Precision M4600 Owners Lounge

if you order with quadcore, you can use 4 ram sticks. between 1333mhz and 1833mhz. its your choice if you want to spend on the "faster" ram.

if you order with dual core, you can only use 2 ram sticks, at 1333mhz.

the minicard ssd is a tiny ssd that can be put into the minipcie slot (where 3G cellular card normally goes into). if you do this, you can have 2 hard drives. one small ssd for booting windows and applications, and one big normal hard drive for storing your photos, files, etc.


bit difficult to open it with one hand as the lid hinge is quite tight, the laptop moves.

 

I'm trying to decide between the Latitude E6520 and the M4600, was hoping some users here could help me decide ? Do both laptops have the same screen ? I see they both have the FHD antiglare LED option. Other than that what would be a deciding factor to choose between the two? Thanks!

 

the main difference is graphics. if you need high performance graphics go for precision, if not, latitude is fine

 

Don't forget about IPS screens...and more powerful quad core processors...

 

i figured if he was struggling to tell the diff he wasnt looking for those features. but yea, those are two points too

 

The E6520 maxes out at the 2720QM processor, while the M4600 goes up the 2920XM (and also the better value 2820QM).

I'm not certain if the main board chip sets are different. I think the M4600 has a newer chip set than the E6520, but not sure. Anyone?

The E6520 maxes out at 8GB RAM, while the M4600 goes up to 32GB. I think the E6520 has 2 DIMM slots, the M4600 has 4 (is that accurate anyone?).

The drive configs are different. The E6520 has the E-Module internal bay that can have a second HDD/SSD, or a DVD drive, or a second battery (but one at a time). The M4600 can have an eSATA boot SSD, and one HDD/SSD, and a DVD all at the same time, with no internal bay (although some folks have figured out how to swap the DVD for a second HDD/SSD).

As others have mentioned, the M4600 has higher-power graphics options, up to the Quadro 2000M (and the Firepro M5950), while the E6520 goes up to the NVS 4200M. So definitely a lot more graphics power on the M4600 for gaming or other specialized needs.

You can get the same 1920X1080 FHD screen on both, as well as several other lesser resolution options. The M4600 has the 1920X1080 IPS option, the E6520 does not.

I don't know what your use of the laptop will be, but I do software development (and some video editing) and wanted more CPU horsepower, more memory, and two full-time SSD/HDD plus DVD, so I went with the M4600. In short, the M4600 is more of a "mobile workstation." The E6520 is very nice, but hits its limits short of that -- but probably good enough if you're not doing serious gaming, or software development, or graphics/video design, etc.

I'm sure other folks will let me know where I got that wrong...

 

Yes, the M4600 has 4 SODIMM slots vs. the E6520's 2. Best value is still 2720QM even for the M4600, as performance differences going higher are not as significant compared to the steep price increase.

 

Probably a matter of perceived value, but I did a little spreadsheet of benchmark differences vs. price differences when I was trying to decide to upgrade from the 2720QM (I ruled out dual core so I could use the 4 DIMMS):

From a 2720QM to the 2820QM, the benchmark differences were not huge, around 2-6% for things like Cinebench, to about 20% for raw CPU things like wPrime. But the price difference was only $150. I kinda figured I was paying about $20 per average % benchmark increase.

From a 2720QM to the 2920XM, benchmarks were around +15% and +20% respectively, with a price difference of $700. So I was paying about $41 for an average % increase.

$700 to upgrade to the 2920XM was noticeable coin, and I was paying twice as much for the relative increase in performance, quite a premium. I did want to try and get as much horsepower as I could within my budget, especially for things like compiling code, so it was worth it to me to pay the $150 for the 2820QM. If I was really trying to save every $ possible, I probably would have settled for the 2720QM.

I also figured that maybe down the road I could swap out the processor for either the 2920XM or something better when the prices went down and I had some extra coin to spend.

That's my (possibly flawed) reasoning. Your mileage may vary.

 

Thanks everyone, my usage would mostly be office productivity use and accessing databases. Excel and MS-Access, Sql server mostly and occasionally for streaming movies .HW Config aside I was wondering which had a better display for readability and better build quality. The first post here says the non ips display has pretty good viewing angles whereas a youtube video on the E6520 had horrible viewing angles and color shifts. Was looking for something with at least the quality of a desktop TN panel.

 

Dear sirs,

Why is there 2 builds of m4600? pictures from Dell and pictures from real owners the internals are built different. Can the Dell rep advice.

Pls see links of said findings.

Removing The Optical Drive

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-b7wiCLfmTbc/TeZsDTeajvI/AAAAAAAC41o/ME-EJoFLxvA/s1600/IMG_1794.JPG