Dell Precision M6700 Owners Thread

Unfortunately, I ran into an issue with the speakers. At first, they worked but after using a set of headphones, the speakers stopped working. The audio jack is clean and in good condition (no play). The situation is the same even after a fresh Windows 10 install with all of the driver updates.

I did a bit of digging and I found this article: https://www.dell.com/community/Laptops-General-Read-Only/Headphone-Jack-FAQ/m-p/3550216
It's stating that this could be the audio board. I have followed the step-by-step instructions and still no sound from the speakers apart from the PSA test. I would like to confirm if anyone else has had this issue and if there are other solutions apart to replace the audio board that I might have missed in my research.

The laptop also did not come with a bluetooth module, despite being listed as having one, so I will be ordering that as well.

 

Can you confirm which audio drivers you are using, ones from Microsoft or from Sigmatel? Microsoft ones should have been installed by default, but you can download Sigmatel ones from Dell.

I ask because I've had issues with the Sigmatel ones not switching properly between the audio jack and the built-in speakers. Also, they introduce a fair amount of DPC latency. I do not recommend using them.

 

It's the Microsoft driver version 10.0.19041.1.

UPDATE
I got the speakers to work again. After several tries of plugging and unplugging a 3.5mm jack, it suddenly triggered the speakers to work. I decided to clean the jack with isopropyl alcohol 75% with a small cotton bud just to make sure the contacts are clean. I did feel something "clicked" while I was cleaning it so perhaps that was the trigger that got stuck not allowing the connection back to the speakers when the 3.5mm jack was pulled out. Just glad I don't have to replace the audio board. Hopefully, the connection will stay stable. I have to say that the speakers are quite decent sounding.

 

Has anyone tried Windows 10, version 2004 on this system?

I upgraded on September 4, figuring 3+ months would be long enough to wait for major bugs to be worked out.

I started experiencing system freezes. Basically... I leave my system powered on all of the time. I do not have my system configured to sleep or hibernate when idle; just the display powers off. Before the upgrade, it was remarkably stable; I generally only reboot maybe twice a month for an update or something.

Since upgrading Windows, I found that if I left my system idle for a while, it would not "wake up" when I returned. So, I would come back to the system with the display powered off and it would be completely unresponsive, not waking to keyboard or mouse activity. Power light on and fans running, but no disk light activity. Sleep button does nothing. I had to do a hard reboot. I checked Event Viewer and found nothing interesting except for a large gap in entries, covering I guess the time between when the system actually froze and when I discovered it.

This didn't happen all of the time; I'd say 2-3 times per week.

Did a little driver tinkering to see if it would make any difference. I upgraded to the NVIDIA 450 Quadro driver branch at the same time that I upgraded to Windows 10 version 2004. I tried going back to the 440 branch that I was on before but that didn't make a difference; still freezing. I also tried using both RAID mode (Intel driver) and AHCI mode (Microsoft driver), thinking that there could be a problem with one or the other (there was an issue with the MS AHCI driver causing freezing back when Windows 10 1607 was first released); no good there, I experienced freezing with both.

Not sure what else to try. Not interested in doing a clean Windows install "just to see" if that makes a difference. Yesterday, I reverted to back to Windows 10 version 1909. Unless I find some clue as to what the problem might be, I am apt to just skip version 2004, and wait and install version 20H2 sometime in maybe January or February, hoping that the root problem is "fixed" between now and then. Could end up running into the same thing because 2004 and 20H2 are the same base (20H2 just has some extra minor features toggled on).

 

I haven't updated my M6700 yet, still on version 1909 as it's nice and solid and I see no reason to update anytime soon. However, I did just update a Dell XPS-17 L702x that is sort of unused in my house to see how version 2004 looks. I honestly don't really see any difference and as long as I keep using some older Nvidia graphic and Realtek audio drivers, it seems just as solid as version 1909. Once big difference in our usage pattern is that I always shut down my systems at the end of the day and boot fresh the next. I have been doing this for 25 years since Windows 95 and I find Windows just gives you less problems by doing this. With today's SSDs and much faster boot times than the old days, there is not much value in keeping your system running all the time unless its acting as a server for other systems. I also don't put it to sleep or hibernate.

How long after a fresh reboot were you seeing the freezes, was the timeframe consistent?

 

It wasn't really consistent. A couple of times, it lasted around 5 days without a freeze (making me think that I had "fixed" the problem), and sometimes it would freeze within 24 hours.

I often leave my PC running overnight jobs and I often access it remotely so I'm not going to get into the habit of shutting it off. I know that it can handle 24/7 operation as it has a remarkable track record... just not on Windows 10 version 2004 apparently.

This is the worst kind of issue to figure out as it leaves no trace. I can dig into the stack trace and figure out a BSOD. I have plenty of experience figuring out obscure error messages. Don't really know what to do about "my PC freezes, sometimes, every now and then" especially when its clearly not a hardware issue.

 

Hi @Aaron44126. I am running Windows 10 Pro Version 2004 OS build 19041.508 with Windows Feature Experience Pack 120.2212.31.0 since June 21, 2020. I have a Quadro K3000M with the driver version 426.50.

I usually put the laptop to sleep at night and have only performed a shutdown a couple of times. So far (knock on wood), I haven't had any issues of waking up or any unresponsiveness. Do let me know if you need me to check anything else.

 

Off topic but you're the m5000m guy, this dude put a Tesla M6 in and says it's fine and there's someone selling a boatload of these for less than $100 bucks up there who says not to use it as a gpu upgrade on older laptops, ever hear of this sort of use for that card?

https://www.ebay.com/itm/333708158296?ul_noapp=true

 

This card is similar in performance to M5000M and GeForce 980M; it doesn't have any display output capability, though, so you can only use it with Optimus enabled (Intel GPU driving display) and you will be limited to the laptop internal display and VGA port. No HDMI or DP.

 

Yeah that's what the seller of the laptop says too, is it possible to get around this with one of those converter cables though? ie vga to hdmi/dp if you say want to just output video to a larger tv screen? There's a boatload of these up on eb for less than 100 bucks.