Dell Precision 5510 Owner's Lounge

Dell has just released a new Thunderbolt controller driver. It's marked "urgent".

John

 

thank you. seems to be an update for most newer systems including other precision models having thunderbolt 3. I'll check it out

 

Might have been shared by someone already, but as I had quite some trouble finding these fixes I'll share them here for others to enjoy:

Issue: on anything but the brightest setting the display occasionally flickers.
Fix: revert the bios to 1.2.0 (yeah, you'll miss all improvements by more recent bios versions).

Issue: the keyboard sometimes repeats individual key presses.
Fix (for ubuntu; for windows there are other possible fixes): fire up dconf, go to org>gnome>desktop>a11y>keyboard and set 'slowkeys-enable' to true, and 'slowkeys-delay' to 5 (try tweaking it if this doesn't quite do it for you). The theory here is that the occasional unwanted bounce by the keyboard is shorter than a 'real' key press; so filtering out any key press that doesn't take at least 5ms should get rid of the double presses. The setting can also be found under 'universal access', but configuring such a small number with the slider isn't ideal, hence the dconf approach.

 

I am here checking out the recommendation of John for this. Because the XPS is more or less the same, I've been using that as point of comparison when physically handling units at stores to get a feel. However I've only found UHD equiped screens at retail, so I'm wondering if anyone here has the Precision with a FHD screen instead of UHD screen. Is the Touch feature of the UHD screen very useful? I have not had one of these screens but I guess they were introduced within the last few years.

 

My Precision 5510 has the FHD panel which I am very happy with. I wouldn't want the UHD panel for two reasons: (a) It causes a big hit on the run time on battery (4 x more pixels to process and power) and (b) potential usability problems with older software which is not scaling-aware. I wouldn't want touch on a notebook this size because (i) I would have to reach forward to touch the screen - less ergonomically efficient than keyboard, touchpad and mouse; (ii) extra weight / thickness due to the glass layer over the LCD; (iii) need to clean off the fingerprints; and (iv) potential glare problems (although I have read that some notebooks have non-glare touchscreens).

John

 

Ah thanks john, that's very insightful. I did not think about the power savings effect. Speaking software compatibility, I see there's an option for Windows 7 downgrade, does that still make sense as a preference or should Windows 10 Pro be the way to go?

 

Derring, I agree with John. The battery on the UHD is actually not too bad. Windows high dpi handling is just bad. If you really want to use touch, you probably need to up the display % up to the recommended 250%, but this make you see a lot less on the screen. I have an UHD, and I really don't think UHD on a 15" (or less) display is a good idea.

 

Microsoft is trying to pull the plug on Windows 7 so support / updates is likely to gradually diminish. I would recommend Windows 10 Unless there's a feature which you know will create problems (you may want a third party start manager to get the right look and feel).

John

 

Thanks guys, I'm more or less leaning toward this model at this point. Regarding the Processor, what's with the Xeon processor as an option? I'm from many years ago where Xeons were being used in servers so this is new to me to see as an option. What benefits/cons does this have over the I7 in a laptop?

If I opt to get my own SSD like the 950, do I need to choose one of the m.2. PCI E drive options as primary to have the m.2. PCI capability or can I save some dough letting it default to the 500gb SATA?


Does Dell still include the Windows CD or USB if I need to do a clean install of Windows or am I on my own now for acquiring that?

 

The main benefit of the Xeon is ECC memory support, but ECC is not supported in the 5510, so... its just a slightly faster CPU.

You can install your own M.2 SSD, but configuring the system with a SATA drive will prevent you from getting the larger battery.

I believe Windows install media is available as an option for $12 or something, but you can just download from Microsoft nowadays:
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
The tool can prepare an ISO, DVD, or USB stick.