Latitude 7450 Owners' Thread

Thanks for the feedback. I have tried to update the driver for the storage device and the controller but the system did not find a more suitable driver. I also tried to delete and reinstall the two drivers according to your instructions. That also did not bring about any change. System is stuck at ATA2 speed.

Sometimes when I boot the machine (it boots Win7 from the msata drive) it says that "A disk read error occured, Press Ctrl+Alt+Del to restart". This happens every 3rd or 4th time I boot the machine.

Maybe the interposer or the msata drive is faulty - or maybe the machine is faulty?

 

You can also try over-writing the Intel storage controller driver. And are you on the latest BIOS? I was going to say it was A07 but Dell released A08 today which has some security improvements and "Addressed the Dell ePSA diagnostic error on a specific hard drive detection issue".

My current theory is that if the connecting cable is slightly damaged or inadequately plugged in then the handshaking to confirm the maximum interface speed might be stuck at SATA 2. You can also set the BIOS to do a thorough self test at boot time which may give more time to negotiate the speed. The SSD itself is OK as you have confirmed in the other computers and, as I have said already, the E7450 should be OK at SATA 3 because that is what I'm running with my 840 EVO mSATA SSD (which was previously in an E7440).

John

 

I updated the BIOS to A08 but that did not solve the problem. I have not tested the msata SSD in the other systems, the readings were just for comparision. I think that something is broken. I have not had much luck with these DELL machines. This one also had a faulty LCD right out of the box.

I have ordered a new msata interposer directly from DELL. I think that I will wait to see if that fixes the problem. If not, maybe there is a compatability issue with the msata Samsung 850 EVO?

Anyway, thanks for your help and advice

 

I would be surprised that the 850 EVO has a compatibility issue when the 840 EVO has worked fine for me.

Another thought: Reinstall the Intel chipset driver. Also, can you reseat the SATA cable where it is connected to the mainboard?

John

 

Yeah, the fan was blowing out a lot of hot air.



The keyboard itself was not uncomfortably hot. As you can see, the surface of the keys are much cooler than inside the gaps between the keys. That said, the surface of the keys can reach almost 40 degrees C which is getting close to uncomfortably hot.

Power draw from the wall when running Dota and with battery removed (130W adapter):



0.240A x 240V = ~57.6W from the wall. If we take into account the inefficiencies of the power brick, I assume the laptop itself is drawing just over 50W.

 

I have measured a sustained 45W at the mains socket on my E7450 during the 3DMark benchmarks but I have the i5-5300U CPU and default settings for the GPU. I wonder if your i7 CPU is pulling significantly more than the nominal 15W while increasing the clock speed of the GPU will inhereently increase the power drain.

You can check the CPU power drain using HWiNFO and opening the sensors tab before doing your gaming. Afterward you can look at the maximum CPU power (or you can write a log file which will show any power spikes). Under most situations my peak CPU package power is about 17W.

John

 

Managed to get the Samsung SSD working at SATA3 speed. The solution was to uninstall the Intel RST software (and driver). However, after a couple of reboots the SSD failed completly. Now I am unable to partition or format the SSD. I am sending it back to the dealer for RMA.

I tested the SSD in the interposer with another computer. It did not work there either. I have put the (slow) SHDD back in the E7450. The SHDD works fine and its interface runs at SATA3 speed.

Jase-dk

 

Thanks for the update.

Let us hope that the replacement SSD works better.

John

 

Anyone else experience issues with the screen and speakers? I've had my E7450 6 month and the last couple weeks the right speaker has stopped working. It was making a lot of static noises for a month or so, now it doesn't make any sound, but the left speaker works fine. I can plug in external headphones or speakers and things work fine. So I think it's a bad speaker.

Also the screen (FHD touch) has developed 4 bright spots that's visible in a light background. Not dead pixels as these spots are much bigger than a single or small group of pixels. It's about the size of a grain of rice or a pea. Started off with 1 spot, now it's up to 4.

Anyone else experience similar issues? I dread having to spend hours on the phone with dell convincing them of the issue and getting them to send parts. Our warranty parts direct contract has expired and hasn't be renewed so we can't just order the parts ourselves anymore. (until dell gets their act together and renews the contract)

 

Bright spots on the display of the type you describe are usually the result of excess pressure on the LCD. The back of the LCD is well protected. Could there be any causes of pressure on the front? Is it touching the keyboard when closed?

I've no suggestions for the speaker problem except to download the install Dell's newest audio driver in case there's a software problem.

John