Dell Precision M3800 Owner's Review

If you aren't already, keep the laptop open to maximize airflow. I found that leaving the laptop open would prevent throttling (even though I was using an external display + peripherals and would prefer to have closed the lid). But if you can, repaste too -- I'll probably do that down the road.

 

Of course, you should clean / blow out dust and you may think about reapplying new, higher-grade thermal compound. But the most effective (and free) way to lower temps is undervolting. So, either way, you should give undervolting definitely a try. Everything from 5°C up to 20°C gain is possible. Whereas a new thermal compound may give you around 2°C - 3°C.

 

Hi guys!
I'm thinking about getting an M3800 2015 model in the future.
Sorry for not reading through the nearly 400 pages of the thread, but I have 2 questions:
1. Is the coil whine issue plaguing the 2015 models as well, if yes, how common is the problem ?
2. Is the battery upgrade-able to the 91Wh battery if I throw out the 2.5" drive ? (I know in theory it can be easily done, but dell might have specific model series to hunt for)

 

#1) I never hit coil whine even in my old one, nor did any of my coworkers, so it either can't be that common or people with good enough hearing to pick it up can't be that common. Not sure which.
#2) Same battery models on all M3800 from late 2013 to the last ones. I got finger-pointing from sales and support about who could sell it to me, and gave up, but enough people have done it that it can't be that hard. There are also now some on ebay although prices are highly variable and condition are unknown.

 

1. All M3800 models have coil whine but at different degrees on severity. Even my local Dell authorized service provider admitted that. I have had the motherboard of my M3800 replaced twice. First it was really terrible and could even be heard >5m away while the TV was playing in the background. After the replacement it was a lot better but still annoyed me a lot of the times. 2nd replacement made the coil whine bearable. It's still there but I rarely notice it any more.

 

I've never heard anything from mine except the (fairly noisy) fans.

 

is there windows 10 driver for the monitor?
device manager shows generic monitor

 

Mine is so loud I pulled it apart thinking there was a magnetic hard drive installed.

Nope just loud coil wine. Lucky I won the laptop so it cost my nil.

 

Guys,
Have been happy with my M3800 but seems to start slowly... 1min 45sec. Are there any particularly sneaky and notorious start-up files or processes I should klobber? Itel seems to have some. IAStorlcon. I turned off Iusb3.

Any news on the next generation in this line?

Thanks

 

That will depend on a lot of things. First, are you running Windows 7, Windows 8/8.1, or Windows 10?
(If Windows 8/8.1, upgrade to 10 now. Seriously.)
Second, are you running the original Dell image? (Not recommended.)
Third, do you have an SSD or a HDD (if the latter, upgrade it; could also be a sign the drive is going.)
Last, do you have enough RAM?

There are a ton of guides for both Windows 7 and Windows 10 for what you can disable. Nearly 2 minutes to start up is seriously off.

The new generation model has been out 6+ months; it's the Precision 5510 (aka Precision M5510, aka Precision 15" 5000 series.) Pretty incremental upgrade, very similar but has the infinity edge screen with tiny bezels, a better BIOS, and a Skylake CPU.