Dell Precision M6700 Owners Thread

IIRC, the battery charge threshold is a very important factor as the battery charging diagram would probably be represented by an exponential function so to charge it to the last 10-20% of the maximum capacity takes more energy and thus more heat is generated which damages the cells (not sure of the exact reasons, didn't really study how batteries operate).

Not necessarily if the higher capacity is achieved by using more cells or cells of different specs. I'm not sure if that is the case with the Dell 87 vs 97 Whr battery models or they just upped the max capacity threshold. I see no change in the wear levels, still stuck at 6% as I got it (I bought a barely used one - no signs of use, but the IPS screen has two dead pixels next to each other in some corner)). But, I have a 4+ years old M6400 which didn't reach more than 15% wear and I used the battery a lot almost on a daily basis in the last year or so I fear this might not be lasting as long.

 

It has; and in may instances and iterations. I used Acronis, not the most economical (you'll have to use search if you want to find the others that were recommended), but was simple enough. Since you were like me, not particular with keep/delete its a simple enough 4 step (or was it 5?) procedure.

Anyway, an external HDD with eSATA connection is all that's needed. The only limitation is it wouldn't take my partitions so I had to give a little (insignificant) stored data so it could reformat and us it.

NOTE: My Precision just blacked out twice in the last 1/2 hour? It just went off while I was typing as if I had hit the log off button which I didn't. I restarted it with no obvious issues. Hope nothing has gone out?

EDIT: The problem may be in the power cord/laptop connection. The connection appears lose. I shook the laptop and it went off again as I noticed it flex.

 

Hello, I'm planning on buying a M6700 soon, and I'd like to know if you can use *both* videocards at the same time.
I tried to browse through the posts in this thread, but I haven't found a clear answer (and I may have missed it in such a jungle ).

Ideally, I'd like to use this computer with Xen virtualization, and use the integrated HD4000 for the host system, and say, the FirePro M6000 for a guest OS with VGA passthrough or PCIe passthrough.

Is there a way to use the external video ports with one card and the laptop screen with the other ? Would Optimus be a requirement for such use case?

Anyway, thank you for such a passionned thread.

 

Thanks, Krane.

So the idea is to clone the original HDD onto a 3rd USB drive, then transfer that clone to the new SSD? Guess I'll have to do some more searching around. Sounds like it might just be easier to buy the smallest SSD OEM, then add another SSD later myself. Comments?

 

@eiffelveh: You can't use the HD4000 with the firepro, for all practical purposes, it's disabled. I'm not sure you could use both with a quadro and the non IPS display either.

@Out of the Maelstrom: You don't need a third drive, just hook the new drive to the computer and clone away. With a M6700, you could even put the new drive in the secondary drive bay, clone and then place it in the primary bay. You also need the cloning software, some drive manufacturers like Intel offer one for free (works with their drives only).

 

@tijo: Ok so, from what I understand, there is no way to use the HD4000 when having a firepro? There is no option to switch between the two cards in bios either, I presume?
I guess I'll have to go the nVidia route... Thanks for your reply.

Question for Quadro owners then : do you have a way to only use the HD4000 on the laptop screen and still use the external video ports with quadro's computing power?

 

Nope, switchable are completely disabled with the firepro and given the issues that Enduro had when the M6700 was launched, it was and still is a good thing. Enduro isn't as mature as Optimus. Oh and there is noswitching with nVidia if you get the IPS display either, simply because the HD4000 can't drive a 10-bit display.

 

I been enjoying my new laptop and the one thing I do not like is how hot is runs in the docking station. Is there a good program to control the fans I can live with a little fan noise knowing it is running cooler.

Laptop is a M6700 Covet,i7-3940XM,8GB 1866 RAM, Quardo 5000 video card and two SSDs.

Should have mentioned i am using windows 7 64

 

With Optimus enabled, the Intel GPU will power the internal display and VGA port, and the Quadro will power the other ports. (The Quadro can render things on the Intel GPU displays via Optimus.)

 

Well, that sounds great. Would *any* cloning software work about the same as others, or are some faster, safer, more accurate, etc. than others??