XPS 15 (L521X)(2nd version) Owner's Lounge (Windows 8/Wifi 1901/ i7 3632QM)

Hi,
I received my new L521x yesterday, and I made some testing in the evening with W8. Mine still runs the Intel 6235N, and I have to test more to be sure, but a preliminary conclusion is there is a strong improvement in the wifi area. The rate is the double compared to the L521x v1, but still far from my wife's 2006 Macbook Pro. I'll do some testing with Ubuntu as well to check if this improvement only comes from the software side or is hardware related.

I'll post my spreadsheet with final results as soon as I can.

Some strange things now, not related to the wifi, is I run it the first time and did the W8 init, run some testing and shutdown the PC. Now, it refuses to start!

 

Little question for owners who runs W8. When I say the XPS doesn't start anymore, let me explain a bit. The PC starts (the screen is on, I clearly hear the DVD drive startup noise), I see the Dell logo and...nothing more.

When I run the XPS for the first time, below the Dell logo there was a kind of bullets circle, thing we find everywhere in the digital world to say "I'm working". Is the abscence of such a widget an indication about the cause of the problem? The XPS is just "out of the box", no change in the Bios.

Thanks.

 

I don't pretend to be current on the windows boot sequence at this point, but I'd guess some base boot loader / driver handoff / HAL initialization is locking up.

I'm assuming you don't have any media loaded (dvd or usb) and no external devices connected, I've seen systems that failed to boot because of that.

It's one of the reasons I make sure the device boot order for me is always HDD (or SSD) before anything else ... if I want to boot from dvd/usb I need to manually intervene.

I guess you could boot install media (if you have it) and try to run a repair. *shrug*

Have you turned up anything via web search for diagnosing windows 8 boot failures?

 

I posted about this in the other thread (and I keep seeing people commenting about having posted in "the other thread," why do we need two threads?), but mine is also frozen at the Dell logo, and it's only my second attempt ever to boot it up.
I'm not in a hurry to figure out what the problem is, though, as I'm awaiting a return authorization anyway due to a bad display.
No wifi problems, at least (in fact, it's better than my L502X), but I haven't tested it beyond 20 feet from the router which is as far as I can go in my apartment.

Edit: Well, it boots up now. Changed the SATA Operation in the BIOS Advanced settings to AHCI instead of Intel Smart Response then changed it back to ISR.

 

Finally I made it work. As Dell is coming to get the previous machine, I had to replace the HDD to keep my data.

I put an old HDD in the XPS, but I had some troubles to start from the DVD. Then, in the Bios, I disabled all the stuff about the Intel technologies, and all the UEFI stuff too. The XPS started from the DVD, I was able to install W8 without trouble on this old HDD.

Thanks c0derbear for the help.

 

so that's two machine reports of dead-boot with win8 on board. Not a large enough sample to make a kerfluffle over, but still worth minding.

guess I dodged a bullet by going with the larger msata ssd to host my os.

happy to help out, when I can.

 

I've seen the message on the other thread too. I would not surprised to see this coming from a wrong UEFI config in the XPS Bios. But I don't want to spend like on this as I only use this W8 HDD for Bios updates and wifi testing.

 

I'm sure this will help someone in the future with out having to go fishing.

 

I solved the "A required CD/DVD drive device driver is missing," issue. I downloaded the 64-bit IRST F6 drivers from Intel, and unzipped them onto a thumb drive. When the error popped up I clicked Browse and selected the thumbdrive. It installed the drivers and I was able to continue the install.

 

I'm beginning to have an issue with key impression(dirt/grease on the screen when opening the laptop, clearly the keys are being depressed by the screen when the laptop is closed..... utter b.s. really. It's understandable how this could get by beta with the first v1, but after 9 months of beta plus commercial testing and knowing of the issue one would think they decided to respect the user and FIX it...

 

anyone else have this issue? or insight?

updated intel 4000 video card (through windows update, probably shouldn't have)...

restarted after, normally. then this morning I powered laptop on and the brightness controls wouldn't work and coincidentally the touchpad was not functioning, this was a first since owning this so far... managed to roll back intel driver in device manager... immediately the mouse and screen brightness started working

 

Can someone with the Windows 8 version of the L521X please let me know if they have any problems with the laptop overheating while playing games? I still have the Windows 7 version and it idles anywhere from 50c to 70c and within minutes of launching a game it hits 85c or more and starts beeping.

 

It may be helpful to know what the ambient room temps are.

 

Typically around 21°C.

 

Hello

I am new to this forum but I have been following the xps 15 threads since I found the same problems many people have with their "premium" XPS15. As I am not a computing expert and as I could not find an answer to my problem I am posting my situation here hoping someone can help me solve it. It will be greatly appreciated.

I have got a XPS L521X with a 750 GB HDD + 32GB SSD. It came originally with win7 and recently I updated it to win 8 via the simple win 8 update procedure. It starts as it came, with bios.

Recently win 8 crashed helplessly and it won't start even trying to start it in safe mode. When It tries to start only loads a blue screen suggesting to use the recovery disk to fix the problem. I booted the recovery disk and tried to do that, but the recovery program cannot find the drive C: where the SO is installed to start recovering windows (cannot find any hard drive at all, the HDD nor the SSD). I suppose it is related to the Intel SRT and the dual disk the machine comes with.

1 I would like to know how to use the recovery disk having a setup like the mentioned above. Do I have to change something in the setup?


2 If recovering win 8 is not possible, how do I re install the image disks of win 7 I created before the upgrade?


I tried to recover the image by first booting the win7 installation disk that came with the laptop and then inserting the image disk as required but it shows an error.

Also tried to recover win 7 from scratch to then recover the image but it cannot find the HDD to do it either.

Any help with this will be very welcome. Happy and prosperous 2013 for you all.

Thank you in advance for your help.

Oswald

 

if i get this model, can i replace the 32gb caching sdd with a crucial 256 sdd msata ( Amazon.com: Crucial m4 256GB mSATA Internal Solid State Drive CT256M4SSD3: Computers & Accessories) and use it as the boot drive?

If i buy a refurb from someone, would i be able to get warranty from dell?

 

A. Yes you can make the mSATA the boot drive. Uses drive in AHCI mode setting in bios.

B. Dell refurbs from DFO come with warranty. Buying from 3rs party will likely NOT have a transferable warranty.


Sent from my brain using neurons fueled by glucose

 

Thanks for the info. one more laptop to add to my list before making a final decision.

 

Rmxo: before considering the xps 15 be sure to research and be comfortable with its wifi and CPU/GPU throttling limitations.


Sent from my brain using neurons fueled by glucose

 

I see several mentions of this new XPS-15 v2 machine having "throttling" issues. How exactly can I test for that to see if it is affecting my machine?
Note: I don't ever run games, so if that's the only time it may occur then I don't care.

 

Easiest way I knows is wPrime95 + FurrMark, monitored by FurrMark and hwInfo64.

hwInfo64 should show you the CPU's running up into boost (4 cores at ~2.8 Ghz, 1 core would be ~3.1Ghz, maybe a bit faster for the 3632QM cpu) and the 640M is in boost when over 700 Mhz.

If I run FurrMark alone the GPU will stay at like 704 Mhz, with wPrime95 also running it'll go down at/below 400 Mhz. That's GPU throttling kicking in.

 

What is the machine expected to do? Is it expected to run all 4 cores and the GPU at max power forever without automatically kicking in a slow-down? Is this a reasonable request for a laptop computer? Maybe a liquid-cooled desktop would be better, or at least a bigger Alienware laptop meant for gaming?

 

That is what I believe that is what some people want, and assumed, they were getting.

What I think is reasonable is that machine could run the cpu/gpu pair at full non-boost ( 2.1 Ghz CPU, 625 Mhz GPU ).

The machine management doesn't do that though, it favors the CPU to max boost over the GPU currently.

The initial release bios (a04) was opposite, favoring the GPU over the CPU.

 

That's exactly it, notebooks are sold under the idea that they will operate at their base clock and occasionally jump up to the boost clock. The L521x fails to do this, and quite often runs with the GPU or CPU clocked far lower. I don't think anyone was expecting Alienware performance out of it (which to me, is the computer running at max boost clock all the time).

It is however borderline criminal to advertise a computer as running at 2.1Ghz with a Geforce 640m that downclocks itself to be as fast as one that runs at 1.2Ghz with a Geforce 620m. That's why people are annoyed about this model, you're paying for good performance, but you're getting performance like you could get from any dime-store special computer. It's like buying a MacBook Pro and having it perform like a MacBook Air. If Apple did that it would be in every paper.

As a comparison, I bought an Alienware m14x R2 after this and not only does it always run at maximum boost clock, but there is a lot of headroom for overclocking and it never even really gets hot.

 

Mine runs as you describe, CPU running nominal through full boost as needed, but I don't do much that uses the GPU so the machine does not have heat contention to deal with.


Sent from my brain using neurons fueled by glucose

 

All L521X models suffer from Thottling, but only during gaming. When running the dGPU and CPU with decent work loads the thermal solution is brought to it's knees. This isn't faulty parts, it's poor engineering. I've had my v1 L521x headpipes, motherboard, fan and screen replaced (screen had dust particles inside it) and it didn't make a difference. I personally think it's criminal what Dell is doing with this laptop, mis-advertised if you will.

 

OK, this one is flat out false. I just received my L521X and I took a 15 inch ruler and placed it across the keyboard and the tops of the keys aren't coming anywhere close to the bottom edge of the ruler. The keyboard area is clearly recessed from the top surface of the rest of the laptop. What is happening to you is more likely that you are closing the laptop immediately after using it, and some heat is still escaping through the keyboard up onto the screen. I always carry a thin cloth (the one that came with my laptop) to protect the screen when having to close it hot (normally I try not to close it right away also). :thumbsup:

 

Is there actually a 2nd version?? if so how to determine this?

Thanks all

 

Only way I know to check is the CPU type, the original version was an i7 3612QM, latest version is i7 3632.

Dell has not published any other change, other than the default WLAN card and OS, and I've seen nobody do a comparative tear-down, but all indicators is that it was a pretty much least-effort running hardware change on Dell's part ... no significant redesign of the casing, wifi antenna or routing, and it uses the same display panel.

 

Yes, I have the i7 3632 version.

Why is the OS not installed on mSATA by dell? Is it easy DIY?

Thanks

 

If the mSATA is large enough, it's not a big deal but it's probably worth a clean install if you can do it.

I have a 120Gb mSATA SSD and I have it configured to put all my data files ( Documents, Pictures, Videos, Downloads, etc. ) on the HDD instead, to save space on the SSD. Let it have room for hibernation and swap file and plenty of free space ( SSD apparently works best for us consumers with 15~20% free space maintained / reserved ).

You COULD probably "move" an install but I think it's more robust in the long term to do the clean install.

I would not try to install Windows on anything less than 120 Gb, Windows would fit on 64 Gb and less but that would leave you with dang little space for applications.

No clue why Dell does it the way they do.

I could make wild assumptions but that's all they'd be, so I will refrain.

 

WiFi performance data point.

I recently moved to my router being an ASUS RT-AC66U. You could probably get relatively equivalent performance from the previous model "Black Night" which does not have 802.11ac support (which can't really be used now anyway).

I have a Bigfoot Killer-N 1202 in my L521X. I also have a NetGear WNDA3100v2, dual-band USB adapter.

With my previous router ( DLink DIR-655, 2.4 Ghz only ) the best I got at about !15 ft from the router was between 40-80 Mbps. Was better sending than receiving, oddly enough.

With my current router at the same location I get

Killer-N, 2.4 Ghz: ~150 Mbps down, ~150 Mbps up (20/40 Mhz channel width)
Killer-N, 5 Ghz: ~200 Mbps down, ~160 Mbps up (40 Mhz channel width)
WNDA3100v2, 2.4 Ghz, ~160 Mbps down, ~120 Mbps up (20/40 Mhz auto channel width )
WNDA3100v2, 5 Ghz, ~170 Mbps down, ~125 Mbps up (40 Mhz channel width)
Gb Ethernet wired: > 330 Mbps down, > 330 Mbps up (speed measurement limitation of Speedtest.net mini)

These tests were run using the Speedtest.net "mini" edition installed on a a Mac Mini, over a WPA-2 WLAN connection, using SSL to talk to the Mac. I assume that if you take away the crypto that rates would increase somewhat, possibly significantly. It's not worth my time to reconfigure things to test that though.

It's interesting not only for the overall increase, but the fact that the Killer-N is now able to outpace the Netgear at home by a reliable margin.

I had done some quick checks with my wife's Studio XPS 1645 last Friday, but had not finished 'tuning' the new router so can't share them. Maybe next week when she's back from CO I'll be able to do that and update this post. I would note that at the same location the Killer-N in the L521X was doing significantly better than the Intel 6235 in her SXPS 1645, regardless of 2.4 vs 5 ghz.

I now also get reliable connections at significantly higher ranges than with the DLink, but I haven't had time to truly quantify them.

 

Thanks, very much. Especially for your input. It's ironic though.. the whole 'flat' out deal you mention..

It's anything but flat.

Dell has fessed up to this and has no solution for this problem as far as I know.

The fact is I and numerous others have recorded(key-logger) multiple keys being pressed (not just one or two but like smashing your hand all over the keyboard...) when the laptop is closed... so .. yeah.. whatever you are deducing does not change the facts of poor experience which not only proves from that keys are touching the screen(software) and leaving imprints of dirt/grease and grime(physical evidence).. but that the keys are also being depressed when the laptop is closed...

It is funny though to see the idea this truth is 'flat out false'... thank you for the laugh.

 

I have 128GB of mSATA SSD and called Del today for help for installation and they did not help saying that it is not their standard installation procedure.

Can people like outline all the steps for people like us who have no experience or have the fear of screwing up. Dell is very less helpful.

Van we use the recovery disk and install. Will it detect the mSATA SSD? Will it detect 1TB HDD after install?

What are the drivers that should be loaded? Mine came with Dell's driver's disc for L521X.

Thanks

 

If the recovery disk is a Windows Installation DVD, then yes. If it's assuming the Dell restore partitions (which are hidden, and only on the factory HDD) then no.

Yes, all drives will be available after install on the SSD. Nothing special required for that.

The only tricky part for you will be getting the Windows 8 installation media, in either DVD or bootable USB form. You need that before you can proceed.

You will need to do some minor, but important, changes in the existing copy of Windows on the HDD - just to be safe - before you install. If you could get and post a screen grab of your system with the Disk Manager up I could tell for sure.

I am using BIOS, not UEFI, on my machine. In theory the machine could boot faster if I was using UEFI only, but a) I rarely reboot and b) it takes only 10-15 seconds now so I don't really care. Switching this after the fact is not really easy. My advice is to use the BIOS in whatever mode it is currently in, for simplicity. If your machine cam setup UEFI, leave it. If BIOS, leave it. Once Windows is running there really is not any significant difference.

Off the top of my head, which means I may or may not forget something, here's the outline. It's a bunch of steps, but they aren't really anything particularly difficult as long as you patiently go one-at-a-time...

Preparation

1. Un-install any Intel Rapid Start support in the current version of Windows (this is done to ensure it is NOT using any of the SSD, which if installed by Dell it IS, and when running Windows 8 off SSD you just do not need). Reboot when done.

2. Make sure you have all the required machine specific drivers from Dell. I would actually advocate spending the time to download them from the driver support site ( Drivers & Downloads | Dell US ) instead of relying on the DVD they sent, as it is likely out of date. Only get drivers for hardware you have, and get the hard-drive install versions. Note that every time you go back to the base page you must manually select Windows 8 before selecting a driver file to download. The site runs slow on my systems so be patient. Note that the file names are NOT intuitively useful, I would advocate getting one file at a time and renaming it accordingly so you know what it is from a directory listing.

3. Delete any existing partitions on the SSD, once the Intel drivers using it have been removed you should be able to delete any partitions on the SSD easily enough with the Disk Manager. Just don't touch your HDD.

BIOS configuration check

4. Verify that you can boot from your installation media ( USB or DVD )
- load media into machine
- reboot machine
- as soon as the Dell logo shows start pressing the F12 key to get the boot selection menu
- select your boot media and press ENTER

5. Verify that the BIOS SATA Operation is configured for AHCI mode ** if this is not the current setting, then this will prevent the HDD based Windows from booting, switching it back should re-enable the HDD version **
- reboot machine
- as soon as the Dell logo shows start pressing the F2 key to get into the BIOS setup
- press the right arrow key to show the Advance options list
- press the down arrow to select SATA Operation
- press ENTER to get drop-down
- press down arrow to AHCI
- press ENTER
- do not reboot or save/exit yet

Final Prep

6. Make sure you have a valid product key to provide Windows to use, if not using a Windows Reinstallation DVD/USB that dell provided. Have it written down on paper.

Installation of Windows

7. Reboot the machine
8. press F12 to get the boot menu list
9. press down arrow to select your installation media
10. press enter to boot
11. You may need to press another key to let a DVD boot, instead of the HDD, pay attention to the screen
12. Once you're in Windows setup it is REALLY mostly a guided process, but pay attention and be sure to select your SSD for a NEW INSTALLATION *not* and UPGRADE
13. You can pretty much use all defaults during install (use whole drive, etc.)
14. Base installation of Windows will likely take less than 30 minutes, and most of the system hardware should Just Work
*disclaimer: Dell WLAN cards may not be supported out of the box, as it were. Ditto for the Bigfoot Killer-N. I don't know.
15. I'm pretty sure you'll need to provide a user, pay attention to set that up the way you want it (name, password, etc.)
16. Final Windows 8 setup happens on 1st login and will require an internet connection (wlan or hard-wired). You can re-use the same credentials you had with your previous install if you want to (I would).

Installation of Drivers

Basically, I would install the Dell drivers, in this order, and any time the driver install asks you to reboot the machine, do it.

- BIOS (if you are not currently at the current BIOS level)
- Intel Panther Point HM77 chipset
- Intel Management Engine
- Realtek Card Reader
- Intel Rapid Storage (note: This is NOT Intel Rapid Start aka:iRST)
- Motion Sensor
- Realtek Audio
- Realtek LAN
- Synaptics Touchpad
- IvyBridge HD Graphic
- NVidia GeForce
- WLAN driver (matches whatever WLAN card you have: Dell 1901, Intel 6235, Bigfoot Killer-N )

Optional Drivers (I don't use any of them)

- Intel Smart Connect (only if you have Intel 6235 WLAN)
- Intel Wireless Display Connection Manager (only if you have Intel 6235 WLAN)
- Intel My WiFi Dashboard (only if you have Intel 6235 WLAN)

Finally, Dell applications

- Quickset

That should leave you with a system ready for use with all hardware active.

 

Hi Thank you. This is great but I am not sure but I will give it go...

 

Currently I am downloading all drives one at a time as you suggested and copying them to my downloads folder and will transfer to a 1tb external HDD. Once I finish the installation can I connect the external HDD and install one driver at a time?

 

Downloading NVidia GeForce?
It gave me 2 options: The lower was selected by default and I am downloading it now...

 

you'll be fine with the drivers on your external HDD.

most of the dell drivers are self-extracting zip files, and will decompress to the C: drive, and then install from there.

Once all the drivers are installed you can delete the "C:\Dell" directory, it isn't needed once installs are complete.

Just take your time, go one step at a time, finish it, and move on.

When you are comfortable with the whole process it doesn't really take that much time (particularly installing onto SSD) but it pays to be patient and methodical.

I'll be on-and-off the net irregularly over Friday, but will try to check in every couple hours or so, just in case.

 

Today, I contacted Dell and they told Dell does not do mSATA becuase it will create problems in the future. Do not what they are....

Also, my Win8 recovery DVD disc from Dell is the one I got for another replacement of XPS L521X. Hence, the question is can I still use it to install Win8 basic/home?

Also, the other worry, I have is that how to find?

Thanks

 

Hey guys, I have recently bought this laptop (i7 3632QM, 8gb RAM, GT 640m, 750gb HDD) and I love it apart from a few problems I am having and I was wondering if you guys could help me out to save me having to send it back to Dell.

I download AC3 from Steam and I am trying to play it on regular graphics settings (everything normal iirc) but in 1080p, the problem is that I am getting awful FPS. I think that the laptop isn't recognizing my GT640m and is trying to run on the HD4000, any ideas on how to sort this? Also the main issue I am having is when I close the game and go back to my desktop, it has messed up all the colours on the laptop, everything is a orange and peoples faces are blue lol. Is there an easy fix for this or am I best off sending it back to Dell to sort out?

Thanks in advance guys

Alex

 

I'd think the easiest thing to do would be to open the NVidia Control Panel, go to the 3D Settings group, the Manage 3D Settings page, and then set a Program Settings tab configuration for AC3 and make sure that it is configured to use the NVidia GPU and not the Intel HD4000.

IF after that you still have performance issue, I would run a hardware monitor like HWInfo64 to see what the GPU is being run at, Mhz wise, and see if it is system 'throttling' that is impacting your gameplay.

IF you determine it is throttling, there is nothing dell can do for you.

You should search for posts discussing the use of NVidiaInspector and ThrottleStop, tools which you can use to take control of the throttling.

Fair warning, if you prevent the system from managing heat exhaustion and cpu/gpu processing rates you CAN allow your machine to become damaged.

The main L521X thread (somewhere in the reset 10 pages of comments or so) has some extensive comments on the use of these tools.

 

Hi, I did the SSD install but could not get some function key become functional:

1. The brightness fn Keys: I see the bar going up and down but it does not do anything to decrease or increase the brightness.

2. I also do not see nVidia graphics in the graphic properties: I can only see Intel graphics and media control but no nVidia… Before the installation I used to see nVIdia

 

Have you installed the NVidia driver, without any errors?

It's stupid, but uninstalling QuickSet and reinstalling it may help the brightness thing.

Or not.

Hard to say.

I haven't had any problem with it, so I have not had to overcome that particular issue.

;^(

 

I installed nVidia again and it is fine now. it prompted me to do another update at nVidia site but I did not do it.

I reinstalled quickset but NO luck with the brightness. My screen is very very bright hurting my eyes.

Thanks

 

For the display brightness, try going via the Mobility Center ( Windows-X -> Mobility Center ).

Are you sure you have the Windows 8 Quickset installed?

It's really weird that it doesn't Just Work. Of all the software installed/etc/ that's not one that normally comes up as a problem.

Do other FN key controls work (volume up/down/mute, dvd-eject, radio toggle, keyboard backlight)?

 

FYI: I actually disable the NVidia Update Service

Windows-key-X
-> Computer Management
-> Services and Applications
-> Services
-> NVidia Update Service Daemon
-> right click
-> Properties
-> Startup Type DISABLED

and I also Disable the UpdatusUser that NVidia installs

Windows-key-X
-> Computer Management
-> Local Users and Groups
-> Users
-> UpdatusUser
-> right click
-> Properties
-> select "Account is Disabled"

 

1. I uninstalled and re-installed quickset but no luck.
2. I also tried mobility center, and no success.

The volume buttons and eject button work flawlessly.

Do not know what I did.....

 

Thanks for the advice but I have just come to the realisation that this laptop just isn't as good for gaming as I believed which is disappointing really.. I thought a quad core processor with a mid range gfx card would be able to play most modern titles in 1080p with everything set to medium.

What are other peoples experiences with games on this laptop? Maybe it's just AC3, here's to hoping

 

You are not the only one
Honestly I thought this laptop would be great for games, but if you are playing Planetside 2, I have to set everything on low, and I will get 5 FPS every 10 seconds you are playing! So disappointed in this laptop, should have returned it! Linux is a pain to install and you have to use boot-repair to get GRUB fixed... Intel quick start doesn't work anymore, and about three drivers on Dell's website says it is not compatable with my XPS 15 ? I payed $1700 for this thing, and Dell decided to include Killer-N and bump the RAM up to 12GB, so now i'm stuck with the Atheros card and 8GBs of RAM Hope other people do not have as much problems as I have!