XPS 15 (L521X) Owner's Lounge

ppl need to keep in mind that the sales reps probably have strong incentive to sell units, and service and support is not in their issue, I'd bet there's now correlation to a salesperson vs the number of returns or service calls.

the support ppl are also probably under incentive to close open cases, kind-of like how most software shops deal with bug "how can we close this defect report" instead of "how can we fix the bug".

of course, I may just be cynical.

 

Guys, stupid question: does the attached file show some throtteling (recorded while 30 min. of playing BF3)?

 

The GPU is throttling the whole time between 405-607. Max is 745 I believe. The CPU core you included (#0) is fine. The temps are pretty high too.

That's a lot better than the stats were like on the older BIOS I had access too. Still not a gaming machine by any stretch of the imagination.

 

But wouldn't I be unable to play BF3 then?
Could it be that HWInfo only records the Intel HD4000?

 

All drivers properly installed, BF3 should end up serviced by the 640m automatically. Look like it was from the log.

Fwiw, the hd4000 may be able to handle it to some degree - I haven't tried though.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

 

Thanks for posting your experience. Dell came & swapped out my display/antenna but there was no difference in WiFi performance at long-range. I'll ask them to bring out a replacement 6235 card and a new 1901 card to try next. I hate to lose that WiDi potential in the 6235 but I don't care about that - I'd rather have better WiFi range anyway since everything else is great for my normal usage.

 

Hi, I am just waiting for my XPS 15 (L521x) to be delivered. Can someone please confirm that the built-in 32GB mSATA can be replaced (e.g. with a 256GB mSATA) so that I can install the OS and programs in the new mSATA? I hope the built-in mSATA is not used for caching only.

This can potentially save me from buying an optical drive caddy and SATA III SSD and not compromising losing the optical drive.

Thanks.

 

Yes it can be replaced. Its a simple swap for the one fitted with the new one you have bought. I put a Crucial M4 in and it took all of 5 mins. You have to make sure once you have done it you set it to AHCI in the bios.

 

I am just wondering because the MHZ rates are typical for the Intel HD4000, right?
And HWInfo shows in the front end the Intel HD4000 as soon as I open it (even when BF3 is running in the background).

 

Battery Life Update:

I was recently informed by a Dell representative that the maximum expect battery life for this system is now 4 hours. So much for 6+ hours.

 

So, like, maybe 3 hours in real use.

 

I can confirm that.
But what is consuming so much power? Other systems with this specs have longer battery usage times.

 

It is straight-forward to replace the 32gb mSATA with a larger mSATA and do a clean install onto it - it may work to "migrate" the pre-installed OS onto it but I have not tried - I was going to do a clean install of Win 8 no matter where it went.

The factor 32Gb mSATA is used for cache AND hibernation partition - but if you first deactivate then uninstall all of the intel smart response tech leaving only the intel WiFi, Bluetooth, and display drivers, then if you NEED to reboot from the old installation you will be able to, without trashing the new device contents.

You will also need to change the bios "SATA Operation" setting (under Advance) from "intel smart response technology" to "AHCI" in order to use the mSATA the way you want and boot from the mSATA SSD.

Note that this will prevent the old OS install from booting but switching it back to "intel" mode will enable the old OS to boot (and does not require reinstallation of the rapid start / etc drivers) and as long as you don't do anything to the device in the old version of Windows you will be able to toggle the BIOS setting back and boot from the SSD again.

Leaving the BIOS setting in AHCI will not affect your ability to USE the contents of the hard drive from the OS installed on the SSD.

There's quite a bit of discussion about it if you search around, but one safe-path for doing what you want boils down to..

- make USB key with Windows installer on it, or make a DVD with Windows installer on it (I used USB)
- deactivate/uninstall intel storage / acceleration drivers (including management interface) from old OS
- backup old os using either Windows Backup or Dell backup, to make a restoration image and bootable CD/DVD "just in case"
- power down machine
- remove bottom of machine, take out mSATA, put in new mSATA, put on bottom of machine
- power up - press F2 to go into BIOS setup
- change "SATA Operation" to "AHCI" under "Advance"
- reboot - press F2 to go back into BIOS setup
- on "Boot" page, under "Legacy Boot" set Boot Type Order to list "Hard Disk Drive" first then under "Hard Disk Drive" set "mini SSD" before "Hard Drive"
- if going to use UEFI then on the "Boot" page set "Add Boot Options" to "Last", "Boot List Option" to UEFI"
- Press F10 to save and exit bios
- insert your boot/install media (usb or cd/dvd - you can NOT use the SD card reader, FYI)
- reboot - press F12 to go to the boot options menu, select your boot/install device to boot from and press enter
- proceed to install

I've posted a link to a dell-blog entry on the clean-reinstall advice that has been officially given, in the Win8 installation thread.

The only thing I'd say in addition to that is

- install win 8 completely, do not install any dell drivers initially
- let win 8 do all updates from MS as desired
- then one at a time install/reboot/check windows update for more, reboot as necessary

I only have a subset of the win8 drivers installed on my machine, my machine works fine and has no surprise issues* - was originally the stock July edition i7/32Gb SSD/750Gb HDD/8Gb RAM config, I have bumped ram to 16 Gb and have replaced the mSATA with a Mushkin 120 Gb device I got from Newegg.

- dell/intel chipset
- dell freefall sensor
- dell intel video
- dell intel wifi & bluetooth
- dell nvidia
- dell quickset
- dell trackpad

( still seems like a lot to me )

My cold boot time is on the order of 9-14 seconds, my wake-from-sleep is essentially instant, my wake-from-hibernation is on the order of 10 seconds and is what I use mostly when "shutting down". I have the machine configured to sleep when closing the lid, and hibernate when pressing the power button.

*known l521x issues I have: sub-optimal WiFi - probably - but I routinely get 70-100 Mbps u/d at home up to ~10 meters range from the router (D-Link DIR-655), and stable access through my house and at the few wifi hotspots I hit, so I don't really care much beyond that. As a computer nerd I'd love to test it faster, but in the digital backwaters that I live within I don't have access to a network that is at/above 10Mbps maximal anyway. This is not a work machine, nor do I travel much.

 

It's also typical for a throttled nvidia 640M - "rated" speed is only 625 Mhz, but will go to turbo max of about 704 Mhz, and I have seen mine as slow as 405 Mhz (or so) in testing.

The Intel HD 4000 GPU has a range of 650 Mhz to 1.1 Ghz (for the i7 3612QM CPU) which is an interesting contrast to the 640M's range if you ask me.

NVIDIA GeForce GT 640M - Notebookcheck.net Tech

intel hd 4000 gpu (note: note on the mobile 3612qm though)

Intel HD Graphics 4000 Benchmarked - Notebookcheck.net Reviews

Intel page on the i7 3612QM

ARK | Intel® Core

 

In regards to the WiFi issue yesterday I received the new display with DW1901 wireless card but the drivers (Win 8) are not installing on my Win 7 machine. I thought some have reported that the Win 8 driver would work on Win 7? Dell is looking into this now.

 

@Marshall
@c0derbear

Thanks so much!

 

I've done more exhaustive WIFI testing with my new L521X full replacement unit (Windows 8, 1901) I received via Terry, and I'm happy to report improvement. The new laptop clearly is performing better than the old one. By performing I mean download speeds as my standard test using speedtest.net. What I found is that at my house, where I have an old Linksys wireless router, performance is marginally better, but still struggles at further distances where other laptops/phones have no issue. I went to a relative's house with a new router that supports 802.11n, and with that active, the new laptop had download speeds twice that of the old laptop, even at long distances. Still didn't match an iPhone's wifi anywhere, but still pretty good. I also noticed that on the old laptop, the speed of the connection bounced all over the place the further I went away from the router. At my relative's house, it locked at 54Mbps everywhere, even at long distance. I think I am ready to call the wifi performance on the new machine acceptable, and am going to upgrade to a new wireless router that supports 802.11n.

 

Did you test with big file downloads within your local network only? could you provide some figures about your wifi rates?

Thanks.

 

Just looking on Dell's website for drivers and saw that there is possibly a new BIOS. It is still A12 but it says it was uploaded today so I guess it is new?

 

I don't know why the date is updated, but so far the file is the same as I downloaded weeks ago - using MD5 digest check on both files yields the same signature value '71ed12083f239cb91483d6e39a399240'

 

I did not try local network only, just speedtest.net. At my relative's house with the newer wireless router, one floor up from the wireless router and I was getting download speeds of 25Mpbs on the new laptop, 12 Mbps on the old laptop. With 802.11n I was getting 35Mpbs on the new laptop, 25Mbps on the old laptop. Moving two floors up from the wireless router and on the far side of the house (as far as I could get away within the house), with 802.11n I was getting 11Mbps new laptop, the old laptop couldn't even complete the test.

 

Will dell decline support for my system (with 3 year warranty) if I updated windows (clean install) to windows 8?

 

we are still waiting for an wifi fix and it has been like 6 months argh...does anyone have any updates at all or any official word? And did dell look into the screen grid issue?

 

That was my experience. I called for help with issues with the BIOS and Windows 8 drivers after upgrading, and was told that Dell would only support hardware now, that they were not legally liable to support anything more due to the upgrade from Windows 7 to Windows 8, and that I would have to call Microsoft for support. After contacting Terry B at Dell, I ended up getting a new L521X, in i7 with Windows 8 installed, and much better WiFi (so far, crossing my fingers) I am still testing every feature and function, and so far, so good.

 

Got my system today. Finally ordered one on Friday when the model I had my eye on got marked down by $200. Actually, it arrived...the 27th...I guess this is the early morning of the 29th. It is the $1699 model (was marked down to $1499) with W8 pre-installed and the 1901 card.

I like the way it looks overall but already knew that I would.
I've had no wifi problems whatsoever. In fact, I get a consistent 24-25 mbps at any spot in my apartment as opposed to my L502X's 20mbps. It is just a one-bedroom apartment, though. Most I can go in here is ~15-20 feet from the router. But it's great.
Audio is naturally sad compared to the L502X, but I don't really care as I will be wearing headphones most of the time.
No touchpad problems.
No problems with screen touching keyboard.
Installed and ran Guild Wars 2 for about 15 minutes. Maxed out settings and got about 20 fps. Matched the modest settings that I had on the L502X to get 30 fps and got upwards of 40 fps. No throttling, but it was only for about 15 mins, like I said.
Screen. Ah, the screen. I knew I was downgrading from the L502X. I knew there were common complaints about gridlines. I was fine with what I saw at first. I could tell the lines were there, but it really didn't bother me. They are gotten used to in a matter of minutes. However, images, particularly photos, were rather pixelly. Unacceptably so. I switch from sublime color or whatever it's called to generic color, and it does help...at the cost of some color. But it's acceptable. I can get used to it. What is not acceptable, however, is the obvious blemish near the center of the screen on my unit. It's like ink was spilled then smeared...on the inside of the glass. If you can call it glass. Whatever. It's on the inside. Cannot remove. Don't want a tech out with his hands and tools all over a brand new $1500 machine, so I put in a return request and for them to send me a new unit.

So...system is fine, the only issue I'm even remotely experiencing amongst those commonly discussed is the screen being disappointing, but I really think it's okay outside of that blemish. Just requires getting used to after using the B+RG on the L502X for over a year. Perhaps I'm crazy for wanting to try my luck on a replacement system due to the screen blemish after receiving one that has perfectly fine wifi. But, what can I say, I live life on the edge.

Edit: I actually don't care much for W8, either, but that's not the system's fault. I think it's another thing that will require getting used to is all, though. So far, it's been a lot of "Where the hell is [program/folder]?" and "Ugh, stop switching to the start screen!"

 

You can disable the metro start screen, that should help.

 

Hi,
received mine new one yesterday, posted some wifi results in the other thread.

 

i'd advocate working with the new layout for 1-2 weeks before turning off stuff.

In my personal experience the new start screen has just become a discrete view of a different set of apps - it's not in my way at all.

I have a license for start8 from Stardock (that I tested out in a test version of win8 within a virtual machine before I reinstalled) but have yet to use it on my final install, and probably won't.

 

wifi performance data point

I was at my wife's college last night (King's College, Wilkes-Barre PA) and ran some network perf tests on my l521x using speedtest.net

Machine spec: "July" L521X, i7, 16 Gb RAM, Win8 Pro, Dell WiFi & Display drivers, OS on 120Gb mSATA SSD, running on battery in power-saver profile, wifi transmitter at max send power.

Connection spec: 6235 WiFi connected "802.11a" according to Win8 task manager, WAP *not* in same room. 25 WLAN's detected by inSSIDer, the strongest at about -70 RSSI, the "KC" net I was connected to was at -75 RSSI.

I ran the test six times. Ping ranged from 10-35 ms. Download ranged from 12 to 14.7 Mbps. Upload hovered around 7 Mbps.

Color me pleasantly surprised. It's the first out-of-house test I have had chance to run since putting on Win 8.

 

IDK if the college test was a fair assessment. Usually colleges have good wifi signals due to the use of repeaters. So you're never a great distance from a repeater. I'm in college and I haven't really been able to test wifi speeds at a distance greater than 10m because there's a router everywhere. I've been getting 20+ mbps upload download for a while on the 6325 but I know the card has issues because it has worse connectivity than my roommate's samsung chronos and mine loses connectivity sometimes when there is someone standing behind me and I'm around a wall.


HMM strange. Just updated wireless drivers from 15.00 to 15.3.1 and the speed dropped significantly at the same spot.

 

Looks like he connected via 5.8ghz (.11a) which is almost always going to be better. I believe this Dell/Intel Wifi problem is with 2.4ghz wifi only (too much internal interference from usb 3.0 etc).

 

It's strange though. I updated to 15.3 and my speeds went to a crawl, under 1 mbps. Whereas before the update, I had a steady 10-20mbps in the same spot. I now rolled back the driver and system restored and the same slower speeds are still there.

 

What did you tell Terry B? How did you manage to get a replacement?

 

After a month long delay, I finally got the replacement LCD for dead pixel issue. (I still remember Dell rep asking me to look for dead pixels after turning off the system....)

Tech came and replaced it. Screen looks amazing....... but he busted my sound card AND laptop casing....

 

I will need to see if I can disable 5mhz and retry next time.


Sent from my brain using neurons fueled by glucose

 

Now my system will not boot. This is my second time trying to power up the machine, ever. I didn't do anything out of the ordinary last time, either. Just explored W8 some, browsed online some, and installed and played a game for about 15 mins (Guild Wars 2). I did not perform any updates or make any changes except to change to generic color mode... I shut it down properly. But now it won't boot. Sits there at the Dell logo forever. If I hold F8, I can run setup and diagnostics utilities, but as soon as I'm out of those, it's back to sitting at the Dell logo forever.

This now on top of the blemished screen is making me think they sent me a lemon. If so, I guess their QC is either incompetent or nonexistent.

I'm surprised that I didn't experience any of the infamous wifi problems in the couple of hours I was using it yesterday.

 

I've had exactly the same problem, but as I had to replace the HDD (because Dell is exchanging my XPS), I removed the m-Sata module and the HDD, put only an old HDD, disable in the Bios all Intel XXX technologies and the UEFI, and then, I was able to install W8 and the computer now starts normally.

 

I had this the day after I got my computer. The BIOS went bad (or something) I took it back to Microcenter and they rebuilt the BIOS and that fixed it. Not sure how to actually go about fixing it, but that is what they said they did.

 

Possibly just using F2 to get into bios setup, reset everything, verify any special settings, and go.

Hard way would be to pop the bottom off and disconnect both the main and CMOS batteries for about 30s - that for SURE will reset the bios to default settings (and the black screen beeping on 1st power on afterwards is normal, FYI).

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

 

I posted this in the other thread, but I fixed it by changing the BIOS Operation in the advanced setup menu from Intel Smart Response to AHCI, saving and rebooting, then back again to Intel Smart Response.

 

So many problems with this machine, why is anybody reading this thread buying this machine? It makes no sense!!?!!!
I keep checking back here to see if the problems are resolved yet, and all I find are more and more people complaining of issues who were reading this thread and bought the laptop anyway??? Even though you knew there were known problems with this laptop???? Is there a word for this madness?

 

anyone running it with a 120Hz external screen via displayport ?

Also: How hard is it to add a 128gb Crucial by myself?

And as I need ~12-16GB RAM: What modules are in there? And how many slots?

Thanks !

 

The word is stupid. Take a look at how much the used models are selling for. I just found one on Craigslist in perfect condition for $800. I have gone through 2 with no luck.

I just sold my $200 ssd and bought an Asus UX51vz. Pretty much the same price for a much better laptop. Try reading their owners forum to find out.

 

My machine came with two 4gb sticks, upgrading to 16gb was not difficult but was pains-taking as one stick is under the main board so the machine needs be mostly disassembled to get to it.

If you are replacing the msata sad that is not a big deal. If you are going to use it for boot-drive you need ton change the bios from 'Intel acceleration' to 'ahci' though.

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

 

After so many posts nothing actally happened. There is no real fix to the problem.
BTW DELL's QC is really sh*ty -- Just one exampple, if your machine runs out of battery and shuts off, next time when you boot it up, it says something like your battery is critically low, 'press F1 to continue, press F2 to run setup the utility', yes, it says 'to run setup the utility'.

 

For no good reason i picked up a Bigfoot Killer-N 1202 and replapa ced the 6235 in my machine.

For light testing in the 2.4 band, my throughput is about double...with wpa disabled throughput bangs on to 100 Mbps u/d pretty reliably (transferring m4v data).

Enabling wpa drops throughput by about 30%.

I'm pretty sure my router (d-link dir-655) is the limiter at this point.

 

I returned my Windows 7 version and ordered the Windows 8 version. If the Wifi fixed, then I'll be happy otherwise it will be returned as well. I'll report results soon.

But when I had the Windows 7 machine, only my Wifi download was bad. I always got 10 Mbit/s upload no matter where I tested it inside or outside my home.

Anyone else have the same issue where only download speeds are slow?

 

I usually got better rates sending over receiving with the 6235...I assume unit was derived from supporting WiDi.


Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk 2

 

Hi there, I'm still not able to post detailed results, but I must say to me, this v2 is a strong improvement in the wifi area. I'm nearly able to play a 720p video stored on my nas which was not possible at all with the v1.

I'm still running the Intel 6235, my wifi rate never gets below 20 Mb/s where is was around 6/7 with the v1, this test in a download on my lan, no internet. Weirdly, I get better results when the channel width for 2.4 GHz is set to 20 Mhz and not "Auto". In that case, I sometimes get rates up to 35 Mb/s at 5m from my router. But I have to say the results are very sensitive, they move a lot but always at an acceptable level.

Of course, the v2 is still far behind my wife's old MacBook Pro. In the following days, I'll do more testing with another wifi adapter, Ubuntu, etc.

 

So is that a good option to get my wifi working better? I have no option for a wired connection and have had this machine far to long for a return. so since Dell chooses to do nothing then I will fix it myself and NEVER by another Dell machine