Precision 7540 & Precision 7740 owner's thread

[aravena562]

I wanted to ask you for help.  I have a dell precision 7540, with an Intel i7 and an AMD Radeon pro wx3200 gpu, I want to improve the gpu ideally with an Nvidia Quadro Rtx 5000. I live in Chile so I have to import the gpu, I wanted to know if I can buy a gpu of a dell precision 7550 and if it will work on my computer.  For a reason that I don't know, I have found better prices for the Rtx 5000 of a 7550 vs. a 7540, which are more expensive used.  thank you very much for your help.

[Aaron44126]

2 hours ago, aravena562 said:

I wanted to know if I can buy a gpu of a dell precision 7550 and if it will work on my computer.

 

It will definitely not work.  Precision 7550 GPUs do not have the same physical shape or position of components as the Precision 7540 GPUs.

 

If you fit a Quadro RTX 4000 or 5000 into this system, you will also have to replace the heatsink, as those GPUs has screw holes in different positions than the others.

[nforce4max]

21 hours ago, aravena562 said:

I wanted to ask you for help.  I have a dell precision 7540, with an Intel i7 and an AMD Radeon pro wx3200 gpu, I want to improve the gpu ideally with an Nvidia Quadro Rtx 5000. I live in Chile so I have to import the gpu, I wanted to know if I can buy a gpu of a dell precision 7550 and if it will work on my computer.  For a reason that I don't know, I have found better prices for the Rtx 5000 of a 7550 vs. a 7540, which are more expensive used.  thank you very much for your help.

The gpu in this case has to be of the same generation as the machine and you'll need a heatsink as the current one isn't going to fit.

[nforce4max]

Bought a second 7740 for scrap on the cheap and it came with an unexpected surprise that it had the full 128gb of ram installed. Kinda cool to have that given how rare it is to find that much even on a desktop these days when most are satisfied with 32gb for example.

[Kitje]

I had the Delta fan in my unit for some time. But I've come to the conclusion at this point considering how often this happens, I might ditch the 7540 entirely and look for a more modern (just as easy to fix and inexpensive) laptop.

 

On a regular basis, the fan on my right side would rattle, which was a common characteristic I had with my M4800. Like, as if something was stuck and hitting the blades. I airdusted it, it goes away. It returns after being turned off overnight until the next day.

 

The thing is, unlike the M4800 where it's a no-brainer to remove the fan I have to take off the keyboard and palmrest to get to it, and unscrew the heatsink and risk spoiling the thermal paste just to take the impeller off.

 

Such fun having to trial and error every time I use the laptop to get the thing to stop buzzing.

 

EDIT: Buzzing is there permanently now. Come on... I'm honestly finished with this.

 

EDIT2: Well I'm not giving up just yet, I'm trying the trick I did with the M4800 in the past with vaseline on the pole of its impeller. I think it has worked...

[nforce4max]

Well I've been dealing with an audio issue with my 7740 that being the occasional crackle and pop while sometimes going mono with reduced quality so have been trying the upgrade the driver game in hopes of fixing the issue. With some experimentation I've found that newer audio drivers from later models work including those from the 7780 with promising results but not completely resolved.

 

Extracted the downloaded driver to a folder then went with update driver from the control panel and the browse option. Hopefully this is of some help should anyone else suffers this issue. Realtek used to be better than this as I never really had this issue before throughout the 2000s and 2010s till now with the exception of maybe Turtle Beach.

[Aaron44126]

9 hours ago, nforce4max said:

Well I've been dealing with an audio issue with my 7740 that being the occasional crackle and pop while sometimes going mono with reduced quality so have been trying the upgrade the driver game in hopes of fixing the issue. With some experimentation I've found that newer audio drivers from later models work including those from the 7780 with promising results but not completely resolved.

 

Extracted the downloaded driver to a folder then went with update driver from the control panel and the browse option. Hopefully this is of some help should anyone else suffers this issue. Realtek used to be better than this as I never really had this issue before throughout the 2000s and 2010s till now with the exception of maybe Turtle Beach.

 

Go to the legacy "Sound control panel" in Windows, pick your speakers from the list, go to Properties -> Advanced and disable "audio enhancements".  See if that helps at all.  These days there is so much Realtek/Maxx Audio fluff that gets piled onto the sound stack, some of it can cause problems, and I find this to be an easy way to dodge them.

[meowpressreturn]

Finally got around to upgrading the 512gb SSD in my 7540. (Put in a 2tb SK Hynix P31 Gold) 
I had to resort to PLIERS to loosen the screw holding in the original SSD! 😱

[PHVM_BR]

The Precision 7540 here is like an old man in top shape:

 

https://www.3dmark.com/spy/50154728

[PHVM_BR]

On 7/18/2024 at 8:40 PM, Chalybion said:

General thoughts on the Precision 7540 after using one for a year:

I still love the good keyboard, good touchpad with nice physical buttons, solid build quality, and ease of maintenance.  The LP156QHG screen is a moderately easy upgrade to a high color gamut / high refresh rate screen that improves quality of life.  The processor and graphics cards are still reasonable competitive for productvity and gaming at mid-range settings, though a bit power hungry.  In newer laptops, the Ryzen 7840U provides slightly better CPU (vs. 9980HK) and comparable GPU to the T1000, all while using less than a third of the power - that would be really attractive in a Precision build package.

I have access to an AIO with i7-1355U and even this CPU with only 2P-cores can achieve multicore performance similar to the i9-9980HK with undervolt and overclock of 4.4GHz all cores (~12k in Cinebench R23) and consuming about half of the power (~60W).