Dell Introduces Precision M4800 and M6800 Mobile Workstations

Dell expands its workstation portfolio with the addition of the Dell Precision M4800 and M6800.

Read the full content of this Article: http://www.notebookreview.com/news/dell-introduces-precision-m4800-and-m6800-mobile-workstations/

 

Wow just checked out the dell site and I have to say the new preconfiguration system is AWFUL. You cant customize anything, no raid, no ram options, no hard drive options, nothing. And for what is supposed to be a highend workstation the highest end configuration they have is pretty mediocre. i7-4900MQ , 16GB ram, 256GB SDD and Dell 2x2 wifi?!!! PASSSSSS

 

What speed is supported by mSATA port, 3Gbps or 6Gbps ?

 

Have ordered an M4800 for work from Dell Australia.

i7-4900MQ
32GB (4x8GB) 1600MHz RAM
nVidia Quadro K2100M GPU
750GB 7200rpm HDD (cheapest option - I have a 512GB Samsung 840 Pro SSD I'll swap this out with)
Dell 1550 802.11ac wireless (this is 2x2, but are there any better 802.11ac minicards??)
1080p ultrasharp screen
3yrs ProSupport

I didn't want the QHD+ screen - I'll be using it docked to a 30" screen most of the time, and it also made me wonder how the extra pixels would affect the performance of the graphics card.

Delivery expected on the 8th of October (3 weeks from order).

Sadly, it looks like it's 3Gbps according to the user manual.

 

What price did they quote you for that configuration? I got a quote from DELL Australia on the m4800 for $3675. That included:

i7-4900MQ
8GB (2X4GB) 1600MHz RAM
nVidia Quadro K1100M GPU
Back-lit keyboard
Upgraded Webcam and array microphone
WiGig display capaibility
Additional 9-Cell battery
750GB 7200rpm HDD
Dell 1550 802.11ac wireless (the 7260 will be available in a couple of months, apparently)
QHD ultrasharp screen (I want very crisp text and a better than TFT display. I think the Sharp is in between the TFT and IPS quality)
4yrs standard warranty support (don't need to ring dell about software or how to configure things, so standard NBD is good enough).

Frankly, I'm wondering if the HP ZBook is going to be a better buy. By the time I upgrade the RAM to 32GB, and install a Samsung PM841 256GB mSata SSD and a Samsung 840 Pro 512GB SSD, the cost is going to be just silly. It will be an awesome laptop, but really, at the price of around $4600? nuts.

I read that the SATA is 6Gbit/s SATA3 for the drives. Will hunt around for a link

EDIT: Looks like it remains at SATA2 because the slot supports wireless broadband. Not much innovation in the new Precision laptops.

 

This is through my business account, but the price was A$3,091 inc GST. He priced it pretty keenly. I also bought an E-Port Plus II dock for A$165 inc GST.

I actually had 2 quotes for the M4800 - one with 8GB RAM, and one with 32GB (and everything else the same). I was planning to get the 8GB option and then put RAM in myself, but the difference quoted was only around A$250, which surprised me. I wonder how much extra the QHD+ would add?

Yeah, it's a shame about the mSATA port. Seems the mSATA and the optical connection (where you can put a third HDD) are both only 3Gbps, but the main 2.5" connection is 6Gbps. I figure a single 512GB 840 Pro will do me, so in the end I'm not too fussed.

The 512GB 840 Pro was A$495 (from pccasegear.com), so about A$3.5k all up in the end for the M4800.

 

Sounds good. I'll push to have them add a couple of components rather than ask them to lower the price. I'm happy to stay with the K1100M gpu as it is 10 watts less than the K2100M. I don't need graphics power.

I hope the fan and throttling issues have been resolved on this version.

I'll grab a 512 840 pro from pccasegear, too. I guess I'll have to add the hdd caddy so I can put the hdd into the optical bay. I wonder if I should get the blue ray drive?

Cheers

 

My final quote was around $3,600 for the following configuration:

I'll add a 512GB 840 Pro and be quite happy with this mobile monster. The price is fairly reasonable for an Australian purchase. Not great but good.

I'll run Windows 7 at 200% to take advantage of the resolution of the IGZO display.

 

What's your delivery date?

Mine was supposed to be delivered today, but the status website now shows this Friday the 11th.
Mind you, it also still shows it as in the build stage (as it has since the day it was ordered - 19/9), so I'm not hopeful!

 

Hi Gibbon,

My delivery date is the 18th and they have reassured me it will arrive no later than the 25th. I'm going overseas with it so they can't be late! Otherwise, I'll need to cancel the order and won't be happy.

cheers

 

Will let you know when mine arrives. Hopefully you'll be alright.

 

Cheers mate. I'll be talking to DELL if my laptop hasn't progressed to build complete stage by the end of the week.

 

Mine is -still- on "Work in Progress" :/

Right, some progress. Sometime last night it changed to "Ship from factory".
I still doubt it'll arrive the day after tomorrow (maybe if it hits Sydney tonight - I'm in regional NSW), but at least it's something!

 

Hey gxtoast,

Do you happen to have a copy of the order number? or customer code? Dell Australia are trying to quote me $3,800 for a 16Gb setup and said the 32GB setup you posted will be $5,300 Aus.

Ludacris...

Cheers

 

So sometime today my delivery date has slipped from tomorrow 11/10 to next Wednesday 16/10. Status is still showing as "Ship from factory".
Was ordered 19/9
Original delivery date was 8/10

 

Hey Gibbon, how long has the laptop been in the "Ship from Factory" stage?

 

3 days so far ....

 

Gxtoast,

I Understand the security of your order number... Can you give me the first and last name of your rep. My rep won't budge and is still saying that ur configuration can't be done for less than $5,300. Claiming its $1100 for a ram upgrade from 16Gb to 32Gb... I personally don't understand as it's only $100 for the 8-16Gb jump...So if your quote of around $3600 for your setup... Pls help me out drop me your reps name.

Thanks.

 

Hi Morkali,

I can only recommend that you continue to negotiate with your rep, or consider the 8GB option and upgrade the RAM yourself. The reps typically work to a formula and I think that you just need to continue to work with them patiently, especially if you aren't time constrained.

Also be prepared to consider HP or the upcoming Lenovo workstations. I was very interested in the new Lenovo's, as they were releasing compelling new chassis designs.

DELL has a habit of hiking up the advertised pricing of their products in Australia and it is up to the shopper to negotiate with them to get them to quote more competitively. I like how Apple is very reasonable with their pricing in Australia. I found Apple would not exceed a $400 AUD difference from the US store for their rMBP. But, there is no negotiation.

Good luck and stay with them. Also, continue to be polite and friendly with your rep. He or she will appreciate it

 

I had a similar problem with Dell au. I got given a new company rep but then he wouldn't budge on price. He was quoting me $2k more than I had from my pervious rep 2 months ago. He tried to tell me it was die to the aud going down... it had actually gone up in that time.

Long story short I went back to my old rep under a different company name and got the same price quoted 2 months ago but for a 6800 instead of a 6700.

Sent from my GT-I9505 using Tapatalk

 

Getting closer - mine has changed to "In Transit" sometime today.

 

Now "With Local Carrier", but delivery has slipped again, out to 18/10 (Friday).

My rep chased up the delay, apparently it was some part shortage.
gxtoast - you'll probably get yours before me!

 

Hey,

The part shortage it seems is the QHD panel for most... but I don't think both your setups are using that panel so not sure what exactly. I t seems though that a lot of the new batch orders are on delay.

Thanks for the advice Gxtoast and others. I kept with my rep and cross referenced a setup from metabox.com and thanks to some awesome customer service on dell's half I got a quote for

i74900
QHD screen
32Gb
750Gb (7200rpm) - prob switch this to SSD
9 cell battery
nVidia 2100
Win8 64bit
backlit keyboard
3yrs with the 24/7 support

Total $3818 + Gst so $4,200

metabox quoted me around the same for the same specs but with a samsung 512 pro SSD, and the lesser screen FHD. Not much takes advantage of the resolution of the QHD atm but i guess the QHD gives me a lil more longevity when for future use and better viewing different situations.

I'll be speaking to my rep tomorrow to finalise the quote but may tweak a few things, still not sure on the screen. I move around a bit so wont always be hooked up to another monitor and like the aspect of a more appealing screen despite the premium. Happy for the competitive quote paying a premium for Dell's reliability and service.


Just hope I don't have to wait as long as you guys... I have a few projects coming up that i'm gonna need this for.

Thanks again,

Peace

 

Yeah, I don't know what's held mine up - it's not the QHD+ screen, I didn't spec mine up with it (will be docked to a 30" screen 90% of the time)
Fingers crossed my delivery doesn't slip any more - I have some work to do on mine too.

Will be nearly a month since I ordered it (19/9).

 

Got my 6800 with better specs than that for 3880 including gst. Will post the specs when I get home for others to reference.

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So ... after my delivery date was updated last night to the 18th (Friday), my M4800 arrived today

Have swapped out the cheapy 750GB 7200rpm drive I ordered it with for a 512GB Samsung 840 Pro, and I'll reinstall windows tonight. I ordered it with Windows 7 Pro x64, and knew it wouldn't come with a disc, but it took me a while to find the product key sticker under the battery (doh).

A few minor cosmetic changes, but otherwise it looks the same as my old M4600 did.

Full spec:
i7-4900MQ
32GB (4x8GB) 1600MHz RAM
nVidia Quadro K2100M GPU
750GB 7200rpm HDD (cheapest option - I had my own 512GB Samsung 840 Pro SSD to swap it out with)
Dell 1550 802.11ac wireless
1080p ultrasharp screen
Backlit keyboard
Win7 Pro x64
6-cell battery
3yrs ProSupport

 

Cool, I'd be interested to see the specs you got. The only down side is I'm not really a big fan of 17" laptops the added weight and size is a pain to carry around esp when walking.... but i'm guessing you got a k4000? I managed to get the price down to $4092, Original quote was I suspect it would go even lower if I grabbed a 6cell battery after the quotes for 128,256 SSD's @ $300 and $900 respectively I assume the jump from a 6 cell to a 9cell would also be around $300... I suppose the battery life isn't as much of a drama when docking it etc but in times when I cant I don't like the idea of carrying around an extension cable for studio work.

I will also replace the 720Gb i have with a Samsung 512 pro for $495 or so =) hottest SSD on the market with a major performance boost for my rendering/composting times.

I think the 6800 has more head room for negotiation too because its supposed to be the flagship workstation and thus priced competitively.

post it up. =)


Grats Gibbon on finally getting it.

 

Nice work, Morkaii.

Gibbon, good to hear you received it already. Mine is with local courier and to be delivered today. Now just waiting for additional battery to ship. I also got Windows 7 Ultimate with mine as I tried Windows 8 and absolutely hated it for desktop use. 8.1 will not be much better.

Microsoft should have completely readded the start menu in 8.1 and allowed users to totally remain in desktop mode when launching apps. Basically, 8.1 should only enable metro when it detects a touch screen, or by configuration. Microsoft flubbed something that could have been easy to manage.

I'm undecided whether to get a 512GB 840 Pro or a 750GB 840 EVO. Difference of about $100. EVO seems competitive with Pro.

Cheers, Guys.

 

Cheers, yeah i'm not sure still on the win 8... i'm largely considering it due to later not wanting to reboot/install windows once i set my laptop up.. lol... lazy but yeah.. if its that much of a pain in the to use i may just stay with win7 i already have an OEM copy I can use if i need to.

not sure on the evo but the samsung offers a 5 Year warranty making it a solid buy for its price

 

Below is the Spec I am receiving... Took out all the BS line items, like labels and left just the core components and upgraded warranty/Service. Was $3880 including GST

1 210-AAYI Dell Precision M6800 CTO Base

1 329-BBPB Smartcard Reader Base

1 401-AAER 750GB 2.5inch SATA (7,200 Rpm) Hard Drive

1 451-BBDJ 9-cell (97Wh) Lithium Ion battery with ExpressCharge

1 555-BBDO Dell Wireless 1550 Driver

1 555-BBJS Dell Wireless 1550 2X2 802.11ac + Bluetooth 4.0

1 630-AAFW Office Professional 2013 MPI Card(English/Simplified Chinese/Traditional Chinese/Korean)

1 338-BCPQ Intel Core i7-4800MQ Processor (Quad Core, 6M Cache, 2.7 GHz, w/HD Graphics 4600)

1 370-AAUT 16GB (4x4GB) 1600MHz DDR3L

1 400-AAYB 256GB 2.5inch SATA Solid State Drive

1 319-BBBS Integrated Camera, Microphone bezel

1 490-BBKU NVIDIA Quadro K3100M w/4GB GDDR5

1 619-ADKW Windows(R) 7 Professional 64-bit (English), No Media

1 429-AAHU 8X DVD+/-RW Drive Slot Load

1 580-ABIL Internal English Backlit Dual Pointing Keyboard

1 346-BBER SWIPE Fingerprint Reader and Smart Card Reader (Contact and Contactless) Palmrest

1 391-BBGI 44cm (17.3") UltraSharp FHD(1920x1080) Wide View Anti-Glare LED-backlit Premium Panel Guarantee

1 754-38267 # Limited Warranty: Extended Year 2 - 3 (NBD)

1 754-38515 3Yr ProSupport: NBD Onsite Service

1 876-10653 2 Yr and 3 Yr Extended Battery Service ( For 9 cell battery )


I will probably look at getting a Crucial M500 480Gb mSATA drive to replace the 750G as my secondary drive. I will only be using the 750Gb in the side slot for backups and to leave behind in the office when I travel.

 

Nice setup, I will be moving around a lot on foot and so the extra weight with the bag would annoy me. My gpu requirements aren't as much as the head room from the ram... Running photoshop, Nuke, Maya etc on multi screens.

Confirmed order rep said will expedite the order for an eta of 10-12 days... Dnt believe it but hope so = )

 

My current 6500 has been all over the world with me. I never really was bothered by the weight but I'm pretty big myself. Always do get worried at airport check in though with the weight... never been stopped yet though.
I use high end drafting software and travel all over often to remote mining camps so hardly ever have access to additional screens.

My order moved to "with local carrier" this morning but never received it so it will hopefully be here Monday. My port replicator arrived today though.


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Has anyone else received theirs and reinstalled windows 7?

I popped my Samsung 840 Pro SSD into my M4800 and reinstalled - all good, except I had some trouble getting the 1550 wireless card driver installed. It's a combined bluetooth/wifi card, but the Dell driver from the support website only seemed to install a bluetooth driver. The wireless device was active, because it was sitting there in device manager as a "network controller", but I just couldn't get the driver to install.

In the end I gave up and bought an Intel 7260 Wireless-AC card ($39 @ PCCaseGear - Intel Dual Band Wireless AC 7260 PCI-E Adaptor OEM [7260.HMWWB] - $39.00 : PC Case Gear), swapped it out and grabbed the driver from the Intel website - it installed fine.

Not that it matters now, but what was I doing wrong?

 

Received my m6800 on Tuesday. I haven't got around to reinstalling windows yet. But I was just going to do it with the recovery disc option in Dell backup and recovery.
Waiting for my Samsung 750Gb EVO to arrive so I can take out the 750Gb spin drive that came as secondary.
Interested to see any responses.

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Just got off the phone with Dell Business sales. They have totally nerf-ed the M6800;

i7-4800QM, 8GB ram, and the junk AMD Video, no Nvidia's, no RGB, nothing over 8GB. Claiming it is a decision from Michael Dell to just sell High end workstations that they can ship in 2 days? I thought Steve Felice was in charge? Well I was ready to buy a M6800, but not any more!

 

Seriously, Dell has totally scrapped configurable mobile workstations?