Precision M4600 Owners Lounge

Funny, I just noticed this a few days ago and was a bit alarmed. I'm surprised I didn't notice it sooner, as I've had the machine for a few months now. Glad to know at least I'm not the only one. You are right though, it is a shame for such a top end machine.

 

flexing absorbs any potential shock. what you need to do is observe the screen while pressing the back. if the screen distorts like someone is pressing on the lcd, thats a bad sign, but in the m4600's case, it dosent. so the flex dosent mean anything other than its gonna do a good job absorbing an impact.

 

I cannot agree more. But the bezel has major quality issue too. Including from the previous generations, it just feels to plasticy and the build quality is just awful... Had the bezel been more STURDY and less flexible, it would have had the best build quality in the industry.

 

jep i fully agree. i got my precision for about a month now and the first think i noticed was the flexible backcover. really poor build quality for such a premium workstation. but anyway...

i'm wondering if it is normal, that the fan is turning on and off all the time. when i'm working at night, the fan noise is really annoying. its not running at 100% but fast enough to make an annoying sound in a quite environment. i also found out, when i turn off power play the period is bigger, but still there.

with powerplay:

turning on for about 15 sec.
turning off for about 35 sec.

without powerplay:
on for 10 sec
off for 2-3 min

Dell support couldnt help me.
Does anyone have the same "problem" ?

my config:

Intel core i7 2720qm
8 GB Ram, Intel postville G2 SSD120 GB
ATI Firepro M5950
Full HD Non-IPS Panel

I saw that dell updated the nvidia quadro drivers. i hope they will release a new ati driver which fix the powerplay problem soon.

 

I'm pretty sure they all do this. It doesn't really bother me though, it's not that loud. If I have any soft music playing in the room I usually can't even hear the fans. Give it some time and you'll probably get used to it and wonder why it ever bothered you in the first place.

On a similar note, I think the fact that the fans come on so infrequently is a huge testament to the awesome cooling system inside these things. And when the fans do come on, it is usually at low speed and quiet, even under heavy CPU loads. The bottom barely even warms up most of the time. That's quite different from my wife's old Mac Powerbook G4, which always amazes me with its absurd underside temperatures. It is borderline painful. I think Apple's idea of a good cooling system is to use their customers' legs as a heatsink. Hmm, what's the thermal resistance of a human thigh, I'd like to see their calculations on that one... Apple, form over function until the end!

 

ok thank you. it's good to hear, that you have the same "problem". first i thought it would be a specific problem of the ati graphics driver, but it seems that users with nvidia quadros have it too. i'm trying to get use to it, but its really hard. especially when i'm downloading stuff, while i'm sleeping the noise is driving me crazy.
i've owned many laptops before but none of them had this weird behavior. i always thought that the fan speed is depending on the temperature. my previous laptop was a macbook pro 13" with 2,53 ghz. idle temperature was about 55 °C and the fan was absolutely quite.my current idle temperature with the precision is at 48°C.the apple was hotter but also quieter. so its a big chance for me now. but i think i have to live with that now.

 

I have the M4600. I have the controlvault fingerprint reader driver installed

The problem is the dell site does not offer the APPLICATION that i need to setup security and fingerprint scanner for windows logger.

I had M4500 before and I used the controlpoint driver and application that was both provided in the site. But those dont work with M4600.

I called the tech support and they got no idea...

PLEASE HELP

 

The cooling on the M4400 worked, The M4500 was better, but the M4600 is really good. I burned in the cpu and graphic card for 14 hours and the graphic card never got above 62C and the cpu was 78-80. I kinda felt like the fans could go a little faster but either way it was more then sufficient and also not too loud. I feel like there is some overclocking room, anyone want to try with me??

 

Sorry I couldn't tell you. I did not order the backlit keyboard on my laptop.

 

Here's how you do it

It worked for me however it's not worth it at all. It took me longer to log in with it than password only. It was so bad I uninstalled it which was a pain as well since you have to uninstall alll of them in an order.