Dell Precision M6700 Owner's Review

update on the screen issue, a tech was here and changed the display... it looks exactly the same, really exactly, tint is exactly on the same poisitions in the same size. next week another tech will come and change the cable of the display because the tech who was here thinks it might be this. he has no other idea.

 

i realize that. but i would rather have 8 bit and Otimus than 10 bits and no Optimus. but that's just me. because i could get by with HD4000 graphics 90% of the time and i need 10 bits 0% of the time. like right now i am looking at a bunch of text and a little dell flash ad at the left of the screen - does this really warrant running a 100W TDP graphics card ? if i was on battery power i would care. and if i'm at my desk then i'm not using a laptop.

yeah i'm old school - i still use desktops - i never liked laptops - they were always too slow - of course this is changing - but desktops still got the edge.

lol i would be very surprised if it is the cable

i would guess that LEDs on the bottom of screen are mounted differently than on the top of screen and that causes the bottom to be of different color than the top ...

or maybe the screen is flexed in the chassis upon mounting ...

or maybe the top of the screen is hotter/cooler than the bottom ...

these are just guesses though ...

 

Very true! I'll add to that that in order to achieve the slim form factor, a few sacrifices had to be made by Apple:
1) Everything is soldered to the mobo, which means, one component fails - everything fails. You'll have to replace the mobo even if a single ram chip goes bananzas.
2) inferior cooling - the CPU will hit 100c even during a HD video playback.
3) Very limited connectivity - you will be forced to use dongles for ethernet and with only 4 ports (2xusb and 2x thunderbolt) it's a huge no go for a pro machine. Try connecting 2-3 external monitors + ethernet + 2 usb devices
4) Screen reflections - I've seen it in person and the panel is as reflective as an average glossy screen.

Grab a regular TN screen and have your Optimus what's the problem?
If you need wide gamut there's a 15'6 RGBLED panel (Lenovo, Sager) with 95% AdobeRGB, can be used with optimus. I have it in my W510 - best TN screen out there, IMHO.

 

Your dream laptop would be 3in/8cm thick, would weigh 13lbs/6kg, and would cost over $6000 USD for a base model. It would have terrible cooling. Only a few people would buy it, and half of them would be on NBR complaining.

You don't want a M6700. Go buy a rMBP and be done with it.

 

Actually, your machine is probably pulling 35 watts total. I have my 240 watt thin adapter plugged into a Kill A Watt power monitor.

Plugged in with charged battery and machine off, less that a watt.

Machine booting, 40 watts at start, 55 watts post screen, short 75 watt peak, then quickly back down to 31 watts at the Windows 7 login screen.

Machine idle in Ultra Performance power scheme with MAx brightness on the screen, I am seeing the same 31 watts with occasional blips up to 37 or 38. Plug in Ethernet, now I am at 34.

Open Firefox. Open Ars Technica website. Power usage goes up to 62, then falls to 44, now at a steady 32. Open Engadget which has lots of ads, power usage is 45 watts, then falls to 38. Go to Youtube, full screen 1080p video of the Planet Earth by the BBC, 48-50 watts.

Remember, this is all with the highest consuming power level with the screen at max brightness.

Now for some fun...

Running Furmark burn in test to fully max the video card, 156 watts with occasional blips to 160. Oh, and the temp of the K5000M tops at in Furmark at 68C.

Oh wait! There is Prime95, lets run that too. We are now pulling 220 watts at the wall. CPU stable at 3.6ghz. Neither the 3920XM or K5000M are throttling. CPU temps at 90C.

31 watts to 220 watts. There is a lot of power management going on here

 

You're welcome

By the way, forgot who asked but the thermal solutions of the M4700 & M6700 do run between both fans. Designed that way so the system can continue to run and cool even if one fan fails.

Mano_G

 

Not true,

while they both have dual fans the CPU is only cooled by one (at least in the M6700)

while you probably will not kill the CPU with no fans it will be VERY crippled and probably unstable.

eventually the overheating will kill it.

the dual fan config is to cool the massive GPU.

also more fans can push more air at lower volume. (DB)

 

* add a few thunderbolt ports

As soon as they reach an actual standard, I agree. Right now everyone is implementing them in slightly different ways. Still sort of the wild west there.

* 4 x USB ports *on each side*

Would make the machine thicker to stack them.

* 2 x Sata3 msata bays for SSD raid 0 boot drive, plus another msata for 4G wireless card

This one I agree with very much. Intel is close to bringing RAID 0 trim support out of Beta testing. Assuming chip densities continue to grow, mSata drives in the M6800 will be at 1tb. This would mean over 1gb/sec of speed at 2TB of storage.

* 2 x 2.5" bays for redundant storage

This one depends. Do you need redundant storage if you have dual mSata drives? I would almost say one 2.5" bay, and the Optical bay can swap in for a second 2.5" bay.

* no optical drive, no expresscard, no smartcard, no fingerprint reader

And you just lost your Government sales...

* dual batteries, each 90 watt hour, with ability to swap either battery without AC and without shutting down, and with ability to remove batteries without making the laptop unstable on the desk

You have that right now. Its the battery slice + the built in battery.

* cold air intake in the back, between the hot air exhausts to enable operation on a soft surface like a bed

This would put the cold air intake right next to some of the hottest air in your room. Also think about how this would work with a dock. Intakes on the front, sides, top, or a combination would be easier to work with.

* 1080p webcam

Agreed. As long as it scales down well for video conferencing.

* dual subwoofers one next to each speaker ( like in a retina macbook pro )[/I]

Actually, the Retina MBP does not have subs. The Legacy MBP 15 does have 1 sub. Even then we are talking about a sub that is the size of the Ctrl key on the keyboard. Also remember that the "sub" on a MBP has a Freq response of 1500hz - 250hz.

I went to the audiocheck.net frequency response test. The M6700 speakers start playing tones around 150hz and are fully kicked in by 200hz.

There were also no rattle or vibrations in the M6700. The Retina rattles and buzzes when the Vol is over 80%.

If you want better bass, you would have to put in a larger sub.

* no number pad, keyboard centered ( like in macbooks )

I would like a larger trackpad. I happen to like the number pad when I am working with numbers. You probably don't work with a lot of numbers.

* 200 milliwatt headphone output into any impedance from 24 to 300 ohms with 110db SNR

200mw @16 ohms would be 24mw @300ohms.
So we have to go the other way. You need a built in headphone jack at supplies 1.6 watts @16 ohms and 200mw @300 ohms.

Still, 200mw is a lot more than the 32mw per channel that ipods and iphones put out. You idea is sound. Get it, sound

I wish Dell could team with with HeadRoom for their headphone output stage. The problem would be additional cost for people that won't use the headphone out.

* woven carbon fiber lid that you could sit on without damaging the screen

That would be nice. Just don't sit on it. All of your weight would be focused on the hinges and the latch. Then on everything until it gets to the rubber feet.

* magnetic power cord ( like on macbook )

Macs deal with 85 watts of power. The M6700 deals with 220 watts. You need a heavier aggregate wire gauge and contact area to get the wattage through without heating up the wiring or connectors.

* 16x10 aspect ratio screen

I think 16:10 is dead. The fix will be higher pixel densities.

* IPS screen that works with Optimus ( like on Retina macbook )

The Mac OS does not support anything over 8 bit color. This means it will never have to deal with the 10 bit color issue that makes Optimus not work. Of course it also means you can't see 10 bit color on an external Mac monitor either. Everything is always 8 bits.

* rounded corners and thinner chassis ( like macbook pro )

Depending on what the trade offs are. Can you only dump 85 watts of heat into the air with the new thinner chassis? Well, that means your going to lose your 55 watt CPU with 61 watts of constant turbo. It means your video card is now limited to 35 watts since your 45 watt cpu already has your total at 80 watts. Better watch those turbo modes.

* in fact i would match the size and shape EXACTLY to the 17" MBP because every case is designed to fit it, but no cases are designed to fit Precision

Hopefully one of our friends from Samsung will chime in about how Apple reacts to someone having the EXACT same design as one of their products.

* ability to choose from 20 graphics cards ( 5 x radeon, 5 x geforce, 5 x firepro, 5 x quadro )

How is this more Mac-Like? Oh. Sorry. Don't want to rub it in that you can only get one single video card on the Retina MBP. Wait. Darn it. I think I just did.

You get workstation card choices right now. I think that as soon as you put gaming and entertainment oriented cards in the machines, you cheapen their standing with people that make purchasing decisions. Remember, many people have to justify their purchases to the people they work for. My boss would know that a GeForce GTX 680M is an expensive gaming card and it will raise an eyebrow. It would also not necessarily help me get my work done any faster. The Kepler K5000M would help me get my work done faster and if my boss goes out and looks up the card, he will see that it is a workstation card. Of course it will still game


* 1500 nits brightness screen for use in direct sunlight

300 nits is 10 watts.
1500 nits is 52 watts.

Don't forget that that is 52 watts of heat you now have to deal with in the display bezel.

* screen backlighting that automatically adjusts color temperature to match the environment

Oh no no no no. You want color temps that stay rock solid. You don't want to edit 300 photos and then realize your white balance was off. People that are serious about color lock down the Environment to match the locked down and carefully calibrated screen.

*and how about this Bokeh: both CPU and GPU cooled by both fans each ( like on Retina Macbook Pro ), enabling either fan to be removed for cleaning without stopping your work and then simply snapping it back in, and moving on to the other fan. in other words ability to run on a single fan just like commercial planes are designed to be able to fly on one engine.

The M6700 GPU is cooled by both fans. The CPU is cooled by one.

The M6700 fans can each be removed by turning 2 screws to remove the bottom cover, then 2 screws for each fan. You could clean them in less than a minute.

You could - in theory - put the M6700 to sleep and clean the fans. You could probably - in theory - clean the fans with the machine running at idle. But why would you want to?

Now, lets look at that Retina MBP. First, make sure you have your Pentalobe screwdriver handy - you're gonna need it! No normal screws on this bad boy! Remove the bottom cover by removing all the Pentalobe screws. Then remove a bracket, then remove all of your antennae, then another ribbon cable, and finally the fan screws. Now the fan is out!

Hopefully the ribbon cable and all the antennae being removed is still allowing the Retina MBP to still run on one fan.

The other Retina MBP fan appears to just have a bracket to remove followed by more screws.




etc

you give them too much credit. their design isn't half as clever as Retina Macbook pro and even Retina MBP could be improved upon.

We disagree on design and that is fine.

At the end of the day I give Dell credit for building the right machine so that I can get my work done.

The Retina MBP will not meet my work needs. The display is too color limited. The CPU and GPU are underpowered in comparison. EVERYTHING requires a dongle or adaptor. It is simply not what *I* need. It may suit other people very well.


they beat their only competitor - HP - wow big deal LOL. now if they instead went against Apple and won that would be something to write home about [/I]

Define "beat".

Are we talking a nice design that will surely take up space at many tables in coffee shops right beside a white iPhone connected to earphones in a hipster's/gadget techie's/aspiring writer's ears? Then yep, you are right. The Retina MBP is THE style statement you need to make sure everyone knows that you spent $2,220 - $2,800 on a machine that suits your needs and lifestyle. It oozes style and sophistication and all of those dongles are just like little pieces of jewelry scattered about.

Are we talking about doing actual work that requires a high performance machine? Like actually MAKING the the special effects in that movie you are watching on your MBP? Well then the Precision will be a better choice.

What about some benchmarks? The K5000M is capable of roughly 3X the performance in 3dMark11.


Dell did the absolute minimum that they had to do to beat HP. and Apple did the absolute minimum they had to do to beat EVERYBODY.

Dell did a lot of things to beat HP. I know you have not dug in to really understand all of the differences, but they are there.

Apple does have some very loyal customers. I have no doubt that in your mind Apple does beat everybody. Part of it is marketing. Part of it is keeping machines very simple and stupid. You don't usually upgrade anything yourself. Your options are mostly set for you. You don't have to think when you buy a mac, you just buy what they give you.

The loss of the 17" MBP was a loss of the closest thing they had to a workstation. With the larger chassis, you also get more room for components and more room to get rid of heat.

In the workstation world, Apple did the absolute minimum. They did not update the 3 year old Mac Pro desktop. They killed off the MBP 17". They turned Final Cut into iMovie.

The writing is on the wall here. Apple is a company for the masses of consumers out there. They are willing to abandon the professionals that create things and design things just to make more profit from a more tightly focused group of consumer products. Apple is not a Work Station company. They are a Consume Station company.

And they have their hook right through your cheek. Apple is like the Swiss Army knife with a small blade, sanding blade, scissors, and toothpick. That is all some people will need. I personally need the Swiss Army knife with a ton of blades and tools to get my work done. The M6700 gives *me* those options. Yeah, I know the knife with more options is bigger and heavier and not as sleek. But I also know which knife won't get the job done.

that's still better than what Samsung does though. Samsung's slogan should be " why innovate when apple will do it for us ?

Yeah, too bad for Samsung and Apple falling out.

 

Great comments, Bokeh! Completely agree. Funny how in the Apple section of the forum, people frown at me when I talk about AdobeRGB. 100% sRGB may be enough for website builders but it's only about 35% of the visible colors. It's like people don't wanna see beyond that. They don't need the versatility, upgradeability, power. Give them shiny new toys with limited functionality and decent reliability and they'll think you're God. Just call it a PRO and professionals will buy it, lol.

 

But you have to respect their decision and why they made it. It goes both ways. Apple products are great for some people. I just don't think they are right for me as a main work machine.

An example. The MBP 17 would convert a minute of video in 9.5 seconds. The M6600 would do it in 8. The M6700 does it in 6. The timing was done by the number seconds to process 10 minutes of video and dividing by 10.

For a 200 minute file,
M6700 - 20 minutes
M6600 - 27 minutes
MBP17 - 32 minutes

Now say you are dealing my workflow today. I have 7 files to process that are all around 120 minutes. The M6700 will finish in 84 minutes. The MBP17 in 133. That is almost an hour saved. The fact that the 3920XM in the M6700 stays at max turbo all the time really helps.