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538 Posts
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Dell Precision M3800 mobile workstation - Developer Edition now available!!
Due to the awesome interest in the M3800 with Ubuntu preloaded, yesterday it became a reality!
- bartongeorge.net/.../welcome-the-dell-precision-m3800-mobile-workstation-developer-edition
- arstechnica.com/.../dell-updates-linux-powered-developer-edition-portables-with-m3800-monster
Get one today :-)
[Select Ubuntu as your OS when configuring your system]
http://www.dell.com/us/business/p/precision-m3800-workstation/pd.aspx
DELL-Barton George
7 Technologist
7 Technologist
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538 Posts
0
February 4th, 2015 06:00
@BlugillandLinux
Great to hear! and thanks for your support!!!
DELL-Barton George
7 Technologist
7 Technologist
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538 Posts
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February 4th, 2015 14:00
@Finalfantasykid
My pleasure, thanks again for alerting us to the issue!
Finalfantasykid
37 Posts
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February 6th, 2015 12:00
A quick question regarding the M3800. Will it have an ubuntu/sputnik plate on the backside of the laptop or will it still have the (tainted) windows one? I know the XPS 13 had a special one like in this image.
barton808.files.wordpress.com/.../xps13-baseplateubuntulogo.png
DELL-Barton George
7 Technologist
7 Technologist
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538 Posts
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February 6th, 2015 12:00
@FinalFantasyKid,
Im pretty sure that it will not have a baseplate neither Windows or Ubuntu :-)
hedgeh
3 Posts
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February 11th, 2015 08:00
After scouring the web for coupons I can just barely afford the default configuration with the quad hd display. I need a new computer before I can save for more RAM and an SSD, so I'll have to upgrade those myself over the next few months.
My main concern is the battery. How long will the 61 whr default battery last under Linux? Is it fairly easy to obtain and install the 91 whr battery later?
I really like the power and expandability of the m3800, but I might have to opt for the XPS 13 depending on what configurations are available when the Ubuntu versions are available.
blugillandlinux
11 Posts
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February 11th, 2015 17:00
I just got my 3800 yesterday and rsynced my data over as soon as I could :-)
I did an un-scientific battery rundown test by unplugging it and using it off and on. As shipped (nVidia proprietary driver installed), I was down to an indicated 16 minutes of battery after somewhere around 4 hours.
I'm going to install an SSD in this machine and will probably go with an mSATA one so that I have the future option of getting the 91 watt hour battery if I feel I need it. Of course, just switching to an SSD should give some improvement in battery life. I would have ordered the 91-watt hour battery, but I didn't want to pay Dell's price for a 128 GB mSata drive that I would just replace anyway. It's cheaper to pay full list price for the battery, rather than the upgrade price. Plus, I probably don't need that much. I'm on line power most of the time, anyway.
hedgeh
3 Posts
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February 12th, 2015 06:00
@BLUGILLANDLINUX
Thanks! That sounds like reasonable battery life to me. I'm a lot more comfortable getting one of these now.
blugillandlinux
11 Posts
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February 12th, 2015 08:00
Glad to help! Of course, in continuous use, I'd expect the battery life to be less. In my off-and-on use, it was just sitting, display off, for some of that time. Once, it even suspended (happy to report that suspend works perfectly, out of the box). Battery life could maybe be improved by not using the nVidia GPU (haven't tried that), in addition to installing an SSD (arriving Friday from Amazon).
Overall, I'm thrilled with the machine and very highly recommend it. I'm passing my 2012 HP Envy 15t-3000 to my dad to replace his desktop system (also running Linux). The Envy 15 is a very nice laptop, but the M3800 blows it away. One thing to watch out for: if it's on your lap and you're wearing shorts, it might pinch your legs when you open it, a side effect of how amazingly thin this laptop is :-)
Do you know what would be really great? If Dell could find a way to cram 32 GB of RAM into one of these things :-)
blugillandlinux
11 Posts
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February 13th, 2015 12:00
I'm having trouble switching from the factory HDD to a Crucial M550 mSATA SSD I just installed.
I installed the drive and used Clonezilla to clone sda (HDD) to sdb (SSD). Everything seemed to go correctly.
My roadblock is figuring out what to tell UEFI about how to boot from the SSD. I've tried all sorts of things underneath /boot/efi but when the system comes up it is always running from sda (HDD).
Unfortunately, in the UEFI I can't edit/view the ubuntu entry to see what's in there, and guessing doesn't seem to be getting me anywhere. Has anyone successfully made this switch?
Here's my lshw output, FWIW:
*-disk
description: ATA Disk
product: TOSHIBA MQ01ACF0
vendor: Toshiba
physical id: 0.0.0
bus info: scsi@0:0.0.0
logical name: /dev/sda
version: AV00
serial: 15CEWPOZT
size: 465GiB (500GB)
capabilities: gpt-1.00 partitioned partitioned:gpt
configuration: ansiversion=5 guid=4ecc7d5b-ea7a-4ca5-ae4b-56de59b57237 sectorsize=4096
*-disk
description: ATA Disk
product: Crucial_CT512M55
physical id: 0.0.0
bus info: scsi@1:0.0.0
logical name: /dev/sdb
version: MU01
serial: 14370E4FADFC
size: 476GiB (512GB)
capabilities: gpt-1.00 partitioned partitioned:gpt
configuration: ansiversion=5 guid=4ecc7d5b-ea7a-4ca5-ae4b-56de59b57237 sectorsize=4096
Thanks for any ideas!
blugillandlinux
11 Posts
0
February 13th, 2015 13:00
Solved.
For reasons I don't understand, removing the HDD caused it to boot from the SSD without incident. HDD now goes on my shelf, with a label on it so I don't forget :)
Interesting side effect of removing the HDD: there's now some resonance in the case from the fan that wasn't there before. I may need to fill that empty space up with the larger battery option. Good thing I'm not a conspiracy theorist, or I'd think it was a plot to drive battery sales ;-)
_drb_
1 Message
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February 18th, 2015 07:00
When trying to customise on the UK store if I select Ubuntu i lose the option for a mini-card SSD meaning I cant configure a 2nd HDD (the option is there but i get an error as primary isn't a mini-card). Is this intentional?
Cheers,
David
starnight
9 Posts
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February 23rd, 2015 07:00
I would like the higher capacity battery and it looks like you need to have a mini card ssd as it takes up more room. But I get a message saying Ubuntu doesn't support mini card ssds. Sigh.
dougorleans
5 Posts
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February 23rd, 2015 18:00
My M3800 just arrived today, and it is sweet! But, the first thing I did was try to upgrade to 14.10, and it failed... and now it will only boot to console mode, no graphics. So, um, any tips for reinstalling the OS back to the factory preinstall (14.04)?
starnight
9 Posts
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February 26th, 2015 05:00
But now I've found that it will let me have the higher capacity battery and the full mini card ssd on the US site. But not the UK site. Doesn't make any sense.
cfhowlett
8 Posts
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February 27th, 2015 06:00
@tbranrb
My device was delivered last week, and I've been familiarizing myself since its arrival. I can answer a couple of your questions.
1. Yes, 1920 x 1080 display is an option, and it works fine.
4. Reverting to the OEM installation of ubuntu is easy; restore to factory settings is an option offered in the grub boot menu.
If you choose to install a different ubuntu, first backup /etc/apt/sources.list and /boot/grub/grub.cfg