E6540 Owners Thread

I've used ThrottleStop to lock the multiplier, essentially underclocking the cpu. Not the same as undervolting per se, but it does use less power and create less heat. I'm sure the 8790M can be undervolted as well. That's not the point though. I want to be able to use the system at the specs I was promised when I bought it. If it can't do that, the system is flawed and I want to move systems to one that functions as promised.

Honestly, so far it looks like the only one in this performance/size range that does that is the M4800. I'm seeing reports of Gpu throttling with the xps 15/M3800 as well as some annoying electrical sound. Too bad the battery life on the M4800 isn't real good. At this point, I might just sell whatever I get from them and move to something else. The Arous X7 looks nice, just waiting on solid battery life and heat details. Maybe I'll got desktop tablet combo. I haven't decided.

 

I've never been able to get XTU to install - it always gives an unsupported platform error or something.

An update about the heatsink:

"By the time that the repair was arranged for those systems, there was still enough quantity of the part, however, due to the number of systems requiring such part for the repair, the inventory at hand diminishes everyday. It is only recently that we incurred deficit of that part and the service repair that we arranged for your system is just one among the hundreds that is affected.

A ticket was already submitted so that an ETA will be provided and for the replenishment of the backlog part."

So they are repairing hundreds of these huh?

 

Interesting.. My guy yesterday said he could look at the reports for this model and while there were some for heat, it wasn't like they were getting tons of them..

If it makes you feel better, so far I haven't gotten a tracking number or any parts associated with my service call. He said the parts will update when it ships, but idk..

 

AAAAAND BACKORDERED! not expecting to get more until 2/20 I'm not waiting another month to get a part I know won't fix the issue. My patience has officially run out..

 

Well, I haven't gotten the message yet for my service call. But when I do I am going to really let them have it... Last time I tried to get service on the heatsink it was also backordered. And they ended up offering me a system replacement. You should ask them. Otherwise, complain

 

That sucks. It probably doesn't help that the Chinese factories Dell sources these HSFs are probably closed for New Year's vacation. Unless the new part has more heatsink fin area or increased fan RPM I'm not sure it'll solve the problems you guys are having.

Just curious, are the throttling issues present also in the IGP-only models or are only the ones with the radeon GPU affected?

 

If they can be backordered that far back I wonder how they are making the ones you can currently order? Doesn't fly with me.

 

I bet there won't be a message about the service call. When I make a service call over the phone, they always have contacted me to schedule it in under 24hrs. Every single time. That's why I called to check the status and found that the Twitter group didn't do squat. I don't want a system exchange at this point. It's my 3rd one already and they all ran like this. I waiting on this rep to call me so I can explain the situation, again, to this new guy.

I would assume that if there were revisions, it would noted in the part number. Probably given a new part number altogether. From what others have said, the part numbers are still the same.

To my knowledge, the E6540 isn't offered without the 8790M. You can choose to not use it, but why would you pay for a machine with a DGPU and not use it?

The parts they're using are probably already allocated to machines. This is assuming they're actually still building these machines and there isn't a stockpile of them somewhere. This is not a particularly popular model, especially compared to the Precision lineup and the XPS 15. I mean, if you look at the models they're offering (in the US anyway), every configuration ships tomorrow. If you look at the post count for this thread, almost 1/5 of the posts were made by myself and a majority of them made from 5 other users. The view count skyrocketed only after we started referencing this thread to the Dell fourm, twitter, reps, etc..

Also, for those of you with monitor issues, post your screen info. HWiNFO64 tells me mine's a Chi Mei CMN15BA manufactured week 29, Year 2012

 

Mime too is a Chi Mei CMN15BA, week 29, 2012

 

Just sent a very long and frustrated email to my new (old) rep. He should be caught up on the details now, but unfortunately for him, he's getting the brunt of my pent up frustration.