Dell Precision 7670 & Dell Precision 7770 owner's thread

[operator]

Thank you for that useful info. So will get NVMe SSDs without heatsink then. Saves a few bucks. 🙂

[pintie]

a heatsink on the SSD would not change anything - where should the heat go? Its not like this is a case with airflow

you need the heatpad to connect to the case. so the case is your heatsink...

[Aaron44126]

6 hours ago, pintie said:

a heatsink on the SSD would not change anything - where should the heat go? Its not like this is a case with airflow

you need the heatpad to connect to the case. so the case is your heatsink...

The DOO fans circulate air within the chassis and should provide some airflow over the primary SSD slot. The other slots have heat pads to “connect” to the chassis bottom panel.

[pintie]

he asked about "all Slots" so i guessed he wants to install more than the first..

 

i guess the airflow inside the chassis is pretty low. Well i will see if Dell will produce mine somewhen in the future.

The delay from august to Oktober sucks...

[win32asmguy]

The Precision 7770 arrived yesterday.

 

Everything great other than CPU performance. CBR23 Multi is ~17000 with e-cores enabled, ~12000 with e-cores disabled. There was thermal throttling limiting the system to 85W, so I repasted with Phobya Nanogrease Extreme and it is slightly better and throttles around 92W. There is still a contact issue as core temperature deltas are still 15C.

 

The good news is the bios setup variables are not write-locked so we can enable UV and tune other settings as needed. I already noted that IA AC/DC LoadLine was incorrectly set to 4.0/1.7 mOhms, so I adjusted it to 1.7/1.7 which is essentially Intel baseline value and the same as the Thinkpad P16. That improved CBR23 scores by about 8%.

[Aaron44126]

So, I've found myself being dissatisfied with the 4K/120Hz display panel.

 

There are definitely some good things about it.  The colors are definitely more vivid than older panels that I am used to (i.e. Precision M6700 1080p, Precision 7530 4K).  The fact that it is 120Hz and supports VRR is nice.

 

The bad things basically have to do when you have dark images on screen.  This could be when watching a video or gaming and running across a dark scene, or just running "dark mode" applications at the desktop.

 

First off, there is a fair amount of inconsistency in the backlight.  I know that some backlight inconsistency is normal for LCD panels, but this one seems worse than what I'm used to.  The top left and top right areas are noticeably brighter than the rest of the panel.  It does change a little depending on the angle that you are looking at.  And I've noticed that you can apply a slight "bend" to the panel just by manipulating the display enclosure and the bright spots will be reduced.  I've thought about taking the panel out and putting some cardstock behind it or something to change the pressure level behind it... but I don't think that will really help, anything I do to "bend" the panel by hand to reduce the bright spot in one area creates a new bright spot in another.

 

Also, blacks are just bad in general.  This isn't really an issue when "computing" on the laptop, but again if watching a video or playing a game with a dark scene, it is quite noticeable.  I'm not really sure how to describe it other than that the blacks/dark areas are "not black" and look a bit strange, and don't blend well with the rest of the image.  I thought maybe that is because this is just a bright panel, but it seems the same even if I reduce the brightness level.  (...I experienced something similar when swapping in a 1080p AUO panel in my M6700 to replace the LG, and I ended up switching back to the LG because of it.)

 

.....I don't think having Dell replace the panel again would address either of these issues.  These issues seemed equally present with both panels that I have used in this laptop; seems to be just the nature of the panel that they are using.

 

So, since I expect this system to be long-lived, I find myself considering replacing the panel with an aftermarket one.  I looked on Panelook and there are tons of options (...but not a whole lot that are ≥400 nits and not AUO).  Does anyone have a recommendation for a great 4K/17.3" panel that they've seen or used in another system (even if it is not 120Hz)?  I might make another thread about this.

 

I noticed that there are some miniLED options out there (i.e. AUO B173ZAN05.0, Innolux HK173VB) but I don't know if such a panel would work in this system...  I seem to remember someone trying a miniLED panel in Precision 7530 (maybe @Ionising_Radiation) and it did not work, maybe because the laptop/BIOS didn't know how to provide power to it properly.  MiniLED panels are pretty expensive but I'd be willing to go for it as an experiment if I had high confidence that they'd produce a good image; I'm concerned about "bloom" (again in dark scenes) which could potentially bother me just as much as the issues I described with this 120Hz panel.  More investigation required.

 

[Edit]

I noticed that the service manual doesn't describe replacing the display panel, it just covers the entire display assembly.  I'm assuming that replacing the panel alone would be similar to other Precision systems (snap off the plastic bezel, take out a few screws, and there it is) but I haven't actually tried to see...

 

[Edit 2]

Regarding the mini LED screens, AUO B173ZAN05.0 is used in the MSI Creator 17 from last year and people seem to like it.  The Innolux HK173VB is actually a 120 Hz panel, and cheaper, but I can't figure out what system(s) it is used in.  I found a page that lists compatibility with Lenovo, but I can't find any reference of a Lenovo 17.3" mini LED system...

 

[Edit 3]

Thinking the Innolux HK173VB panel might just have a mini LED backlight but no local dimming (FALD) like the AUO B173ZAN05.0 panel has.  Still better for backlight consistency & range of brightness.  I guess I'm going to take apart my 7770 display enclosure soon and confirm that the panel is reasonably easy to remove and has a 40-pin eDP connector in the expected place... and then I might proceed with ordering a swap panel.  Looks like it will take 2-3 weeks to arrive from China.

 

[Edit 4]

Actually found B173ZAN05.0 for cheaper... but learned that its FALD mode doesn't kick in unless you are viewing HDR content, hmm.

[Aaron44126]

1 hour ago, win32asmguy said:

Everything great other than CPU performance. CBR23 Multi is ~17000 with e-cores enabled, ~12000 with e-cores disabled. There was thermal throttling limiting the system to 85W, so I repasted with Phobya Nanogrease Extreme and it is slightly better and throttles around 92W. There is still a contact issue as core temperature deltas are still 15C.

 

The good news is the bios setup variables are not write-locked so we can enable UV and tune other settings as needed. I already noted that IA AC/DC LoadLine was incorrectly set to 4.0/1.7 mOhms, so I adjusted it to 1.7/1.7 which is essentially Intel baseline value and the same as the Thinkpad P16. That improved CBR23 scores by about 8%.

 

Did you use ThrottleStop to get around 85W PL1?

Can you point me to a resource about adjusting the IA AC/DC LoadLine?  (Never messed with that before.)

[Aaron44126]

Poking around with display panel stuff and I realized that Dell has released a driver / color profile for the 4K AUO panel in the Precision 7770.... but it's only available over on the Alienware support page.  (Confirming that they are sharing this panel between the Precision and Alienware lineup.)

https://www.dell.com/support/home/en-us/drivers/driversdetails?driverid=cwkg5

 

Giving it a try but I doubt that it will make any difference, other than maybe Dolby/HDR stuff as noted on the driver page.

 

[win32asmguy]

5 hours ago, Aaron44126 said:

Did you use ThrottleStop to get around 85W PL1?

Can you point me to a resource about adjusting the IA AC/DC LoadLine?  (Never messed with that before.)

Yes, Throttlestop 9.5 to adjust the power limit.

 

As far as IA AC/DC LoadLine it can be modified by an EFI setup variable (just like the undervolting guide uses for Config Lock/ Underclocking Lock)

 

setup_var CpuSetup 0x132 0xAA # set IA AC LoadLine LSB to 170 (1.7mOhms)
setup_var CpuSetup 0x133 0x0  # set IA AC LoadLine MSB to 0

 

[Aaron44126]

So.  I took the display panel bezel off.  It was pretty standard, held in place with plastic clips and adhesive around the actual panel.  I carefully worked my way around with a pry tool.  (The left and right sides of the bezel are pretty thin and seem like they could snap if you just try to pull it off with your hand.)

 

My plan was to take the panel out as well and check out the labels and connector on the back.  But, I found...

 

 

...no metal tabs with screws holding the display panel in.  It looks instead like it is held in place by adhesive strips.  There are pull-tabs at the bottom (circled above) that appear to be to aid in releasing it.  But that means putting a new panel in would require adding new adhesive behind it and aligning it by hand.  (There is "wiggle room" between the sides of the panel and the tabs that hold the bezel in place.)  ...Yuck.

 

I guess this explains why removing the panel itself is not covered in the service manual.

 

Anyway, the act of removing the bezel and reapplying it seems to have made the backlight bleed problem a good bit less bad.  Maybe there's less pressure on the screen and that helps.  (Or maybe I'm just tricking myself and I'll notice it again once it gets dark.)  Doesn't help with the issue with the "blacks", but I'll stick with the panel for now and see if it still seems like a big deal after a few weeks, or if I get used to it.

 

[Edit]

It does look like you can still remove the hinges separately.  (I had to replace the hinges in my M6700, one of them snapped after seven years of use...)  But the display panel is something that I would say "should" be easy to replace separately.  It's not like there's not room for the metal tabs and screws here .... maybe they would have to add a quarter millimeter to hold the aluminum bracket that goes around behind the panel.  You "could" source an eDP panel from anywhere but unless you want to go through the trouble of dealing with the adhesive/alignment, you'd have to source an entire display enclosure from Dell to replace the panel.  This along with the keyboard are disappointing steps in the direction away from self-repairability.

[samatsu]

5 hours ago, Aaron44126 said:

So.  I took the display panel bezel off.  It was pretty standard, held in place with plastic clips and adhesive around the actual panel.  I carefully worked my way around with a pry tool.  (The left and right sides of the bezel are pretty thin and seem like they could snap if you just try to pull it off with your hand.)

 

My plan was to take the panel out as well and check out the labels and connector on the back.  But, I found...

 

 

...no metal tabs with screws holding the display panel in.  It looks instead like it is held in place by adhesive strips.  There are pull-tabs at the bottom (circled above) that appear to be to aid in releasing it.  But that means putting a new panel in would require adding new adhesive behind it and aligning it by hand.  (There is "wiggle room" between the sides of the panel and the tabs that hold the bezel in place.)  ...Yuck.

 

I guess this explains why removing the panel itself is not covered in the service manual.

 

Anyway, the act of removing the bezel and reapplying it seems to have made the backlight bleed problem a good bit less bad.  Maybe there's less pressure on the screen and that helps.  (Or maybe I'm just tricking myself and I'll notice it again once it gets dark.)  Doesn't help with the issue with the "blacks", but I'll stick with the panel for now and see if it still seems like a big deal after a few weeks, or if I get used to it.

 

[Edit]

It does look like you can still remove the hinges separately.  (I had to replace the hinges in my M6700, one of them snapped after seven years of use...)  But the display panel is something that I would say "should" be easy to replace separately.  It's not like there's not room for the metal tabs and screws here .... maybe they would have to add a quarter millimeter to hold the aluminum bracket that goes around behind the panel.  You "could" source an eDP panel from anywhere but unless you want to go through the trouble of dealing with the adhesive/alignment, you'd have to source an entire display enclosure from Dell to replace the panel.  This along with the keyboard are disappointing steps in the direction away from self-repairability.

Display enclosure parts,can be found sold separately.

[Edit]

The same as the mobile phone replacement method, pull the adhesive strip down and remove it, and then buy the adhesive strip and stick it on.

[win32asmguy]

I enabled undervolting and tested -75mV P-core and P-cache, which scored 14750 CBR23 with e-cores disabled at 75W pull.

[operator]

5 hours ago, win32asmguy said:

I enabled undervolting and tested -75mV P-core and P-cache, which scored 14750 CBR23 with e-cores disabled at 75W pull.

 

Thats a ~23% gain according to your initial 12000 score! Sound very good, doesn't it?

[Rojaho]

5 hours ago, win32asmguy said:

I enabled undervolting and tested -75mV P-core and P-cache, which scored 14750 CBR23 with e-cores disabled at 75W pull.

 

You're doing some excellent work here. 

Whats the CB23 Run with undervolt and e-cores enabled? (I'm hoping your edging into the 19k region) 

[Aaron44126]

11 hours ago, samatsu said:

Display enclosure parts,can be found sold separately.

[Edit]

The same as the mobile phone replacement method, pull the adhesive strip down and remove it, and then buy the adhesive strip and stick it on.

 

Good to see, but I myself am not confident that I could align the screen properly without a definite physical guide (which there doesn't seem to be here), especially since you "only get one try"... so I'd hate it for being "a little bit off" for the rest of its service life...  (I'm the guy who would be pretty particular about this sort of thing.  Same thing with applying a glass screen protector on a phone...)

 

And, if I want to just try a new panel and not commit to it (again, not even sure if a miniLED panel would work to begin with)...  I either have to have it hanging out of the chassis or go through a more extensive process to swap the panel back afterwards, with new adhesive strips and so forth.  A panel swap used to be a five-minute affair.

[Edit] Actually you would have to remove the current panel in order to even try a new one, because the eDP connector on the back is inaccessible while the panel is stuck in.

 

I can say, I used the machine some after dark last night and the bright spots are definitely better after just removing and replacing the bezel.  Odd, but not complaining.

 

10 hours ago, win32asmguy said:

I enabled undervolting and tested -75mV P-core and P-cache, which scored 14750 CBR23 with e-cores disabled at 75W pull.

 

I've been thinking about trying undervolting; I've seen the guides to (re-)enable it at the EFI level, but as I understand it, these days you can't undervolt if you have Hyper-V enabled these days?  I definitely need Hyper-V active for some of my workflows.

 

Glad to see I'm not the only one who was initially thermal throttling at 85W.  Well, not glad really, that means that the stock paste definitely could be improved upon.  But at least our experience there was consistent.

[Aaron44126]

Noticed this discrete chip with its own connection circled in blue...  Any idea what it is?

 

[TwistedAndy]

8 hours ago, Aaron44126 said:

I've been thinking about trying undervolting; I've seen the guides to (re-)enable it at the EFI level, but as I understand it, these days you can't undervolt if you have Hyper-V enabled these days?  I definitely need Hyper-V active for some of my workflows.

 

Actually, you can undervolt the CPU with Hyper-V active. If you're planning to use ThrottleStop, you would need to disable VBS (Virtualization-Based Security). This feature locks some registers and prevents them from changing.

 

Once you find the stable voltage offsets, you can put them directly to the BIOS settings in the same way as you unlock the undervolting. In this case, you will be able to enable VBS.

 

On my device (XPS 9720) I was able to achieve -0.15V offset, but for some reason the system crashed while my IDE was indexing the project. Maybe, there're some JVM-specific issues there. I ended up with -0.12V offset. As for the system agent, it is unstable at low voltages, so I decided to apply -0.06V for that.

[Easa]

Hello guys,

I am a first time poster, but I do laptop repair and modification service for a living, and I have always preferred Mobile Workstations for my daily drivers. I have worked with or repaired a quite number of them, so I (kind of) know their weaknesses and strenghts even on the electrical level, and I have the ability to compare between each generation since 2007.

 

Back in 2014 I have purchased Dell Precision M4800. It was a good laptop with great cooling and internal access, I still love its industrial brick design. Unfortunately, after year or half or two years of usage everything started to break down in almost all aspects (keyboard delays, fingeprint recognition, PCH malfunction, multiple times replaced motherboard within ProSupport etc.). I have replaced it with ZBook 15 G1 that I have modified to same specification, this is what I use to this day. I saw no point in upgrading from Haswell to Skylake or its latter recycled variants, so I have decided to skip DDR4 era completely and wait out for new generation with DDR5 support and new architecture. I was hoping that it will be similar to transition from Core2 Duo Penryn era laptops to Sandy Bridge, that the performance and effectivity will be in a different league.

 

Well, here we are with Alder Lake, a downsized & spliced Skylake pseudo-next gen mashup with ridiculous thermals, bad memory controller and manufacturing variable so high, that the worst i7-12700K chips differ from the best ones by about 80-100W top load consumption and 25-30° Celsius on same cooler and conditions. Even Noctua NH-U12A is struggling to cool these down, and now they throw them in laptops. Again, ridiculous. I knew where this was going since day 1 of Intel mentioning mobile Alder Lake chips. 

What we are going to end up with is that lets say, my (non existent) Dell 7770 will surpass your indentical machine just because I got lucky with a better, less leaking chip from factory. I mean, silicon lottery was always a thing in desktop OC & XOC circles, I respect that, but I have a serious problem when I buy a machine based on benchmark / review results and end up with something that is operating 30% below my expectations just because a CPU manufacturer cannot guarantee any consistency or QC. Not even speaking about durability of these things. I had to send several 12700K & 12900K´s to RMA because of faulty cores - not a great deal on desktop where you can switch out CPU within minutes, but in our world it sadly means motherboard replacement, which, if you want to keep the device for a longer time (after the warranty ends) like me, is worrying.  

 

I was dead set on buying Precision 7670. I really was. I like 16:10 ratio and all the new features, but now, seeing this, I really had to rethink my situation, considering I still can squeeze one more year from my trusty old Haswell ZBook before retiring, even though its performance has become limiting to me. Who knows, maybe with the Raptor Lake it will be better and more consistent (though I seriously doubt that), otherwise I am screwed. At least there should be new GPUs available (with same ridiculous power draw increase). R&D of laptop cooling has not really evolved anywhere in the last 10 years, only thing that we have now is high speed fans with high blade count (and a lifespan of 2 years before the bearing gives up). 

 

==================================

About replacing screens, yes, this is the way that all modern (2021+) laptops are build, with screen attached to lid via double sided adhesive. Good thing is that many of these adhesives return to their shape after pullout and are, in fact, reusable for a couple of times. Bad thing is that they (the original ones) are not available separately, only included in larger part such as replacement lid itself. You can use acrylic or butylene tape, but you lose the ability to remove screen without damaging it. 

I also hope that in the next generation we will be able to choose 16:10 FHD IPS with high refresh rate, otherwise I will have to swap it out by myself. I do not want 4K in laptop, 2560x1600 is maximum for me. 

 

==================================

 

About liquid metal - this is definitely a way to go, I lost count of laptops that I have modified this way, but on most machines you get a whole new level of thermals, silence and performance. On my ThinkPad X1 Extreme (i7-9750H) the result was that the CPU could draw 88W of power without throttling basically for an unlimited time. 

 

==================================

 

PS: Is there anybody else that would celebrate the return of bottom sided docking port, just like M4800? I know I would. My ideal workstation would be a 16:10, 16-18" with ThinkPad design, M4800-like internal layout, IBM keyboard with hardware buttons for both trackpoint and trackpad, dedicated status LEDs and buttons (like T61p or older Compaq), 2.5" hotswap bay (M4800 had one), lid lock, desktop-like UEFI and bottom dock. I mean, these things are heavy beasts designed for workflow, why do they still pursue some unreachable idea of everything being thin & sexy like ultrabooks. Nonsense, at least for me. End of daydreaming, sorry.  

[Aaron44126]

21 hours ago, Easa said:

Hello guys,

I am a first time poster, but I do laptop repair and modification service for a living, and I have always preferred Mobile Workstations for my daily drivers.

 

Thanks for joining/posting and welcome!  😄

 

21 hours ago, Easa said:

I saw no point in upgrading from Haswell to Skylake or its latter recycled variants, so I have decided to skip DDR4 era completely and wait out for new generation with DDR5 support and new architecture. I was hoping that it will be similar to transition from Core2 Duo Penryn era laptops to Sandy Bridge, that the performance and effectivity will be in a different league.

 

I am coming from Precision M6700 (Ivy Bridge / ten years old) and waited for Alder Lake for similar reasons.  I've been wanting to upgrade for a while but basically didn't want to hop on Intel's recycled 10nm+++++ architecture if a "new" architecture was only 1-2 years away.

 

21 hours ago, Easa said:

I was dead set on buying Precision 7670. I really was. I like 16:10 ratio and all the new features, but now, seeing this, I really had to rethink my situation, considering I still can squeeze one more year from my trusty old Haswell ZBook before retiring, even though its performance has become limiting to me. Who knows, maybe with the Raptor Lake it will be better and more consistent (though I seriously doubt that), otherwise I am screwed. At least there should be new GPUs available (with same ridiculous power draw increase). R&D of laptop cooling has not really evolved anywhere in the last 10 years, only thing that we have now is high speed fans with high blade count (and a lifespan of 2 years before the bearing gives up).

 

I understand the predicament.  I'm thinking waiting just one generation for Raptor Lake won't do much.  Since this is a new chassis (for Precision 7000), Dell is likely to reuse it next year, so basically I am expecting something very similar to Alder Lake but maybe available in a 8P+16E configuration, and NVIDIA Lovelace GPUs, and maybe one or two small surprises from Dell but otherwise basically the same as the systems that have just launched.

 

Lovelace will have a node shrink so it will perform better than Ampere, even if the performance boost on the mobile side will not be as great as on the desktop side (because NVIDIA can't continue to crank up the power limit like they are doing on desktops.  We'll probably see an AD103 or AD104 GPU constrained to ≈130-150W, lifted from a desktop card that wants to run it at 300W+.

 

All that said, I don't think that you're necessarily "screwed".  it stands to reason that even if you purchase a Precision 7670 or 7680 with these "issues", it will perform much better than your Haswell-based ZBook, and if you so choose, you will be able to improve it further with tweaks like we are figuring out here (repaste / undervolt / adjust power limits / etc.).

 

So I guess it is back to what I have posted elsewhere.  Some expectations adjustment is needed for the modern MWS market.  Despite the power/thermal limitations, the system is still faster than its predecessors.  We have entered an era where desktop CPUs and GPUs are going in that won't be able to reach their full potential due to thermal/space limits.  I wish things were a bit different, for sure, but it's still workable.

 

(There's also the sad state of lack of competition for proper MWS systems, especially at the 17" level.  The available options are Dell, and... MSI, I guess.)

 

...Don't know what to make about the fan lifespan comment.  I have multiple Precision systems that run the fans 24/7 (at low speed) for years and I've never had a fan fail on me.

 

21 hours ago, Easa said:

About replacing screens, yes, this is the way that all modern (2021+) laptops are build, with screen attached to lid via double sided adhesive. Good thing is that many of these adhesives return to their shape after pullout and are, in fact, reusable for a couple of times. Bad thing is that they (the original ones) are not available separately, only included in larger part such as replacement lid itself. You can use acrylic or butylene tape, but you lose the ability to remove screen without damaging it.

 

Yeah, this is new for Precision (7000) with this generation.  I have a Precision 7560 (2021 system) and I have taken the screen out just to check the display connector, it just took a few minutes.  I guess my issue with this change is not just the fact that it's mildly more troublesome to replace the screen.  It's that it's significantly more troublesome to even experiment.  I'd be interested in checking a mini-LED panel to see if it would work, but even confirming the display connector position or trying to hook the eDP cable up to a mini-LED panel outside of the chassis would require undoing the adhesive to get the stock panel out.

 

...I get that Dell has no reason to care about this, really, since >99.9% of Precision owners will never care about taking their display panel out.  But I'd like a laptop like this to be able to be fully disassembled and reassembled just by taking out screws and unsnapping things (other than having to repaste the heatsink if you take it out which obviously can't be avoided)...  No "one-way" disassembly, please.

 

21 hours ago, Easa said:

PS: Is there anybody else that would celebrate the return of bottom sided docking port, just like M4800?

 

Oh yes, I do miss the ePort for docking.  The Thunderbolt docks have never really done it for me.  But that's something that is never coming back.  I would also like more status LEDs like you say, seeing the hard drive activity indicator is something that I miss in particular.  (Can't say that I really miss a 2.5" SATA drive bay, though.  While it's a bit sad to not be able to reuse old drives, I can definitely see how those are an unnecessary use of space at this point and sort of had to go.)

[Easa]

Quote

All that said, I don't think that you're necessarily "screwed".  it stands to reason that even if you purchase a Precision 7670 or 7680 with these "issues", it will perform much better than your Haswell-based ZBook, and if you so choose, you will be able to improve it further with tweaks like we are figuring out here (repaste / undervolt / adjust power limits / etc.).

 

I know that I will eventually have to settle with options that will be available, but it just makes me sad. One way or another, switching to liquid metal, changing thermal pads to Fujipoly or TG Extreme and adjusting voltage / power limits will be done ASAP, that is after I will be sure the machine runs with 100% stability under my workload. 

 

Quote

(There's also the sad state of lack of competition for proper MWS systems, especially at the 17" level.  The available options are Dell, and... MSI, I guess.)

 

I do not want to whine again, but there is literally no competition ATM in the whole MWS segment. HP seems to have abandoned 15&17.3" variants completely, going somehow jack-of-all-trades way with ZBook Fury 16 G9 (which namescheme is almost OCD triggering and flawed from the start as its actually 1st gen of 16" ZBook)  with its limited display options, underpowered GPU and not very competitive price. Then there is Lenovo ThinkPad P16, which is only appealing to me because of its keyboard and colour scheme, otherwise has nonsense price tag, its service support cannot be even remotely compared to Dell (at least in my region) and the service options are limited by both expensive parts (as all modern Lenovo laptops) or plain inability to perform BGA or other solder work due to the crucial parts being underlaid with black epoxide that you often cannot dissolve without damaging the PCB. Compared to Lenovo, Dell is quite cheap and easy to maintain even after 5+ years. 

 

Next, MSI, which I am not even putting in the same class b/c from service standpoint they are just nightmare to work on. Support is either unwilling or non existent, basic parts are often unavailable after 3 years. 

 

So here we are, literally stuck with Dell because it is lesser evil. This reminds me of something...

 

Somebody at Fujitsu should wake them up from their catatonic state to actually produce something newer that 10th Gen.i7 H7510, their Celsius line was quite good (!!!still bottom docked!!!), brick looking, had NBD support, nothing glued, bolts everywhere, easy to repair, just old school. Bad thing was proprietary parts like EC controllers that only they used and nobody else. 

 

Then there is that no brand is even remotely interested in the large MWS segment, because there is very small profit. Asus, Acer or small players like Dynabook or Vaio could not cover products like this with their service network similar to the way Dell does. Speaking of Vaio, back in Sony days and XP / Vista era they could make a god tier laptop. Nostalgia strikes again.

 

Back to relevant topic, I personally think (and also heard insider rumours) that the 15.6" and 17.3" form factors will eventually cease to exist, with 16" replacing them both, and we might just see a new 18-19" 16:10 form factor emerging which, due to the thin screen borders and aspect ratio, will be similar in outline dimensions to older 17.3". 

 

Quote

...Don't know what to make about the fan lifespan comment.  I have multiple Precision systems that run the fans 24/7 (at low speed) for years and I've never had a fan fail on me.

 

I was talking about whole laptop market, not just MWS which (on general) are built with better parts. For example, on consumer gaming / creative machines from Asus or Acer the lifetime of fans is about two years (talking about 8th generation Core and newer) when in daily usage. Also depends on actual OEM, Delta and Sunon are the better ones, FCN / Forcecon are not. 

 

Quote

...I get that Dell has no reason to care about this, really, since >99.9% of Precision owners will never care about taking their display panel out.  But I'd like a laptop like this to be able to be fully disassembled and reassembled just by taking out screws and unsnapping things (other than having to repaste the heatsink if you take it out which obviously can't be avoided)...  No "one-way" disassembly, please.

 

I am 100% with you on this. MWS is a niche market and should be treated as such, not back down on quality and service accessibility just because mainstream machines are like this nowadays. 

 

Quote

Oh yes, I do miss the ePort for docking.  The Thunderbolt docks have never really done it for me.  But that's something that is never coming back.  I would also like more status LEDs like you say, seeing the hard drive activity indicator is something that I miss in particular.  (Can't say that I really a 2.5" SATA drive bay, though.  While it's a bit sad to not be able to reuse old drives, I can definitely see how those are an unnecessary use of space at this point and sort of had to go.)

 

I mean, it should not have been ditched in the first place, it was clearly the better option. Status LEDs were there for a reason, another cost cutting nonsense, it was great to see if the WLAN/WWAN/HDD etc. is working just by looking at the laptop without any further action. If they can place infantile RGB lights around whole machines today, why not a few subtle LEDs. As for the 2.5" drives, well, I tend to swap them alot using external dock, but even without this, lets just say that you can place A LOT more NAND chips on a 2.5" drive (just imagine how many M2 2280 units would fit into that 2.5" 7mm metal box) than on the M.2 unit, it has its own body as passive cooler and shielding, thus the manipulation is easier, more safe and convenient when you need to swap between two devices for some reason. For a large drive that you only need as a storage (8TB+) where SATA speeds are enough, this is ideal solution. I think that MWS should have some "accessory" bay that could either be configured with a hot swap unit, an optical drive for those who need it, a PCIE M.2 expansion module, USB-C or other port expansion module, or even a 2nd battery unit. They had it like this in the past. Now we are going all external for no apparent reason. 

 

 

 

 

[win32asmguy]

I replaced the thermal pads today on the CPU side with some mid grade 12.8W/mK and now performance has jumped over 15%, CBR23 Multi scores without undervolting was 20634 with e-cores enabled. This was with Phobya Nanogrease Extreme.

 

I did not do exactly a great job with the repad. My vision is not great these days nor my ability to make the precision cuts and hold them steady dropping into place, but this is still a great improvement over the factory job. I will post an image with the pad thicknesses marked later. Aaron I hope you do not mind me borrowing the photo you took for the pad measurements.

 

 

[Aaron44126]

If you look at my heatsink photo, it seems like the "stock pad missing" from your image is actually stuck on the bottom side of the heatsink when I removed it.

 

Anyway, I certainly do not mind you using my photo for measurements...  Looking forward to the details because I would definitely like to reproduce this.

 

[Edit] Realized later that the photo just above actually has the thermal pad thicknesses embedded on it.  I will plan to use this as a guide when doing my own pad replacement.

 

[Edit 2] Actually looking at the pictures, looks like the stock pad that is missing in yours is also missing in mine...

[Easa]

Quote

I replaced the thermal pads today on the CPU side with some mid grade 12.8W/mK and now performance has jumped over 15%, CBR23 Multi scores without undervolting was 20634 with e-cores enabled. This was with Phobya Nanogrease Extreme.

 

So Phobya NanoGrease Extreme on CPU+GPU and 12.8W/mK pads on other components, correct? This looks promising. I wonder what 17W Alphacool / Fujipoly Sarcon would do, those are the best that I have ever worked with. There are also new Thermal Grizzly Minus Pad Extreme which should have around 28,8 W/mK but I seriously doubt that. 

 

Heck, I would even try custom made copper shim + paste mod on VRM and VRAMs, but going all frankenstein on straight-outta-box 4 grand laptop is...disturbing. 

[win32asmguy]

7 hours ago, Easa said:

 

So Phobya NanoGrease Extreme on CPU+GPU and 12.8W/mK pads on other components, correct? This looks promising. I wonder what 17W Alphacool / Fujipoly Sarcon would do, those are the best that I have ever worked with. There are also new Thermal Grizzly Minus Pad Extreme which should have around 28,8 W/mK but I seriously doubt that. 

 

Heck, I would even try custom made copper shim + paste mod on VRM and VRAMs, but going all frankenstein on straight-outta-box 4 grand laptop is...disturbing. 

Yeah, unfortunately it still cannot be sustained at that level. It eventually settles back to 85W scoring about ~18500 in each CBR23 loop and still thermal throttling with P-core temp deltas still 16C.

 

This model is worth tuning as it is the only option with HX cpu, 17 inch FHD display, 3080ti, Windows 10 support and a TB4 port mux. It also gets over 8 hours of battery life in light usage scenarios with my config so its also superior to the Clevo NH55J in that regard. The only downside is that only modern standby is supported so I have that disabled and only completely power off the machine or use hibernate.

[Light]

Does anyone here have the 7670 with the 83 wh battery? How is the battery runtime?

 

Or are there any reviews anywhere of the 7670 battery runtime?

 

Wondering how the 7670 with the 83 wh battery compares to the 7x60 series with the 95 wh battery.