Dell Precision M6700 Owners Thread

Thanks for explaining the similarities between them. Will definitely look out for 970m, 980m, M4000M and M5000M and see which one will come out cheaper.

Does Windows 10 work well with these machines or will there be some functions that may not work? My unit will come with Windows 10 pre-install but theses online shops here in Asia tend to install other pirated programs so I am weary that potential malwares are installed. Is it enough to wipe the disk clean through the Windows 10 program option or will it be better to nuke the disks with something like DBAN?

As for the NVIDA driver, I have read that it would be better to install the drivers from the official Dell repository instead directly from NVIDA? Or have I gotten this reversed?

Lastly, does anyone have any tips for cleaning the inside of laptops? I was looking to purchase a compress air (CRC Duster) and some sort of contact cleaner (CRC QD Electronic Cleaner or WD-40 Contact Cleaner). I have used compressed air and I know it's safe but I have never done so with a contact cleaner.

 

To best clean a motherboard, just use water, dishwashing liquid and an hard brush then put the board in an oven at 100°C for over an hour, but for you case it's not necessary, you should just use a brush or compressed air to clean off the dust everywhere and between the fin of the heatsink, then clean heatsink contact area using isopropylic alcohol and that would be good, you can also use isopropylic alcohol to clean off connector on the graphics card an on the ram, the rest probably don't need to be clean.

 

Thank you. That seems to be a lot simpler. I will just get a can of compressed air then.

 

I'm using the driver from NVIDIA and it works fine. (I recommend this for gaming. The one on Dell's site is rather out of date.)

I just use compressed air to clean the fans and heatsink fins. If you need to clean something off of the board, isopropyl alcohol works, with a q-tip. (You can get these at your local pharmacy.) You will definitely need this if you replace the GPU as you will have to clean off and re-apply the thermal paste on the CPU. I've never used water+soap or the oven method. Seems a little scary to me

Windows 10 is fine. It's fully supported by Dell as well... They have drivers and everything available on their site.

 

Noted on the drivers and glad to know Windows 10 works well. Sounds like compressed air and isopropyl alcohol are the way to go then. Should I go for 70% or 95% isopropyl alcohol?

Sent from my SM-N960F using Tapatalk

 

Is there any recommendation for a Dell Docking Station model that works well with the M6700 and Windows 10? I found listing for e-Port Plus PR02X and PRO3X models. Any other models that I should look out for?

 

I have one of those Docking Station and I think they are terrible for the M6700, there is a huge void between the laptop and the "moving part" that should touch the laptop, there is no docking station which fit correctly the M6x00 lineup sadly
Also if you want a clean version of windows 10, try LTSC or enterprise edition

 

I have PR02X and I have no issues with it, it works and fits great and I've been using it without any trouble for years... You just have to slide out the "bumper thing" for the M6700 to fit on it correctly. (You'll see what I mean when you have one in your hand, I think, there is a piece that can be extended or retracted with a slider for fit.)
Do realize that there are two versions, one that supports USB 3 and one that does not.

PR03X sounds better because of the higher number, but it is actually a slimmed down version that is missing some ports.

Any edition of Windows 10 will work. They are all basically the same except for the feature set. I would start with version 1909 if you can; 2004 is still on the newer side. I do not ordinarily recommend LTSC (which is different than the others) for general use, it is missing some things like access to the Microsoft Store, it is more for systems that need to be solid and long-lived for a long time without having to worry about re-validating everything after major upgrades. (Kiosks, or systems in doctors offices or hospitals are some examples I can think of.) Enterprise or Education editions are great if you can get access to one of them, they have an extra year of support for the fall releases of Windows 10. You can upgrade less often and just stick to the fall releases.

 

Thanks. I am going to try and see if my unit comes with the Windows 7 sticker and see if I can upgrade that to whichever Windows 10 I can get to save some money.

Excellent. I will keep an eye out on both units and see which one will surface at a better deal.

Thanks!

Thanks. I will stick with version 1909 then.

 

I believe Windows 10 will still accept Windows 7 and 8 keys for both upgrade and clean install. If it has the Windows 7 product key sticker (which you have to remove the battery in order to find) then you can use that. If it originally shipped with Windows 8, then the key will be "burned in" to the BIOS. You can use this tool to recover it. https://www.nirsoft.net/utils/product_cd_key_viewer.html

Pretty sure that Dell only offered Windows 7 Pro and Windows 8 Pro so you would get an upgrade to Windows 10 Pro.

If you went to university, you can check to see if you have access to this page which will let you download Windows 10 Education and give you a product key. (I was able to get in with my alumni credentials even though I have been graduated for over ten years.) Education is basically the same as Enterprise.
https://azureforeducation.microsoft.com/devtools

You can download Windows 10 from here but it will always get you the latest version (2004 at this point).
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10
This page will let you download ISO images for prior versions.
https://tb.rg-adguard.net/public.php — It's a non-MS page but it does direct you to microsoft.com URLs for the downloads.