M6600 Owners Thread

Thank you, just to let you know that I even opened Revit forcing it to use the Nvidia Quadro but it still used the Intel graphic anyway!!

I bought this computer mainly to use Revit, this can't be happening to me!!!...

By the way it is Revit 2012

 

Pros and cons of Optimus. It still isn't 100% reliable technology.
Did you get the fingerpint scanner to work?

 

Oh yes by the way, thank you! But the bad thing is that it only works to login windows. On my Sony Vaio, I can use the fingerprint for any software or website using a login and password and that is sooo convenient. DELL must do something about this quickly.

As for Optimus, the problem here is that Revit doesn't recognize my Quadro even when I force it!!

 

Same here - still haven't found a way to actually use my Quadro 4000M. Even CPU-Z only reports Intel HD graphics.

Perhaps I'll try to connect more than a single external monitor...

Piotr

 

Can anyone report if they have any success with Vertex 3 SSD with M6600? Thanks!

 

Measured the 17.3" WLED and WLED Touch screens.

Both do cover the 72% color gamut in the specs. In fact they both slightly exceed the sRGB gamut.

The native white point on mine was 6900K on the reg and 6600K on the TS. To oversimplify, 6500K is neutral. Higher is blue, lower is red. Uncalibrated they both looked bluish and a little washed out. After calibration they are fine.

Both panels calibrate well with a delta of .2

They are a step down from the RGBLED screens in the M6500. They are probably a step up from the WLED screens in the M6500.

The IPS panel will be the one to get if you really care about color. It should be the best screen on any laptop to date - definitely any Dell. The WLED will get you by as long as its calibrated.

 

After Bokeh post about overclocking margins of Quadro 4000M i became more curious about the peak performance of this card.
Indeed stock settings (475 / 950 / 1250 ) are very conservative, that's witnessed by the steady performance and temperatures you get when you start pushing up the values.

Keep in mind that the following experiments, made in 3DMark 11 basic, were done just in order to find out the limits of the card, i'd never use these any of these settings as "production" settings. My CPU is a i7 2720QM.

Experiment 1 - Stock settings

Core: 475 MHz
Shaders: 950 MHz
Memory: 1250 Mhz;

3DMark Score P2427
Graphics Score 2037
Physics Score 6671
Combined Score 1984
GraphicsTest1 9 FPS
GraphicsTest2 9 FPS
GraphicsTest3 12 FPS
GraphicsTest4 6 FPS
PhysicsTest 21 FPS
CombinedTest 9 FPS

Max GPU temp: 63°C

Experiment 2 - GTX485M settings

Core: 575 MHz
Shaders: 1150 MHz
Memory: 1500 Mhz;

3DMark Score P2906
Graphics Score 2621
Physics Score 6792
Combined Score 2791
GraphicsTest1 12 FPS
GraphicsTest2 12 FPS
GraphicsTest3 16 FPS
GraphicsTest4 7 FPS
PhysicsTest 21 FPS
CombinedTest 12 FPS

Max GPU temp: 66°C

Experiment 3 - max MSI Afterburner settings

Core: 620 MHz
Shaders: 1240 MHz
Memory: 1625 Mhz;

3DMark Score P3122
Graphics Score 2826
Physics Score 6951
Combined Score 3005
GraphicsTest1 13 FPS
GraphicsTest2 13 FPS
GraphicsTest3 17 FPS
GraphicsTest4 8 FPS
PhysicsTest 22 FPS
CombinedTest 13 FPS

Max GPU temp: 67°C

Bottom line: the Nvidia Quadro 4000M is by far the most tolerating card i've ever owned , being able to sustain a 30% peak overclock on both core, shaders and memory, with a 28% measured performance gain in benchmark. That's at the price of a measly 4°C more in maximum temperature: 67°C (already a low value, i recall my Quadro 3700M hitting 78°C).

This low peak temperature makes me thing this card is probably capable to to handle more than 620MHz on core. However i'm fine with stock settings (475MHz), very happy to have margin, meaning reliability to me.

 

Isn't this amazing that we can't use these Quadro cards as we would like??? I've been reading a lot of forums to try to find out a way to use my 3000M and a lot of people complain about the same issue!!

Why didn't DELL inform us about that before purchasing?

 

I really do think that these machines are overbuilt - especially the cooling. It is how a workstation should be.

I need to seek out an HP and Lenovo to compare it to as far as heat and fan noise. I don't see how they could be better.

 

Definetely!

Now my last experiment with the Quadro 4000M, the big one.
Does this card tolerate a over 50% overclock?

Took my countermeasures, set up cooling and some alarms, then i did it:

Experiment 4 - maximum overclock: +57% core and shaders clock, +40% memory clock

Core: 750 MHz
Shaders:1500 MHz
Memory: 1750 Mhz;

3DMark Score P3679
Graphics Score 3379
Physics Score 6937
Combined Score 3551
GraphicsTest1 15 FPS
GraphicsTest2 15 FPS
GraphicsTest3 20 FPS
GraphicsTest4 10 FPS
PhysicsTest 22 FPS
CombinedTest 16 FPS

Max GPU temp: 66°C

Bottom line: Yes, it does handle graciously monstrous settings and i'm done with tests.

This card definetely can handle more than what i dare to throw at it.
It does handle a 50% overclock on core without any sign of artifacts or problems.
It does run @750/1500/1750 without even going past 70°C and consider there's 27°C temperature here.
This sums it up, it's worth all the money it costs, i won't investigate over