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I recent got a 15 inch Dell Precision. I’m running a recent Ubuntu. I don’t recommend. It constantly throttles the CPI. I get lots of PCIe recoverable error

I recent got a 15 inch Dell Precision. I’m running a recent Ubuntu. I don’t recommend. It constantly throttles the CPI. I get lots of PCIe recoverable errors. The USB bus runs out of available throughout. Plugging anything Displaylink is a disaster. The camera/microphone is below the screen, which sucks more than I expected. It takes 2 hands to open the laptop. It is possible to plug in the power supply such that computer thinks it is charging but it actually drains the battery.

DoofusOfDeath 9y ago
Interesting. I've purchased two batches of Mobile Precisions in the past: one about 8 years ago, and another about 4 years ago. (Sorry, I can't remember the particular models.) Both of them had really good Ubuntu compatibility.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
sametmax 9y ago
I own a dell xps 15. Same, i don't recommand it. Autonomy is abysmal, usbc support very poor, the bios took a year to be stable and the sound died after some months. Not worth the price tag. Mind you, the xps 13 doesn't seem to have the same problems. I still love my old samsung 9 serie and wish the brand would have worked out the quirks and made a new one. My next try will be a thinkpad carbon since every owner around me are very happy.
- stefantheard 9y ago
  This was also my experience with the XPS15. Took a lot of struggle just for really basic hardware to start working properly on the ubuntu side, also extremely painful to install ubuntu itself and to have it recognize the XPS15's touchpad. I would not spend 1400$ and 10-20 hours to configure the damn thing again, do not recommend.
  - nickthemagicman 9y ago
    Had the same experience with Dell XPS and ubuntu 17.02 and earlier versions. Upgrading 17.10 and everything is working perfectly. Still would rather use my MacBook though because of software incompatibilities.
    - Thriptic 9y ago
      Interesting, so everything works on the xps 15 w/ Ubuntu 17.10? I want to pull the trigger on buying one but I am concerned about the Linux support. Also, do you know if the new XPS 15 support a two hard drive configuration?
      - stefantheard 9y ago
        technically it does not "work" but after some amount of hours of googling specific issues that pop up you can get it going. it's painful though.
        musicaldope 9y ago
        Any pointers on specific issues to look out for? I'm thinking of upgrading from 16.04 on my XPS 15
        pbrumm 9y ago
        I use the precision. my biggest issue was with getting encrypted drive setup. the trick was to use the dell recovery image to install with encryption. this works but leaves the machine with an older kernel that doesn't have all the tweeks around usbc and wifi and such. You have to switch to the Hardware Enablement Stack to get it running well.
      - j88439h84 9y ago
        Everything works great for me, no problems.
      - caleblloyd 9y ago
- Boulth 9y ago
  > Mind you, the xps 13 doesn't seem to have the same problems. Maybe not the same but I've also had bad time with 13. Coil whine, 10 seconds to dell logo after pressing power button (sic!) and u had one firmware update that bricked the laptop. Fortunately it was still under warranty. And don't get me even started on accessories (TB15 was a disaster that should've been recalled).
  - Cakez0r 9y ago
    I have an XPS 13 and also cannot recommend it. Same deal with the coil whine (it's a very annoying buzz sound). After a while, my battery began to swell too, which has broken the touchpad and visibly elevated the keyboard.
    - lasagnaphil 9y ago
      I have an XPS 15 (>2 years old) and also had battery swell, which made the trackpad unusable along with other safety concerns. Dell decided to replace the batteries for the 84wh model for free, but not for the 56wh model, which is very disappointing... Also the throttling in the XPS 15 is real. Even with the 960m I can't even run light games on it because of frequent fps drops... And the BIOS was pretty unstable for the first year (laptop running fans at maximum while in sleep mode, while getting really hot inside my bag), with lots of coil whine. Overall, I am very disappointed in the overall build quality of it (I previously had a 2010 macbook pro and had no problems). Going to try a Lenovo for my next laptop (it seems to have less build quality issues)
- BlackjackCF 9y ago
  I have a Dell XPS 15 as well. Mine does the coil whine and the keyboard isn't great. It's kind of sad, but it's probably still the closest thing to a MBP that I've had out of a non-Apple laptop. I'm also running Elementary OS on it and it's been okay.
  - jwatte 9y ago
    The Razer blades are more like MacBooks both in shape and in inability to upgrade the hardware. Much faster GPUs, though.
- tamrix 9y ago
  Also got the xps 15 and don't recommend it. The PCH overheats very easily causing cpu/gpu tasks to throttle for its life. The system has a interrupt overload from the WiFi extreme which causes subtle stuttering. I've lost 47%battery health in just over a year. The sound pops when playing YouTube videos and sometimes just goes Max volume until the sound card resets. The graphics card didn't work when I got it and had to be downgraded to a different model and version for it to work. The thing is a piece of shit. I had the macbook 2015 before that and it worked flawlessly in comparison.
- gormz 9y ago
  :/ wow, I was about to sell my 2015 mbp and get a xps. If not an XPS I don't know what to get. I've tried out a few of the newwer thinkpads and I'm just not impressed. Maybe I'll check out the carbon though.
gumballhead 9y ago
Huh... I had a Precision 5510 running Linux and I loved it
- dijit 9y ago
  I have a Precision 5520, it's pretty flawless aside from the TB16 dock having an issue with offloading CRC checksums... but you can work around it pretty easily: `sudo ethtool --offload eth0 rx off` I mean, the hardware/batterylife/support/build is great, although it does soak up grease from my fingers super easily.
jjoonathan 9y ago
Dell Precision 6800 here. Do not recommend. I too experience constant erroneous thermal throttling (in Windows). The docking station has extremely poor construction; any connectivity that travels through it flickers with the slightest mechanical provocation. External displays don't work at all unless you disable switchable graphics and have severe compositing glitches regardless. The official ubuntu install is so old that neither Firefox nor Chrome can install latest (without offroading dependencies), a modern ubuntu install without special drivers causes the backlight to turn on and off at 30Hz (hadn't seen that before!), and Dell's instructions for packaging drivers (can't just install them, you need to build an image) have broken in enough places to sink my best efforts.
StillBored 9y ago
Yah, dell seems to be returning to their early 2000's level of quality. I purchased a dell notebook a little over a year ago. Exactly 13 months in the motherboard died, although thanks to the fact that I purchased it from a 3rd party reseller that apparently didn't report the sold date properly dell repaired it for free. I've had a number of associates who told me similar stories about their recently purchased dell's, so its common enough that purchasing a dell as anything other than a throw away machine is probably not a good plan.
theyinwhy 9y ago
What precision have you got? I have a m3800 running Fedora 27 pretty smooth. Trackpad support is better than on Windows to my surprise. Additionally it clogs on Windows but does not on Linux so that's a plus. Wayland is working fine, hdmi-out, no prop. Have not found time to test the dp however.

DoofusOfDeath 9y ago

Interesting. I've purchased two batches of Mobile Precisions in the past: one about 8 years ago, and another about 4 years ago. (Sorry, I can't remember the particular models.) Both of them had really good Ubuntu compatibility.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

sametmax 9y ago

I own a dell xps 15. Same, i don't recommand it. Autonomy is abysmal, usbc support very poor, the bios took a year to be stable and the sound died after some months. Not worth the price tag. Mind you, the xps 13 doesn't seem to have the same problems. I still love my old samsung 9 serie and wish the brand would have worked out the quirks and made a new one. My next try will be a thinkpad carbon since every owner around me are very happy.

stefantheard 9y ago
This was also my experience with the XPS15. Took a lot of struggle just for really basic hardware to start working properly on the ubuntu side, also extremely painful to install ubuntu itself and to have it recognize the XPS15's touchpad. I would not spend 1400$ and 10-20 hours to configure the damn thing again, do not recommend.
- nickthemagicman 9y ago
  Had the same experience with Dell XPS and ubuntu 17.02 and earlier versions. Upgrading 17.10 and everything is working perfectly. Still would rather use my MacBook though because of software incompatibilities.
  - Thriptic 9y ago
    Interesting, so everything works on the xps 15 w/ Ubuntu 17.10? I want to pull the trigger on buying one but I am concerned about the Linux support. Also, do you know if the new XPS 15 support a two hard drive configuration?
    - stefantheard 9y ago
      technically it does not "work" but after some amount of hours of googling specific issues that pop up you can get it going. it's painful though.
      - musicaldope 9y ago
        Any pointers on specific issues to look out for? I'm thinking of upgrading from 16.04 on my XPS 15
        pbrumm 9y ago
        I use the precision. my biggest issue was with getting encrypted drive setup. the trick was to use the dell recovery image to install with encryption. this works but leaves the machine with an older kernel that doesn't have all the tweeks around usbc and wifi and such. You have to switch to the Hardware Enablement Stack to get it running well.
    - j88439h84 9y ago
      Everything works great for me, no problems.
    - caleblloyd 9y ago
Boulth 9y ago
> Mind you, the xps 13 doesn't seem to have the same problems. Maybe not the same but I've also had bad time with 13. Coil whine, 10 seconds to dell logo after pressing power button (sic!) and u had one firmware update that bricked the laptop. Fortunately it was still under warranty. And don't get me even started on accessories (TB15 was a disaster that should've been recalled).
- Cakez0r 9y ago
  I have an XPS 13 and also cannot recommend it. Same deal with the coil whine (it's a very annoying buzz sound). After a while, my battery began to swell too, which has broken the touchpad and visibly elevated the keyboard.
  - lasagnaphil 9y ago
    I have an XPS 15 (>2 years old) and also had battery swell, which made the trackpad unusable along with other safety concerns. Dell decided to replace the batteries for the 84wh model for free, but not for the 56wh model, which is very disappointing... Also the throttling in the XPS 15 is real. Even with the 960m I can't even run light games on it because of frequent fps drops... And the BIOS was pretty unstable for the first year (laptop running fans at maximum while in sleep mode, while getting really hot inside my bag), with lots of coil whine. Overall, I am very disappointed in the overall build quality of it (I previously had a 2010 macbook pro and had no problems). Going to try a Lenovo for my next laptop (it seems to have less build quality issues)
BlackjackCF 9y ago
I have a Dell XPS 15 as well. Mine does the coil whine and the keyboard isn't great. It's kind of sad, but it's probably still the closest thing to a MBP that I've had out of a non-Apple laptop. I'm also running Elementary OS on it and it's been okay.
- jwatte 9y ago
  The Razer blades are more like MacBooks both in shape and in inability to upgrade the hardware. Much faster GPUs, though.
tamrix 9y ago
Also got the xps 15 and don't recommend it. The PCH overheats very easily causing cpu/gpu tasks to throttle for its life. The system has a interrupt overload from the WiFi extreme which causes subtle stuttering. I've lost 47%battery health in just over a year. The sound pops when playing YouTube videos and sometimes just goes Max volume until the sound card resets. The graphics card didn't work when I got it and had to be downgraded to a different model and version for it to work. The thing is a piece of shit. I had the macbook 2015 before that and it worked flawlessly in comparison.
gormz 9y ago
:/ wow, I was about to sell my 2015 mbp and get a xps. If not an XPS I don't know what to get. I've tried out a few of the newwer thinkpads and I'm just not impressed. Maybe I'll check out the carbon though.

gumballhead 9y ago

Huh... I had a Precision 5510 running Linux and I loved it

dijit 9y ago
I have a Precision 5520, it's pretty flawless aside from the TB16 dock having an issue with offloading CRC checksums... but you can work around it pretty easily: `sudo ethtool --offload eth0 rx off` I mean, the hardware/batterylife/support/build is great, although it does soak up grease from my fingers super easily.

jjoonathan 9y ago

Dell Precision 6800 here. Do not recommend. I too experience constant erroneous thermal throttling (in Windows). The docking station has extremely poor construction; any connectivity that travels through it flickers with the slightest mechanical provocation. External displays don't work at all unless you disable switchable graphics and have severe compositing glitches regardless. The official ubuntu install is so old that neither Firefox nor Chrome can install latest (without offroading dependencies), a modern ubuntu install without special drivers causes the backlight to turn on and off at 30Hz (hadn't seen that before!), and Dell's instructions for packaging drivers (can't just install them, you need to build an image) have broken in enough places to sink my best efforts.

StillBored 9y ago

Yah, dell seems to be returning to their early 2000's level of quality. I purchased a dell notebook a little over a year ago. Exactly 13 months in the motherboard died, although thanks to the fact that I purchased it from a 3rd party reseller that apparently didn't report the sold date properly dell repaired it for free. I've had a number of associates who told me similar stories about their recently purchased dell's, so its common enough that purchasing a dell as anything other than a throw away machine is probably not a good plan.

theyinwhy 9y ago

What precision have you got? I have a m3800 running Fedora 27 pretty smooth. Trackpad support is better than on Windows to my surprise. Additionally it clogs on Windows but does not on Linux so that's a plus. Wayland is working fine, hdmi-out, no prop. Have not found time to test the dp however.