel hasn't changed too much though.

Don't have that issue. Maybe a corrupt windows installation? Try getting it replaced.

 

So an odd issue just came up for me. I just updated Windows 10 using Windows Update and the latest version is installed. My mouse pointer while using the touch pad is totally borked. If I click "enable pointer precision" in the mouse settings, the speed of the pointer slows to a crawl and won't speed up regardless of the speed I set. If I disable the pointer precision then my mouse speed adjustments will apply, but the precision will be not as precise. No drivers for touch pad on Dell site. I guess I will try to update to the Synaptics driver in another thread on here and see if that helps. So strange.

Update, tried Synaptics driver, was so-so, removed it and back on default drivers w/ enhanced precision off. Adjusting to the settings, it's not too bad, I'll get used to it.

 

would the fhd users be so kind as to read out their panel types by using hwinfo for example? so that we know if dell is using different displays. that might explain the users' different brightness impressions.

 

What is your BIOS start-up time. Please check in your Task Manager.

 

Yeah I've got a Sharp SHP 1420 IPS 1080x1920 panel. Now can you go to the task manger and check your BIOS start up time please?

 

Can someone with the FHD display please verify if the laptop uses PWM for screen dimming? This can be done by dimming the screen below 50% and checking if multiple lines are visible in this test: http://www.testufo.com/#test=blurtrail
Thank you!

 

Myself and others have had similar issues with the XPS 15 9550 (Infinity). Seems to occur most often with the space bar. Ran across a YouTube showing the problem with the XPS 13 9343.

Problem seems to be that a ribbon cable underneath the space bar can bulge the wrong way and press into the bottom of the space bar. See YouTube video Dell XPS 13 9343 2015 - Fix Space Bar sticky resistance tight defect problem DIY & disassembly. Not for the faint of heart...

 

I received my FHD model two days ago and I'm quite impressed. I love the design, and have had no problems with the screen brighness.

I disabled "pinch to zoom" and the touchpad is so-so for me. My main problem is that when I try to do two fingers scrolling, when I lift my fingers most of the time I'll get a random scroll. What I'm doing to avoid it is lifting a finger first, then the other one.

I tried to install the latest/biggest Windows 10 update and it got stuck at 71%.

The screen reads:

------------------
Updating Windows
Your PC will restart serveral times.

71%

Installing features and drivers: 91%
------------------

After an hour or so like that, I rebooted the computer. Anybody with a similar experience?

 

Monitor Name: Sharp [Unknown Model: SHP1420]
Monitor Name (Manuf): LQ133M1 [DELL P/N: V4FJ4]

Brightness is fine. It's not great, but I tend to have it between 20% and 50% most of the time when inside.

12 seconds.

 

Thanks a lot guys! That is the very same display notebookcheck was testing in their reviews.

I asked the Dell chat concerning the official Display brightnesses:
answer was:
FHD 277,5
QHD: 400

 

You're right it does not compete with the XPS 13. It's a different class of PC. However, in some ways the 2015 Ativ9 is better. Obviously, the Ativ9 does not perform as good as the XPS13 but that does not necessarily mean it performs bad. For social media, watching Netflix and YouTube, Office and other light apps, the Ativ9 is still fast. And it has 700 nits brightness, no CABC, better display ratio (16:10) (Yes I believe watching movies on laptops are only secondary & occasional time kill and is actually stupid if you do it on a regular basis. We have big HDTVs for a reason), and is considerably lighter at 950g.

But as for me who still plays games and do occasional Photoshop & Vegas rendering, the XPS13 with a faster chip is the winner.

 

You're right it does not compete with the XPS 13. It's a different class of PC. However, in some ways the 2015 Ativ9 is better. Obviously, the Ativ9 does not perform as good as the XPS13 but that does not necessarily mean it performs bad. For social media, watching Netflix and YouTube, Office and other light apps, the Ativ9 is still fast. And it has 700 nits brightness, no CABC, better display ratio (16:10) (Yes I believe watching movies on laptops are only secondary & occasional time kill and is actually stupid if you do it on a regular basis. We have big HDTVs for a reason), and is considerably lighter at 950g.

But as for me who still plays games and do occasional Photoshop & Vegas rendering, the XPS13 with a faster chip is the winner.

 

Same monitor here. Don't know where in Task Manager is the BIOS startup time.

 

I may just get an ATIV 9 off Amazon to try out alongside the Dell, it is much cheaper there than at MS store. I mostly scroll through 1000 page PDFs for work and the 16:10 ratio is so much nicer to use. I thought the screens were awfully similar (pretty great) when looking at them side by side. I don't understand why no manufacturers have jumped on 16:10, there's demand for it. If someone made a 16:10 QHD matte non touch screen, in a form factor about 3 pounds or less, with an i5/i7, it would sell like mad. I think Lenovo may be on the brink. They recently did a large survey of what people want out of upcoming laptops and I think 16:10 was among the suggestions.

 

Task Manager > Start-up tab > Last BIOS time (top right)

Mine is currently 14 seconds.

 

Hello,

Many user of XPS 15 4K complain about a red shift when the screen is viewed form the side ( http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/dell-xps-15-with-infinity-display-2015.776840/page-253).
It seems pretty bad so I would like to know of XPS 13 QHD+ owner see the same issue here.
And by the way, I would also like to know if the XPS 13 FHD is affected.

One last question : for XPS 13 QHD+ owners, how bad are the reflections on the screen ? Are they mild or is it a real mirror ?

Thank you very much for your help !

 

FHD is not affected.

 

Thanks!

9.8 seconds here.

 

I've also noticed that the BIOS Fastboot options seem to make no difference: Thorough, Minimal and Auto have exactly the same boot time.

This leads me to think that it's doing a Thorough check each time, or else its having trouble mounting the SSD. There's been a few times where it's failed POST for me (hanging on the Dell logo) until I've forced a reboot, and I suspect that might be the problem. Even the Dell diagnostics tool can't seem to locate the SSD ...

 

I have the QHD screen and it does not experience that color shift when viewing from the side. I'd say the reflections are somewhere in between mild and mirror, if that makes sense. I do notice the reflections most of the time but have seen far worse in terms of glossiness.

 

Thank you ! Compared to a macbook pro retina, do you think it's worse or better ?