XPS 15 (Haswell) Owner's Lounge

Video app from W8 and Video app from W8.1 are NOT the same. So that theory about software still stands

 

Just to confirm, you're seeing this while running the drivers from Intel's website, not Dell's? The Intel driver version that seems to have fixed everyone else's issues is 16.6.

 

Dell tech came out today to have a look at the noise. The sent him out with battery and fans etc.

He took the back off and confirmed the noise is coming from the motherboard. They are sending him one of those to replace. Will see how we go.

 

Quick question....

Is the sku on the dell.com US site for $2299 the exact same one as the one on the Costco website for $1999?? Is Costco that much cheaper or am I missing something?

If someone could confirm, that would be great.

Dell XPS 15 Touchscreen Laptop | Intel Core i7 | 2GB Graphics | Quad HD+ Display | Backlit Keyboard

XPS 15 Touch Screen Laptop Details | Dell

 

from all the research i have done these 2 systems are identical, but cant compare the SKU, i guess you can email customer service at Costco and find out?

 

Last night my screen was OFF for 5hrs, in Skype call. No other apps running, Windows was on lock screen. I then got another 2.5hrs out of the battery with screen on minimum brightness, general web use.

Estimates with the screen on minimum brightness are 6.5hrs, so having it off didn't actually save a great deal.

Either way, considering I'm supposed to get 11hrs from the 91Wh presumably with the screen on, I'm very disappointed with the battery life.

 

Yeah, I've tried Intel's 16.6. Sadly, it didn't help.

 

Who say that they have used Video app in test with Sony Vaio?
They have made their test with media player classic on both W8.1 and W8, so that my previously statement is still valid.

Inviato dal mio GT-I9100 con Tapatalk 2

 

The buzz is really annoying on the speakers, it won't go away. Halp :X

 

Mine's getting at best over 5 hours with 30% brightness and light browsing/file transfer

 

91Wh or 61Wh?

If 91Wh, pretty similar to me really. If 61Wh.. I feel that's what we *should* be getting. Minimum.

 

Large battery.

Anyone know how to make games work on fullscreen? For example Call of Duty Ghosts. They just change to a centered box whenever I load them, at whichever resolution.

Edit: switch to lower res (max supported by game), Desktop blurry but game is fine

 

FINALLY! My XPS15 is shipped!!! I chatted with a Dell representative last night. Asked why my laptop took so long before shipping. Told them that I was following this thread and that it took some only 10 days from order to receiving. They told me that "little things" in the different orders can make a big difference.. I still don't get what "little things" can make it so that it took THREE WEEKS to MAKE my laptop when others got theirs in 10 days. It frustrating. I just hope that mine arrives without any of the problems that I have been seeing here.

 

Could have been a parts shortage, like the display or 512GB SSD if you ordered that spec.

 

Played COD Ghosts at low/mid settings, 2048x1152 (max allowable res), for about an hour

max temp 91C, immediate after exit it goes back to idle <50C, room temp 14C

very impressive, palmrest never heats up at all. other laptops with inferior hardware would've heated up to an uncomfortable level on the palmrest, and internals would likely have gone near or above 91C on a standard dual or quad.

now if only the battery, touchscreen, and mouse would work properly

 

I bench my XPS 15 (top tiers model) with 3Dmark 11.
I am a bit surprised by the low score that the 750m got.

According to notebookcheck it should score around 2400 and 2700 with a median around 2600.
Mine got a poor 1972.

It is 25% less than expected.
I updated everything with the latest drivers.
What about yours ? Whats wrong ?

During test it doesn't seem to be too hot or throttling ...

 

When I played I set it to only use Nvidia, or it's possible I may see stuttering

Same thing if you open Facebook games etc, they stutter because they are on 'auto' and they inefficiently switch between the graphics

 

Ok thanks, I'll retry that later.

 

Also if you are running the benchmark on battery power it is possible that your power profile is limiting the clock speed of the GPU in order to prolong the battery life.

 

No my battery was full and i was plugged.
Firefox was closed, the only I see is power profile and force nvidia 750m
I saw that there is a new nvidia driver (331.82). I'll update it as well.

 

what are you using to monitor temps? thanks!

 

and my computer still doesnt recognize my samsung galaxy s4...what the F? i called dell, they were useless, i called geek squad that handles best buy tech stuff, totally clueless...anyone else having troubling pairing their cell phones with 8.1?

 

What's the resolution that you use to run 3DMark11?
The standard resolution is 1280x1024, if you set higher then your score goes down.

Inviato dal mio GT-I9100 con Tapatalk 2

 

I let it by default and yes I think it was 1280*1024 or something around this.

 

Until now 2 users have reported the result of their test with 3DMark11 one has obtained 3000 and the other one has reported your same value just under 2000.

 

For the touchscreen, did you try the potential fix I posted a while back that one other person has confirmed resolved the issue? Link: http://forum.notebookreview.com/del...15-haswell-owners-lounge-115.html#post9456844

For the mouse, are you already running the generic Synaptics drivers rather than Dell's?

 

Ordered one from Costco, will report if it's the same for $300 cheaper

 

The hardware should be, but keep in mind that part of the cheaper price is likely the fact that the Costco box doesn't come with a 1-year at-home service warranty from Dell. That may or may not be important to people, but saying you're getting the exact same product for $300 less isn't exactly true.

 

Is anyone else completely dissatisfied with the clickpad on this thing? I mean - for a $2000 machine this is just unacceptable IMHO. On mine, no matter how I adjust the sensitivity (speed, touch force) or the other optional settings for multi-touch, it frequently behaves erratically. The worst is during fine movements. If you move the cursor maybe one line of text, and then lift your finger, it will jump back to where it was before. Moving diagonally seems to make this happen more frequently. I went to Best Buy and tried all of the Dell laptops they had. They ALL do this. They are also all insensitive to touch near the bottom and bottom left of the touchpad surface. What is up with that? Does Dell really feel that is acceptable?

 

I have made a clean install. Maybe my low score come from that ?
Can we have other test from user please ?

 

The ability to run two external monitors, preferably digitally, is a requirement, and I want a laptop that is highly portable, with long battery life, ideally a high resolution screen (after spending a week using a rMBP, it is the way to go), and as close as I can get to the processing power available in desktops. Ideally a 17" display, with 15" being the minimum. I carry a laptop most everywhere with me (Graduate student) and cheaper, poorly built laptops don't survive the rigorous use.

From my research, it appears the laptops that fit that profile are the MSI GS-70, the 15" rMBP, the Dell XPS 15 and the Lenovo t540p (and the Asus N550, but I really, really dislike its silver keyboard). The GS-70 didn't seem built well enough to last, and has mediocre battery life. The rMBP seemed the ideal solution, but it ran too hot to be usable in my opinion. The Lenovo isn't yet available in Canada, but will be available with a high resolution screen, though it is likely to have a matte/semigloss finish (I prefer glossy), and the GT 730m discrete graphics are a bit disappointing. I was concerned that the XPS 15, would not be able to run two 2560x1440/1600 monitors (I could not find the HDMI specification in any of the Dell documentation), but after reading the Precision M3800 Owner's Review thread on this forum by Bokeh, it appears the M3800 is HDMI 1.3 so two high resolution monitors is not an issue for it, and one assumes for the XPS 15 either. With the available $150 coupon from Dell, the 512GB model with the larger battery is $2150.

For my requirements, the XPS 15 seems the best tool, but I won't hesitate to return it and get the t540p if the Dell has issues (I am a little concerned about the humming noise many are reporting).

 

True, though I've found costco's concierge service more then adequate for any problems I've had with electronics purchased there. Plus they double the warranty for free.
No at home service, but I have other computers to use if I would have to send the dell in for repair so the $300 savings (plus the 10% off coupon I had) is pretty compelling to me.

Others opinions will vary of course.

 

The HDMI port would actually have to be 1.4 for bokeh to get the result he did, not 1.3. HDMI 1.3 would allow you to run 2560x1600 but only at 30 Hz, not 60, because of its maximum bandwidth. HDMI 1.4 on the other hand has enough bandwidth to push that resolution at 60 Hz, which in turn is enough bandwidth to do 4K but only at 30 Hz. However, keep in mind that the HDMI port on many DISPLAYS is only 1.3 or less, so even if your laptop can push 2560x1600@60Hz out of its HDMI port, that doesn't mean your display will accept that setup on HDMI. Lots of 2560x1600 displays will only accept that resolution over dual-link DVI or DisplayPort even if they have HDMI ports.

But in fact this laptop could actually run THREE external 2560x1600 displays, because that MiniDP port is version 1.2, which has enough bandwidth for any of these combinations, all at 60 Hz, achieved either through daisy-chaining or an MST hub:

6x 1680x1050
4x 1920x1200
2x 2560x1600
1x 4K

Daisy-chaining would require all of your DisplayPort displays except the last one in the chain to support daisy-chaining, but an MST hub would allow you to use DisplayPort 1.1 displays all around.

However, that doesn't take into account limitations that may be imposed by the two GPUs in this laptop; the Intel one is the larger cause for concern. So far we've seen this laptop simultaneously drive its built-in QHD+ panel, a 2560x1600 display, and a 1920x1200 display. It may or may not be possible to drive two external 2560x1600 displays AND the built-in panel simultaneously, and throwing a 4K display or two into the mix would make prospects even dicier. But in any case, you'll absolutely be able to do what you want now and likely even more later if the need/desire arises.

 

Hoam

Please try the following steps and let me know if this helps.

1. Enter the BIOS
2. Look for the Advance Charge Setting (it is by default set to Auto)
3. Change from Auto to Standard
4. Save changes and restart.
5. Check to see if the battery will now charge to 61WH


Thank You

TB

 

Can any of the owner please check, if the XPS-15 has an build-in TPM chip?

 

Even if this works, it may not be recommended if you prefer maximizing your battery's long-term ability to hold its charge over maximizing its capacity on any single charge. I posted earlier in this thread about this:

 

Already confirmed:

 

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/1667786

Score 2008

 

Yesterday I received my new Dell XPS 15 top end model. It happens to have the same problem others have reported with the screen pressure spot. When moving the screen(even the slightest amount) it causes a pressure point under the glass in the lower right screen region. Mine seems to be such an issue that it may even been damaging the pixels. It seems there is some slight discoloration in the affected spot. I have since contacted Dell and they didn't seem to know of the issue I was having and I pointed them in the direction of this forum since I had read about the problem here. The call went on to the point where I was asked to make a video demonstration of the issue. I felt obligated to post it here as well. The Dell representative gave me the option of having an in-home tech come and install an new display or a completely new XPS 15 built and shipped to replace the flawed one. I opted for the new one, which should arrive in the next 7-10days. Other than that hardware issue, I am unaware of any other issues as of yet. The touch screen has worked flawlessly, and the wifi works great(have 802.11AC). The only thing that has bugged me is the track-pad. It seems to miss gestures and takes a bit of getting use to to get the gestures to work every time. Other than that its the great machine.

Here is the video of the screen issue. Quality isn't great but I'm pretty sure you can see it.

 

My current laptop is a Dell XPS 15 L502X (1080p, i5, GT 525M). I love it, but it's showing its age in terms of both power and wear.

I have, so far, returned two touchscreen laptops for the same reason: the screens were not 'clear' or 'pure'. There was a grainy, rainbowy, sparkly effect. The machines in question are the Dell Insprion 15 7000 (7537) and the Samsung Ativ Book 8; my L502X does not have this issue. It seems I am one of the few seriously bothered by it, though.

My question, of course, is: does the new XPS 15 have this issue as well?

 

Nevermind about my 3DMark Score ...
I was running 3DMark 2013 and my score with Fire Strike Standard Graphics 1920x1080 is 2008 which is pretty good !

 

Not at all. The screen is as clear and in many cases clearer than a Retina MacBook Pro. The only caveat I've found to this is (besides those with defective screens) is that the backlight really needs to be turned down for normal lighting conditions otherwise it gives off a minor backlight bleed around the edges.
No blurriness or rainbowing to be found.

 

hello everyone, ive read every one of your posts and they are very helpful, i just received the midtier xps 15, and i would like to exchange the msata to a 256 gb one and boot from it,to take advantage of the speed and advantage of an SSD, but i don't know how to do it, i am shall we say a entry level techie, is it too difficult to do?or should i pay someone to do it for me, which one should be better, a clean install or clone the os, or is it the same? could anyone help me with a guide or step by step, any help would be tremendously appreciated!!!

 

Thanks for the info jphughan, that's quite good news and very helpful!

 

Thanks for your quick reply, very much appreciated. That would be such a relief. I was starting to fear it's the norm, at least among touchscreen laptops - after all, none of the reviews I read (and hardly any users) ever even mentioned it...

Now, that leaves just one "minor" issue... this machine is well over my budget, not to mention still not available where I live.

 

Just got my xps 15 today. I have been working with it all afternoon. I will just comment on what I think will add to this discussion, rather than repeating a lot of what others have already said.

I am a software engineer and use Eclipse. I haven't seen anyone comment on how Eclipse works with the high res screen (the resolution is set to 3200x1800). It works very, very well. The only problem I can see is the toolbar icons are too small. Text everywhere is spectacular. I cranked the editor font down to 7pt (!!) and it is still quite usable. This means I can set eclipse on one half of the screen and use the other half for a browser, or db tool or whatever. This is going to be a fantastic mobile development station. Scaling in general is better than what I feared from reading this thread. Chrome actually looks fine - it's certainly is pixelated, but I wouldn't call it "fuzzy."

I consider the trackpad an emergency pointing device, so I am not concerned with its quirks, but for the record, it seems serviceable. I also don't care about battery life. Unfortunately for those of you who do, it is not impressive, at least on the first cycle. So far quite happy. Once I get my entire development stack installed I will post on how performance is for java web development.

 

I don't think cloning will work because of how the SATA controller is set up to use the disk plus an mSATA cache; switching to having mSATA accessible as an independent drive involves a BIOS change (at which point your spinning drive may not be readable anymore until it's wiped via formatting) as well as a driver change -- so even if you exported an image to another medium before making the BIOS change to make sure your content was available to be cloned onto the mSATA drive, the driver configuration from the image wouldn't be appropriate for the new mSATA-only config. I'll give you a somewhat higher-level step-by-step guide; if you need something incredibly granular, that would probably be more typing than most people would be willing to do, and at that point it may be worth getting help from a tech-savvy friend/collegue/family member. But here's what you'll need specific to this machine:

1. Buy a 256GB mSATA drive. I'd recommend the Samsung PM841 (not officially available for retail, but sold on Amazon through third parties), but the Crucial M500 would be a solid choice too and IS officially available for retail, so you'd benefit from firmware updates and such that way.

2. Grab the manual for your system at support.dell.com, which will contain instructions for removing the spinning drive (if you intend to do that) as well as swapping the mSATA unit.

3. While you're there, download the drivers you'll find there, though I would get the NVIDIA GPU drivers from NVIDIA and the Intel Wifi and Bluetooth drivers from Intel, personally.

4. Make sure you have a Windows 8.1 installer on a USB flash drive. You should be able to download the installer from Microsoft to create a suitable bootable flash drive.

5. Back up any data you want to keep from the magnetic drive, because it might not be readable anymore after the next step; I'm not sure, but it would avoid a hassle to have a backup.

6. Power up your machine and go into the BIOS. I don't have the machine yet so I can't tell you exactly what the name of the option is, but under a heading like SATA Mode (or something to do with SATA), switch it to AHCI; it will probably be on something that says RAID or Intel Smart Response prior to that. This will let you use the mSATA drive as an independent drive rather than treating it only as a cache. Then move the mSATA drive above the magnetic drive in the boot order.

7. Boot from the flash drive, install Windows onto the mSATA unit, and then install all required drivers and applications. If you want to use Intel Rapid Start, you'll need to take extra steps to partition your disk to support it. Intel's guide for this is here for MBR disks and here for UEFI. At that point if you retained the magnetic drive, you can format it to start clean and use it as bulk storage going forward, or you can leave it out to reduce weight, noise, and heat, as well as increasing battery life.

 

any throttling? lag spikes? i have the new one coming soon. want to check up on that. my xps 15 l521x always throttled.

 

Well, that makes sense. So have you actually tried 3DMark11 at 1280x1024 (or whatever the standard is?) What was the score?

 

If you don't mind me asking.. where did you get that 10% off coupon?