New XPS 17 questions

1. Unclear.  If the Intel GPU is still controlling all outputs, then you'd be limited to 3 simultaneous independent displays, including the built-in display if you want to keep using it while external displays are attached.  And the Intel GPU built into the CPUs used in the XPS 17 9700 is still the older GPU that only supports DisplayPort HBR2 and up to 4K 60 Hz, not the newer GPU included in the "Ice Lake" CPUs found in the XPS 13 that supports HBR3 and 5K (5120x3200).  Note that certain ultrawide resolutions like 5120x1440 would be fine to run even on that older GPU because 5120x1440 is actually slightly less total pixel area than 4K (3840x2160).  In terms of max frequency, again if the Intel GPU still controls all outputs, then at best you'd be limited to whatever you can run over DisplayPort HBR2.  I believe QHD 144 Hz works over DisplayPort HBR2, but I don't know if Intel GPUs in general support 144 Hz at all.  I've seen confirmation that they can run 120 Hz, but haven't seen 144 Hz either way.  And again this all assumes that the Intel GPU does in fact control all outputs.  If Dell has broken with their established pattern and wired at least some of the USB-C/TB3 ports straight to the NVIDIA GPU, then you'd be able to take advantage of whatever that GPU supported, which would include DisplayPort HBR3, 5K displays, and even things like G-Sync and VR.

2. I touched on this above.

3. To my knowledge, Intel only offers single and dual port Thunderbolt 3 controllers.  I would expect that this system would use two dual port controllers.  As to how bandwidth works, that will likely require someone who has one to look at device chains.  My expectation would be that each TB3 port on the chassis will support PCIe x4, but each dual port controller will only have a PCIe x4 link wired back to the CPU.  So any given port can run at max speed, but each pair will be sharing PCIe x4 bandwidth back to the CPU.  I doubt that both dual port controllers would share a single PCIe x4 link back to the CPU, but I suppose that might be possible too.  But note that PCIe traffic has no bearing on DisplayPort capabilities, since DisplayPort does not run over PCIe.  It comes from an output being wired straight from the GPU to the Thunderbolt 3 controller.

4. Looking at photos, the XPS 17 doesn't have a dedicated charging port, so it would have to charge via USB-C.  Dell already makes a 130W USB-C charger that's been used with the XPS 15 9575 and the new XPS 15 9500.  They might use that if that would be enough power to run the XPS 17, or they might stretch even farther past the 100W max of the USB PD spec and offer a 180W USB-C charger or something.  The other possibility would be that the XPS 17's USB-C charger has to be plugged into two USB-C ports.  The WD19DC dock already uses this dual connector design to provide up to 210W to systems that require power levels in that range, such as the Precision 7000 Series models.  I hope that's not the answer, but on the other hand using a 130W power source on a 17" system equipped with an RTX GPU seems like a recipe for slow battery charging or possibly even battery drain under heavy load, and I'm not sure Dell would be able to safely push a lot more than 130W over a single USB-C connector.  Maybe if they raised voltage rather than amperage?  I'll be curious to see how this one goes.  In any case, it's a safe bet that third party USB-C chargers won't be ideal because even a 100W third party charger wouldn't deliver the power level expected by this system, so using those would likely mean slower battery charging and/or performance throttling as the system tries to adapt to the reduced power budget.  The existing XPS 15 models designed for a 130W power source already have this problem.  And making it worse is the fact that right now, all Dell systems I've seen limit themselves to drawing no more than 65W from non-Dell power sources, even when the source can provide more and the system would benefit from more -- like the XPS 15, where using a third-party charger means that at best, you'll only be giving the system half the power it's designed to have available.  I have no idea why Dell imposed that limitation and sincerely hope it goes away.

5. Unless the system has display outputs wired directly to the NVIDIA GPU and you have a display attached to one of those outputs, then the system already disables the NVIDIA GPU when it's not needed.  This technology is called NVIDIA Optimus.  It's been around for years, and it's how the vast majority of dual GPU systems on the market have worked for years.  The ability to do that is WHY most laptops have all of their display outputs wired to the Intel GPU, including the built-in display, since that means the NVIDIA GPU can be disabled when it's not needed.  Otherwise, the NVIDIA GPU has to remain active whenever a display is connected to an output it controls, even if nothing graphics-intensive is going on.  But the tradeoff to having everything wired to the Intel GPU is that certain technologies can't be passed through an Intel GPU at least today, including VR, G-Sync, stereoscopic 3D, and some others.  In any case, you shouldn't need to manually disable the NVIDIA GPU.  If it isn't being used, then it would be disabled automatically.  And if it IS being used, then obviously disabling it would be a problem.

6. An external GPU requires Thunderbolt 3 rather than regular USB-C, but since this system has that, yes you can use an eGPU.  People have been doing this with the XPS 15 for a few generations now, and it has an NVIDIA GPU.  I'd recommend that you use an NVIDIA GPU as your external GPU though, simply because matching vendors on your GPUs seems to avoid a lot of potential driver problems.  The NVIDIA drivers will know not to use the built-in GPU when an eGPU is present, at least if it's an NVIDIA eGPU.

7. Wait for reviews.  But reviews of newer XPS 13 models still indicate that 4K imposes a significant battery life hit -- a few hours depending on usage on that system -- and that's on a 13" display.  Fyi, Notebookcheck is a great site for notebook reviews.  They go very in-depth on all sorts of aspects of the system, and they often test multiple configurations of the same model specifically to compare things like performance and battery life of different CPU configurations, different display options, etc.  Take a look at some of their reviews of recent XPS 15 models to get a sense of what they do.  You'll likely find separate reviews for the FHD and 4K versions of those systems, so I would fully expect them to do the same for the XPS 17.

8. You could certainly disable it in Device Manager, but having used a few Dell systems with touchscreens, I haven't seen any that allow it to be disabled at a BIOS level.  If you take a look at the Service Manual on support.dell.com when it becomes available, you might be able to determine whether the touchscreen has a dedicated connector that you can physically disconnect from the motherboard.  But it might also be incorporated into a larger display ribbon connector, in which case that wouldn't be practical.

9. I'm fairly sure I've seen options to disable the camera, and maybe even the fingerprint sensor, within the BIOS Setup of Dell systems.  But I'm not 100% positive, and if you just want to disable the camera's Windows Hello capability rather than disabling the camera entirely, that might not be possible.  You could certainly disable Windows Hello via Group Policy within Windows though.

10. When you say order without an "external graphics card", did you mean a "discrete graphics card"?  The XPS 17 certainly won't come standard with an external GPU.  If you're asking whether it will be possible to order it without a built-in NVIDIA GPU, I don't think that's been confirmed one way or the other, and it might vary based on region anyway.  The XPS 15 at least in the Dell US store can be ordered without an NVIDIA GPU as its lowest-end configuration, but then you can't get the 4K display.  Previously you were also limited on memory and storage options if you chose the lowest-end configuration, but it seems they've fixed that.  But again, this might vary from region to region too.

11. Check the Service Manual on support.dell.com when it becomes available.  The XPS 13 went to soldered WiFi a while ago, and it seems the XPS 15 just did that with the new 9500, judging by its Service Manual that's already available.  But at least these days Intel owns Killer, so having Killer WiFi soldered onto the board isn't nearly as big a problem as it was when the XPS 13 first went to that model while Killer WiFi was still not great.