Precision 7680 & Precision 7780 Owner's Thread

[Honest Lady]

I purchased a Precision 7780 on Black Friday weekend 2023.  Dell chose Fedex to deliver my computer.  They would not give me an exact date of delivery at first.  When I was finally told the delivery date, they would not allow me reroute the shipment to my place of employment.  The first problem was that I had to take off a day of work to be home in order to receive the shipment.  This cost me a lot of money.  I waited for the Fedex driver and ran out to the curb to get my computer.  The driver told me that Dell had authorized that the package be left on my front step of my house if I was not home to receive the delivery and that a signature was not required.  I had to sign for the package only because the driver didn't come up the sidewalk to my front door and I met him at the curb.  If I had not been home, my extremely expensive computer would have been left on the front step in the terrible weather.  My story is downhill from here.  The first 30 days the machine operated fine.  Remember, you only have 30 days to return it.  However on 12/31/23, the computer began to have problems.  It was a few days after the 30 days so a return is no longer allowed.  I spent close to $8,000 on this computer.  Imagine being told that your $8,000 machine is being delivered to you without a signature being required for the delivery and an authorization from Dell has been given for the machine to be left on the front step of your home in the middle of winter in the terrible weather.  Fortunately, I was there to accept the delivery.  The mouse was the 1st thing to begin to malfunction.  I immediately called tech support because I had bought a PROSUPPORT tech support policy with the equipment.  The tech guy told me that I needed to return my equipment to factory defaults because he believed there was a software problem and could not access the computer remotely because the mouse was not working.  I complied because I assumed he knew more than me.  The mouse continued to not work.  I was subsequently told that my brand new computer that cost nearly $8000 had a hardware problem and that a new mouse was needed.  The only problem was that the part was on backorder.  Therefore, they were unable to fix my machine.  As of 1/3/24 I am still waiting for Dell to receive the part and to be willing to help me.  This is the primary machine I need to operate my business.  Therefore, I am losing money every day.  What type of terrible company whose sole purpose is to sell computers would be so stupid as to not have an adequate supply of parts to repair the computers they are selling?  Even when you do get technical support, you are faced with dealing with a technician that barely has an adequate command of the English language.  I could not be more sorry I purchased a computer from this company.  I will never purchase anything again from Dell.  Please do yourself a favor and give your business to a company that cares about customer service.  

[katalin_2003]

Hello @Honest Lady and welcome to notebooktalk.

When you say mouse do you refer to the touchpad, underneath the laptop's keyboard, or an USB mouse?

If it’s the former, do you have an USB mouse to check if the cursor moves?

 

[Aaron44126]

6 hours ago, Honest Lady said:

I purchased a Precision 7780 on Black Friday weekend 2023.

 

Unfortunately, nothing about this story is a surprise.  :-\

 

Dell does generally use FedEx for delivery and doesn't require signature.  They also "lock down" many of the options that you can use with FedEx like rerouting the package.  One thing that you can do is place a "vacation hold" on your address through FedEx, and FedEx will not attempt to deliver the package on days when a vacation hold is in effect.  But really, you do have to decide where you want the machine shipped and be prepared for the uncertain delivery date.  (If I worked in an office, I would have it shipped to the office, even if I was not sure if I was going to be there on the delivery day.)

 

The lack of repair parts is also not a surprise.  When I bought the Precision 7770, I had to wait over a week to get a replacement display panel and a multiple weeks for a replacement heatsink when I asked for those.  I'm not sure what is up with Dell's parts supply these days.  It wasn't like this in the past.

 

The mouse thing is weird.  I can sort of get it if you're talking about the touchpad, but you should still be able to connect a USB mouse and use the PC.  If you have tried multiple different mice and it is still not working, then it is most likely a software problem and not a hardware problem.

[iieeann]

If the mouse doesn't work, it should not be the reason of making u a loss in business.  Just get a spare mouse that's it.  If there is no spare mouse, there are many types of mouse u can buy from the road side with just a few $, wired, wireless, bluetooth etc.  If all mice failed, this is obviously software problem and a simple OS restore should fix it.  Worse comes to worst just reinstall windows and get the system back in 1 or 2 hours.

[Radmeister]

So have any of you guys been able to get rid of the 85w cpu limit?

[heikkuri]

@Honest Lady I understand that you are angry and frustrated. But what is the point to write a long text to forum if you do not reply to our questions. We forum members maybe able to help in your problems. What we cant fix is how Dell support or packet delivery works in USA. In my country it works a bit better. Here any delivery companies never just leave box outside the door. If you are not at home they will ask a new time and come again or you can go and collect your package yourself from their pick point.

 

@katalin_2003 did ask you very good questions about your mouse case. Your original message was missing detailed information what kind of mouse your are using. You can have several mouses connected to same device at the same time.

[Sco]

She sounds like the perfect Apple customer.

[rintalahri]

can rtx 3500 ada get with thin body. is the rtx 2000 ada the same cooling as the rtx 3500 ada? I ordered a 7680 from ebay with a thin body, is it possible to upgrade to rtx 3500 or rtx 4000

[nero519]

On 1/13/2024 at 6:38 PM, rintalahri said:

can rtx 3500 ada get with thin body. is the rtx 2000 ada the same cooling as the rtx 3500 ada? I ordered a 7680 from ebay with a thin body, is it possible to upgrade to rtx 3500 or rtx 4000

 

I don't think is possible to upgrade the GPU after you purchase it

[iieeann]

Anyone here using Dell TB4 dock or upgraded TB3>TB4 dock?  I am having strange SSD speed drop problem. sequential big file read/write dropped to 200MB/s from 3000MB/s.  This happened after sometimes (about 20min) in windows.  Right after boot the speed is normal, when exactly it dropped i do not measure.  Weird enough, when the speed is slow, using Crystal Disk Mark to test everything is normal at 6000-7000MB/s, but in actual file copy the speed is only 200MB/s.  I use a SN850X and 990 Pro to copy to each other to test the speed.

 

I have old TB3 Dock at another place and i observed no SSD speed drop issue actual file copy speed is ~3000MB/s.
I do not know how to explain this, and I am not absolutely sure if this is Dock issue, but since the laptop is the same unit and this happened only when i am using upgraded TB4 dock, I suspect the dock could be the problem.  How an external dock can affect internal SSD transfer speed i really cannot imagine.

 

I like to challenge the limit of the laptop and hardwares, so i used to experience various type of funny issues. 

[aldarxt]

7 hours ago, iieeann said:

Anyone here using Dell TB4 dock or upgraded TB3>TB4 dock?  I am having strange SSD speed drop problem. sequential big file read/write dropped to 200MB/s from 3000MB/s.  This happened after sometimes (about 20min) in windows.  Right after boot the speed is normal, when exactly it dropped i do not measure.  Weird enough, when the speed is slow, using Crystal Disk Mark to test everything is normal at 6000-7000MB/s, but in actual file copy the speed is only 200MB/s.  I use a SN850X and 990 Pro to copy to each other to test the speed.

 

I have old TB3 Dock at another place and i observed no SSD speed drop issue actual file copy speed is ~3000MB/s.
I do not know how to explain this, and I am not absolutely sure if this is Dock issue, but since the laptop is the same unit and this happened only when i am using upgraded TB4 dock, I suspect the dock could be the problem.  How an external dock can affect internal SSD transfer speed i really cannot imagine.

 

I like to challenge the limit of the laptop and hardwares, so i used to experience various type of funny issues. 

It seems like its the dock itself. If this only happens when transferring a large file, moving volume, where as crystaldiskmark is only testing speed, not moving volume, so it's not the SSD. If you are copying from laptop thru dock to another SSD...

try plugging in usb hdd/ssd to test

[rintalahri]

19 hours ago, nero519 said:

 

I don't think is possible to upgrade the GPU after you purchase it

Yes it is possible, but heatsink i wonder, is it same rtx2000-rtx5000

[Aaron44126]

I believe you will find that the heatsink is different between lower-end and high-end GPUs.  You can enter your service tag at dell.com/support and get a parts list for your system.  Maybe someone with a higher-end system can compare the part number for the heatsink.

[Chalybion]

The heatsinks are different.

Here is a service tag for the 2000 Ada (from an eBay listing):  43F5CY3

Here is a service tag for the 5000 Ada (from a Youtube video):  75ZPCY3

 

2000 Ada heatsink part # is HFYY9:

 

5000 Ada heatsink part # is 847JD:

[nero519]

On 1/15/2024 at 9:54 PM, Chalybion said:

The heatsinks are different.

Here is a service tag for the 2000 Ada (from an eBay listing):  43F5CY3

Here is a service tag for the 5000 Ada (from a Youtube video):  75ZPCY3

 

2000 Ada heatsink part # is HFYY9:

 

5000 Ada heatsink part # is 847JD:

 

For what is worth, this is what I have for the 4090: 

 

If possible, I would upgrade to a vapor chamber heatsink though

[Radmeister]

On 1/18/2024 at 8:00 PM, nero519 said:

 

For what is worth, this is what I have for the 4090: 

 

If possible, I would upgrade to a vapor chamber heatsink though

Thats the same as the RTX 5000 Ada, just note that you have a 7780 which is different than the 7680.

[Radmeister]

So i got rid of the 85W PL1 limit. Not really it's still there but the EC will never see it because there is a 30W offset.

 

Using the same USB tool i mentioned and in the same window where we changed the AC loadline settings set the IMON Slope Offset to 70, 30000, and change the prefix to (-). This will make the CPU report it is using 30 less watts, so 85 is now 115, which you will never maintain anyways because of thermals. 

[Radmeister]

22 hours ago, Radmeister said:

So i got rid of the 85W PL1 limit. Not really it's still there but the EC will never see it because there is a 30W offset.

 

Using the same USB tool i mentioned and in the same window where we changed the AC loadline settings set the IMON Slope Offset to 70, 30000, and change the prefix to (-). This will make the CPU report it is using 30 less watts, so 85 is now 115, which you will never maintain anyways because of thermals. 

 

These results are with PTM7950 and all new 12.8mw/k thermal pads and the exhaust side of the fans that blows into the chassis blocked off. BTW if any of you have poor contact with the left side of the CPU die (side away from GPU) there is a stock thermal pad that measures 1mm, i measured the compressed height using playdough and a height gauge and got 0.56 so i recommend using a 0.5mm pad with thermal paste. All the rest of the pads are 1mm with the exception of the GPU VRMs at 1.5mm.

 

[woffe]

On 1/22/2024 at 4:56 PM, Radmeister said:

So i got rid of the 85W PL1 limit. Not really it's still there but the EC will never see it because there is a 30W offset.

 

Using the same USB tool i mentioned and in the same window where we changed the AC loadline settings set the IMON Slope Offset to 70, 30000, and change the prefix to (-). This will make the CPU report it is using 30 less watts, so 85 is now 115, which you will never maintain anyways because of thermals. 

 

Hi, that sounds great! 

Can you explain what Imon Slope (70) and Imon Offset (30000) will do? I want to get arround 100W, so which parametes i have to choose? Is it not enough to set only the Offset? 

[Radmeister]

Hi woffe,

 

Not quite sure if only setting one is enough, the guide I found set both. The 70 represents 70%. So the cpu only reports 70% of its wattage, 30000 is the offset in milliwatts so 30 watts. Don’t forget to also set the prefix to (-). I wouldn’t worry too much, you could use the same settings as me, the cpu thermal throttle won’t let you go much higher than 100w sustained anyway or 160w burst.

 

 

[PHVM_BR]

On 10/29/2023 at 6:40 PM, yslalan said:

Just flashed RTX3500ada vBIOS extracted from 7780 to 7680, i got the GPU boosted to instantaneous 160Watt and the total power consumption is 280Watt using the AW GaN 330w brick.😃

what is the TGP reported in the Nvidia control panel of the RTX 3500 Ada on the Precision 7680 originally?

[woffe]

On 1/25/2024 at 1:58 PM, Radmeister said:

Hi woffe,

 

Not quite sure if only setting one is enough, the guide I found set both. The 70 represents 70%. So the cpu only reports 70% of its wattage, 30000 is the offset in milliwatts so 30 watts. Don’t forget to also set the prefix to (-). I wouldn’t worry too much, you could use the same settings as me, the cpu thermal throttle won’t let you go much higher than 100w sustained anyway or 160w burst.

 

 

Hi, thanks for the answer. Yes your settings work great, but what happens on battery? Will the more Power eventually damage the battery? 

[rintalahri]

Has anyone added wwa card and antenna cables to the 7680 model afterwards? I came without the wwa option, but I would really like the wwa option. What all needs to be changed or added.

[Aaron44126]

50 minutes ago, rintalahri said:

Has anyone added wwa card and antenna cables to the 7680 model afterwards? I came without the wwa option, but I would really like the wwa option. What all needs to be changed or added.

 

These systems come with two different lids (display enclosures) depending on whether or not you have WWAN antennas.  The non-WWAN version has an all-aluminum lid.  The metal would not be helpful for connectivity if you try to put antennas in there.  The WWAN version has a separate (visible) plastic strip at the top where the antennas go.

 

The WWAN version looks like this, note the separate piece with a line across the back/top of the display enclosure.  That part is plastic, and the rest is aluminum.

 

If you have the non-WWAN version then I am not sure where you will put the antennas, but if you can find a spot (either in the display enclosure or in the lower chassis) that allows for connectivity then you should be able to just drop in a WWAN card and SIM card and be good to go.

 

You could replace the display enclosure with the WWAN version (Precision 7670 version would probably fit as well), but the display panel is held in by adhesive, not screws.  So, getting the display panel aligned in your new display enclosure would require careful measurements and steady hands, or be an exercise in tedium.  😕

 

If you have the OLED panel, they might not offer that with a WWAN version...?

[Radmeister]

On 1/30/2024 at 7:29 AM, woffe said:

Hi, thanks for the answer. Yes your settings work great, but what happens on battery? Will the more Power eventually damage the battery? 

It will drain faster that’s for sure, but you can always set battery profile in throttlestop and reduce pl1 and pl2 to a lower value that takes the 30w offset into account. The AC load line is actually a minor undervolt, like 3% or so.

 

i haven’t needed the battery yet, in my use case I’m always plugged in, even when I go on site, it’s more of an ups just in case power goes out or someone unplugs my extension cord. This thing gets about 1.5hrs on battery to start with. It going down to 1hr 15min is not the end of the world lol.