M4800 Owner's Thread

Thanks! then I'll have to disassemble my laptop body.

 

What happens if I just take out that magnetic sensor? would it make my laptop malfunction?

 

Like I said above, no telling; no one has tried this AFAIK. It could work as you expect and stop the screen from turning off. It could cause the laptop to fail to boot. It could cause the laptop to always think the lid is shut. It could do something strange. (I scratched my M6700 motherboard near the WWAN slot once and it caused the system to run highly throttled with the fan at max even though temperatures were fine. Had to replace the motherboard.) I recommend that you have an extra I/O board on hand before messing with it, in case removing the sensor makes things worse.

 

lol I thought this laptop was a good deal.. but what a bad luck ;P

 

Well comparing all the alternatives from this period, that is the same cpu generation, gpu and 4x slots for memory being a workstation laptop it is the best alternative for me

M4800 advantages

• The HP has only one fan
  
  
• Thinkpad has only one fan
  
  
• HP is fat like an elephant..and ugly from underneath and they knew this, why they made the top and palmrest so beautiful with overhang so you would never see the bottom half from any product image
  
• The Thinkpad creaks and bends like a credit card without using any force and the plastic parts is prone to brake when you need to tare down the computer, I had enough of that on my old Thinkpads
  
  
• The screen assembly on Thinkpad laptops even P1> is only screwed in to the plastic housing with brass nuts molded into the plastic and I have had enough of repairing this*
  
  
• Thinkpads beginning with the x30 generation blocks bios flash, from now on you need to use a clamp or soldering to mod the bios to remove whitelist etc etc and it does not allow you to use a 3'rd party battery or 3'rd party charger because those are now being blocked..Dell does not have a whitelist for wireless cards or whatever components
  
  
• M4800 was the last true workstation laptop with 13 ports to use, thats more than what the average stationary computer have
  
  
• W540 apart from the HP zbook 15 G1 and M4800 does not have an MXM slot but the gpu is soldered on to the motherboard, so if you bought a lower spec model with the K1100M you're stuck with it unless you buy an entire motherboard, same goes if the gpu starts failing and I have had this issue on my older Thinkpads why I now wanted an mxm slot.
  Luckily you can disable the discrete graphics entirely in bios if it starts to fail, not sure if they still allow you to do this in P1 for example?
  
  
• Very easy both to tear down and a logical sense how the parts are assembled, looking at you Thinkpad...and HP back in the DV7000 days could have 200 screws in different threads and lengths in one laptop like wth?!
  HP has gotten better at this in the recent years but back then it was like:
  - Here take the whole box we have plenty screws here..
  - But sir isn't this enough?
  - no.
  - okay..
  
  
• Very easy to maintain, both the HP and Thinkpad the heatsink is among the last components to leave the computer which makes cleaning the heatsink from dust is impossible without tearing down the whole thing to bits.
  On the M4800 you just remove the back panel and unscrew the fan, two screw on each fan and flip it over...take a brush and remove it all and blow a little until you can see right through the other side and it looks all clear and reverse the teardown and you're up and going within 3 minutes.
  
  
• Physical dedicated volume up/down and mute buttons not placed within the Fn keys
  
  
• The best keyboard with clear and square keys, I've always loved this with Dell but unfortunately this is the last model with the classic Volvo square keys, the newer models all have a more rounded keys with different layout, it gives the hardware a bold look, it does not try to be a gamer or fashion model its just a server equipment that will blend into any office
  
  
• The Trackstick is just as good as the Thinkpad now when I have the Trackpoint 3D printed adapter with the soft rim cap
  https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:316420
  
  
• And it is the most sturdy computer of all alternatives, it feels solid, it does not creek or bend, its heavy but it lives up to why its heavy because it is solid in the build quality

M4800 weak points

• The one thing Dell does not have is manual fan control, compared to Tpfancontrol or thinkfan, or Notebookfancontrol for HP but the EC take good care of the cooling, it does not make the fans run forever like many Thinkpads have issues with..
  
  
• Switchable graphics does not work very good in Linux, for example Linux mint, the switchable works but the gpu fan does never turn off after switching to the internal intel graphics in the nvidia software and then log out and in again
  
  
• Hard to find spare parts, often expensive and you need to be fast to order when you find the part you need that is in stock before it goes away
  
  
• ALPS trackstick is not as good as the synaptics and the driver interfere with many software.
  For example space bar + left click and moving with trackstick or touchpad does not work, but it works if I use the external mouse.
  This works fine if I uninstall the driver, it also works and has worked fine on synaptics trackpoint.
  Working mobile is a little harder in this regard but I need the driver to get the acceleration I need which is limited to a lower value if the driver is not installed.
  
  
• As mentioned earlier, there are some issues with some of the components related to the broadcom daughter board, the smartcard reader, express card reader, nfc reader, fingerprint sensor full/swipe
  
  Extra
  If you want to convert the newer Thinkpad Trackpoint to be able to fit the old wider nubs use this
  https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:3299221
  https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2822042
  
  All laptops and computers have their weak points and compromises but weighing in the bad and the goods the M4800 for me is the best alternative out of these three laptops, why these?
  Well I need the trackpoint/trackstick and a three button mouse key on the keyboard which they all have.
  HP only have three button on their zbooks while Thinkpad have them on all their models and same goes for Dell with their Latitude and Precision all have it (those that have the trackstick)

 

Hello.
Does anyone know what's the part number for Precision M4800 motherboards supporting UHD & QHD+ screens?

I need to install an AMD GPU like RX 460M or WX4150 for the sake of better multimonitor performance but at the same time I also occasionally have to go out with my laptop, which means that I need to keep the internal screen operational as well.

Due to possible issues with higher end AMD GPU support in Precision M4700, I'm thinking of moving to an M4800 machine and would like to make the right motherboard pick.

 

I replaced the io daughter board.. but now none of the ports are working, can't boot off usb on the left side but right side works fine.
Booting to diagnostics goes on without any errors detected..
Gonna tear down the computer one more time and fiddle with it a little, if I can't make it work I have to put back the old io board.
I'm gonna flash the bios one time and see if it might make a difference, and reseat the connector.. that's my two ideas I have.
The board itself is working, volume buttons and lights are all working that are connected via flex cables but none of the external ports

I flashed the bios hoping it would do something, but no luck..
I removed the plastic sheet and washed the whole board with isopropyl to get rid of any contamination that might interfere but no luck here either.
I washed the connector with isopropyl to make it really shiny on the gold contacts but no luck.
I installed the old io board and immediately it recognized the usb stick when booting to F12 single boot menu..
So I will buy another io board when it comes back in stock at parts people because at least I can trust them to send a guaranteed working board and I get the parcel within 4 days.
I bent the pins in the 3.5mm port so they hold on the contact and then I sprayed some contact spray and went in and out and rotated the plug to brake through the corroded layer and hopefully reduce any sparkling when moving the plug in and out

 

Wow! I changed my M4800's keyboard to a new backligt keyboard. Now everything's working fine... It no longer triggers lid close.

 

Maybe my old keyboard was triggering lid close... I can't explain. These devices are nearly five years old.

 

huh wtf... thats the last component I would have guessed, but if you think about it it is located in the same area but there are no magnetic parts.. either there might be some magnetic foreign object stuck there or somehow parts has become magnetized.. or something wrong with it causing EMI's that triggers the switch?

Anyway I have my M4800 back together and I'm in the process of configuring everything before making a macrium backup before starting to use the disk.
I have replaced

• Bottom chassis assembly
  
• Palmrest assembly (assembly meaning I bought the palmrest new with all components and PCB's installed, buying "part" alone only include the palmrest plastic piece)
• Power plug
• Gpu from K2100m to AMD 5100m with thermal pad mod + Thermal Grizzly Hydronaut thermal paste
  
• Heatsink for AMD gpu
• I/O board... but this board had defective ports so I was forced to put the old one back until I can get a new replacement, will probably take a few few more months to find one as they are rare to be found in new condition or old stock item still sealed

My keyboard is already replaced with a backlit new keyboard year.
Power cord always dropped to the floor so I had it replaced with a new plug.
I must say the AMD gpu is light-years better than the Nvidia who screwed up everything the last years on Windows 10..
Right click opens immediately without the delay you have caused by nvidia injecting their options in to the right click menu.
Everything opens like that! Every animation is fast and smooth.. I love Nvidia but they screwed it up completely with their drivers and the rage is never ending on reddit and nvidia website.
And I'm sick and tired of reading the nvidia forum switching between different beta and whql drivers every time a new update in windows 10 breaks the driver or causes bsods or lockups.
I still have a bad feeling from the old AMD days that their components are ridiculously hot and power hungry, its kind of true with their vega gpus too but mostly its just an old thought of habit I haven't forgotten yet.
Only issue I had was that LibreOffice wouldn't start but I solved it by starting it to (safe mode) after installation is finished then choose configure, then Disable OpenGL, then press apply and restart and it will start right up.
Otherwise it will be stuck at the LibreOffice starting splash screen and hang..