M4800 options in the UK

I am really keen to buy a Dell Precision M4800, but in that odd way Dell do these day, they're making it really hard for me to want to spend two thousand pounds with them.

On the UK consumer/small business website I can see sort of the machine I want (E-value code: ca008pm48008mumws) which has the QHD+ screen, K2100M card, i7 4900MQ processor and 16GB of RAM. However, the storage really confuses me on this - I want a workstation for photography, so 256GB doesn't cut it. It's annoying that the 256GB SSD is in the 2.5" slot, not in the mSATA slot, so I can't cheaply increase the storage - I have to pull out the 256GB SSD, buy a mSATA SSD and then slap a larger spinning HD into the 2.5" bay. I'd much rather be able to buy a machine that came with an mSATA SSD, not a 256GB 2.5" drive that I don't want.

I also don't want Windows 7. Windows 8.1 comes with much better options for display scaling which is a big deal on a QHD+ screen.

Is there any way to customise these machines? The website provides no customisation options of any note. I can customise if I speak to an agent, but they *cannot* include a QHD+ screen on any machine they customise for reasons I do not understand (but I have checked with three agents). Is there a solution I'm missing?

Tom

 

Win 8 doesn't deal with scaling better, just has an option for multiple displays.

The win 7 machine should also come with win 8 media, so all you need to do is reinstall.

If you don't need an optical drive, you could have three drives: the spinner, the 256, and your mSATA.


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I don't know what your budget is but Samsung has come out with a 1tb msata. Might be interesting if you need more storage and dont want to get rid of the 2.5".

 

Thanks destinationsky and alexhawker, these are both sensible and helpful comments. I suppose my frustration is that I can't customise the machine Dell are selling, even though I *could* customise it were I buying in the United States. Is there some clever way of unlocking these customisation options in the UK?

 

You can try buying from us website and then ship to UK. Price will be about the same, even considering import tax.

 

I really can't say, sorry.

If it helps, I ordered a 750 GB HDD and 8GB ram and did the SSD, ram, and optical caddy upgrades myself, which saved me some money. I notice the uk pricing is basically the same as the us with the currency symbol changed...


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I've had a look, and cannot seem to find a way on the Dell US site to ship to the UK. I guess it would also have a US keyboard, but that's not the end of the world.

 

I think he meant off Ebay or so. Dell itself wont ship. Have you called or chatted with a Dell rep? Might help

 

I meant shipping to a 3rd-party mail forwarding company in US.

 

yesterday there were 5 variants. 2 at £1180 ex vat. 1 at £1400 ext vat. and 2 at £1900 ex vat. i can only see 1 variant on the uk site today. price is £1,985.74. Dell Precision M4800 Workstation Details | Dell UK