Precision 7540 & Precision 7740 owner's thread

[SvenC]

New BIOS 1.18.1 with support for Dell Dock HD22Q.

 

What Dock could that be?

 

Google does not know.

[Aaron44126]

Just leaving these here:

• Legacy NBR owner's thread — https://www.nbrchive.net/forum.notebookreview.com/threads/dell-precision-7540-and-7740-owners-thread.830037/
• Legacy NBR pre-release thread — https://www.nbrchive.net/forum.notebookreview.com/threads/precision-7740-7540-specs-release-date.827802/
• Driver RSS feeds: Precision 7740 • Precision 7540

 

No idea about HD22Q dock.  I wonder if we will see similar messages in the next BIOS updates for other Precision 7000-series systems.  (They often release these within a few days of each other so we might know soon.)  I'd speculate that this is a new dock launching with the next round of hardware in a few months.  Maybe that's not even the real model number, it could be a Dell part number a new dock.

[Aaron44126]

On 3/9/2022 at 8:37 AM, Aaron44126 said:

I wonder if we will see similar messages in the next BIOS updates for other Precision 7000-series systems.  (They often release these within a few days of each other so we might know soon.)

 

Precision 7X30 BIOS update 1.20.1 was posted on Friday, 3/11.

From the release notes:

- Supports Dell Dock HD22Q.

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=65m8t&oscode=wt64a&productcode=precision-15-7530-laptop

[heikkuri]

BIOS 1.19.1 is out for Dell Precision 7X40 models.

 

Release date 25 Apr 2022

 

 Fixes & Enhancements
 - Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities including (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - CVE)

   such as CVE-2022-21123, CVE-2022-21125, CVE-2022-21127 and CVE-2022-21166.
 - Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities including (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - CVE)
   such as CVE-2022-0005.
 - Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities including (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - CVE)
   such as CVE-2022-21151.
 - Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities including (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - CVE)
   such as CVE-2022-0004, CVE-2021-33159, and CVE-2022-21181.
 - Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities.

 

Plan is to update few computers tomorrow. Let's see what happens.

[SvenC]

My fingerprints were lost after the update. Had to reconfigure Windows Hello login. Besides from that everything worked smooth.

[PHVM_BR]

Hey guys, I bought a 100W USB-C GaN charger with the intention of using it in my Precision 7540 when I'm out of the office, obviously for lighter tasks...I've tried everything and I can't charge the laptop through the Thunderbolt ports. Windows informs that the system is not being charged and in another message it informs that a charger of at least 90W is necessary for this to work. Well, I've already tested this GaN on two Inspirons and it worked perfectly delivering all the machines' performance. Are the Precision 7540's Thunderbolt ports limited for charging via third-party chargers? I have a problem? I often use both USB-C ports with flash drives, external hard drives, smartphones, etc... Sorry for my english, it's not my native language.

[Aaron44126]

I tried something similar with my Precision 7530 and a USB-C MacBook Pro charger (85W?).  It threw an error in the tray complaining about the power adapter and wouldn't charge or even power the system.  I've never heard of anyone having a good experience with these systems and USB-C PD (unless using a Dell dock).

 

If you want a smaller power adapter, you can look at the GaN chargers being offered with newer Alienware and Precision 7X70 systems.  They should be compatible with older Precision models.  (Probably not that cheap to pick up standalone, though...)  I can't find 180W offered yet but it should show up on the Precision 7670 "parts and upgrades" page shortly after those systems launch.

[PHVM_BR]

23 hours ago, Aaron44126 said:

I tried something similar with my Precision 7530 and a USB-C MacBook Pro charger (85W?).  It threw an error in the tray complaining about the power adapter and wouldn't charge or even power the system.  I've never heard of anyone having a good experience with these systems and USB-C PD (unless using a Dell dock).

 

If you want a smaller power adapter, you can look at the GaN chargers being offered with newer Alienware and Precision 7X70 systems.  They should be compatible with older Precision models.  (Probably not that cheap to pick up standalone, though...)  I can't find 180W offered yet but it should show up on the Precision 7670 "parts and upgrades" page shortly after those systems launch.

I contacted support and they don't know if it's a lock done on purpose by Dell, if it's a problem or something else.

They simply claim that Dell cannot guarantee the performance of third-party products.

Luckily I have a P2723QE monitor with USB-C Hub with 90W Power Delivery. I'm on a business trip and as soon as I get back to the office I'm going to test it on a fully Dell system.

At most I have faulty Tunderbolt ports and I will get a 7670 in return...

Thank you very much for your attention Aaron44126!

[jeamn]

Well, I finally gave up on my 7720 with battery issues and got a surpassingly good deal on a 7740 on eBay.   So my Precision journey current stands at:   m6800 -> 7730 -> 7510 -> 7720 -> 7720 -> 7740

 

My 7740 specs: Xeon E-2276M, RTX 4000, 32GB, 1 TB NVMe.  That's the stock config, I have a couple spare 16GB ram that I'll adding shortly and another NVMe to install Linux.

 

A few thoughts/impressions so far.

• Had one initial issue.  I believe windows updates were mid-installation after initial setup and I had it plugged into a thunderbolt dock (an Amazon Basics one that is actually quite good).  When I undocked, the computer hard locked and I had to hard reboot. After that, Win10 started a boot loop that repair/restore wasn't able to fix.  I reset windows and all was good. After updating the thunderbolt controller firmware, docking/undocking was fine.   (I actually had the same firmware issue with my 7730 in the past)
• Wow, it's hot!   CPU pretty much immediately spiked to 100C  and PROCHOTs.  I have already updated to most recent BIOS so undervolting was initially locked.  I used the 'Restore to factory defaults' trick in the BIOS to unlock it and undervolted by 100mV.   CPU now peaks at about 90C, even during some benchmark runs.
• RTX 4000 is much faster than I expected.  I briefly had a Clevo laptop with a full 120w 2070 GPU and the RTX 4000 is actually performing better than the 2070 with a slight overlock.   Here's a comparison of some Fire Strike scores: https://www.3dmark.com/compare/fs/28564781/fs/19741518
• Did Dell finally figure out battery life?  My 7730 had *terrible* battery life, even in battery saver mode it would only have about 5hrs tops and idled at almost 15w, even with GPU inactive.  This 7740 idles at about 5w power draw.  I've been working on battery a few hours this morning and currently have 80% battery life and 14hrs expected remaining.  That's obviously gonna drop once I kick off some compile jobs, but at least it idles like it should.

 

 

 

 

[Aaron44126]

26 minutes ago, jeamn said:

Did Dell finally figure out battery life?  My 7730 had *terrible* battery life, even in battery saver mode it would only have about 5hrs tops and idled at almost 15w, even with GPU inactive.  This 7740 idles at about 5w power draw.  I've been working on battery a few hours this morning and currently have 80% battery life and 14hrs expected remaining.  That's obviously gonna drop once I kick off some compile jobs, but at least it idles like it should.

 

Regarding power use / poor battery performance, you should always check and see if the dGPU is actually on or not if you have Optimus / graphics switching enabled.  If you have basically nothing happening but more than 10w power draw, it is possible that the dGPU is not powered off.  Many users have reported issues with the dGPU staying powered on, even when no apps are using it, and even when the Windows system tray thing you can enable from NVIDIA control panel is showing it in the gray/off state.  It's been going on since the beginning of time (or the 12ish years that Precisions have offered graphics switching) and not everyone seems to be affected by it.

 

I have this issue on both my Precision 7560 and 7770.  My Precision 7530 was spared from it, but other users of that system did report this issue.  Dell has not been helpful in figuring out what is going on.

 

To see if the dGPU is actually on or not, I use NVAPI to query the running temperature.  If it gives you a value, the dGPU is still on; it'll throw an error at you if it is off.  To kick the dGPU into turning off when it should not be on, I just disable/enable it in Device Manager.  (I actually have a quick script for this now so I don't have to do any clicking.  I fire it automatically fire it about two minutes after login...  For me, it seems to behave as it should at boot but then silently power on the dGPU about one minute into a session, and then it stays powered on until I do something about it.)

 

The disable/enable trick also works to get the dGPU to power off when applications get "stuck" on it (i.e. after docking/undocking, connecting in via RDP, using fast user switching, ...).  Another trick that @Ionising_Radiation found is to run an Adobe app like Lightroom and keep it minimized.  For some reason, this fixes up the dGPU power behavior.

[jeamn]

40 minutes ago, Aaron44126 said:

 

Regarding power use / poor battery performance, you should always check and see if the dGPU is actually on or not if you have Optimus / graphics switching enabled.  If you have basically nothing happening but more than 10w power draw, it is possible that the dGPU is not powered off.  Many users have reported issues with the dGPU staying powered on, even when no apps are using it, and even when the Windows system tray thing you can enable from NVIDIA control panel is showing it in the gray/off state.  It's been going on since the beginning of time (or the 12ish years that Precisions have offered graphics switching) and not everyone seems to be affected by it.

 

 

That is good to know.  Like you say, I've been using the tray icon app to monitor apps that get stuck docking/undocking, but I didn't know the GPU might still get stuck on...

 

I've used nvidia-smi on Linux to determine if the GPU is active and kill procs or check power consumption as necessary.  I think that's available on Windows too, maybe a power shell script could replace my shell script that I have stashed somewhere...

[PHVM_BR]

On 6/30/2022 at 8:10 PM, PHVM_BR said:

I contacted support and they don't know if it's a lock done on purpose by Dell, if it's a problem or something else.

They simply claim that Dell cannot guarantee the performance of third-party products.

Luckily I have a P2723QE monitor with USB-C Hub with 90W Power Delivery. I'm on a business trip and as soon as I get back to the office I'm going to test it on a fully Dell system.

At most I have faulty Tunderbolt ports and I will get a 7670 in return...

Thank you very much for your attention Aaron44126!

I tested the 7540 connected via Thunderbolt port to the dell P2723QE monitor with PD of 90W and it works!

I believe Dell has blocked the PD of the 7540's USB-C ports for use with 3rd party chargers...

[Kitje]

Sorry for the bump, a newcomer for a recently acquired 7540. Finding the LCD in mine quite dim and lifeless, especially for an IPS. I was reading the maintenance guide and saw this:

Disposable? Really? Does that mean it intentionally breaks?

[Aaron44126]

10 minutes ago, Vaardu said:

Disposable? Really? Does that mean it intentionally breaks?

 

Weird.  I've definitely pulled the Precision 7530 bezel off and put it back on and it should be the same part as the one in Precision 7540.  Be careful when you are pulling it off and you should be fine.  (It is pretty easy to break if you bend it too much.)

[Kitje]

2 minutes ago, Aaron44126 said:

 

Weird.  I've definitely pulled the Precision 7530 bezel off and put it back on and it should be the same part as the one in Precision 7540.  Be careful when you are pulling it off and you should be fine.  (It is pretty easy to break if you bend it too much.)

Yeah it doesn't look like it'll be as easy as the M4800, or Zbook 15 G2... Although it's reminiscent of removing the Zbook's though. Secondhand images show some adhesive around it. Even then, the bezel of my Zbook reattached fine despite a cut finger or two.

 

 

[Kitje]

The manual states that I need to discharge the battery as much as possible before disconnecting it. You don't need to in the M4800 but in the 7540, is it still necessary? Also I'm not sure if you can remove the bezel without having to take the display assembly off.

[Aaron44126]

24 minutes ago, Vaardu said:

The manual states that I need to discharge the battery as much as possible before disconnecting it. You don't need to in the M4800 but in the 7540, is it still necessary? Also I'm not sure if you can remove the bezel without having to take the display assembly off.

 

You can remove the bezel easily.  Tilt the screen open as far as it will go.  Start with the outside edge of one of the bottom corners and then just work your way around.  I have a Precision 7530 sitting right here and I was able to get it started with just my fingernail.  A pry tool would probably be best so that you can avoid bending the plastic too much as you work your way around (it can snap and break), but I have done it by hand without issue on multiple systems.

[Kitje]

4 hours ago, Aaron44126 said:

 

You can remove the bezel easily.  Tilt the screen open as far as it will go.  Start with the outside edge of one of the bottom corners and then just work your way around.  I have a Precision 7530 sitting right here and I was able to get it started with just my fingernail.  A pry tool would probably be best so that you can avoid bending the plastic too much as you work your way around (it can snap and break), but I have done it by hand without issue on multiple systems.

Ah alright. And since the battery needs to be apparently discharged before disconnecting, how far should it be until its safe to do so?

[Aaron44126]

2 minutes ago, Vaardu said:

Ah alright. And since the battery needs to be apparently discharged before disconnecting, how far should it be until its safe to do so?

 

I don't really know, I have never bothered with discharging the battery before disconnecting, and I have never seen a Dell tech do this either...

[Kitje]

2 minutes ago, Aaron44126 said:

 

I don't really know, I have never bothered with discharging the battery before disconnecting, and I have never seen a Dell tech do this either...

That's strange. The 7530 manual says doing it completely and the 7540 as much as possible. But alright. I am worried about causing some discharge and damaging the mainboard as a result, since it's not simply just releasing from the lock mechanism on the older Precisions.

[Kitje]

Oh dear, seems whoever was in this laptop last forgot plenty of screws... Especially for a laptop of this calibre. Time to hunt replacements. There are sets, but I think I need a specific type, and I know Dell lists them on the maintenance manual. What's missing seems to be for the palmrest, and battery. Some seemed quite tightly fastened too so that was a bit difficult but they're not too bad.

 

There were two screws that didn't look like they belonged to the laptop, but I got those ones out. This is quite a first for me from a refurbisher.

[Kitje]

So it's been a while... After attempting once to get the bezel off, it's not really that feasible without having to remove the assembly and that may be the only way to actually replace the screen. I'm going to put in the ZBook's current IPS panel into it, and reinstall what the Zbook originally had, since I don't really do critical stuff on it now.

 

I also have found screws that seem to fit the screwholes for the palmrest assembly and battery, not the same colour but still there's some assurance it won't fall apart now.

[Kitje]

Just bought a new 6 cell battery direct from Dell, which is the first step of getting this laptop more capable being off the mains. Next up a new 500GB SSD. 😄 I'll probably give the Dell OS Recovery utility thing a go, too. Just to give it the OEM treatment.

 

EDIT: Yikes, just moments after checking out I'm given a different part number and the battery itself is different from the one I added to cart. Can't cancel it now, and it's not a good look directly from Dell either. I'm gonna have to figure out what to do now because this isn't normal.

[Kitje]

So now I've managed to get the bezel off since I may as well change panel but discovered something is a bit different to what I expected to have.

 

The LCD doesn't appear to be secured through the screws on the tabs but I can see an adhesive tab (I think) on one corner. I'm not sure what is really going on here.

 

[Aaron44126]

24 minutes ago, Vaardu said:

The LCD doesn't appear to be secured through the screws on the tabs but I can see an adhesive tab (I think) on one corner. I'm not sure what is really going on here.

 

Huh.  That is a surprise.  I know that Dell has fully switched to adhesive for newer models (Precision 7X70+), but I have removed both the Precision 7530 and 7560 displays and they were just screws.  In any case, if they have used adhesive in your system, at least the screw holes are still there so you can mount another display without having to use adhesive.