PS - I suspect this article may be what my PC repair guy based his advice on.

The bottom line is that it's an 8 year old system that's exceeded its design life by at least three years -- any remaining lifespan likely has more to do with how it's been used and maintained, rather than which GPU it has -- just as a 10 year old, 150,000 mile car that has a maintenance history can wind up more reliable than a 5-year old car with 70K miles on it.

I only stopped using my 13 year old Latitude D520 two years ago - and not because of any faults but because I needed a faster machine in order to  make videos - and there are still a lot of D520s for sale on eBay, fetching quite decent prices; and there are loads of E6540s for sale there. So my original question stands. Was the AMD controller a cause of overheating and serious unreliability in the E6540, and was it removed by Dell for that reason in later iterations of the E6540, as my PC repair guy believes, and as the ifixit article seems to indicate - or is he misinformed?

Dave

Welcome to the Dell Community @Dave_Rado 

As far as I have seen, we have not noticed any difference in failure rate.

We are always looking for thinks like that to inform purchasing so they try to stay away for models that have a high failure rate.

If the AMD is needed then use that model.

When you receive it make sure to do a PM.

I do a PM once a year on all my systems. "If they need it or not"

Best regards,

U2

Hi @ejn63 

I'm not clear what you're saying in the third paragraph. You seem to be saying that there was no systemic defect with the models that had AMD controllers as well as Intel controllers but I'm not sure if that's what you meant?

Dave 

Hi @U2CAMEB4ME 

Many thanks for your help.

When you say "we" I'm not clear who you are you referring to? Are you referring to Dell?

Also do you know for certain whether my PC engineer was miniformed when he was told that Dell withdrew the version of the E6540 that had both the AMD and Intel controllers on it long before they discontinued the version that had Intel only?

And please could you clarify what a PM is?

Many thanks again.

Dave

Nothing has been publicized about the reliability of the AMD GPUs in these systems, that is correct.

What I am saying is that any systems still out in the wild that are eight years old are survivors.  No matter what you buy, there's no guarantee something won't fail in the future.  Notebooks are designed around a 5 year life cycle -- anything older is essentially like a 15 year old automobile - it may be working now, but it may* need repair within the lifespan you have planned for it.  There are simply no guarantees  on any device that is beyond its expected lifespan.

* will, is more likely.

I think the conclusion is being drawn based on suspect evidence.

First, the vast majority of these have Intel GPUs only - the sample size of AMD-equipped systems is smaller, which makes the variance in longevity much larger.

Second, as would be the case with a car model equipped with both a performance engine and a base engine, two units could be  used quite differently -- both in intensity of work, and in the number of power-on hours.  

Finally, my suspicion is that the age of these systems means than any systemic defect -- such as the nVIdia GPUs of about a decade ago -- would have surfaced and had to be addressed (as the class action that nVidia settled on their faulty GPU design forced them to address).

@Dave_Rado 

Sorry for not replying sooner but I had to help process a few hundred MacBook's today.

I'm part owner of a small laptop refurbishing company.

"We" would be myself and my warehouse tech's.

Every laptop that gets processed is numbered and logged in an Excel spreadsheet.

Looking back on some of the old ones I really do not see that much of any major failures for the E6540.

In fact the E6 series laptops seem to be real work horses and reliable.

"PM" Preventative Maintenance

Depending on the amount of use, a laptop should have a PM performed at least once a year.

I remove my base covers and clean all vents with canned air.

Torque all screws.

Paying attention to the "Hinge" screws. 

If installed clean the laser on the CD/DVD.

Replace the thermal paste for the CPU/GPU.

Things like that.

Regards,

U2

Many thanks, @U2CAMEB4ME.

Do you specifically monitor the ones with and without the AMD controller? And have you had enough of the AMD ones for it to be statistically significant?

Your comments about preventative maintenance were very helpful.

Dave

Dave_Rado, everything you were told, was correct. Reliability of laptops with AMD GPU is very poor, and their life is much shorter. But you are among the few users that really need discrete (AMD or NVidia) graphics for video editing.

Many thanks, @ilian359.

Please could you expand on what you wrote, though? How do you know their reliability is poor? Do you have a way of monitoring it statistically? I ask because of @U2CAMEB4ME's posts earlier in the thread. It would be very helpful to know how you can state this objectively.

Thanks again.

Dave

I'm not trying to get guarantees, just enough information to make a reasonable calculation of the relative risk. I was told that Dell discontinued the E6540 models that had the dual AMD and Intel GPUs well before they discontinued the Intel-only version of the E6540. Do you know whether this is true or false? If it is true, even though nothing has officially been publicised by Dell, it would seem to back up the ifixit article. On the other hand, if it is definitley false, that would make me less wary about going back to AMD, given the major performance benefits. Either way, it would be very helpful to know for certain, one way or the other.

Thanks again.

Dave