Dell Precision 7670 & Dell Precision 7770 owner's thread

[MyPC8MyBrain]

interesting, I've never heard of it before (i too notices the bloat ware Acronis been adding over the years  i guess to stay relevant even though they don't need any of it), for my backup routine i only ever need Acronis bootable media with nothing ever installed in windows,

my practice for my personal pc backup ever since XP came out, as soon as i complete installing the system initially, i activate full administrators account, before i login for the first time there's a reg key one can change to move users folder to another drive, i do the above than login to my profile which will be created on another physical or logical drive (usually root of D:\users\...), from there on my system drive "C:\..." can be backed up then recovered 1000 times without me ever losing my personal data, heck if i leave a new txt on my desktop after full drive recovery even its position will retain when i boot back in,

whenever a recovery is needed its usually system side files never user data,
i also have another "program files" folder in the root of D where i install most of my software, so its never lost after recovery as well, i can even install a brand new system with new SID and relocate the content of my user folder to the new system and everything works almost flawlessly (usually some reg keys might be missing or some files in program data folder but its easy to restore),

the only real threat remains physical drive corruption, for that i will have 2-3 separate media where i save an image of my entire D drive with my personal user data, i also keep my C system image backup inside a systems folder under "D:\System\Backup\" drive, its a different technical approach to personal backup that worked for me many years without fail,

[ATAN]

15 hours ago, Reshen said:

What really bugs me right now is the heat. The top left corner is really hot even on the keyboard side.

 

The right side is fine. Is there a chance a fan is not working?

You want no heat? No e cores, and 65w power limit is a good start. Then undervolt to reclaim perf until "stable". Its how its designed, after a certain point the heatpipes are overwhelmed and the small heatsink, that is roughly half as tall as it could be not that it would help if it was taller, helps dissipate a bit more heat but its better suited to a 12700h not even a 12650hx let alone a 12950hx. They saw the 55w tdp and went wild.

 

If anyone wants my throttlestop inis/power plan settings for 77w or 80w(cooler modded for sub 100c package temp) usage on p cores only that you might actually be able to run because it isnt aggressive let me know, its got 4 different profiles for four different levels of thigh pain, desktop grade(in alderlakes case, unleash the clocks!), mobile workstation grade, efficient ryzen without a cooler grade, and lastly 6800u at 35w but faster/cool/nofan/worseigpu grade pain. im salty

I'm sending mine back. Just going to build a 13900k/13700k sff (slightly smaller than my 5700g/6900xt) with my 6900xt and disable all/all but 4 e cores and go ham on the oc/uv. All these laptops arent worth the money even slightly. $2000-3000 to thermal throttle via near base model workstation or 3000+ for gaming laptop that can go jet speed sound levels.

i'll be doing two builds, a new z690 itx system (w/ 6900xt, old psu, and old ram) and, using my old 5700g build, a 5600x/6650xt/32gb ram family pc for less than half the p7770 as configured ($2500 w/ 45% off from what dell said)

Im also selling the 5700g prebuilt i stole my desktops apu from to recoup 90-110% cost along with my two 21:9 monitors, the 64gb of ddr5 sodimm i used for 3 weeks in this tabletop(anyone interested?, Kingston Fury Impact 4800mhz cl38 32gbx2 kit), and lastly my 2 year old 5775c mobo + ram combo that I played with and unofficially broke some records at 4.5ghz with. 120-150w 13#00k here i come!

 

[Reshen]

Yeah, this is mighty disappointing. I hope I can get to a happy median. The laptop will spend allot of time docked, so at least I won't feel the heat.

 

Question: Do e cores have any role or advantage when running software like ANSYS or Solidworks etc?

 

@ATAN I would definitely like to give your throttlestop settings a go. Just need to school myself on how to use it 🙂

[Aaron44126]

6 hours ago, ATAN said:

You want no heat? No e cores

 

Eh.  Depending on what type of load that you are dealing with, forcing background tasks to run on P cores instead of E cores may well increase the power required (and thus heat) — even if you take undervolting the P cores into account.  You should run some tests both ways and see what you prefer.

[1610ftw]

17 hours ago, Aaron44126 said:

I'm now thinking hard about buying the paid version of Macrium Reflect and doing daily incremental backups.  Seems like it would be super handy to be able to restore or browse the image for a particular day, and since System Restore doesn't even work right......

 

Get it, it is worth it. If you have the amount of storage you do you can even do the backups on a drive in your system so when your laptop has issues like the one you have now you can restore it no problem.

 

I have been using an on-laptop and off laptop backup for some time now and it is the best solution for a laptop that usually is not always where the external backups are.

 

In the paid for version Macrium now also has intradaily backups which assures that you can go back to right where you were before you installed some faulty drivers or other software mishaps.

 

If you buy it please put in the code 1610ftwMR so that I get a bit of a commission - just kidding 😄 I like the program and have used it for about 16 years now.

[Aaron44126]

14 hours ago, MyPC8MyBrain said:

i do the above than login to my profile which will be created on another physical or logical drive (usually root of D:\users\...), from there on my system drive "C:\..." can be backed up then recovered 1000 times without me ever losing my personal data

 

I also keep my personal data on a separate drive from my Windows install for similar reasons.  I just strongly prefer to be able to recover my entire Windows install so that I don't have to remember / figure out all of the configuration that I have done.  The restore that I did yesterday was just overwriting C : drive but not my data D : and E : drives.  I do a system image of C : but the data drives are backed up with a different mechanism.

(Man, this forum really wants to put emoticons in if I type drive letters with a colon but no space.)

 

Macrium Reflect actually made it quite simple to replace the C : Windows 10 partition only, even though the image was for the whole drive.  I also have Windows 11 and Linux partitions on the same drive that were not touched.  (Maybe you can also do this easily with Acronis as well, but again, this was free!)

 

47 minutes ago, 1610ftw said:

Get it, it is worth it.

...

In the paid for version Macrium now also has intradaily backups which assures that you can go back to right where you were when you installed some faulty drivers or other mishaps happened.

 

Sounds interesting, I will probably pick it up.  In addition to the storage in my laptop, I have around 30TB of NAS space, so should be able to hold a pretty long history of incremental backups.

 

(Need to figure out an off-site backup solution.  I was using Carbonite for a while but got frustrated with the poor Windows software which always gets hung up backing up the number of files that I have.  I'm thinking about dropping a system with a big drive at a relative's house if they will just let me run it in their basement, and doing some SSH+rsync to move stuff over at night.)

 

[Edit]

If I'm going to pay for it, I might as well use it fully.  I'd be interested in backing my data drives up without doing a full image of those drives so that I can have different "policies" for different folders; have you used their "file and folder backup" feature at all?  Does it also support incremental-type backups for that?  (I've only used Macrium Reflect for full drive images so far.)

[1610ftw]

44 minutes ago, Aaron44126 said:

Sounds interesting, I will probably pick it up.  In addition to the storage in my laptop, I have around 30TB of NAS space, so should be able to hold a pretty long history of incremental backups.

 

Sounds very good - I have done up to 200 or 300 incremental backups and could still mount recover.

 

 

 

44 minutes ago, Aaron44126 said:

Need to figure out an off-site backup solution.  I was using Carbonite for a while but got frustrated with the poor Windows software which always gets hung up backing up the number of files that I have.  I'm thinking about dropping a system with a big drive at a relative's house if they will just let me run it in their basement, and doing some SSH+rsync to move stuff over at night.)

 

That sounds pretty cool, still do not have that due to speed limitations in the possible locations.

 

 

 

44 minutes ago, Aaron44126 said:

If I'm going to pay for it, I might as well use it fully.  I'd be interested in backing my data drives up without doing a full image of those drives so that I can have different "policies" for different folders; have you used their "file and folder backup" feature at all?  Does it also support incremental-type backups for that?  (I've only used Macrium Reflect for full drive images so far.)

 

Folders are no problem at all and very easy to mount and access. I have started to use folder backup this year and it has been very helpful already for a number of occasions where an older version of a file needed to be accessed.

[alittleteapot]

I'm sure most of you are aware of 3-2-1 backups, but just a reminder:  3: One primary backup and 2 copies of data (three total sources), and two the copies have to be on different media, one of them should be in the cloud (encrypted via BackBlaze is very useful, and can be done for one laptop for $75 a year).  I actually have a nightly RoboCopy job from a Windows Striped/Mirror shared drive to a USB external HDD, which I then mirror that to the cloud.  I'd probably get in trouble for the Backup Police for stretching the definition of "3 Copies" by having the first copy be the "mirror"!

 

@MyPC8MyBrain, that has got to be one of the most original approaches to a rapid restore I've read in a long while.  Personally, I treat OS installs as "semi disposable" - the laptop is basically to install Windows and Office, and everything else is in VMs.  Base Windows installs inevitably need reinstallation - it's just a matter of time, except for VMs which can last for over a decade with no issue.

[serpro69]

14 minutes ago, alittleteapot said:

'm sure most of you are aware of 3-2-1 backups, but just a reminder:  3: One primary backup and 2 copies of data (three total sources), and two the copies have to be on different media, one of them should be in the cloud

 

The rule actually states that 1 copy has to be off-site, not that it (the copy) should be in the cloud.

 

Generally I can't say I'm too fond of cloud backups, there are more disadvantages than benefits to it IMO. You are essentially dependent on the cloud provider, internet connection, etc etc. And your data is in someone else's hands, albeit encrypted, so that means you do not own your own data. Plus the cost of cloud storage is higher than a physical drive.

[Aaron44126]

1 hour ago, alittleteapot said:

one of them should be in the cloud

 

43 minutes ago, serpro69 said:

The rule actually states that 1 copy has to be off-site, not that it (the copy) should be in the cloud.

 

Yeah, I'm familiar with this rule and I also have heard "off-site" (not necessarily "the cloud") for the final bit.  Basically, it's for "in case the building burns down" (or some other similar local disaster), your data will still persist.  Which is why I am looking to just park the data at a relative's.  Other than being a bit cheaper, this has the added benefit of being able to just go and physically collect the hard drive if I need to do a recovery, rather than wait for everything to come down over the Internet.  (10+TB could take a while.)

 

I think I also read that Backblaze doesn't let you upload certain types of files unless you take some steps to work around it?  (Maybe I'm dealing with old information.)

[Edit]

Found it, they don't back up ISO files, VM disks, and so forth by default but it looks like you can remove this exclusion pretty easily.  Eh.  Maybe I will check this out too.

[MyPC8MyBrain]

1 hour ago, serpro69 said:

The rule actually states that 1 copy has to be off-site

indeed, tough still valid it is also 50 years old and steams from days of magnetic tapes being the main backup media, taking tapes physically offsite to ones home at least once a week if not daily were the practice back in the days, today private sector has the privilege of "cloud backups", these were also normal practice back in the day, but back than it was your own private storage hardware hosted in an offsite data center,
 

[serpro69]

1 hour ago, MyPC8MyBrain said:

indeed, tough still valid it is also 50 years old and steams from days of magnetic tapes being the main backup media, taking tapes physically offsite to ones home at least once a week if not daily were the practice back in the days, today private sector has the privilege of "cloud backups", these were also normal practice back in the day, but back than it was your own private storage hardware hosted in an offsite data center,

 

True that. Speaking of tapes, they're still very much actively used and cloud providers offer "tape-based storage" solutions for "cold storage", which costs pennies compared to other cloud storage options.

 

1 hour ago, Aaron44126 said:

Basically, it's for "in case the building burns down" (or some other similar local disaster), your data will still persist.  Which is why I am looking to just park the data at a relative's.

 

Exactly. I think the "keeping the data at a relative's" is one of the most popular options (for individuals) for the off-site backup storage.

 

1 hour ago, Aaron44126 said:

Other than being a bit cheaper, this has the added benefit of being able to just go and physically collect the hard drive if I need to do a recovery, rather than wait for everything to come down over the Internet. 

 

That is, if your relatives live nearby :) If you need to fly to another country - things get a bit more complicated, heh. But still, offsite backups for me personally contain data that I never want to loose, and whatever the circumstances I probably won't ever need it immediately. Not having an OS backup is painful, but manageable, so I'll probably never bother storing a backup of this kind of data off-site.

[Aaron44126]

NVIDIA just dropped their first enterprise (Quadro/RTX) 525.xx drivers.

https://www.nvidia.com/download/driverResults.aspx/194240/en-us/

 

The 525.xx series supposedly has decent performance improvements for DirectX 12 games.

https://notebooktalk.net/topic/810-nvidia-directx-12-performance-boost-522xx-drivers/

 

(Not applicable to those of us with the GeForce card; you can go get a GeForce 525.xx driver from NVIDIA's web site if you like.)

[Reshen]

I'll give this a try. Installed Assetto Corsa and MS Flight Sim. 

 

Both ran without any issue I could see. No issues with the Logitech 29 on win11. Did need to download the drivers.

 

Heat is still annoyingly high on the left side. But in docked mode I can live with it. 

 

Gonna start a new project with CAD and ANSYS. I'll post my findings with some 'real' work software.

[Easa]

 Guys, member a few pages back when I told you about 18" laptops? 🙂 

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Next-gen-Razer-Blade-18-specs-leak-out-along-with-impressive-Geekbench-scores-for-Intel-s-i9-13900HX-mobile-CPU.667619.0.html

 

Sorry for the off-topic post, but there were a few ppl interested here. 

[SvenC]

Time for a 7890 and 5880 😉

 

7780 will likely use the 7770 chassis . But the 5770 and XPS17 could be ready for a new chassis.

 

But those 18" displays should at least reach 400 nits. Less is pretty much indoor only. And yes, I would carry an XPS18 outdoors 🙂

[serpro69]

4 hours ago, Easa said:

 Guys, member a few pages back when I told you about 18" laptops? 🙂 

https://www.notebookcheck.net/Next-gen-Razer-Blade-18-specs-leak-out-along-with-impressive-Geekbench-scores-for-Intel-s-i9-13900HX-mobile-CPU.667619.0.html

 

Sorry for the off-topic post, but there were a few ppl interested here. 

 

There's already a thread for it here on NBT:

 

[Aaron44126]

BIOS update 1.7.1.

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=XMCK4

 

Fixes:
- Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities including (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - CVE) such as CVE-2022-21198, CVE-2022-26845, CVE-2022-29893, CVE-2022-27497, CVE-2022-33159, CVE-2022-26047, CVE-2021-23223, CVE-2021-37409, CVE-2021-44545, CVE-2022-21212, CVE-2022-21197, CVE-2022-21160, CVE-2022-21139, CVE-2022-21172, and CVE-2022-21240.

Edited November 15, 2022 by Aaron44126
1.7.1, not 1.7.3…

[FlashWolf]

Does anyone here know how much pcie lanes thunderbolt 4 can use?

Because i want to use an egpu "Razer Core X" but i heard that there could be some latency when there are no pcie lanes left over for thunderbolt?

 

thanks in advance

[pintie]

thunderbold 4 = 4 PCI-Express-3.0-Lanes (= 32 Gbit/s)

you could also use the SSD door and the M2 slot  - also 4 x PCIe3

 

a 4090 would not make any sense. But something like a 2080 is not very limited with this.

 

[Aaron44126]

The M2 slot would be 4x PCIe4, right?

[pintie]

i think you're right. so twice as fast as thunderbold...

[brunooo84]

On 11/14/2022 at 12:02 PM, Aaron44126 said:

BIOS update 1.7.3.

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=XMCK4

 

Fixes:
- Firmware updates to address security vulnerabilities including (Common Vulnerabilities and Exposures - CVE) such as CVE-2022-21198, CVE-2022-26845, CVE-2022-29893, CVE-2022-27497, CVE-2022-33159, CVE-2022-26047, CVE-2021-23223, CVE-2021-37409, CVE-2021-44545, CVE-2022-21212, CVE-2022-21197, CVE-2022-21160, CVE-2022-21139, CVE-2022-21172, and CVE-2022-21240.

did you update? does it revert the custom setupvars?

[Aaron44126]

6 hours ago, brunooo84 said:

did you update? does it revert the custom setupvars?

I haven’t updated to this one yet, but past BIOS updates have left setup vars alone.

[Dell-Mano_G]

Sorry for the late notice, I just saw this on my calendar.

Join our Dell Client Community for some info on the Precision 7000 series and CAMM memory

Topic: HOLD: Dell Client Community Precision Mobile 7000 Series and CAMM Deep Dive

Time: Nov 15, 2022 11:45 AM Central Time (US and Canada)

 

Join Zoom Meeting

https://innovatisgroup.zoom.us/j/97128197405?pwd=TXM3ckpyR1ZnRWNWaHgxY0V2V3NEUT09