XPS 15 (L521X) Owner's Lounge

the rep told me that anything that takes time to build will be new. Only the pre-built ships next day have not been updated.


I believe that Dell does piece together the laptops as they are ordered albeit with the same internals. Makes no sense as a business if they build say 100K and then they didn't sell. So you'd figure they get a few thousand orders a day so their factory is always in motion.

 

What i meant was, compared to what?
does it achieve similar speed on the same spot as other laptops? something like that so we can take some conclusions.

If a fix has really been implemented i imagine the number of people that would ask for a laptop exchange. it certainly isn´t going to be cheap to dell if the only solution they have is a brand new computer.
Then again, how many people would notice the wifi problem, and how many of that would give to the trouble of asking for a fix?

 

Just recieved my new system after having my original plagued with poor wifi reception. So far, speed tests ran close to the router from both are producing equal and different results, ranging from the old one being higher sometimes and lower than the new one. Will test 10-15 feet away from the router in a few and get back.

The noise from the hard drive seems to be completely silent now, however wifi from farther than the same table the router is placed on has my 10mb connection lower to 3-4mbs and down. Will keep testing this out but looks like either I got an old machine (Which speaks even more poorly of dells customer service) or they have just been lying to the customer.

 

I think my battery life is messed up big time. 81% says 4 hrs. However when it drops another 1%, it goes down 20-30minutes. However it only took 3 minutes to drop 1% of battery -.-

 

Just to share, I jsut posted the following on Dell's Community Forum under the existing WIFI problems on Dell xps 15 L521x. As a reply to the last few posts, consumers should not have to guess which systems do and do not contain the "fix" if there was one. Anyway, here is the post.

I have read tons of posts and followed thsi for awhile. About three days ago, I was reading that new machines were fixed, so I called a Dell Sales rep. and they said the problem was fixed and the New XPS 15 no longer had WiFi problems. Needless to say, there was a sale on, I ordered, next day delivery, tested the WiFi and ...just like everyone else - bad WiFi. I understand all that everyone has done here and on other posts, but for me I have a couple of problems with the "resolutions" that Dell is asking us to accept. I have spent about two hours on the phone with tech support being bounced from one rep to another and all they suggest is return the machine and order a new one - no exchange. Plus they want to send someone out and check drivers. Here are my issues with the proposed resolutions.

1) If I return it, wait for the refund I will miss the sale price that I paid. No one is offering to allow me to return this one and order a new one at the same price

2) Having a tech come out, or having to load new drivers make no sense to me, I probably have too much tech at home and I don't agree that if I pay for a new machine I will need to have someone come over (on my time) and fix a brand new system - this crazy to me - especially at this price.

I appreciate all of you who have worked with Dell tech support to load new drivers, have a tech come out and replace hardware - but at some point, as consumers we have to say enough. If the laptop is faulty - don't sell it anymore until there is a resolution. I am not getting paid for my time spent on the phone just to get someone who can understand my situation, It's as if our consumer "time" is not valuable. In order to have a tech come out, now I have to schedule more time away from my life to sit with them while they "fix" a BRAND NEW PREMIUM COMPUTER. Not to forget that by all of the posts I have read, none of the on-site tech visits have actually helped anyone. There is no excuse that we have paid $2,000 (more/less) for PREMIUM system that needs Safe Mode, or a new card, motherboard, drivers or anything else to simply use the Wifi.

I have been a long time customer/consumer of Dell products - 3 laptop, Alienware Aurora, 2 PDA's before my M1330 and I loved the M1330 and went through that fiasco in the end. BTW sent my M1330 to be fixed, and they lost the machine - replaced it with the original XPS 15. I have since puchased a 15z (no real headaches) - and now I have the NEW XPS 15 - which needs to be replaced.

To Dell: I have enjoyed your machines through the years, really haven't liked your support of major issues, but with this current XPS 15 WiFi (not to mention LCD and CPU/GPU issues) problem, it may be time for consumers to start talking with an attorney about a class action suit again. My faith in your sales people, time, patience, and money have all been provided to you without a viable solution. Unacceptable.

 

that sucks man. The rep should have told you that Ships Next Day systems are older stock. Maybe he didn't know but that just proves that their inter-company communication is poor. If you're system is being replaced, demand that it be a new build, will take about 2 weeks but at least the probability of a working system is much higher.

 

Just so everyone knows, this is not possible, unless Dell are now including a different LCD panel. All of the LCD panels have the screen grid problem -- it's just that some people don't notice it.

 

So it means all is OK and working. What meant to be work...

... But if you are in need of laptop without throttling, then L521X isnt for you, its not gaming lap! It throttles and will throttle in future too, if you stressing CPU/GPU together ("wrong" design/cooling).

 

I reflashed several times and the fan still runs.

 

I re-flashed several times and the fan still constantly runs.

 

That is true but at least I could have took it to an Apple store instead of dealing with online support, UGH!!

 

Didn't work for me, reflashed several times and no luck.

 

Did you download A09 again or are you flashing the first download again? I would download it again and try if you haven't already

 

as an owner of many different laptops this year, I can say its becoming increasingly hard to find laptops that don't throttle. Unless of course you buy tank laptops like Sager that are 1 feet thick lol

Then again where are people going to point the finger at intel/Nvidia combo. They need to get better at heat and power usage.

I had 2 HP DV6 laptops, one had iCore 7/650 and the other had AMD A10 and some Radeon i forget the number. Everything else on system was the same and the AMD system got better frames on GPU intensive games and the battery lasted about 3 hours longer than Intel/Nvidia using 9 cell battery

If not for the very poor craftsmanship and poor quality I would not have even been looking at the Dell. Glad I did though, I love my XPS

 

Hey, guys. I'm planning on ordering the currently-$1600 L521X build in about a month as I'll have hopefully saved up enough money, and it will hopefully be pre-loaded with Windows 8 by then, as well.
I was actually following the speculation thread for a while before the system's release with much anticipation but didn't order right away due to mild disappointment with the display and price.
Anyway, I have not been paying attention to the system since its release and was wondering if there were any changes or improvements planned that I should know about. Like, will there be more screen options? Will there be further customization (as opposed to the 4 preconfigured builds we have now)? Price drops or coupon codes or other discounts? Any current complaints that are being addressed? Just anything at all you think I should know about prior to ordering one in about a month.

 

I can't help but notice that Bill's replacement didn't check in today like he promised someone on Twitter. Could someone maybe contact Bill, and see if he can get the replacement to give us an update?

 

Anyone try to reach him at his other avenues. He has been active everywhere else but here.

Lionel Menchaca, Chief Blogger's Profile - Dell Community

This page has links to his G+, Facebook ,Twitter, etc.

 

It's obvious that he doesn't care about helping us like Bill did. I would just let him be. I don't want him to feel like He's being forced to be here.bill wanted updates as much as We did so he would always show up even if he had nothing. This issue doesn't affect him in any way so he can't be bothered with it

 

Yeah, that Lionel is totally worthless. Don't bother with him; he won't have anything to offer anyway. I'm sure Dell wanted it that way anyway; Bill was "too good" and probably revealing too much. And like he said, they have obvious problems that they are struggling with right now. Lionel is just a Dell sock puppet.

 

Yes, every time I redownloaded and reflashed.

 

can you see your graphic card?
do you know if optimums is working?

if the graphic card is on it can keep laptop warm and noisy.

 

I don't know if you guys have noticed but Dell has withdrawn A09 reverting to A06 as the default Bios file

 

Quick update for anyone following:

Was on the phone with Dell Customer Care for about 4 hours yesterday, went through the back and forth, rep hang ups and even one rep that put me on hold for like 45 minutes - didn't come back - but left me there. So I actually gradbbed another phone and called back while I was on hold. Basically nothing, I received a manager who said they would call me back that night. Later that night another manager called me - saying that it was a policy exception, but they would replace my system with a new system - but if the new system has the same problem - they would not refund me - I would have to go through tech support. All for a machine that is less than a week old and only on for about two hours.

I am not in a rush to receive the machine, but now this has become a focus for my attention, based on the amount of money the machine cost and the amount of time I have put in to getting this replaced. As I said to the manager, "Let me get this straight, you plan to make an "exception" replacing the machine with another brand new machine, but if the new machine has the same wifi issue - a refund will now not be possible on a machine that is only a few days old." Needless to say if the the new machine still has the wifi issue - this will get interesting. For everyone that has gone through this issue - explain to me why customers have to resort too spending 5 - 10 hours with Dell on the phone or with tech support to get an issue resolved. Why is our money not good enough to the point where we also need to invest our time into getting resolution for purchasing Dell's Premium XPS laptop line?

Anyway, I told them to take their time on the replacemet since I am in no rush, I just want what I paid for - a properly working laptop - without having to have a tech crack open a new machine and fiddle with it. They said it would take about 5 - 7 days for the process.

For the rest of you, thanks for the continued posts and I would highly suggest for the short term to take these posts with a grain of salt until you speak with Dell yourself. Those who thought Bill was great or Bill was bad - in either case he is gone and his posts are now only good for those that want to pursue this past just Customer Care. Do your homework and spend the time on the phone, and document EVERYTHING - every call, time, Dell Rep name and Dell rep. ID. They all have one and don't accept that they don't. The logs may come in handy one day, if someone actually calls to thoroughly discss a resolution.

For those that are happy with the XPS 15 L521X as is, with or without porblems - one day I'll be there with you!!

 

Thought I would share another development with you. I rang up today for any new news and was told they had narrowed the problem down to low level driver issue with the Ivy Bridge HD graphics driver. So I went along with the tech and unistalled the old one and let him install the new one. Obviously i was very skeptical but to be fair its certainly improved things quite dramatically. No matter where in my house I go I now get a steady 16MB connection speed with the link speed never dropping below 150mbps. He told me this had fixed 100% of the systems they have tried it on. The driver was only released yesterday but I was unable to download it myself so he had to do it for me.

 

Do you have to "uninstall" the old driver? Can't you just download the new driver and let it update (overwrite) the existing driver?

If it's better to unistall the old driver can someone post a procedure please (I'm nervous about hardware not working if I unistall the driver)

 

They have! looks like progress . Maybe Dell are working on a new BIOS (that actually fixes the problems) and have realized that A09 just doesn't cut it.

 

has anyone been able to download the new drivers? would be nice to download this if it does fix the wifi (even if i find it ok now since the new wifi driver)

 

Hi guys

Recently I have been thinking about getting an XPS 15. I haven't been able to go through the entire thread (324 pages...), but I did read quite a fair bit of it.
I just have a few questions for current owners of this laptop, if thats ok.

Wifi. The wifi issue appears to be the major problem on this model. A few pages back a member seemed to have pointed out that the problem should not exist for those produced after 12th Sep.
For those who are suffering from the poor wifi, whats the adaptor model on yours? Is it the XPS model or is it the Intel Centrino N 6235?
The Australian website states that the XPS 15 comes with the Intel Centrino N 6235...does that mean it is safe to buy it now?

Pixel grid. Is it on SOME units or is it on ALL units? What i mean is, say if I get an XPS 15 that has obvious pixel grid problems, I can always exchange it for a good one?

Refunds? If the wifi doesnt work, am I entitled to a refund? The gentleman (SureFix) mentioned he had no luck with it on the last page...has anyone had any luck tho?
Or, if I were to call up and talk to one of the reps, do you think I'd be able to make him/her guarantee a refund should the wifi issue exist? (of course I will write down the time and ID)

In general, despite the wifi problem, would you say this is a good laptop to go for? I love the look of it and I heard the craftsmanship on this model is impressive. The FHD screen seems to be great too.
I do not like the weight tho...2.7kg? thats a bit of a let down, but I think I can tolerate it.
Is there anything else you guys hate about this laptop?

I am probably gonna order it by 4th Oct. There is a deal going on in Australia where an i7 + 8GB ram + Nvidia 640 2gb DDR5 goes for $1600 AUD ($400 off).
Or would that be Dell trying to get rid of the old faulty units?

 

I have it, and I would say in most respects it is very nice. It is a beautiful build, and I love the aluminum-and-glass construction. However, if I were you I would wait a while if I could. Don't take chances with getting one with a WiFi issue; it's just not worth the trouble. I suspect there is light at the end of the tunnel and Dell will get them straightened out, but it is too expensive to take chances. If we are lucky, maybe it will just be improved drivers and BIOS that fixes it... I hope.

Mine has "sorta ok" wireless because I basically only use it in the house fairly near a router anyway, so I don't have as much of a constraint as many others do, luckily. But I can understand the anger, and if I really needed better wireless coverage I would probably be irate. As far as the "pixel grid" I really don't see it, so either I have a later model with and improved screen, or it's subtle and not a real big deal. Just hang on a bit and I think it will end up a great machine.

 

Thanks for your reply!

Oh right may I also ask about the noise and heat?
Is it quick noisy sometimes? (idle/fully pushed)
Coz I have a very low tolerance for noise...my sister has a dell inspiron and it makes this high pitch clicking noise. (very very mild my sister says she can hardly hear it) That drives me crazy. Fan noise is another thing that pisses me off some much. like, A LOT. (I'm kind of a weirdo on this matter)

Heat on the other hand is less of a concern to me. Still, i suppose it'd annoying putting your palms on a very warm machine for a long time...

Yeh I agree with you. Ideally I will wait for the wifi thing to be officially resolved before I buy one. However the problem is (1) that $400 off discount is on valid until 4th Oct and frankly, I think thats probably as cheap as it will ever get. (2) The primary reason why I need this laptop is because I will be working away for 3 months in late Nov. I think I should definitely get the laptop at least a month before I depart, as shipping takes time, and should anything goes wrong, warranty takes time too.

 

Just to update what's happening on the three Dell XPS 15 L521X laptop replacements I just received. Besides all 3 having perfect screens and wifi, two of them are fine when it comes to CPU, however the third is not functioning correctly when attempting to play games. So, HWInfo64 revealed to me that the two good laptops while playing games had fluctuating CPU core's where each cpu core was jumping from 1.1 to 2.9 etc (these are the good laptops, preserving heat generation working as intended). The bad laptop does not do this, instead during gameplay the cores just all stick at 2.9ghz with no fluctuation what so ever causing heat to be a problem. Now of course I fixed this myself by using ThrottleStop, disabling DB ProcHot on the CPU and setting a perm multipler of 23 (2.3ghz). This made games run stable on it without temperatures exceeding 95c and causing a random massive fps drop every 10 seconds due to heat (and a dysfunctional CPU).

Anyhow, I'll be giving the escalations manager a call first thing Monday to arrange a replacement for this one problematic laptop. The funny thing is this. When I received the 3 laptops, the two good and perfect ones had this "Blue One" sticker on the shipping boxes, where as the one with the problem did not have this on the box.

 

If you are purchasing, make sure you purchase an XPS 15 laptop that does NOT say "ships next business day". This is most likely old stock and you may end up being plagued with the CPU throttling issue, WiFi problems and possibly the grid screen. Secondly purchase it directly from Dell and not some Dell outlet store or reseller as they also may have old stock. What you want is a fresh system built from Dell's manufacturing line. I recently just got 3 of them a few days ago, they have none of the problems others described except one has a problem with cpu throttling which I can fix manually using ThrottleStop program as an interim measure. Meanwhile I'm organizing to get in touch with the same person that replaced my original Dell XPS 15 L502X laptops with these L521X laptops to replace this one faulty one I have received.

As for weight, you can't really expect much. 2.7kg is light for a 15.6 laptop of this build quality. The exterior design is FAR from flimsy and is built tough. Well and truly worth it! Previously I had a 15.6" Sony and after that a 15.6" Dell XPS 15 (the L502X) model. Both of these laptops are heavier than the new XPS 15 L521X.

My family just had a big gaming session on the L521X playing guild wars 2 for 5 hours, was great! Medium graphical settings on it's native res of 1920x1080 getting over 80fps. Again, as per my previous post, one of them had constant fps spikes every 10 seconds, but this is a defect with the CPU in that one and it not throttling correctly. But again was no major drama, I used the program ThrottleStop to rectify that. But the overall fix, that one is going back to Dell while they give me a replacement.

The L521X is totally worth it. Mac lovers will bag you out though

 

I have also *heard* here on NBR several times that if you have ordered from Dell in the past (possibly even if you haven't and are nice), you may be able to get a discount IF YOU PHONE IN YOUR ORDER. In other words, you can haggle on the phone with a live person. That's the story I have heard, but I cannot vouch for it, as I haven't done it myself. If you have already found a special deal on one, then probably you'd better just go for it as you see it. In my personal opinion, it's a pretty awesome unit, and if you are in a "civilized" location with good WiFi and a router nearby, then even if you get one with less-than-ideal wireless, you will probably be ok. My wireless could be better, but it really isn't bad enough to cause me any trouble.

I am following-up at the driver download site at Dell, and they have updated several drivers already and probably will continue to do so. If you buy one after all, be sure to keep checking for improved drivers. Dell has been getting somewhat of a bruising from customers so far on this machine, so they are posting updates actively.

One thing I nearly forgot to mention is that this machine will not come with an OS recovery disk (unlike other machines in the recent past), so if you are like me and want a squeaky-clean operating system install without any other junk, you need to call tech support and request the "real" operating system disk; they will send it to you if you request it. If you don't do that, you will only be able to recover to a factory image of the system as they built it, using their recovery software and the recovery partition.

 

5 hours while gaming? My battery life goes down to 50% from 100 after less than an hour..

 

Thanks guys!

Everyone seems to be happy about it in general, I think I will get it.
I have checked the Australian Dell Website, and the model I'm gonna order hasn't got "in stock for fast delivery" on it and it would take around 11-17 working days to deliver. First time in my life I am glad that shipping is slow. lol

XPS 15 laptop details

I will definitely go for customise too, just to make sure. There isn't any hardware configuration options tho.

Before I go for it, I am gonna call up tmr and try to make one of the reps guarantee a refund should the wifi be bad. I will record the time of the call and the rep's ID just in case.

Thanks again guys! Will let you know when it arrives.

 

I might be a little late on this homerchiu, but check out the refurbished XPS 15 systems ( Pre-configured New Systems - XPS Laptop | Dell Australia) this is what I purchased. Mine is a full spec i7 machine that I got for $1200; Dell's discounts wont get anywhere near that for a loooong time. Still comes with 12 month warranty and I've had no wifi issues whatsoever.

 

Thanks!

I had a quick look...unfortunately nothing that suits me :/
There are a few XPS 15 units but they are all "slightly scratched". Although the price is really really amazing (more than $400 cheaper than new), it's just not what I have in mind.

btw, now that i think about it, I AM actually an existing customer of DELL. I ordered my sister's inspiron online last year. Also, I ordered another desktop for my aunt from DELL HK last year too. Would I get a better price for this? Hummmmm I will definitely try it on the phone tmr!

Do you guys have covers on yours? I am kinda worried I will have scratches all over that flawlessly beautiful aluminium surface in a few days...

 

Its updated pretty regularly. The unit I got was scratch free; and I also think it may be the reason I haven't had any wifi issues... For me, I was willing to wait a week or so to get one that was suitable and save an extra ~$400 on top of the "discount" that seems to pop up every now and then.

 

Homerchiu - just to be clear. Dell WOULD process a refund, but I wanted a replacement - which is what has been the bad experience. However if I waited for the refund, the sale here would be off and Dell said they could not honor the sale price if I returned it for a refund - in order to buy a non broken one.

Definitely good luck, I haven't really used mine - but the poor performance of the wifi would affect me as I tend to travel and if it was bad at home close to the router...out on the travel would be horrible.

Keep us informed on your result.

 

Regarding the earlier post that the "fix" for the Wifi issue is an Ivybridge HD graphics driver update, an updated dated Sep 26 (8.15.10.2778 A01) is available on the Dell Support page, however clicking on the "download" button results in a "Sorry, the requested file cannot be downloaded." The earlier post did mention the Dell service tech had to download the driver from a special location (the Dell FTP site perhaps?)

 

I tried the new video drivers from the dell site both marked urgent. I also installed a while back the 15.3 intel 6235 drivers marked urgent. My WIFI is still the same. None of these drivers made any difference to the WIFI performance on my l521x. I uninstalled the previous drivers in each case before loading the new ones.

I am also on Bios A09 which I notice Dell has pulled from the site. Obviously they had issues or would not have pulled it. Thanks again Dell! Hopefully there will be a new one coming out to address the issues for those that did update to A09.

 

It seems to be working now as i have downloaded and installed it. But per my previous post it did nothing for my WIFI issues here.

 

I just downloaded the drivers about 5 min. ago .

 

Hi everyone,
I found the new drivers here:

ftp://ftp.dell.com/pages/Drivers/Laptops/XPS/XPS 15 (L521x)/index.html

Anyway, no difference about wifi on my machine... I've tried various combination of drivers with no luck. I have 4 days to return the notebook. It would be interesting to know if it's true that after the 12th september wifi on newly produced notebook is fine. Tomorrow I'll call tech support asking some info and if they can send me a replacement (a new one, not refurbished). If not, I'll return it for a refund...

PS sorry for my horrible english!)

 

I tried from the beginning to get a replacement and I was told it requires 2 visits from a technician before they will even consider it. so good luck

 

Can you share the actual version number of the driver they installed for you? I wonder if it is the one on their site from 9/26 or if it is even newer.

Sorry this was meant for Marshall1975, apparently my phone didn't want to quote properly.

 

Thanks! Well, I'm inside the "return window" so if they refuse to replace it, I'll just send it back for a FULL refund. Overall the notebook is awesome for my needs, I'll be happy to order another one in the near future IF they fix the wifi issue....

 

I ordered mine today so when i receive it i will update you guys

 

The driver version he installed for the Intel HD graphics was 8.15.10.2778

 

I have that version installed and my WIFI is far from perfect but definetly better than it was on my original machine
Can be found here Drivers and Downloads | Dell [United States]