XPS 15 (Haswell) Owner's Lounge

any idea if the 91whr version is the same as the 61whr except for the battery size? all other components like motherboard design, usb ports etc are the same? reason for asking this is that my home country only sells the 61whr version and if they have to do repairs, it would be cheaper/easier to repair if they share almost all common parts except the 2 obvious ones

 

Yes, they are identical. The 61 WHr version also includes a SATA ribbon cable and hard drive caddy in order to allow a 2.5" drive to be used, which the 91 WHr lacks because the space that would be occupied by that 2.5" drive is instead used for the larger battery. But they are otherwise identical, and in fact some people have even swapped between the types of batteries on their systems.

 

My 2 cents for all the people waiting for an alternative to the Xps15, the ASUS NX500 seems to always be the alternative choice . But I had a deeper look at the specifications and I was surprised how similar both the laptops are and the Asus doesn't seem the runaway winner as it looked at first glance. It has an edge obviously launching 1 year later than the XPS15. But they have put it up on Amazon for the similar going price as that of the xps15 in the UK. Interestingly the GTX850 doesn't beat the GT 750M hands down as the GTX 850 has a DDR3 vs the DDR5 in the 750M and you also get the 12GB model with the 4GB soldered on. Definitely the 4K is amazing but I don't know if I would spot the difference in between the 3K to 4K on a 15incher. On the weight front also the Asus is slightly heavier and on the battery front the GTX850 consumes more power. This makes me wonder that Dell really got the configuration right as a year on it is still comparable . But in that case I should say that Apple really got it right as it came before the XPS. If only Dell could solve the coil whine issue !!

 

Today my xps15 died:

Won't tun on. It hangs at the bios screen.
Already where in touch with a dell technician. Together we change the ram, did a bios reset (remove battery + cmos battery). still dead. No use with all we tried.- --> Next week I will get a MB replacement.
(oh noo, have serious doubts because of the coild whine, I had it but I it was intermediate. I'm very afraid, it can get worse with the next MB )

So, MB broken and on my 3rd screen!!! Dell what is with your quality? - XPS 15 in principle a good concept. But totally faulty HW.
- I love the machine, if I would not have to life in continuous fear, that the next thing breaks. ... damn and I need it urged for my thesis.

 

Actually, as far as I understand it will come with DDR5 memory. And apparently also with coil whine.

 

The GTX850M comes in both GDDR5 and DDR3 variants: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 850M - NotebookCheck.net Tech

The NX500 isn't released yet. The rumors I've seen on the Asus sub-forum suggest a September/October release. It's not impossible for Dell to announce a 2014 refresh with a GTX800 series card before the NX500 actually makes it to market.

 

Amazon led me to believe it was a DDR3 as it is mentioned here under Graphics RAM type but this video at 0.34 leads me to believe that ASUS have put in DDR5 so I may be wrong . I guess we will come to know only when we get to see all the variants. ASUS does a lot of variants are they are really confusing . They did so with the UX301 and UX302 , good laptops but I never saw all the variants properly released in all the markets.

 

Anyone else have an issue with USB freezing?

I have a USB wireless mouse / keyboard. If a plug that in and also plug in a USB flash drive, then my USB mouse/keyboard stop working. When I take out the flash drive, it starts working again.

This has happened to another friend too with the XPS.

 

So after ownership of the laptop for about 2 months i have now decided to call Dell Technical, as it within 100 days they gave me three options. Repair/Replace/Refund.

After decision i went with a replacement.

They are replacing it like for like but as its a new one i will receive an xps 15 with the new chipset 4712. Which sounds good.

The problem i had was leaning my right wrist whilst using the touchpad on the laptop the left area and bottom corner would become stuck. Applying pressure underneath also makes this release it and there must be some hardware panel underneath the palm area.

So will await my new laptop just need to use acronic to create my image.

 

Is there a difference in quality between the xps 15 and the precision m3800.

 

No, they're hardware-identical except for the GPU and the fact that the XPS has NFC.

 

Sorry, but this does not happen with mine. I connect my hard drive, flash drive, phone and the wireless receiver all at the same time. I did have the problem of disconnecting/reconnecting phone which I solved by flashing the a05 bios so please try that if you havent already. Hope this helps.

 

...and that xps has 10-point multitouch compared to precision's 5-point(not that you would use more than two at a time, but still its a difference).

 

ty guys, but when i compare both systems, why is the precision more expensive (>300 € and has less weight (0,13 kg)?


click

 

hi,

I'm looking to replace my Lenovo T400 (Yes...damn old laptop lol)

I'm on the fence btw this XPS 15, vs the Ativ 9 15.6" and the upcoming Asus NX500. Not to mentioned the Broadwell laptops coming in at the end of this year, but I read on the news that they are delayed?

Use:
Excel, Photoshop, generally office work.
And er...maybe on occasion abit of DOTA 2? LOL

Priority:
EXCELLENT screen. I do photoshop and lightroom quite often.
Battery Life
LIGHT.

I'm not too sure on the QHD screens of the XPS 15 and the NX500 though. I'm using a Dell U2410 24" on 1920x1200 for my desktop and it's perfectly fine for me. I'm actually worried about those QHD screens being a unnecessary burden on the battery life.

I'll appreciate if you kind folks can help me in deciding

 

I have the same issue: applying even slight pressure from the bottom underneath the clickpad and close to the rim will make it click or keep it clicked. By slight pressure I mean resting your wrists on the palm rest while keeping the laptop seated on one leg (centered on it).

The reason for this is that the bottom frame is too flexible and it's too easy to bend it slightly thus making the clickpad work less well.

Based on my usage, I also get very **BAD** response from the keyword. I am understating how much I hate the keyboard, it makes me want to hit it with a hammer. I get missed key presses especially with upper right/left keys (wersdf and uiojkl) and I suspect this has to do with both they keyboard itself and pressure on the bottom plate.

So far the XPS 15 is the best general purpose laptop I could find running Windows, but build and engineering qualities are not up to the cost.

Best regards,

Marco

 

Happens to me all the time. Disabling gestures on the touchpad does not solve this problem (but improves multi finger handling).

Marco

 

This makes sense. I am not sure, but i think for example on MacBooks it does not matter where you click, you have always the same amout of counterpressure.

Nope. What i do is i move the cursor around with one finger. Then I press the same finger down to click (without moving it) but the cursor somehow jumps away from the point i wanted to click. Dissableing gestures wont work. Which touchpad drivers are you guys using? The dell one or the one from synaptics?

For now i have another question concerning hibernation. I disabled rapidstart as it was recommended in the wiki. When i close the lid of the laptop the notebook now goes to the hibernation state. Is it possible that the notebook wakes up from hibernation when the lid opens?

 

No, the MacBook Pro has the same top-hinged design, so it's more difficult to click at the top than the bottom -- but maybe the design is a bit different so clicking at the top of the MBP's touchpad is easier than clicking at the top of the XPS's. I don't use MBPs regularly so I can't say for certain.

I'm using the Synaptics driver.

If your system is still hibernating, it's using the regular Windows hibernation at this point, not Rapid Start's. But you can't have the system resume from hibernation simply by opening the lid; in hibernation, the power to the system is off, so it has no way to detect that the lid has been re-opened. If that's not what you want to have happen, go into your Power Options and disable the option to hibernate after a certain time interval.

Ah yes, I remember reading about that. That's on the touchscreen, not the touchpad, correct? Has that been confirmed with screenshots? I'd be surprised if Dell randomly decided to use a different type of touchscreen for the Precision. But you're right, I can't imagine using more than 2 or 3 fingers even if I were playing a touchscreen-based game.

 

Thankfully im not alone the keyboard i love i have to be honest, so easy to type and the feel is just like my old laptop. The arrow keys could of been slightly bigger.

 

This sounds very much like a driver issue to me. And just to clarify, I don't necessarily mean that you have the settings wrong......I mean that some drivers are just not very good. I only used the Dell driver for about a week, but I think it belongs in that "not good" category. It exhibited all sorts of unwanted behavior, like cursor jumping and unintentional hold and drag.

I've since switched to a Synaptics driver (thanks to jphughan for the tip about v.16.3.15.1....installed flawlessly). It's a typical Synaptics-sourced driver..... infinitely more adjustable than the dumbed-down Dell option, and those unwanted behaviors are completely gone now. I do turn off most of the more gimmicky functions, like rotate, pinch-to-zoom, etc., and I'm left with excellent performance for the functions I actually use. I'd recommend you try completely uninstalling your current driver and starting over with this one.

 

Hi guys I revisit this thread after about 5 months of having the laptop.

So my conclution is that given the chance I would have bought it again. I have no audible coil whine and keep in mind I am 26 years old so it is not me not hearing it, also my freinds havent noticed it too.

The only problems I have found

1) clunching sound around the power button tht it does someimes. I have no idea what it is probbly someone else should have noticed earlier too.

2 problem is that the trackpad sometimes when pressured at the left corner down it gets stuck there.

3 I cannot connect my phone properly to it ( a nexus 4).

If anyone has any solutions please let me know

Overall very happy with my purchase and I think that theselittle problems are fine. Even notebookcheck when compared it to the new MB noticed that the 2 laptops were very cloce together. I have no idea why is the rankings the MB is first and this beaty is second. According to them MB is better mainly at the screen department but when both laptops are not callibrate but a proffetional will always callibrate a laptop no matter what. Also despite thefact that the CPU is better there is no huge difference in the perfomance and it is know that at leat the older model of MB had to drain power from the battery in order to keep CPU and GPU running.
Finnally, I was reading n the dell forums that Dell as of july has managed to reproduce the coil whine problem and tries to reaarange the motherboard ETA of something new is not nown at the moment, but I would expect delays with it as Dell has been recently repurchased by its former owned and in abig company like that it takes time for the new QC standarts to be applied and all the projects need to be reapproved before going forward etc.

 

Can you provide the link to the post that the coil whine problem has been reproduced? I have kept a close eye on the coil whine yet I've never seen this information.

 

I am currently using the synaptics driver v17.0.19 which is newer than your one (but i had to allow windows to use unsigned drivers) but i still have the jumping issue. I will give the one you are using a shot.

Okay i think i'll send the system to sleep when i close the lid, so it can awake from sleep when i open it (instead of hibernation) which is probably even better for the ssd as the ddr content doesnt get dumped on it.

Is there a tool to control the fans on the xps? I think they are kicking in way to early and are running constantly on my XPS (even if i used passive cooling over active cooling in the settings). And i dont think the fans should kick in at 45 degrees core temperature or am i wrong here?

 

What sort of battery degradation are you guys getting? I"m at 80% total storage capacity of the original shipping battery after 2 months. I feel like that's pretty high degradation.

 

Hey trofi....thanks for your 5-month re-assessment. These kinds of comments are especially useful for prospective buyers and us "new" owners wondering what to expect in the coming months.

I'm really only having one issue with mine, but it's an increasingly bothersome one. The hinge is SO stiff that I practically have to pry it open, and I'm wondering if mine is just particularly "sticky" or if they're all like this. For those who've had their XPS for awhile now, like trofi, have you found that the hinge softens up over time?

If it's supposed to be like this, I think it's a significant design flaw. Opening a laptop shouldn't require two hands and force, especially when the slim design offers no edge to easily grab onto. With the MB Pro I'd been using in recent months, the hinge is tensioned perfectly....I can open it with one hand without the base lifting off the table. From the front or either side. The XPS, by comparison, is a bear to open. I pretty much have to dig my fingers (of both hands) between the top & bottom, fairly close to the middle of the front edge.

I REALLY hope it softens up over time. Anyone have any thoughts? Similar or different experience?

 

I set my PC to charge only when below 50% and never charge above 90%. Had it since March. Battery wear still at 0%.

 

Batteries don't degrade anywhere near linearly (or discharge linearly, for that matter, despite the percentage-based display people are accustomed to), so your battery isn't going to drop to 0% after 10 months. I have my battery set to wait until 50% before charging and never exceed 80% since I'm almost always on AC power, which should help with longevity, but if that's not a feasible option for you, then just keep using the system as you need to. And absolute worst case, these batteries are extremely easy to replace as long as you have a Torx T5 screwdriver, unlike Apple that practically uses rubber cement to keep their batteries attached to their chassis.

 

How does one set the battery to charge for those intervals?

 

You can do it in the BIOS settings: Set the "battery charge" mode to custom, and then you can set the lower and upper % for charging.

 

lucky you. My battery came with 7% wear right out of the box

 

I changed the charging plan to 75 start charging and 95 stop charging. I noticed other plans called 'adaptive' and 'normal' after 'primarily ac'. Does anyone know what those first two are?

 

Adaptive:
Optimizes battery settings based on your usage patterns. One of those settings for users who don't like to customize settings and just want the OS to take care of everything.

Normal/Standard:
Charges the battery at a "medium" rate, supposedly to strike a good balance between battery wear and charging times. (Faster charging, i.e. the "Express" setting, results in accelerated battery degradation, while slower charging helps preserve battery life.)

 

Does anyone know how exactly the "Primary AC power" mode behaves? I.e. does it start charging at x and stop at y?

 

Only one way to find out!

But based on the name, I would bet that it uses a strategy similar to what we've been discussing: Avoid charging until it reaches a low level (the lowest you can go on Custom is 50%), and stop charging well short of 100%. That's the best strategy for battery longevity, and if you're primarily on AC power, it's not likely to matter if you occasionally need your battery and find it well below 100% capacity.

 

I set custom charging from 50% up to 80%. I set it while the battery was at 88%, and it's been on AC power ever since. For awhile (several weeks?) the battery level stayed at 88%, which is understandable. I then noticed the battery level had risen to 90%, and then maybe a week later it rose to 92%. Can anyone explain?

If anything, I might expect the battery level to slowly fall over time until reaching 50%. But increase?

 

Last week I started hearing a cyclic faint buzzing noise from my laptop and my mind went immediately to the coil whine but somehow I was not convinced as it was not high pitched. It seemed to be emitted from the right side of the laptop and was faint and intermittent and kept irritating me a lot . I was really confused and intrigued by what was causing the noise. After a couple of days and on opening up the machine lo and behold I was greeted with a static Video fan . The fan tried to move and I could see the blades vibrate and then nothing happened. This kept emitting the buzzing noise every 30 seconds as it tried every 30 secs. When the fan was not supposed to run the noise was not there. As usual ran e-PSA and Video fan test failed. Did the usual call up Dell support they promised to replace the fan and sent someone on the next business day and as luck would have it I discovered it on Friday evening. On Tuesday the service rep from Dell came , replaced the fan and it seems to be running fine now. Really strange as this was a new replacement laptop for the first one in which the 750M did not work and now within a month of getting the replacement the video fan died on me. I hope nothing else dies in the next months. I like this laptop and I hope I can keep it but it seems to be testing me now.

 

Could someone please confirm the XPS 15 supports 4k 60Hz MST output over its miniDP-port at all times? I have been searching but couldn't figure out if 60Hz is supported, especially if the iGPU is used for output.

I'm thinking of buying this laptop as a desktop replacement but 4k60 support for my UP2414Q is mandatory.

 

This is from the Precision M3800 thread. If you haven't been following, the Precision M3800 is hardware-identical to the XPS 15 except that it uses the Quadro version of the XPS's GeForce GPU and lacks the NFC card that the XPS has:

So yes, the XPS 15 will also support it. Fyi, the DisplayPort 1.2 spec that includes MST and 4K support was approved in December 2009, so any DisplayPort connector on systems/GPUs from the last few years should support it. GPU performance would only affect frame rates when playing video and such at those resolutions, but considering that even integrated GPUs these days are supporting dual 1600p displays, I can't imagine you'd have an issue with a single 4K display while using typical applications. The discrete GPU is also supposed to kick in automatically when it's required to maintain satisfactory performance, and even if it doesn't, you can force certain apps to always run on a particular GPU.

 

I am having quite low and unstable wifi speeds with the newest 17.0.5 driver from intel and the newest wifi driver from dell.
The maximum speed I get with those drivers is 28mbits, while I pay for 50mbits.
With the driver that comes with Windows however, I get maximum and much more stable wifi speed (49-50mbits!). (Driver version: 16.5.3.6)

Anyone else experiencing this or is it just me?

 

Yes, I know DP 1.2 specs support MST but to my knowledge especially the intel drivers have or had issues with 4k60 output and I read the iGPU is used for managing the signal and not the geforce.

Anyhow thanks, i'm happy to order the xps now

 

I am currently using an LG 34UM95 with this laptop. Although the output is not 4K, (3440x1440) I am able to set up this monitor with displayport 1.2. I output both screens with the Intel HD4600. I cannot verify through software that it is actually supported as I do not know how this is done. Through fora I know that unsupported DP 1.2 videocards should generate popping sounds inside the monitor, but it does not. I think DP 1.2 is fully supported. However, this guy: [Hardware Info] LG 34UM95: 21:9 UltraWide QHD 34-inch monitor - Page 58 argues that true DP 1.2 support is only with nVidia Quadro and AMD Firepro for 10bit. If you really like your external monitor (which support 10 bit), buy the Dell Precision 3800.

On another note, the DPI scaling of win8.1 is horrible. I try whatI can, but I get blurry text on either my laptop screen, or my home screen. Only when the scaling is turned off. This usually leaves my laptop screen useless, because of its small letters. After I am done with my 'desk' work I really prefer to take the laptop with me, leave all programs on and look at some stuff later in the day/night. If I want to do this, I need to increase the DPI size, which forces me to log out, before everything is no longer blurry. This in its turn forces me to close all open programs. In the end I am left with a very mobile laptop, which I do not take anywhere, because of these annoying difficulties.

There is this guy: Solved Global DPI Scaling Disable for Win8.1 for all files/users who provides a solution, but either my reading is bad, or my knowledge of Windows registers is too limited, because I cannot get it to work.

Anyone else annoyed by the poor scaling of dpi on exernal monitors? Anyone got a solution?

 

Those sound like internet speeds....is that what you're measuring? The internet speed from your modem is completely different from, and much slower than, your wi-fi speed. So measuring one doesn't tell you anything about the other.

The AC7260 has a theoretical max of 867Mbps, but most users' routers will likely put them at 300 to 450Mbps. You can see your top wireless rate by looking at the "Status" for your wireless network.

 

Have you tried a lower resolution? I find it to be a preferable to scaling (better results, easier to change quickly).

 

Yes it is the internet speed I am measuring.
The link speed between my computer and my modem is reported to be 300mbps by Windows, regardless of what driver version I have installed.

 

To be clear, it's not the DPI scaling in Windows 8.1 that you're seeing and deeming horrible. If things look good on your internal QHD+ panel when DPI scaling is set to 200% and no other displays are being used, then regular DPI scaling is working fine. You're referring to the multi-DPI scaling functionality that comes into play when you use two displays with very different pixel densities. And on that front, unfortunately that's the best you're likely ever going to get when using monitors with vastly different pixel densities simultaneously -- and it's not just Windows 8.1. The same thing occurs on Mac OS in this situation. I wrote up an article on the XPS 15 Wiki that goes into some technical details and provides a few workarounds, but they're just workarounds, not full-on solutions: Multi-monitor Setup - XPS 15 Wiki.

There's also an AnandTech article somewhere that details the different behavior you can see with different applications based on the APIs they use and how they've been coded, but that was a bit more detailed than I wanted to cover in an already long write-up.

Of course you COULD think of this quandary as an excuse to invest in 4K desktop displays. As long as all of the applications support HiDPI well, you'd be able to leave scaling on at a consistent 200% with no blurriness from adapting for multi-DPI setups.

 

If you haven't already, try updating your router firmware. Otherwise Intel seems to be revising the drivers for this card pretty frequently, so it seems that either there's plenty of extra performance to be obtained through software enhancements and/or they're discovering kinks that need to be ironed out that may only occur under certain conditions and/or with certain routers. But in the meantime, if the old drivers work better, then by all means stick with them. Maybe try newer ones as they're released to see if there have been any improvements, but otherwise, if it ain't broke....

 

Has anyone had luck in finding protective gear for this laptop? I'm looking for something like an invisible shield that I could put on the aluminum cover of the laptop to prevent scratches, or maybe something like the clear hardcovers for the MBPs: Amazon.com: TopCase CLEAR Crystal See Thru Hard Case Cover for Macbook Pro 13-inch 13" (A1278 / with or without Thunderbolt) -NOT for retina display- with TopCase Mouse Pad: Computers & Accessories.

 

Yes, I have read your very good article on the Wiki, even before I bought the laptop, but I thought it would all be blown a bit out of proportion, as is a lot on fora. In this case I stand corrected, and should have paid more attention to your article. Your workarounds are indeed no true solution, but I nevertheless have tried to adopt these. All are, for me, unsatisfactorily.

Do you have a link perhaps?

This was a bit of the point why I am complaining. Although my monitor, the LG 34UM95 is not 4k, it is close. It has the same width as 4k (3440) only the height is lower (1440), thereby making this a 'halfway monitor'. I thought the additional real estate would be marvellous and I would be able to use it efficiently in combination with the 3k laptop screen. I have to disagree at this moment in time. I will try and mess around with this problem, and write down any interesting findings I might have, but I have already contacted Dell and asked them to take the laptop back.

I think in this scenario a MBP 15" would be more beneficial. It has no touch screen, which I cannot use currently due to the super-tiny elements on the laptop screen, but it does have thunderbolt, which is a marvellous addition to the LG 34UM95, since I can have all external appliances operating through one cable I hook up to my laptop.

 

You will find the link here. http://forum.notebookreview.com/del...5-haswell-owner-s-lounge-591.html#post9701236