Precision 7560 & 7760 Owners' Thread

So recently I've been having a new issue. In the past month, three times after traveling with my 7760, upon reaching my destination, the computer refuses to turn on. The light at the very from of the computers glows amber while the power button is held. Then whenever it feels like it, the computer will turn on. I don't know if commuting/walking around with the laptop in my backpack messes with the CMOS battery or what, but all that I have done internally since I received this computer is add an SSD and swap the ram with the 2x16GB sticks that I used on my older 7740, so there should be no reason why this is happening on my end.
Also the front rubber foot is peeling off from both ends...how??? It's not like I viciously rub it against rough surfaces or anything.
And the very front of the palm rest never touched the base plate, there has always been a few mm gap, as if there should be a screw on the base plate keeping them together.
None of these were ever problems with the 7740.

EDIT
Regarding the Amber light and the pc not turning on, the last two times(the last time being right now) the computer started to work as soon as I removed the base plate. I took the plate off, and saw a brief white flash as I unflipped the pc, and when I pressed the power button, it worked.
Really weird stuff like this are the reason why I keep both a flathead and star screwdriver in my backpack.

 

Did you remember if your 7760 worked fine before replacing the memory sticks? Check if the battery bank sits properly and double-check every step involved in replacing the memory sticks, presuming you had to remove the original one from the primary memory slot.
If those can't help, then I think you should contact support.

 

Thanks for the info. Just a minor note, I saw you were doing 175% scaling with your 3840x2160 display. Non-integer scaling requires extra computations for the pixel interpolation which would likely drop your score a little bit. Anyway, it doesn't matter much as long as it fits your use case.

Glad you are happy with your 7560. I had waited more than 1.5 months for the laptop, but I'm a happy customer now.

 

Do you turn the system off or do you hibernate it? If you turn off do you have fast startup? Maybe something is causing the battery to drain. When you got it to turn on, did you notice the battery level?

I have had issue with a 7710 with hibernate and not waking up so I try not to use it. I always shut down and turned off fast startup. Both the 7710 and now the 7760.

 

I ordered the 7760 with a single 8GB memory stick since from the start I knew that I would just be transferring the 2x16GB sticks from my old computer to this one. These sticks that I put in are indeed in the primary slot, under the keyboard, I learned through trial and error that the 7760 doesn't like having ram only in the secondary slots. The battery level remains the same after it starts working again.
When I looked up this problem for Dell computers, the problems that I've seen are CMOS/coin cell, or ram-related. For the second and third time that this happened, the computer was put to sleep, and the second it was in hibernate more. I'll try shutting down instead to see if that makes helps (I too keep fast startup disabled). And the battery is indeed keept firmly in place with its screws, and connected properly. (Even if charging, the computer won't turn on, so I doubt that it's battery-related.)

But I find it very strange that twice, almost immediately after taking off the baseplate, the computer quickly flashed white and started to work again; I wonder if it was a coincidence, or if there is physical blockage or something along those lines maybe messing with the CMOS battery (I actually don't know where this battery is located, I'm used to seeing the large black disk-shaped battery with a red and black cable from older Precisions).

I'll likely take the baseplate off later today to inspect it more indepth.

 

I know with the 7710 I forgot to plug it in once after I turned it on. It went into hibernate or some sleep. I plugged it in and it would not turn on. I remove the battery and put back in and it would not turn on. I had to unplug, remove batter, and hold power button for 20 or 30 seconds to drain the residual power. I then plugged in and it booting. In this case I think it got stuck in a sleep mode.

Reading through the service manual page 71, there is a coin cell batter connector. Maybe that is not seated all the way after you changed the memory. Do you lose bios settings when this happened?

 

Accessing the CMOS coin-cell battery requires a near-complete disassembly, as it's hidden to the 'north-east' of the touch pad. Do be careful.

If you don't succeed, you should ask for a full-machine replacement.

 

Finally on the verge of ordering the 7760. Could use help on choosing between the FHD (1920x1080, 60 Hz) and the UHD (3840×2160, 120Hz) displays. What kind of resources are used to run the UHD display at FHD (with any of the CPU and graphics cards, though I will be using the A4000 and 11800H)? What effect does UHD scaled to FHD have on heat, CPU or GPU percentage, and/or battery life? I do not play games and need the lower resolution to see/read because of vision problems. It could be nice sometimes to use the higher resolution when running certain software and/or when using a larger external display, but most of the time I need to run at FHD/1080p. Anyone have data/impressions of the effects that the UHD/4k screen scaled to FHD has on heat, CPU or GPU percentage, and/or battery life?

 

Last June I ordered a 7560 with the UHD display and an A2000. I currently multiboot Windows 10 and Ubuntu 20.04 LTS.

In Windows I scale the display to 175%. Even though that is a fractional scaling factor, I've observed no impact on performance/heat/battery/etc, BUT I've not attempt to quantify any of those differences. I don't play games or other apps dependent on highly responsive graphics performance, and I rarely use the machine for more than a few minutes without connecting the AC power adapter. The most graphics intensive applications I use are Lightroom and Photoshop, which is why I wanted a panel able to display the full Adobe color gamut.

In Ubuntu I operate the display at FHD (1920x1080) resolution. Under Ubuntu I mostly run office apps, Web browsers, email, and software development tools. As with Windows I've observed no performance impact attributable to running at less than the display's native resolution.

I strongly suspect the active graphics processor will handle most of the work of displaying FHD on an UHD screen with minimal impact on performance or battery life. I'm sure you're aware that an external display that extends rather than mirrors the laptop panel need not match the panel's resolution. Also, if you're mirroring the panel and an external monitor, changing the scaling value in Windows isn't at all difficult, and can be done from a batch file.

Are you able to order a Precision laptop with a UHD screen? I ask because I don't see a UHD screen as a option offered by Dell's online configuration tool except in an XPS laptop.

I really like my machine (i9-11950H, 32GB RAM, A2000, 2TB Samsung SSD), and don't at all regret ordering the UHD screen. It feels just as fast as my desktop.

-Bob