Dell Precision M3800 Owner's Review

The closed source NVidia-provided driver and Bumblebee seemed to work for me, although I haven't run any heavy 3D apps to be 100% sure. See https://github.com/Bumblebee-Project/Bumblebee/wiki/FAQ ... I'm on Gentoo so I have no idea how to get it installed on Ubuntu, but I can't imagine there isn't some build for it.

If you don't want to try it yourself, if you can suggest an open-source CUDA benchmark I'd be happy to build it and report back for you.

(Sadly, there is no "Optimus disable"/"Nvidia-only" option in the BIOS as on older models.)

 

Hi,
thanks, but I don't have RapidStart enabled.

 

Ok, in that case the only potential fix I can think of would be keeping your video drivers (both Intel and NVIDIA) current, and in the meantime I have a workaround for you. Go into Power Options > Advanced and set your Power button to put the system to sleep. Then whenever you wake your system up and it won't light up the display, press the Power button to put it back to sleep, and then you can try waking it up again.

 

Thanks, I will try to use Bumblebee. Here are two programs to use as benchmark:

This one: Mfaktc - Mersennewiki compared to these: GIMPS (Prime95) mersenne.ca mfaktc GPU CUDA performance

This one: CUDALucas | Free Science & Engineering software downloads at SourceForge.net compared to these: GIMPS (Prime95) mersenne.ca GPU CUDALucas performance

Be careful, self tests run more than 24h!

 

First, thanks so much for taking the time to reply!

Thanks!

Someone weighed the model with HDD+SSD and 61Whr ... 2.02 Kg. I believe you're right, the quoted 1.88 Kg online would be without the HDD, though they still cheated since a single platter 2.5" hdd is 90 grams or less (not 120g), but I bet they would blame weighing scale tolerances for the "error" ... 1.88 Kg looks better than 1.91 Kg.

I would bet that the XPS 15 weight virtually the same, apart from the added NFS (5 grams maybe?), so I consider this "error" to be unfair-play from Dell because it makes the M3800 look lighter. Not cool.

Thanks again for all the answers!

Reading this thread and the XPS 154 thread, it seems to me that the M3800 is less plagued with throttling of the CPU and GPU than the XPS15 is. Possibly due to the lower freq of the Kepler core (which is the same on both the Quadro and the Geforce) but it still seems like there is more CPU throttling occurring with the XPS15 than the M3800.

Could it be just my perception because the XPS15 is a *much* longer thread, hence more opportubnity for bad feedback to surface (following the rule of thumb that people experiencing problems tend to complain more than those without problems tend to praise).

Or does the Quadro in the M3800 also have a lower idle temperature which influences the CPU temperature too (since they sit under the same heatpipe)? ... It's very hard to compare idle temps because I haven't seen anyone owning both laptops and everyone has different ambient temp.

Any thoughts?

 

Yes, the fact that the XPS 15 thread is longer is definitely more opportunity for bad feedback. Also keep in mind that a) deliveries of XPSes started about a month before M3800s, b) more people order XPSes than M3800s, and c) the massive parts shortage started pretty much immediately after M3800 deliveries began, so very few people actually have an M3800 in-hand.

While your conjecture about idle temp and thus throttling differences is possible, for the reasons you cite I doubt you'll get much in the way of confirmation, sadly.

 

I've never really found any photo viewing application that I'm happy with, so I was excited to try out this new "3D Vision Photo Viewer" program from NVIDIA.
I tried to run the desktop icon for the program, but it gives me the error "Primary display's adapter does not support NVIDIA 3D Vision". I figured it might not have made it onto the whitelist of apps configured for the NVIDIA chipset, so I right-clicked on the icon, and selected "Run with Graphics Processor / High Performance NVIDIA Processor". Nope, same error! Grr.
So I right clicked on the icon once again and selected "Run with Graphics Processor / Change Default Graphics Processor", but upon arrival to the "Select Program to Customize" window, it wants me to select the application's name, but it is not on the list, and there doesn't seem to be a "Browse" button that would allow me to navigate and select the "nvstview.exe". World's stupidest user interface ever (NVIDIA Control Panel).
Has anyone ever been able to successfully run this 3D Vision Photo Viewer? If so, what's the trick?

 

If I go into NVIDIA Control Panel > Manage 3D settings > Program Settings, I see an Add button and then at the bottom of the window that pops up, I see a Browse button. I'm on Windows 8.1 running the drivers from NVIDIA, for what it's worth.

But if you get an error that 3D Vision isn't supported, you probably don't have the 3D Vision component of the driver installed, and/or it's not loaded because you don't have a 3D display attached. Or do you? And for that matter, how did you get 3D JPEGs?

It may also be that the Intel GPU doesn't support stereoscopic 3D, and if it doesn't, then even if the NVIDIA GPU can render it, the Intel GPU (that's physically attached to all of the display outputs) won't be able to pass it through, in which case you're stuck. But I haven't looked into stereoscopic 3D support on the Intel GPU since I don't have any 3D displays.

 

Once I clicked the "Add" button (which is very misleadingly placed right next to an unrelated dropdown), I was able to browse to the folder where the 3D Vision Photo Viewer program resides and select the executable, and then specify that it should utilize the NVIDIA graphics processor. However, the same error happens!

3D display? That's a big NOPE. I'm connected to a normal LCD IPS Display. I guess my hopes for a new cool photo viewing app are fading fast!

 

Ok, so then either the 3D Vision component wasn't installed, or like I said that component isn't loading because you don't have a 3D display. That app is intended for you to view 3D photos on 3D displays.