*** XPS 17 Owner's Lounge ***

no it was the cheapest 8gb memory video card that was available. the same with the xps. HA HA. you are the one throwing the tantrum that your goodlucktronics is not the deal you think it is. and xps 17 is priced inline with everythging else...which it is. And yes. Please. we are done. lets make this thread about the xps 17 not the rp max or anything else like it should have been in the beginning. And no I am not throwing a tantrum it seems you cannot accept the fact that I took the items I wanted in the xps and then shopped around. if the Max 17 was hundreds less for the same spec I would gladly state it. However, in FACT, it's not. it's 50 bucks cheaper spec for spec (just incase you didn't know that means same processor, ram, video card storage and actually, i priced the touchscreen 4k screen on the xps which is not even an option on the eluck.)

take care now.

 

You do know the XPS comes with a 2060 which has 6gb of vram right? The same card the MAX-17 comes with stock (but you can actually upgrade). Oh and the 2060 in the MAX-17 is not a Max-q variant which means it's much faster.

Configurations to illustrate my point:


Only when you add 8TB of storage and a 2080 (a $750 upgrade and not worth it IMHO) does the Max cost more than the XPS. No they don't have a 4k option sadly. And yes these prices are in US.

*On edit*
I do greatly apologize for totally derailing this thread when my initial post was only meant to display discontent for the pricing of the XPS 17. I think it's a cool machine that would be amazing to own, but is $1000 over what I would spend on a laptop. I hope a few users on this site are lucky enough to invest in it and they truly enjoy their system. Who knows, maybe they will have an amazing sale when it hits the outlet and I can pick up a refurb for $1300ish, but I don't think that's going to happen. I enjoyed my previous experiences with the XPS and doing reviews on them with stock scores vs modded scores.

No, they will accept USB-C power cables directly plugged in. I have a 130W USB-C adapter from a 9575 that I use on my Vostro 7590.

This is an example of what I've done with previous XPS laptops:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/dell-xps-15-9570-benchmarks-temps.817970/

No it's not just temps that determine the cooling but how fast the CPU is running at the same time. Initial reviews from the Precision 5750 (the same chassis) show the CPU hitting 100C and throttling down. I'd love to see someone go through the extensive effort that I did to figure out the cooling on the XPS17 and what it is really capable of.

 

Also, join rakuten, you will get over 200 off the 17 as well.

 

I've used Rakuten for all of my Dell purchases over the past 5 years and it's been worthwhile. Their cash back amounts fluctuate but it's always worth clicking on it:

 

Do you think the cooling in the XPS 17 is better than the Precision 7740?

 

That's a great question, I just am not familiar enough with the Precision 7740. Based on the pictures, I would say it likely is, but take that with a grain of salt. Perhaps @Aaron44126 may know more.

 

Highly doubtful.

Not a knock against the XPS 17, specifically. It looks like a well-engineered machine. It's just that there is a tradeoff between size and cooling capability. XPS is clearly going for smaller size.

Everything about the XPS 17 is smaller when compared to the 7740/7750. It's going to have smaller fans, less ventilation area, and less surface area on the copper heat fins. So, unless the Precision 7740 cooling system was designed terribly (doesn't look that way to me), physics dictates that XPS 17 is not going to cool as well. If XPS 17 or Precision 5750 could cool as well as a larger Precision, then there would be nothing keeping them from fitting it with a larger power supply and more beefy GPU.

You can look at Precision 75X0 systems (15") compared to past iterations of the XPS 15 and it's basically the same. The Precision 7000 series can cool itself off more easily and has a higher limit for thermal throttling.

 

Can you link me to the 5750 benchmark review? Thanks.

 

Sadly no specific benchmark reviews out there, but this person has a 5750 and you can see from his rendering test the CPU is hot and throttling. Sadly it doesn't list the frequencies but you can extrapolate from the voltages that it's probably around 2.5GHz or so...


It also looks like Dell is sticking to their 77C limit on the GPU. Here is to hoping you can increase that with ASUS Tweak...

 

Last week they had 8.5 percent back up here. Great deal.

 

Going to his blog, he does mention being partnered with Dell and getting a very early sample (only 7 people outside Dell apparently) so there is hope the retail version is better with updated bios and possible tweaks will do good - whatever benchmarks he ran could become very irrelevant as we’ve seen in the past with various other laptops (recently famously the MacBook Pro 15 post launch patch fix to the performance issues).

The new XPS 15 isn’t far off the MBP 16 in many of the benchmarks (sometimes beating it) so one thing for certain is, Dell will ensure this one mops the floor with the MBP 16 as it’s main selling point.

I think this looks positive but given the long XPS 15 history I can see why there is scepticism.

 

I don't know why you guys compare eluktronik and xps. The customers target and the goal of creating these laptops are different. Same spec or better spec doesn't mean that one must be more expensive. Look at some smart phone, One Plus , or some chinese brand , they have decent spec , the price is 1/3-1/6 compares to Samsung but people still prefer Samsung. First, it comes to brand name, then the value of products is decided by the customer. You can pay $8 to buy a ripeye steak at a local restaurent, and someone willing to pay 3 times more expensive for that steak in a 5 star restaurant although the taste are the same. The XPS laptop is focus on the entertainment laptop, the design, to satisfy end user by giving them the feeling that they are using the great product. Maybe Eluktronic can upgrade to rtx 2080, but if the customer don't gaming that much, if they only want to sit in front of the bautiful laptop, watch a hdr movie on a beautiful screen, and that laptop's spec serve enough for their needs: using multi thunderbolt capturing device, edit 8k videos, run multiple VMs, on a premium model of a trusted & premium brand. I am a person who is always looking for cheap but powerful laptop. However, after all, I feel like I am easy to get boring to those laptop although they are fast , powerful and full loaded. After all, I ended up with purchase XPS 17, and I will make it better by tweaking anything I could do: upgrade rams, ssd, repaste with LM if neccessary, apply dbrand skin, to customize it the way I want. Yes, I am in a few people (or many?) will pay for this laptop. However, I have my value estimation for this laptop, and when I managed to get that price, I think it worth it: i7-10875h, 16gb 3200 ram, samsung m.2 512gb, 4k screen, rtx 2060, 4 thunderbolts for $2,278.97 (INCLUDED TAX). I think it worth it. It lacks usb A, it is fine, just buy an adapter for it. Trackpad not smooth? Then ask Dell to send you a replace (someone managed to get $160 on XPS 15 9500 because of asking a replace for this issue). Loud fan? Wait for updated XTU or updated throttlestop to accept lower voltage on it, or repaste it (not too difficult to do this, just do it carefully, I have done repaste with LM for many laptops before with zero issues). Screen goes black for few seconds when plug in/out power adapter? Just turn HDR off in display setting and this is not a big issues. These are issues people face with xps 15 9500. Battery life of 4k XPS 17? 6h for video looping is a decent and is difficult to find a competitor.
My conclusion is if you want to by eluktronic and prefer it, because your mind set is different than people who buy XPS 17. That leads to the way to consider the values not the same as others. As long as you are happy with your buy, then it is good.

 

You won't be able to undervolt sadly as Intel blocked it due to plundervolt. If the bios supported undervolting then you could (but it doesn't).

 

Then repaste with LM is the only way to go but it is ok since playing normal games it still can handle it, and for adobe premiere export which supports hardware acceleration now makes rtx 2060 has jobs to do. Programming with 4k 17inch will give more lines to track. Deep learning with rtx, 8 core cpus is still good for now.

 

You can still undervolt the GPU which is a good effective way to lower its operating temps, especially since Dell still has their stupid 77C throttle limit. You may be able to raise that with Asus GPU Tweak but I don't know for sure. Unfortunately undervolting the CPU was the biggest difference in operating temps/speeds, but I'll blame intel for that mess up.

 

hehehe

 

Has anybody received one yet? I just ordered one this morning, but it won't be here until Thursday...

 

Did Intel force Dell to cripple the BIOS by hiding menu access to important options that some other OEMs do not, and thereby depriving customers of the ability to undervolt, or (equally important) disable SGX? The inability to undervolt is Dell's doing, not Intel's. They're not alone in their crimes against consumers. There are HP, ASUS and Acer systems with the same problems. That behavior is unacceptable no matter whose logo appears on the lid. Putting up with it will only ensure that such bad behavior will continue.

 

The thing is this affects 1 in 10,000 users as 99 percent of people don't care about undervolting, and most don't even know what it is. They hit power, do their work and go on with life. They don't care what temp their processor is, don't care what scores they get on benchmarks, they don't care that if they undervolt they may get a 1 percent reduction in temps. They care that they finish their work and go on with life.

 

I've already replied to the blacklist thread. You really think Intel who gives Dell financial incentives to use their chips anyway doesn't ask that Dell implement the plundervolt fix? Also your argument is for 9th gen stuff, 10th gen comes locked down already. It's Intel's doing, they could have implemented a low level fix but instead they just disabled it. Don't like it then don't buy Intel.

 

Agreed - also I found undervolt software to be flaky anyway - and the only good implementations were when laptop manufacturers sold them pre-undervolted.

The move isn’t malicious anyway, I believe the reason it’s being disabled is to prevent the plundervolt vulnerability where a hacker used the same method gamers/enthusiasts use to modify voltage - so cant really hate on them.

 

Of course its not malicious. That is is off the wall to even suggest that anyways. Like Dell brass sat down and said ha ha ha. let's stick it to the geeks. ha ha ha. Seriously people. There are like 10 people here who would even bother with undervolting and that is because you bought the wrong tool for the job. Gaming is not what the xps is for, benchmarking is silly in real world usage and no one cares about that. Like I said, people who buy the xps line up are people who want a lightweight, powerful device to edit photos, videos and create. They don't care that their processor is 3 deg hotter or colder than the last version, they don't care that brand X is 2 percent faster than their xps even though brand x is a gigantic chunk of plastic gaming brick, They don't care that Brand x is 500 dollars cheaper for lesser parts. They care about creating and making money with their work and having one of the best screens, lightweight devices and awesome warranty and support behind them. Simple.

 

I wanted to buy the new XPS 17 today in the UK. But after speaking to a sales rep, he said I should wait for a couple of days for some discount on them

 

Implementing a fix is not the same thing as limiting end-user autonomy. Don't like it then don't buy Intel Dell.

It is only locked down when the BIOS is locked down. Yes, locking down the BIOS so that customers that want to make their own decisions cannot because the options are hidden is a malicious control freak move. If not that, then it is just poor leadership and ignorant people with the power to make decisions.

The fact that most consumers are ignorant doesn't excuse bad behavior on the part of those that are not, or shouldn't be based on the job description. We need to stop making excuses for them and begin holding them accountable. If those of us that know better do not things are simply going to continue on a path of decline and all that anyone will be able to expect is what the bottom-feeders are willing to put up with. They will rise no further than their level of incompetence.

 

UK buyers: Use the code " PGBIGSALE" for 15% discount

 

Yes the bios is locked down, just like 95% of all laptops out there. With the new microcode for 10th gen CPUs, you're going to see every brand having this save for a few select laptops. You won't see mainstream laptops implementing this. You really think major companies like Dell, Lenovo, and HP are going to unlock all of their bioses for the 5% of people who tune their laptops? You keep blaming Dell when big daddy Intel is the one forcing manufacturers to go that route. But I see who you are attached to. We can take bets as to which list is bigger, the 10th gen laptops that can undervolt and the ones that cannot.

 

Does the XPS 17 have an extra slot for NVMe M.2 SSD? Also how many RAM slot does it have?

 

It has 2 slots for ram and 2 slots for M.2 drives. I believe both slots support SATA and NVMe, but I'd research that more if you're considering a SATA M.2 drive..

 

No. There is no accountability as I said. People don't care. Nobody other than a few tweakers even care about this. 99% of the public who buy ANY brand notebooks, buy them, plug them in, use them, and turn them off. They care less about any of the stuff you talk about. Go buy a gamer system if you want to tweak and fiddle.

 

I would be willing to guess than more than a few would care if they knew their shiny new laptop that they believe was expensive, and a product they believed to be of high quality, was malfunctioning and overheating. If those that know will take the time to educate the folks that do not there could be some accountability. Ignorance is fixable. Stupidity is not.

Having a menu option to turn off SGX is by no means an unlocked BIOS. This is no different that having an option to select boot order, disable Secure Boot or choose between RAID and AHCI.

Is there something you have read where Intel is telling them they need to enable SGX and hide the option to turn it off? Unless they are doing that this is an OEM-induced problem. Deploying a fix for Plundervolt doesn't require the flawed feature that enables it to be forced on. The ability to disable it is present on numerous systems that have a crappy locked-down BIOS. It is not an essential or useful feature for mainstream consumers and it does not need to be enabled for most users.

 

@kojack
I also don't think that asking for the expected amount of performance from their laptop is unreasonable. I know some people are ok if they don't get what they paid for, but I'm not a huge fan. Dell will win no bonus points for me. I was able to get 17% more video decoding performance with an undervolt and repaste on my XPS 9570. That's not a trivial amount of performance gain. Even though I don't fully fault Dell for the plundervolt fix, they won't get a free pass either. We've gone round and round on this and I won't change your mind, but again people will speak with their money on it.

Intel's specific fix to manufacturers was to enable SGX. Prior to plundervolt, please tell me which laptops had bios options to enable/disable SGX, my guess is none. The fact that undervolting was disabled with the new Intel microcode and ME firmware update shows that it wasn't Dell who chose to implement the fix. Sure Dell includes the new microcode and ME firmware in their bios, but that's always been the norm. They include it because it fixes security flaws and the like. So far the only manufacturer that I'm tracking that is going to great lengths to address this is MSI via their secret bios.

 

Clevo, Eluktronics (TongFang) and even the Area 51M R1. It's a basic right, just like choosing boot priority, AHCI vs RAID, Secure Boot on/off, and the language of the words that the BIOS/UEFI displays.

Even Intel acknowledges this right. Not allowing consumers to make their own decisions is immoral, unethical and downright diabolical. And, there should be hell to pay for any OEM that is not letting them.

Intel® SGX for Dummies | Intel

Thus, the option to disable SGX exists in the firmware provided by companies that care about their customers. The companies that do not care may not give their customers the control they deserve and they are not upholding Intel's values.

 

Then pray tell why the Intel microcode enables this by default? You do know Intel creates their microcode right? You can link to an Intel blog (from 2014) that is all rainbows and unicorns but that really doesn't mean anything. You do know Intel is responsible for BGA too right? lol.

Let's not be dramatic about basic rights. It's a luxury just like the rest of the other technology things in our lives.

I'll stop further derailing this thread as we will never change eachother's mind.

 

Ah, thanks for this insight. I was just thinking that with the vapor chamber on the XPS 17 it may be able to cool better. Although the heatsink in the 7740 does have quite a bit of copper and exhaust area so maybe it can still do better regardless. I am pretty sure the power limits are much higher on the 7740 too (75W CPU, 110W GPU)

 

The efi console "trick" might still work on the new XPS 15/17 to enable undervolt. Someone might just test to see. I would if I had one, but I wont buy a new laptop for the next 5-7 years or so.

 

Looks like we're going to hit 10 pages of complaining before anybody here actually has an XPS 17 in hand... Can't wait to hear something positive from an actual owner!

 

What the model number of the RAM? I'm planning to upgrade my to 64gb. My delivery date is on Friday 3rd July 2020

 

You miss the point entirely as you are looking at it through a computer geeks eyes. I use to tweak the crap out of everything I owned. My desktops, laptops and even my phones. Overclocking etc. You are looking at it wrong. Do you know why? Because when it's all said and done, you Don't notice a difference unless you are constantly monitoring. Uninstall all the monitoring software, benchmarking and whatnot and use your damn computer as it is supposed to be used. Ater two weeks, you don't care about it anymore. I gave up and never looked back. I do everything I want and have no issues with my systems now. Before if I hit one degree over what I "should" have been I would freak out. I would compare benchmarks and swap components like they were tic tacs. At the end of the day, It made no difference to the actual running of the machine.

 

Im going to go and sorta...disagree with you on this one.


Its a well established fact that current gen processors run hot as baking beans. Even people that dont know anything about laptops know that there laptop is burning hot when you cant keep a finger on there 3k aluminum shells. Were in a time currently where money is at a premium given the circumstances with covid. People want to protect there investments, not watch them burn up after 6 months of 90C use. Undervolting does not reduce the thermals by 1 percent either, more like between 5-15% depending on the system. That 10% can be the difference between running at 91 degrees or 82 degrees. 82 degrees is an acceptable temperature, anything above 90C and you better have a fat wallet to shell out more money in a year after your internals choke on the heat, start a fire, or melt.

Back in the day, it was common place that gaming laptops would run in the 90C range. The technology was not their in its infancy to produce a product that could run at the temperatures we can see today when proper steps are taken, such as....yes, you guessed it, undervolting along with a number of other things that can be done. When gaming laptops first evolved with decent abilities to run graphical demanding tasks the hardware inside them, well the hardware would run very hot like I said, in the 90C. There were always posts, even on this forum, where people would show pictures of there plastic shroud covering the exhaust had melted away. We have come along way since those days, intel not giving every user the option to undervolt there cpu, which takes seconds before doing an demanding task, is a step towards those days of melted PC's. Its ridiculous.

I dont often complain on this forum, Im the one figuring out a resolution to a problem people constantly complain about. But this, this is silly, plain stupid. Anyone that can sit on there expensive laptop and run it at 90C while using it for hours needs to have something examined, and im not talking about the burning hot laptop.

Finally, we can shoot a tesla car into space and let it hover around space, intel can disable undervolting causing more damage to products that are already hard to care for with constant updates, viruses, trojans and hackers and crappy software engineers along with crappy hardware engineers. Getting everything to work cohesively is an act of god without having to deal with temps you can fry an egg with. Whats the point here, AMD should take over where intel has left us off at I think, that or intel should spend a few of there precious minutes figuring out plundervolt so we can undervolt.

PS to any engineers out there I was not talking about you specifically.

 

All those XPS notebooks catching fire is burning up the news for sure. Again, what you state involves a few armchair benchmarkers/fiddlers here. I have yet to hear of real consumers or people who actually use their laptops (not just xps, but any brand) complaining about undervolting, heat or otherwise. They open their notebooks, put them on their desks, tables etc, do their work, and turn them off. There is never any arguements, complaints or otherwise about damn, wish i could undervolt my device....or damn, my temps are 86deg, they should be 82. NOPE. Just, check out this I just did on my computer. It's awesome.

 

No I'm not looking at it wrong, I noticed a difference when running games. If I was a youtuber I would notice it in encoding. If I were a photo editor I would notice it there. You're assuming (and we know what that gets us) that I didn't notice a difference. I really noticed a big difference (and not in a good way) when Dell lowered the GPU throttling setpoint to 77C (enough to sell the XPS). I'm hoping there is a way around that for XPS 17 owners, but if not I wouldn't count on using the GPU for gaming or video encoding without a 25% performance loss. Sure you won't notice that when surfing the internet, but why spend $4799 to just surf the internet. I know your going to say that the XPS is not a gaming laptop, and you're right, but the fact that it has a 2060 means it should be ABLE to game. Also that performance loss will happen with GPU encoding work or FEA GPU calculations or anything that taxes the GPU. That's why you have a 2060 in the XPS right? It's not there just for bragging rights.

We've been through this before if you don't recall. You will never change my mind and I won't change yours. But let's not assume you know what my experience was.

 

GAMES. Exactly wrong tool for the job. XPS is NOT for games. I edit batch photos on my cheap dell and don't notice it slowing down etc. I am damn well sure the xps can do it without draggin butt either.

Get your Eluk, game and tweak away.

And yes, please take your advice and leave this thread to the xps 17 and all the good it has and take your constant xps bashing elsewhere.

 

You should take your own advice and read my whole post. I talked about video editing and FEA as well. What are you supposed to do on the XPS with the 2060 if not utilizing it? Please enlighten me as to how a 25% performance drop is acceptable? You're quick to point out throttling in Apple based laptops but cannot see the exact same flaws in the Dell? Sorry if my pointing out that Dell does make mistakes (and I believe pricing is one of them) doesn't fit with your agenda. I still think it's a cool laptop but it's not perfect.

*on edit* a GPU doesn't know the difference between being utilized for games, encoding, solid modeling, etc. If the throttling affects one it will affect them all. My desired use for the laptop was gaming. If I were still working as a mechanical engineer doing solid modeling, I would notice it there.

 

Google is your friend. xps 15 vs macbook pro 15. xps mops up the macbook. Xps does not throttle doing video coding, macbook does ALOT. I crap on macbook for various other reasons actually like the use of old gen technology at latest gen prices.

Here, here is a better place for you to spend some time.
http://forum.notebookreview.com/forums/other-manufacturers.11/

All you do is complain about every xps you supposedly owned. every owners thread of any xps is full of you whining. So please, either make your own threads about it and quit bringing it to the device threads, or better yet, stop buying the "vastly inferior" xps devices and move on. You will be much happier.

 

Wow nice. Such a shame the 32GB / RTX 2060 variant doesn’t exist in the UK yet or I’d place an order right now.

Might pivot to the XPS 15 or the XPS 13 with eGPU to take advantage of this code.

 

Hang tight IMbaQ. I am sure that config will be available soon. If you were looking at the 15 and 13 I would go with the 2 in 1 for extra use cases. I love having the ability to flip into tablet mode for certain things.

 

The fact that I gained 17% in video encoding shows it was throttling. Me bringing up short comings and potential solutions is beneficial to owners so I think I'll stay. The whole point of my previous extensive work with the XPS 9550, 9560, 9570, 9575, etc was to help users maximize their performance. It wasn't to complain about them like you think. There were a lot of good points and a few bad points about them. There is no perfect laptop, they all have some cons associated with their pros.

 

I had to order the 16gb RAM /RTX 2060 variant and hoping to upgrade it when I receive the laptop

 

That's a good idea, will likely even save you money in the end. I'd keep your 16gb of ram though in case you need to service your laptop.

 

Will this RAM work on the New XPS 17?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B07ZLC7VNH/ref=ox_sc_saved_title_1?smid=A3P5ROKL5A1OLE&psc=1