Dell Precision M3800 Owner's Review

4960HQ is 2.6/3.8 GHz, Iris Pro 5200 @ 1.3 GHz max and 128MB on package eDRAM which accounts for about 5 watts.
I personally would take that tradeoff over the 4702.

 

Correct me if I'm reading this wrong, but are you suggesting the m3800 is going to fail because it does not address one segment of this market?

I would like to respectfully disagree with that.

 

What? I like the stickers. Mine are still on my HDX. Okay, I took off the Vista one.

The glue comes off with a simple bit of rubbing. It rubs into a ball then pluck it off. Use Pledge Muti-surface (I hate advertising them) if you want it squeaky clean.

 

I'm coming from a heavy Precision M4400 and looking for a lighter replacement.
I was leaning towards 3 lbs ultrabooks until i saw the new XPS 15 and M3800 that are closer to 4 lbs.
how do the two compare with each other? i noticed they both have high resolution screens.

will there be a haswell 14" of the XPS 15 or M3800 that has dedicated gpu or Iris ?

 

@Bokeh:

I am not sure if you are allowed to mention the price. If so what does it cost? ** saw the dell press release. so i guess that is answered. Just gotta wait and see the local price in malaysia.
2. Does it come with Iris Pro graphics+Quadro or only Iris pro option??
3. supports 7mm or 9.5 mm 2.5 drive?

thanks in advance

 

That segment of the market is the workstation market. That is what they are aiming for. Not the gaming or business market. So it would be strange not to include a K2100 GPU or a faster processor like the 4960HQ is 2.6/3.8 GHz as option. What's the point of not having these options. Then you might as well buy an XPS or any other consumers laptop.

 

The K2100M and 4960HQ are each 10W hotter than the K1100/4702MQ -- 20W more cooling needed in total, and over 100W of CPU+GPU for both. I don't recall even Apple doing anything like that in one of their MacBookPro models, and they've had a lot more experience putting high end components in very small packages than Dell has. It can certainly be done -- Razer combines the 4702QM with the Geforce 765M (which is I think a 75W peak) in the 14" Blade... but a gaming laptop does not have to have the reliability under long run times of a business notebook (let alone a workstation) and those machines get ridiculously hot.

The newest MBP has a 47W processor option and a 45W GPU... and only an 85W power supply. Some things are clearly going to throttle on that one. (Compare to the 130W supply on this, or the 170W monster on the M4700 or W530.)

As for should buy an XPS, this as best anyone can tell so far this IS the same machine as the XPS -- with a few more customization options, a business warranty, and the Quadro ISV-certified firmware/drivers; pretty sure the K1100M and 750M are the same silicon. If you don't need any of those (or you're willing to pay for the warranty upgrade on the XPS, although past experience says that generally is a losing proposition, cost-wise) then why not get the XPS?

As for "any other consumer laptop," there is usually a big difference in quality and often specs as well between premium consumer models (including Dell's XPS and Alienware lines, Razer's Blade/Blade Pro) and low-end consumer models (Inspiron, Ideapad, etc.) At best, you get what you pay for.

What would be interesting from Dell would be an Iris Pro model with no Nvidia chip... not great for gamers, or for people who need professional 3D, but for a lot of folks in my industry (software development) need the CPU, and want the form factor/screen, and as long as there's enough GPU to drive hires text, we're good. (Personally, I also game, as do a lot of my coworkers, but I can't go back to our director and say "...but we need a bigger GPU..." without a business justification. Thus the W520/W530s we've been buying have all had the lower-end GPU.)

For people who need more CPU/GPU/both, there is always the M4800 or W540 or one of the 17" models. It's obvious that hte that the M3800 is not intended to replace that, but rather to open up a new market to Dell that up to now the MacBookPro has largely had uncontested. Yes, it's very similar (if not identical) to the XPS, but while I might buy the XPS personally, corporate IT departments are virtually guaranteed not to (despite Dell's failed attempt to sell the XPS 13 to them) and while slapping the "Precision" badge on their is in part brand engineering, it will open doors that trying to convert the XPS brand to a business-friendly one won't.

 

If anyone wants to see a review of the screen, my guess is the screen is the same as the M4800 (with the exception that the M4800 has a matte non-touch screen, while the M3800 has a glossy touch screen), which has been reviewed by notebookcheck:
Review Dell Precision M4800 Notebook - NotebookCheck.net Reviews

 

You made some valid points here. I've been using the M6400 covet for over 4 years and I can say that it's the best laptop I've ever owned. I've been using it professionally and personally for 2d/3d stuff (Autodesk products), GPU as well as CPU intensive renderings and adobe products. I've upgraded it several times from a 4Gb memory, to 16 Gb, from a single 256 Gb 7200 rpm hd to a raid 0 512 Gb total SSD.

But the size of the laptop and power brick is killing. I've replaced several bags already. And even though I can live with the daily commute lurking such a heavy machine, It’s more the looks you get when you pull out such a beast from your clients. The world is getting thinner and lighter which is why people are flabbergasted to see a such a huge box in 2013. And that is why I was initially very excited about the M3800. And I still hope Dell provides some more performance options for the high end user.

Since I’m in architecture where mobility and style is the norm, I’m kind of forced to consider the MacBook pro which most of my colleagues use. But Since all my applications are Windows based, the M3800 seems a more logical choice. But as you said, if performance is the deciding factor, I may have to consider the M4800. It would have been nice if Dell could have reduced the thickness buy a few millimeters and the ad a covet addition for the M4800.

 

Is the dual HSF thermal solution of the M3800 sufficiently linked (via heatpipes) in order to accommodate a higher wattage CPU without a dGPU?
Or are they operating independently with only some potentially shared airflow?
But I agree and would like to see a Iris Pro option if they could accommodate one.

What would be interesting from Dell would be knowing what their thermal power limitations truly are in the M3800 design and if higher wattage options CPU/GPU/both are actually thermally limited, marketing limited (i.e. fan noise or surface temps would be too high) or supply chain limited (i.e. don't want to support a bunch of additional relatively low volume SKUs).