Kaby Lake Precision pre-release discussion (5520 / 7520 / 7720)

Hmmm, did a test configuration, on the 5520, and my set up would cost about $2886. That's with the top i7 chip, 16G RAM, 1080p screen, a 1T SSD,3 year Prosupport (since that also includes accidental damage), 97 whr battery (no extra charge!) and an extra 130W AC adapter. Also the battery warranty. It really bugs me that the battery is "Glued in" - I keep my laptops for several years, and always end up needing to replace the battery. That's trivial for a laptop where the battery pops out, not so much if it is not user replaceable.

Again - it says the i7 "is only compatible with the Quadro GPU" - does that mean the Intel HD 630 is disabled on the i7 machine?

For those smarter than me (i.e. all of you!) what's the difference in the 1T SSDs they offer? Specifically the M2 1T "Class 30" and the M2 1T "Class 40" SSDs?

 

The Precision 5520 manual has yet to be published but I would be extremely suprised if the battery is glued in. It's internal, so it's not quick to replace, but I'm 99.9% sure that it will be the same arrangement as in the 5510. Business customers expect to be able to change the battery if it wears out. Note that you can't have a 2.5" storage drive and the large battery option.

They mean that you can't have the non-dGPU version with i7 CPU (because they don't make it). The Intel GPU runs on all versions.

I can't answer all the SSD class questions but the Class 40 appear to be NVMe SSDs which have faster interfaces and usually faster speeds (but some have write speeds worse than the best SATA SSDs). Whether you will notice the benefit of the NVMe speed depends on your work patterns. My 5510 came with a 256GB NVMe SSD which I swapped for a 1TB SATA SSD and I don't notice any speed difference in everyday usage.

Unless there's something about the 5520 which you really want, a 5510 from Dell Outlet for half the money will give you almost as much bang for half the buck.

John

 

If it is like the 5510 (likely), the battery is not glued in. You need a torx screwdriver to remove the bottom panel, but then the battery can be removed easily.

 

Thanks. On the SSDs, honestly, I'm pretty ignorant. I'm not sure how much difference I would tell between the different classes; if the differences are in milliseconds, I'm not sure what I do where it would matter.

In my current system I have a 256G SSD as my C: drive, which I use for the OS and all programs that I run, and a 750 G standard hard drive, which I use to store data. But I really want the biggest battery for longest battery life, so I'll have to live with one internal drive (I also use USB 3.0 external drives for some data that I just use once in a while.)

 

I agree. What gets me is that the whole "M dropping" move was to equalize desktop and laptop. The confusion is even bigger than before. For example now we have 1080 GPUs in some machines that barely outperform 1070 in others making it obvious that having a 1080 written on the box doesn't guarantee its performance. Same can be said for 1070 vs 1060. As for Quadros, they are not even equivalent to their desktop counterparts to begin with. At the very least I hope that these chips would be binned, unlike what is "thrown" into GeForce 10 series.

I'm personally eying the WX 7100

 

Yup, Dell loves to use T5s for the bottom casing. Not everybody has Torx drivers laying around, which is good

 

ard

That is all so true, however, Nvidia is not that dissimilar from any other industry. Consider the automotive industry for example. The VW Touareg, Audi Q7, Bently Bentayga and even Porsche Cayenne are all built on the same VW MLB platform.

In this case, 4 variations on a theme, but with different dynamics and totally different markets in mind. With some manufacturers, there are even more variants. A car that cost $60,000 is the same shell as one the costs $230,000. An even better example would be their power plants: one base engine with bits and pieces added.

Maybe you could think of the difference between the cards as tuning? Where Quadro cards have added bits are additionally tweaked and tested to work consistently and reliably with specific applications. And we can't forget the long-lived warranty. Keep in mind, it's the pro cards that fuel the research so we can all enjoy our games.

 

I'm hearing that the 5520 won't have a fingerprint scanner. What?

 

In Europe the 5520 can be configured with fingerprint reader.