Owner's Thread: Dell Inspiron 11 3147 2-in-1

Sadly I'm returning this machine. Sometimes it works flawlessly others it drives me nuts.

Randomly just locks up, wacky touchpad, slow then fast then slow, the audio thing is something I shouldn't have to worry about. Beautiful machine but it really pushes you. Wish it was better as there are some things I love about it

 

Hi Clipse, I had the same problems with mine at first. I returned it for replacement, which works fine now, though the replacement laptop still needed driver updates to make it work right. That was all I had to do. The touchpad works well with the right drivers and some power-settings tweaks. Replacing the HDD with SSD is an OPTION that will make it run faster and improve battery time, but it's not essential, and the pre-installed network card works fine if you don't have an AC router. My network responsiveness and online audio are much improved after tweaking the power settings.

I'm glad I decided to keep mine and fiddle with it a bit to make it right, but I can certainly understand your frustration with a machine that SHOULD work just right when it comes out of the box (after countless Windows updates of course, which is Microsoft and not Dell).

If you decide to return yours for exchange, come on back when you get the replacement and let's sort out any issues it may have! Don't be warned off by the length of this thread. Most of the questions and replies are repetitions of the same few issues. Aside from a few folks who really did seem to have hardware problems, the other fixes mostly boil down to some driver updates done in the right order, and some power-settings tweaks. It's pretty straight-forward now that some folks here (all smarter than I am) have already done the hard work to troubleshoot the problems and share the solutions that have worked for so many of us.

If you decide to return your laptop and go with something else instead, I wish you all the best and hope you'll be very happy with your new choice!

 

Hi techman,
Not to worry. This should work for you:
http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/04/Drivers/DriversDetails?driverId=8HY96
And the how-to's:
http://www.dell.com/support/article/us/en/19/SLN115289

If your HDD is the original image, there is a recovery partition hidden there that is about 6.72GB in size. You can use "Disk Management" (via Windows Key+Q) to see if that partition is there. If it is, you can create a bootable flash drive with Win 8.1 install files on it (like a Windows CD).

 

Thanks for all of the great help!
What audio issues are people having? I've felt that the sound quality of my unit isn't as good as I expected.
Also I'm not satisfied with operation of the trackpad. Can anyone confirm instructions to install an updated driver for the trackpad? I found some instructions here, just want to confirm they are correct.
http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/t/19615166

Also my machine was somewhat slow and locking up. It all got better when I removed the Dell utilities and Macafee.

 

I just got my Dell 3147 when Staples had it on sale for $349. However, the one I got has the N3540 Pentium. The box label said N3530. Mine was shipped on April 10. According to the Dell website, they are now shipping 3147 with N3540s. Supposedly, the 3540 has a higher Turbo frequency but a slower FPU. In any case, I got a PCMark 7 score of 1711 with the original equipment.

I upgraded the drive to a EVO 840 SSD. That pushed the PCMark 7 score to 3005. Then I implemented the Samsung Magician Rapid mode and the PCMark 7 score went to 3084. CrystalDiskMark shows Rd/Wr seq speeds of over 1200 and 700. That certainly helps with the Sata 3 interface. BTW, I used Macrium Reflect to clone the drive. I did not need to install any drivers.

The only issue I had with replacing the drive was moving the SATA cable out of a plastic guide on the battery.

The only 3147 issues I ran into are the static issue with the touchpad and the sound static. Using the Dell power mode stopped the static issue. BTW, I found that the Dell support assistant software adds about ten seconds or more to the boot up time.

I may try the screen protector on the touchpad fix but I have not seen the crazy cursor in days.

Overall, I am very pleased with this budget tuning laptop. It has great battery life and a great display for the price. For extra portability, I use an XPAL AB25 tip with WB72 cable with an XPAL 18000 battery.

 

Does anyone know if there are any distinct differences between the following
1. Re-installation media on USB drive that Dell will send you for free
http://www.dell.com/support/home/us/en/19/media?c=us&l=en&s=dhs
2. Creating a USB drive recovery disk with Dell Backup & Recovery utility
3. Creating the same from the Windows 8 Control Panel
http://www.howtogeek.com/131907/how...ery-drive-or-system-repair-disc-in-windows-8/

 

see post #93

 

I didn't find my installation on my Dell 3147, out of the box, to have any pre-installed junk to speak of. It had no McAffee AV or any other bloatware. It did have a trial of Office 365 which I easily uninstalled and it came with the basic Dell apps (a few of which I uninstalled like Dell Update.) So mine was fairly bare bones out of the box.

 

With a brand new PC, I do an F12 or equivalent and boot to a WinPE Macrium Reflect USB drive and backup the whole OS drive. It has always worked as a full recovery drive. I have restored my Dell Venue 8 Pro many times as I experimented with different setups, with WIMBooting, and with Windows 10.

Using one backup/recovery method makes it easier to do backup/recovery. My Yoga 2 13, Dell 3147, Acer Switch 10, Dell Venue Pro 8 and others are all backed up the same way. I could use the Yoga OneKey recovery or the Dell Backup program but this means learning how either works and what the limitations are.

I have never had a problem with Reflect.

 

That's my "universal" method, too. I first save an untouched new-system image, then do updates & drivers, adjust settings to my liking, test, and clean up internet debris, and then I also make a "custom" full-system image. Recovery is quick & easy to my choice of factory-fresh or custom set-up.

 

Okay, now I need a bit of help!

Since this last week, my Dell 3147 touchpad cursor has begun to freeze on bootup or to just disappear from the screen. If I reinstall the Dell Synaptic driver, the cursor reappears and behaves normally .... until I reboot it again. This happens perhaps 70% of the time.

I suspected, since it is recent, that it was software based; either a Windows Update conflict or some other program I installed (except that I've not installed anything new in the last week.) To be sure, I uninstalled Classic Shell and Malwarebytes Anti-Exploit Premium and tried to get the OS with as little baggage as possible.

The disappearing-cursor issue persists. Ideas anyone? Should I try the non-Dell Synaptics driver (there are several versions out there) from other sites?

 

Any thing in the event viewer? Maybe reset the touchpad settings to default?

 

Where do I find the "event viewer"?

 

post #93 (page 10) has been revised for a proper clean install with no issues. let me know if you have any questions.

 

As an update on my freezing or disappearing cursor/touchpad issue, I seem to have found a solution by updating the Dell-listed Synaptics 18.1.2.9 driver to a Synaptics 18.1.3 driver from a Toshiba page. I've lost a few of the Dell "pretties" on the app GUI, but the updated app has all of the essentials options (though in a less stylish interface). The good news is that my cursor over the last two days is no longer freezing or disappearing.

Of course, unlike some, I keep all mouse gestures, scrolling and zooming options off, as I rarely need them. After all, I now have a touch screen that can do much of that easily.

Here is where I found the 18.1.3 Synaptics driver. Works fine on my Dell 3147:
http://support.toshiba.com/sscontent?contentId=4005593

.

 

And for those of you who've upgraded your wireless card to the Intel 7260NGW -AC, a newer driver has been released: 17.16.0.4 dated 4-20-2015 (be sure to get the 64-bit Win 8.1 version):

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/download/24864

** The smaller download is the driver only for the Intel wireless card (not the BT driver). The larger download includes extra Intel UI software which you likely don't need.

UPDATE: Here is the link to the latest 7260 BT drivers (17.1.1501.01 dated 4-15-2015) for Win 8.1 64-bit:

https://downloadcenter.intel.com/do...uetooth-technology-for-Windows-8-1-64-bit-WP-

 

Sorry not getting back sooner - right-click on Start, Computer Management.

What happens if you uninstall the Toshiba driver and reinstall the Dell driver?

 

In your instructions you state the following:

"3. Press F2 during bootup, choose 'Boot', disable 'Secure Boot', Enable 'Load Legacy Option Rom', set 'Boot List Option' to Legacy, press F10 to save and reboot.
4. Erase the pre-installed Seagate 500gb HDD and all partitions then change GPT to MBR with AOMEI Partition Assistant Standard Edition (link below) or use your own replacement SSD, make sure it is set to 'MBR' and not GPT"

Why put it in legacy and why MBR over GPT. Can you explain this please

 

Well I have returned! I took back the original 3147 to BestBuy and then a few days later Dell had a good deal and I ordered it from them. I get a piece of mind with 1 year in house warranty now so. Cross the fingers I like this thing so...Upgrades in time...

 

Nice

Nice. Congrates on the new Dell deal. Yes, that would make better piece of mind for sure!

What sort of deal did they give you, if I can ask?

 

Hi k8twyn,
Could you tell me what power setting tweaks you did that helped you and what they did? Thanks.

 

Are you stating to get the Touchpad Driver from the factory pc link because it is better or different than the one from dell drivers link?

I'm also interested in the answer to why MBR vs GPT.

Also, should I use the Partioning tool on my new Samsung 850 EVO SSD to convert to MBR?

Thanks for your post!!!

 

Personally, I just cloned my original HDD that came with the 3147 to an older Samsung 840 EVO 500GB SSD that I had in a unit that had died. It was an exact copy, so I didn't bother with MBR vs GPT, etc. Recovery partition is now on my Samsung SSD. My original HDD also did not come with any bloatware or adware, so that made it easy as well. I'm sure I lost some space doing it this way, but it works well and no driver issues either (except for issues from some of the default drivers at Dell like the touchpad driver ... updated it to the 18.1.3 driver (from the Toshiba site) that was NOT posted on the Dell site.)

 

When doing a clean install of Windows 8.1 with the Dell 3147 and just the drivers on there website, is that the Dell Touchpad drivers do not install/show up in device manager and because of this the touchpad will not be disabled when changing over to tablet mode as seen below. This is why I provided the original system drivers that includes the touchpad. If you have your original hard drive that came with the 3147, then simple backup the drivers with Driver Magician and your good to go.

It should be noted, a new SSD hard drive by default comes with the partition set to MBR, so you don't have to do anything there. I should have stated in the instructions, changing from GPT for MBR only applies to the original hard drive with the Dell 3147, not a ssd replacement.

To date, have configured 6 of these laptops and had to do this process for each of them. Tried to explain to Dell tech support the issue with there drivers many times with no resolve, speaking to Dell technicians is like talking to a brick wall.

As Quatro stated, you can definitely clone the factory partitions to a new ssd drive, whatever works best for you, please do that.

 

Would you please update the link to the Factory PC drivers as when I go there, I get the DVD2 Part4/4 download. I do need a copy of original drivers.

Thanks

 

I found the Dell driver from May 2014 from Dell's site , but couldn't get it running. I ended up installing Edited***Synaptics from their site (accidentally stated Toshiba on original post)*** drivers and I like them a lot so far. Thank you for your help.

Edited above.

 

Sorry about that, all links have been corrected.

 

@PDQ8, no problem.

I completed the clean install on my original HDD as a trial run. My SSD comes Wednesday.

One problem is the Audio drivers have the crackle when increasing and decreasing volume. I've resolved the problem on my Stock 3147 in January, but currently I uninstalled the Realtek drivers, no crackling with the Microsoft drivers. Will keep uninstalling and reinstalling till it resolves just to see if the Maxx sounds any better for headphones/speakers. Also tried the drivers from Realtek site but same crackling.

 

Indeed. I've just left the Microsoft HD Audio drivers installed. I can't tell any quality difference and no conflicts or crackling like there can be with the Realtek drivers.

 

It was a deal of the day in Canada - $455, Targus sleeve, 1 year in home service. It was online one day. This machine feels different than the BB one I got. Touchpad and audio work perfect! Seems faster, only issue is battery drains like a MOFO when closed. I have it going to sleep and everything. Also what can I uninstall from this thing?

 

There may be something on in the background that is interfering with it going to sleep. In that case, I'd start using hibernation (takes about 3 sec to hibernate on my SSD and about 6 sec to wake up & reload the desktop). Not sure how long it is on an standard HDD.

 

I have been loving the 1TB SSD upgrade on my Inspiron 11. If anyone else is planning on doing an SSD upgrade, here are photos of the Inspiron 11 SSD upgrade procedure.

For some reason I had forgotten that the RAM was upgradeable too, so an 8GB DDR3L ram upgrade and an 802.11 AC Intel wifi card are my next upgrades Peace out and I hope you all enjoy your nice Dell laptops!

 

Thanks for this post, My touchpad wasn't locking so I ended up doing the IC2 trick, then the Dell touchpad drivers and the 3148 Quickset.

After my clean install on the original HDD, I ended up following your advice to clone. My clone is running great.
Sound and touchpad are not having any problems thanks to the folks here.... PDQ8, Quatro, PDSway...

 

Yes, for me, I also lost touchpad & keyboard locking while in tablet or tent mode. It turned out while I was deleting various Dell apps I didn't think I needed, I'd uninstalled the Dell Quickset 64 drivers ... that was a mistake. They are needed. Once I reinstalled them, my touchpad & keyboard locked again.

 

Has anyone installed Windows 10 on this unit?

 

If you read back on the thread, you'll see that some have installed various Win 10 preview builds as they were released. I haven't yet, but plan to once the full version is released at the end of July.

 

Waiting for Windows 10 final to be released, hoping Dell will release new drivers as well.

 

Windows 10 installed on desktop and 2 laptops without any problems. Just asking if on the eleven it was easy to install, and if there were big problems after the installation. Also I have seen that one installed it and did a recovery after, he did not like it or did not have time to get used to it? Thanks for the follow up.

 

Hello, 3147 owners!


I purchased a refurb 3147 back in January for $280. However, i’ve had some issues with it, so hopefully one of you can help me.


First, the top half of the touchscreen will sometimes (intermittently) respond erratically (like registering touches in the wrong place, or not at all, or with more fingers than I actually used) to touches. If I flip it upside down (tent mode) the problem area will be on the bottom (same physical area of the screen.) I saw someone else report a similar issue in the Dell forum and the support article and tried those solutions, but with no luck.


Second, the laptop will sometimes refuse to automatically sleep. This one is also intermittent. It has no problems turning off the screen automatically as well as auto hibernating after I manually sleep it, though. This could be a third-party program, but I don’t think it is since I disabled wakelocks in power options and have had no problems installing the same programs on other machines. :/


I might as well mention that the laptop came from Amazon (Warehouse Deals) with a clean install (a few drivers preloaded, though). I thought these issues would go away when I followed post #93 (which I did) but they have persisted across both installs.


Hopefully you guys don’t mind the long post and have some insight.

 

Hi DJL,
It sounds like you've gone after the issues methodically (my kind of analyst). Unfortunately, these 3 combined symptoms might indicate a hardware problem:
* refurbished (often fine, but could be a return to Amazon for previous issues and not checked by anyone at Amazon)
* touchscreen has erratic touches
* when flipped, the erratic touches are in the same physical location as before
I'm not sure a software glitch would produce those last two issues. But it isn't always a defective display either (it could be).

My Nexus 4, when plugged into a cheap certain charger (I have 2 of this brand and they BOTH do it), the display will begin to give false or erratic touch responses. I can tap an area and something else launches or it acts like I gave it 3 touches, etc. When I unplug it, the weird, spastic behavior stops. Plug it into a another charger, no prob. Plug it into one of the defective chargers and it begins to act up again. You get the idea.)

Needless to say, those 2 chargers went into the trash ASAP. Now I've discovered one of my wife's chargers that does it 50% of the time.

If the display is the issue and you are out of warranty, then you may be up a creek w/o a paddle. Sorry, if that is the case.

Since you followed post #93, I'm guessing you switched out the HDD and perhaps other upgrades. I'd suggest opening it up again and making sure no cables are crimped and no pressure on the screen. If you replaced the stock HDD, make sure the replacement SSD is the thin, 7.0 mm type and that the seating of everything is good; the outer case has no pressure on it when closed.

1) What you want to rule out is that it is not a hardware issue (I know you know this) or that there are no issues causing a hardware prob.

2) Does the touch issue happen when it is on battery? If not, it may be due to a defective charger brick. Here is the backup charger I use at the office. It works well for me:
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00O9IJPKA

3) You have probably already tried reinstalling the OS. Another trick to try. If you did switch out the HDD and you still have the stock HDD on hand with the OS intact, try switching back to the stock HDD and see if the touch issue reappears.

4) Doubtful it is anything on your display, but be sure it is very clean, just in case.

I'm sure there are more ideas. That's all I have at the moment. And I hope it isn't a defective display or MB issue.

 

As to your 3147's sleep issues, that could be some resident app conflict that is keeping it from sleeping when the lid is closed. That has happened to me several times on other laptops and perhaps twice on this one. Not good for the battery or possible overheating.

If it is a software conflict and you can't isolate it, then you can do what I do. I manually shut it down it or hibernate it (or put it to sleep) each time before I close the lid. This is a fast procedure and gives me peace of mind.

On sleeping, I find my touchpad usually acts up (starts to act weird) if I wake it up from sleep. That could be my touchpad driver. I don't know and don't care as it happens on the Synaptics 18.1.2.9 and the 18.1.3 drivers that I've tried.

So I never put it to sleep now. Since I have a 500GB Samsung EVO 840 SSD in it, reboot or wake up from hibernation are both very fast. 8 sec (plus 3 sec after sign-in) for bootup and 6 sec to awake from hibernation.

So don't do your troubleshooting after awaking it from sleep mode. You might get issues from that that mess up your results.

 

Hi Quatro,

I did follow post #93 to reinstall the OS, but I didn't upgrade anything, though I did open it up. I do have an image of the HDD from before I wiped it. The touch issue seems to happen regardless of whether or not it's on battery. I sure hope it's not a hardware issue, if it is i'm basically SOL.

PS: Another Nexus 4 owner!

 

Yeah. I hope it isn't a hardware issue for you either! SOL indeed. So will you try restoring the image and see if a factory install solves it (I'm not hopeful.) The fact that it is a localized area on the screen that gives wrong touch input no matter which way you turn the screen greatly concerns me (as I'm sure it does you.)

But you never know. Maybe you'll get lucky and the factory image will sort the problem.

Since your 3147/48 is a refurb from Amazon, (or is it just an open box from Amazon?), does it carry the Dell 1-yr warranty? Have you contacted Dell support (mixed reports on that as well). Makes me wish I'd gotten a Square Trade warranty on my 3147. My unit appears to work well, but the user reviews are very mixed on Amazon. Makes me suspect the workmanship quality is poor and unit quality is inconsistent. Too bad. I chose the 3147 because within that price, no other 2-in-1's offered such upgradability and specs.

PS. And on my Nexus 4, I recently replaced the battery (had severe overheating and charge issues), but the replacement battery isn't of the quality of the original (hard to find that on Amazon unless I pay a LOT more). Now it is still overheating. Under CPUTemp app, it is reporting avg temps of 130 F and up. Often spiking to 180. A few days ago, while using the GPS, it went to 220 (!) and then dropped slowly down. I'm not sure it is long for this world. 2 1/2 yrs old. I think my next phone will be an unlocked Samsung S5, if I can keep this one going until next Spring. It has been a good phone except for the heating issues.

 

I think I'm gonna open it back up to see if there's anything wrong internally, like a crimped cable or something.

Other than that, I downloaded the recovery DVD from post #93, but I'm a bit confused by the parts. I thought it would have extensions like .001, .002, etc. for the parts to combine upon extracting, but they're just .rar files, so I don't know how to combine them. Also, I'm wondering if there's a way I can put it on a (single?) flash drive, since the thing has no optical drive.

 

Well, I know the OS can be restored from a flash drive as I requested one from Dell's website (it's free and they mail it to you on a flash drive.) But I've never done it so I've no suggestions there.

I can't remember where online or how I ordered the flash drive OS (Win 8.1) from Dell but it's called "Dell OS Recovery and Restore USB Key" and is available for free from Dell for any registered owner. The packet lists it as:
US-0FG2K3-74287-4C3-005K-A00. The flash drive itself has yet another number:
2-45-141104-10300 and has a part number P/N FG2K3_A00

 

I purchased a new 3147 from Staples on May 1. About four weeks later, i noted random touch bubbles on the top quarter of the screen after being on for several hours. I backed up my 3147 and did a factory reset and tested. The bubbles would appear after a few hours. Putting the notebook to sleep would make the bubbles go away. BTW, these touches had a real effect on icons where the bubbles touched. I videoed the bubbles and Dell replaced the LED panel after seeing the video. Without the videos, Dell was not approving a repair work order because the 3147 passed all diagnostic tests.

I had a similar problem with a Yoga 2 13 and had it repaired also. That problem took six months to show up.

Just my experiences.

 

To unpack the recovery DVD's, right click on 3147RecoveryDVD1.part1.rar and choose extract, this in turn will create an .iso file which you can burn to a DVD - do the same for the second disc. The recovery DVD will ERASE EVERYTHING on your pc, so backup anything first. There is no way to combine them, however, you can use two 4gb flash drives, should work fine as the files are iso and doesn't matter what media it is written to. Use Rufus to unpack them.

DVD Recovery Disc 1:
3147RecoveryDVD1.part1.rar
3147RecoveryDVD1.part2.rar
3147RecoveryDVD1.part3.rar
3147RecoveryDVD1.part4.rar

DVD Recovery Disc 2
3147RecoveryDVD2.part1.rar
3147RecoveryDVD2.part2.rar
3147RecoveryDVD2.part3.rar
3147RecoveryDVD2.part4.rar:

-EDIT-
If you get Dell's to send you the recovery flash drive, it contains just the OS, no drivers, no applications.

 

All right, thanks for the help.

So today I woke up the 3147 from hibernate and the touchscreen issues popped up again... until I went into Device Manager and re-enabled the USB Input Device. Seems like a driver problem.

EDIT: Well, over the course of a few days, this fix hasn't failed after multiple instances of the touchscreen bugging out. I guess it's time to figure out how to fix the driver...

 

I see the USB Input Device (4 of them) under "Human Interface Devices", but didn't realize there was a driver for that. I assumed it was installed as the OS set itself up.

 

Well, it is, but apparently mine's bugged.

Also: I'm planning to install Windows 10 (Insider Preview) on my machine, I'll share how it goes if anyone's interested.