Dell 17r N7720 SE - user review

Pada, KSMB,

thanks also to you for your answers and advices!!

And if would ask them for a precisione 6700 paying something like 700 euros of difference??? do you think it could be possible?

ciaoo

 

you meaning you want to buy a Precision M6700 for €700 ???

i would do it in a heartbeat IF it was in good shape. (Precision models are the best DELL offers)

i drool after a Precision M6700.....you have IPS screen and other awesome features on some of this laptops.

 

my xps+700eur vs m6700 instead of my xps vs 17R SE full optional

 

if you want play high shader games (crysis, bf3, etc)...go for the 17rSE (Precision m6700 use OpenGL which is better for CAD, etc)

BUT (yes, there is a but)... for example new M6700 with Nvidia Quadro K5000M is compatible Nvidia 3D Vision Pro & pure video (which means it working great in BF3, etc)...its one of the best cards Nvidia ever made actually.

 

main use of pc would be lightroom and photoshop and randomically avid studio...so basically photo editing and a little hd video editing...

 

Then m6700 Works flawless. M6700 use true life or other type of screens with higher color gamut and blackness. Perfect for photo editing

edit....
not that strange why photo & news people use the new Macintosh (desktop) with the Quadro K5000 GPU ..(its the most powerful gpu for the moment))

 

it has nothing common with ours tn panels (true life or not), it´s IPS panel, totally different technology used by professionals and also very expensive.

Quadro K5000 is not the most powerful gpu at this moment, its probably based on GTX675, but with some minor tweaks and with optimized drivers for CAD applications.

I would take it, this is highest notebook class hardware you can get, but depends on your needs;-)

 

ok, but of course I could not go over K3000, because of price... ;-)
I think k3000 would be good the "same", don't it?

ciao!

 

So its not possible to config raid 0 in this laptop to run windows??

 

Well maybe your m6700 have IPS.
But the truth is that most m6700 have TN -true life screens. (Just the most expensive configuration who have IPS screen. A whopping $600 extra they also charge)



In the OpenGl GPUs k5000 is fastest ( no question about it). It based on the same Kepler-chip as gtx680m. That simple.

 

Hi guys,

I'm looking for a new laptop currently, and am tempted by the 17R SE after seeing a good offer.

However after reading various reviews and parts of this thread, I've got a couple of concerns/questions - hopefully you don't mind me asking in here?

Firstly, does anyone find that this laptop runs a bit too warm/above average, both when idling and under load? Notebookcheck seems to highlight the temperature as a bit of a negative.
Secondly, is there an issue with Turbo Boost not working still, or has that been resolved? I probably won't be needing the boost too often, but I'd rather a purchase operates as intended...!
Thirdly, is there anything else since owning the laptop that would, in hindsight, have stopped you from buying it in the first place?

Thanks in advance for any pointers.

Cheers,


Steve

 

NVIDIA Quadro K5000M - Notebookcheck.net Tech - Its somewhere between 675M and 680M, 3Dmark11 Gpu score is below 5000 points, in 3D apps there are no huge differences in performance between gaming cards and these professionals cards, but it has some features, which comes really handy in CAD or 3D apps. (4 active displays, etc.),

But you right, there is an option for TN true life screen and only the most expensive ones has IPS screen.

 

temperatures are totally fine, but for hardcore gaming and using CPU turbo boost, it requires to have some cooling pad in some heavy CPU games, it gets pretty warm on the normal table. Idle temperatures for CPU/GPU is : 30-50/40-50, under load 60-75/60-75 max.
GPU turbo boost issue is still there unfortunately, but there is pretty fast fix - in case you disconnect your nb from AC, it get stucked and you have to turn your nb off, unplug the AC, reinsert the battery, plug your AC again and then the gpu boost is working again. I recommend to escalate this at DELL to get this fixed fast.

there is a post on offical forums : http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/laptop/f/3518/p/19470791/20204443.aspx#20204443

 

Is there any way to manualy turn on CPU turbo boost ? When i am playing almost any new game cpu load is between 20-30% max on 2300MHz. How does it work ?

 

switch to maximum performance in windows battery options.

 

my bad, was checking just windows gadget called ALL CPU meter there is just fixed clock 2300 but when I actually open CPU-Z its 3100

 

Guys, i would like to have clean windows 8 install (my nb came with win8 pre-installed), but there is no dvd or anything, even serial is not present at the botom of nb. What should i do?

 

do not use the build in partition (if you have one)....call DELL and they send you a real windows CD..........

i spook to DELL some month ago...they told me they going to remove the build partition on all DELL laptops in the future because they have major issues with that crap (people call them all time having bugs, etc)...it actually happened to me on a older Xps laptop.....i did a recovery and it worked mediocre.

 

Have you checked under the battery? That's where I have my windows licence sticker hidden away.

 

Yes, there are no licence stickers anymore in case of WIN8, seriál number is already written in Bios on motherboard, so you need only OEM version of Windows 8 on DVD, which is not included with the laptop. Awful to get a functional version of WIN8, but then it works seamlessly. pitty, Dell should give us a proper link to bootable iso.

 

That's slightly above 660M levels, but far from 670M performance. I get the same scores with my 650M OCd to 970 MHz. I'm sure it could go faster if one was so inclined.

 

far ?? (far in your mind seems very far)

that what just a post about the easiness to gain power with this machine.

i hit +3000 in 3dmark11 without any problem at all....thats far better....(or am I too far away ?)

 

Hi
I've just ran the HWinfo64 software on my new Dell 17R SE (i7-3630, 8GB RAM, 1TB ST1000LM024) and it tells me the hard drive is SATAII (got transfer rate of 3GB/s). I thought they would have put a SATA III disk in as the laptop supports it I assume



Also looking to either
a) install a 128GB msata drive as cache for the existing 1TB HDD
or
b) Install 256GB SSD drive as main OS/App drive and use the existing 1TB HDD for data . Am I right in saying this would mean having to move the existing 1TB drive to the spare drive bay in the laptop and the SSD drive installed in the bay the 1TB HDD cameout of, or can I just plonk the SSD drive into that spare bay and install Win8 (that's what laptop came with) without moving the existing 1TB HDD

Also will this invalidate warranty? It's not clear. They give you this manual to pretty much d0 anything in the laptop, but nothing that I've seen that says it will invalidate warranty.

 

The bay doesn't matter and no it won't nullify your warranty

 

HDD is SATA 3g, but 17R can handle Sata 6g if you connect the SATA 6g device.

 

It's annoying they put a SATA II drive in though.

Thanks for all answers. So which should I go for option A or Bubble, bear in mind the original hdd is ONLY SATA 3.


Any advice welcomed.

 

15 - 20% is far, and you have proved numerous times that your perception of reality is slightly distorted. What frequency is your GPU operating at in order to get 3000+ points?

 

There is absolutely no need for mechanical HDDs to sport faster interface due to their physical limitations. In fact, only a handful of drives saturate SATA I.

 

Dude, SATA II is plenty fast for a mechanical drive. What were you expecting, that DELL would put 10k Raptors into their consumer line laptops??

... for those interested, the 7200k 750GB mechanical drive that DELL supplied with my laptop can sustain about 105MB/s transfer rate. Not bad for a laptop hdd.

 

What I want to know is if you can effectively cool the GPU when OC'd to that level. Getting through 3DMark11 with a 1000+ clock is easy, you only stress the GPU for short periods at a time... I doubt it would get through the benchmark if it did not have the loading screens between the individual levels to cool down..

 

To answer your question, yes it gets warm...temps are well in spec but when playing anything the palmrest at wasd where you would put your wrist while playing gets quite uncomfortable. I wished the exhaust was on the opposite side, as for turbo...works like a champ!! The is an intel app that shows you the turbo level...that and the actual performance boost combined convince me its working as advertised

J

 

i strongly disagree...........if i compare my laptops (7720, m1710, sxps 16)............7720 have WAY lower temps. (@bajjer if your palmrest gets so warm on your 7720...i suggest you replace your thermal paste). i nearly feel any heat on my palmrest (even in games)


7720 idle temps


my sxps 16 idle about 15C higher (m1710 about 10C higher)

 

@KSMB Your temps are consistent with what I get however after bout half hour I find it uncomfortable to the underside of my left wrist. As for thermal paste...just reg Arctic Silver, Ceramique or alumina or what would you recommend?

 

I gotta agree with KSMB on this one (...wow, who would have thought). Even when gaming for long periods, with the GPU running in the 80-85C range, my palmrest is still pretty cool and comfortable... I would go as far as to say that in a blindfold test, I would not be able to tell if my 7720 was running full throttle or idling, just by touching the palmrest.

For thermal paste, I've done some reading up on it a few months back, and the Arctic Silver 5 came out on top in pretty much every review... can't imagine much would change since then, but google around, there are thousands of threads, reviews and comparisons out there...

 

Cheers for clearing up the sata2/3 query for me. I've just received Dell windows 8 disk via UPS and have ordered a 256GB Samsung 840 SSD. Looking forward to a bit of messing about once I recover from the flu

 

I figured out most of my issue was my SSD is also located there so I moved it and its much better...as for thermal past yea there is thousands of threads...mind numbing lol

 

I would like to share some results from CPU benchmark i did today, this time some serious stuff from real 3D application (3Ds max rendering), no syntetic benchmarks we are used to.
same scene, same settings of course.

DESKOP :
Intel Core i7 3770k (no OC) : 5:03
Intel Core i7 3930K (no OC) : 4:28
Phenom II X6 OC to 4GHZ - 5:22

NOTEBOOKS:
Core I7 3610M with turboboost - 5:58
Athlon X2 mobile 1.8 GHZ - 37:42


TEAMWORK (Distributed rendering) :
Phenom II X6 4GHZ + Core I7 3610M - 2:59

I have to say, iam impressed by this laptop results! :thumbsup:

 

Is this model available with BOTH nvidia and intel card? I have run everest engineer and it only shows nvidia and device manager only has the nvidia card as well...I see a lot of complaints about the video performance (although as I said mine runs fantastic so far)

Anyone know?

J

 

Hi Guys!
This thread seems to be the most active, so I will share my experience/question here:
I just got a Cooler Master Notepal U3 for my 7720...my gpu temps normally get 67 C max. in a demo run in 3dmark 11 (950 core, 2400 memory)...just by using the pad without the fans, the temp goes UP to a whopping 80 C!!
Adding the fans gives around 75 (not placing any directly under the fan intake, that makes it even slightly worse ...).
So...any ideas/suggestions? (have another pad, gonna try with that too tomorrow)

Update: Notepal X2 on full speed nets 80 C, with fan speed down a bit and front raised (thought that might be the problem) 90 C. :/ Again without anything it's still 67 C...
Update2: evenly raising with 4 water bottle caps = 90 C

 

Just found out in case anyone else is interested...no integrated video if you buy the 3D version like I did


J

 

I'm going to ordering one today with a 3630QM.

Looking to change the thermal paste with some IC Diamond after 30 days of use (basically after return policy at BB), this should be enough to know if the laptop has any problems for me.

 

So I picked up a cpu from ebay for cheap. I will be trying out a 3820QM in this laptop. Wish me luck...

 

ooooooo PLEASE let us know!!!!

 

3820 i7 should work.....BUT it produce more heat..............Artic silver 5 is a must.

 

Cool, let us know how what happens!

 

Windows 8 sells worse then Vista. Seems Microsoft has big problems getting this touch screen OS out to PC folks.

Windows 8 går sämre än Vista - IDG.se

Use Google translate

 

So I placed my ordered for a 17R-SE and the laptop should be arriving early next week, the laptops comes with Windows 8 pre-installed so I think I'll be keeping the OS to get a jump start into learning the Metro UI since Windows Blue (supposedly the next big Windows update in 2013) will also be using the Metro UI albeit more customizable and PC friendly by then.

Some questions:

Can 2x 2.5" hard drives be configured in RAID 0 on the 17R-SE?

If yes, can SRT with mSTATA SSD be configured for cache with 2x 2.5" in RAID 0?

What is the biggest size supported for SRT on the 17R-SE (Intel website says up to 64GB but maybe Dell BIOS limits the physical mSATA max size to 32GB)?

Can sample rate (48000 - 96000 Hz?) be changed with the onboard IDT sound controller?

Can fan speed be changed via software (Dell software, SpeedFan..etc)?

I'm highly considering getting 2x 750GB hard drives configured in RAID 0 and then adding a 64GB mSATA for SRT caching if this is possible on the 17R-SE.

Thanks in advance,

 

Raid only in software I am afraid...If I recall speedfan will let you manually control the fan...I couldnt get it to work automatically but that may have been user error on my part. as for cache my bet would be 64G cache but I recall reading about someone using 128G card there but he used it as a boot drive.


J

 

As per above software raid only. Yes you may use bigger msata. I use a 128GB msata just fine. A user tried a 256GB with no luck. Maybe it was a msata firmware issue , who knows...

 

Thanks,

You are correct the 17R-SE can only do RAID via software, I read that up right before I came back to this thread. This means no RAID partition as boot.

I'm betting 64GB will work since the 17R-SE does not limit the maximum size for mSATA SSD and SRT is enable through software in Windows however SRT software itself is only limited to 64GB maximum cache.

Good to know SpeeFan works to manually control the fan, downer that Dell does not provide cooling solution software with their laptops (Lenovo and HP does).

In regards to my IDT sound controller and sample rate question, I only asked because I'm so use to having Realtek onboard sound which lets you change the sample rate it's not really a big deal since the speakers on the 17R-SE from what I've read is pretty decent.

This will be my first IDT sound controller on anything ever just IMHO Realtek makes the best onboard sound controller, hardware, software and sound quality wise (wonder why Dell did not use Realtek on the 17R-SE).

Thanks again,