Precision 7530 & Precision 7730 owner's thread

Actually, I think, same configuration, 7730 and 7530 are almost similar price, so it looks like there is no reason to choose 7530 at all. Yeah I understand some guys only need 15 inch system. But 7730's size is actually reasonable, it is not hugely larger than 7530.

 

Generally true. If you don't need graphics then you can save a lot of money by picking the 7530. I looked into it when ordering and getting a 7730 would have cost me about $1000 more, mostly because I would have been forced to get the P3200 instead of the P1000 NVIDIA GPU.

 

Agreed, for me it was $300 more and it wasn't worth it for an extra M.2 slot and USB-A port. As someone who does a lot of traveling the 2lb weight savings was more important.

 

The P52 configurator does not offer the ability to not include a dGPU (Quadro). The 7x30 does, which reduces the cost a bit if you do not need a dGPU. Moreover it seems that the P52 BIOS will not let you just use the iGPU (disabling the dGPU entirely).

 

It’s time to upgrade my Dell M6700. I’m either looking to replace it with the 7730. Yes I would prefer something smaller but love the screen real estate. My Primary use is Photo Editing with LightRoom, Photoshop and some video editing. I’m on the road generally 4 days a week as a pilot. So I’m looking for something with a little more storage and screen real estate. Primary concern is screen quality and color accuracy. I did have a couple of other questions that maybe people could answer.

Does anyone have any experience using the Thunderbolt networking. Looking to network two computers directly to transfer large raw photos and video files, so I can work on them on the road.

Is the card reader a UHS II?

If I went down in size to the 7530. It looks like it has a full keyboard and number pad? Is the keyboard cramped? The graphics card will be more power limited than that on the 7730?

I was also looking at the possibility of getting the 5530. Is it going to thermally throttle?

People still having issues with the TB18 dock?

 

Yes, USB attached keyboard and mouse tend to loose connection from time to time for a second or so. Can result in missed letters, or if the key-up event is missed the last key stroke is executed many times.

 

Network Performance ist really good. About 100MB/s while copy large vm Images. I have the keyoard issue once every two days. Currently my biggest issue is that my Monitors do not wakeup after standby or fail after resolution change. Also after each reboot screen scaling ist invalid. Looks like a 4K Image on a full hd Monitor. Windows detects the fault and requests a logout. After logout Monitors, go to standby again and do not wakeup. This ist really annoying.

 

Have you tried different cables?

I have two 24" displays attached, one DisplayPort (1920x1200) and one HDMI (2560x1440) and no problems.

 

For networking, why don't you just directly connect the two machines via Ethernet? You'll get gigabit transfer speed and you don't need any special cable (cross-over cable) for this anymore. Do you need something faster than gigabit?

The keyboard in the 7730 and 7530 is exactly the same and completely interchangeable in between the two units. 7730 just has a little bit more space around it.

Graphics card options are different between the two machines. On the NVIDIA side, 7530 has Quadro P1000/P2000/P3200 choices and 7730 has P3200/P4200/P5200. The overlapping P3200 is actually different between the two machines, the one in the 7530 is limited somewhat.

5530 will have thermal throttling. In fact I believe that all of these machines will experience thermal throttling but the 5530 will experience it more. (Someone has tried undervolting the CPU in one of the 7000-series machines and that cooled things off enough to eliminate the throttling.)

As others have mentioned, TB18 has issues with I/O (keyboard/mouse). I have these connected directly to my system via USB hub for the time being. Other stuff that I have attached to my dock works fine. Sometimes I have trouble getting it to deliver power to the laptop (all of the dock-attached stuff is working but the laptop is running on battery power), I have to disconnect and reconnect the cable a few times.

 

Alright—purchased a 7530 with specs:

Spoiler: My Precision 7530 Specs

Components
1 Intel Xeon E-2176M, Six Core Xeon 2.70GHz, 4.40GHz Turbo, 12MB 45W, w/Intel HD GFX
1 15.6" UltraSharp FHD IPS, 1920x1080 AG, NT, w/Prem Panel Guar 72% color gamut LCD
1 Palm Rest, with DigitalPersona Full Scan FIPS finger print reader and Smart card
1 15.6" FHD IPS, Non-touch, Cam/Mic Bezel
1 15.6" FHD IPS, Non-touch, WLAN/WWAN Cover
1 8GB, 1x8GB, 2666MHz DDR4 Non-ECC
1 M.2 256GB PCIe NVMe Class 40 Solid State Drive
1 Power Cord (UK)
1 E5 180W 7.4mm Lot 6 PCR, Chicony
1 6-cell 97Wh Lithium Ion battery with ExpressCharge™
1 Dell Venture Backpack 15
1 Intel XEON Processor Label
1 NVIDIA Quadro P3200 w/6GB GDDR5
1 Thermal Pad for Nvdia Graphic cards
1 Intel WiFi Link 9260 2x2 802.11ac
1 Intel WiFi Link 9260 Wireless Driver
1 No Mobile Broadband Card
1 Bracket for the config of no 7mm HDD
1 Internal Dual Pointing Backlit Keyboard, US English
1 Dell Developed Recovery Environment
1 Waves Maxx Audio
1 SupportAssist
1 No RAID
Software
1 Resource Media not Included
1 Windows 10 Pro for Workstations (4 Cores Plus) English
1 Windows 10 Pro OS Recovery 64bit - USB
1 No Productivity Software
1 System Driver for Mobile Precision 7530
1 vPro MOD - Manageability
1 Dell Power Manager
1 Dell Precision Optimizer
Service
1 No Installation Service Required
1 3Yr Technical Support
1 Limited Warranty:Yr1-3 (Labor)
1 Limited Warranty:Yr1-3 (Parts)
1 3Yr ProSupport:Next Business Day Onsite Service
1 3Yr ProSupport: (7x24) Technical Support & Assistance
1 3Yr Accidental Damage Service
1 No Dell ProSupport for Software, No DDPE Encryption SW

And as of today's exchange rates, I paid US$2894 for it.

I'll run a full suite of benchmarks on it when it arrives in a couple of weeks.

I plan to throw in 32 GB of 2666 MHz ECC RAM at some point in the future—likely next year, when DRAM prices are expected to drop, as well as a 1 TB NVMe WD Black SSD, or a 1 TB Samsung 860 EVO SSD, whichever I think is more worth. Or maybe both.