Dell M6500: A Precision Strike on Bling
by Jarred Walton on March 9, 2010 3:00 AM ESTDell M6500 Gaming/Graphics Performance
Overall, the Quadro FX 3800M should be slightly faster than the GTX 280M; it has clocks of 675/1688/2000 (Core/Shader/RAM) compared to 585/1463/1900 for the GTX 280M. In fact, even the updated GTX 285M is still slower than the FX 3800M, as its clocks are 576/1500/2040—the small increase in memory bandwidth isn't enough to outweigh the higher core/shader clocks on the 3800M. That's of course only in theory; NVIDIA states that Quadro cards are optimized for professional applications where GeForce is optimized for gaming. Just as GeForce is able to run professional apps (but not at workstation GPU performance levels), Quadro can run games. The question is whether it can match the GTX 280M or not. Of course, we don't expect anyone to plunk down the money for an FX 3800M purely for gaming, since you can get 285M SLI for about the same price as a single 3800M, but the Quadro card shouldn't have any trouble running most games at high detail settings. We'll start with our graphics performance comparison using the ubiquitous 3DMark applications.
As expected from the hardware, the M6500 comes out ahead of the GTX 280M equipped laptops in all of the 3DMark versions. It's interesting to note that the margin of victory is much higher in 03/5 at 13/11% (respectively), and it drops to 7% in 06, and a tie (0.3%) in Vantage. Some of this may come from the RAM, firmware, and/or driver differences, but let's move on to the actual gaming results.
As mentioned earlier, we are including a selection of older titles and a few new games for this review. We'll be retiring Crysis and Mass Effect, replacing both with their sequels, but we wanted to leave them in for a comparison point. We'll also be shifting to 1600x900 as the base resolution going forward. Below are the gaming results, with M6500 results in green and WUXGA native resolution on the M6500 in red; there's also an overclocked Q6600 desktop with HD4870X2 in black as a point of reference.
Here's where things get a little whacky, and clearly the drivers in the M6500 aren't fully optimized for gaming. Certain titles show the M6500 where we would expect relative to the competition: it has 15% more core/shader power and 5% more bandwidth, so we would expect somewhere between 5% and 15% more performance. Crysis, Empire: Total War, Far Cry 2, and Mass Effect 2 all fall into the expected range. Dirt 2 shows a 17% performance increase, which is a bit higher than expected but close enough. On the other end of the spectrum are Batman (only 1% faster), Crysis: Warhead (5% slower), and the original Mass Effect. The STALKER: Call of Pripyat result has the M6500 slaughtering the competition at 1600x900. Look a bit closer and you'll see that performance utterly tanks at 1920x1200—and though not shown, performance was equally poor at 1680x1050 and 1080p. The original Mass Effect also shows some oddities, with 1600x900 performance coming in 41% faster than the 1680x1050 result. Batman is likewise 42% faster at 1600x900 vs. 1680x1050, and Crysis: Warhead is 90% faster at 1600x900 than it is at 1920x1200.
Obviously, NVIDIA isn't just kidding around when they say that the GeForce line is for gaming while the Quadro cards focus on professional apps. Gaming in general won't be a problem, but it's not the target market for the M6500. We expect updated NVIDIA drivers could smooth out most of the rough spots shown here (Dell is currently shipping the M6500 with 188.43 NVIDIA drivers, compared to the latest GeForce 200M 195.62 drivers), but unlike consumer GPUs, NVIDIA's Verde driver program doesn't support Dell's Precision notebooks. More to the point, NVIDIA is likely far more concerned with Quadro hardware working properly with profession CAD/CAM/DCC applications. Again, we totally understand why that's the case: the 100+ ISV packages that the M6500 is certified to run are more important than getting higher frame rates in games. If you want a mobile workstation that can also work "after hours" as a gaming notebook, the M6500 will work in most cases, but be aware that you may encounter driver issues at times. Outside of those looking for a two-in-one workstation/gaming notebook, gamers would be far better off getting a gaming notebook with GTX 285M SLI for less than the M6500 with FX 3800M.
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geekforhire - Friday, March 12, 2010 - link
Some things I forgot to note:The cost of mine was a little more than half the amount quoted in the article - complete. This a beast of a machine is available for a modest premium if you just resist the temptation of designing with only bleeding edge equipment.
When I ordered mine, the Core i5 processors were not available for the M6500. That may be part of the intent as part of the prerelease whisper from the manufacturer, but as of yesterday they still aren't available for the M6500.
There's a wonderful article on the virtues of the Core i7-720QM processor from last fall, here:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/mobile-core-i7...">http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/mobile-core-i7...
geekforhire - Friday, March 12, 2010 - link
Here's a link to the Core i7-790QM processor spec sheet from Intel:http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=43122">http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=43122
Here's a link to a page on the Intel website which helps decode what the processor numbers mean.
http://www.intel.com/products/processor_number/ind...">http://www.intel.com/products/processor_number/ind...
The i7-720QM has a 45W package, 4x1.6 Ghz processor cores with HyperThreading, 6M cache, DDR3-1066/1333 memory, 8GB max physical memory limit, and a "Turbo Mode" which allows a few cores to spin up to 2.8Ghz (note that all processors cannot operate at this speed simultaneously, but is available when some cores have been dynamically turned off and the TDP would not be exceeded).
Naina - Wednesday, March 31, 2010 - link
I like what you said about the Dell M6500. I am a photoartist and work mostly with Photoshop. I do thisprofessionally and I am travelling a good deal. I like the Dell M6500 but am not sure what configuration to look at which would meet my need for speed and space.
I wonder if you could make a suggestion.
Naina
icrf - Tuesday, March 9, 2010 - link
I've been using an M6400 at work for the last six months, which is very similar to this. The chassis looks the same, but it's generation older hardware (Q9100 / FX2700M).On the docking station front, I apparently ended up with the cheaper one. It has DVI, DP, and VGA ports, but it won't drive both the DVI and DP, so I have to run one of my two external displays on an analog VGA connection.
hko45 - Tuesday, March 9, 2010 - link
I haven't seen any other comparable docking station to the E-Port Plus -- to be able to connect to two monitors through the same kind of ports (DVIs or DisplayPorts). When you're editing images, you need to make sure that both monitors are reasonably alike. That's why I would only buy Dell's Precision or Latitude (not all) laptops -- just for to be able to use that docking station.icrf - Wednesday, March 10, 2010 - link
Some of my co-workers have dual-DVI (but no DP) docking stations. We're just developers, so the accurate color reproduction isn't all that important. Honestly, if I could have gotten the thing without the Nvidia graphics, I'd of been better off. I never render anything in 3D. I was just looking for a 17" 1920x1200 chassis with a speedy quad core and 8 GB of RAM. Unfortunately, the office wouldn't spring for a SSD, as I think that would have made the most difference. I get the feeling random read is the biggest bottleneck.Fanfoot - Thursday, April 1, 2010 - link
The laptop I see on Dell's site doesn't appear to bear much of a resemblance to the one you describe. The one I see has a max of 4GB of RAM, comes with 32-bit Windows, has no USB 3.0 support, and is very expensive. Even basic WiFi isn't included in the price of this thing. Three drives? Where does it say that? I assume one of the drives you're counting is the special 64GB Flash drive, probably a mini PCIe card, but still, show me where it says you can swap out the SLOT LOADING DVD for a second full sized 2.5" drive, something I'm used to with Thinkpads, but that is otherwise uncommon.From the machine that I appear to be able to configure on Dell's website, I'd say both HP and Lenovo have better, more capable, machines in this range available today. The one you talk about sounds fine, but I see no way to configure a machine like that on Dell's website...
holytouch - Sunday, April 11, 2010 - link
i think you should go back to dell.com and try again. the laptop he describes is there, and contains the specs within the review. make sure you look at the 6500/6500 covet. i ordered mine with win7 pro/64bit with no issues.honestly, it couldn't be any easier to see that the machine he describes is on the site.
tozndsand - Saturday, June 19, 2010 - link
I have heard that i5-i7 processors are not supported by Adobe CS5. Is that correct? That would be a deal breaker for many. ThanksDellVictim - Tuesday, April 10, 2012 - link
I am frustrated with how many positive editorial reviews this machine is getting. I bought one with all the trimmings (twin HD's with RAID etc) and before long at all, started having lots of issues. One of the HD's has been replaced 4 or 5 times, the motherboard 3 times, the graphics card twice, the screen, and it's currently broken, again, despite two dell technician visits - the last of which left telling me the RAID was rebuilding and all was good. Less than 30 minutes after he left, there was a beep, the computer restarted, got stuck in the dos BIOS screen and when I pressed F1 to continue it told me that there was now NO bootable disk! I'm fusious. I have been without my laptop and important data now for over three weeks. So much for next day service, everytime they need to get parts, they seem to be out of stock for several days, then they don't ship them early enough in the day for me to get them next day. They leave voicemails saying they'll call you later and they don't. They won't give you a direct dial number to your service representative. They won't pass you through to the team that deal with refund/replacement requests and that team seems to take 3-4 days to decide that despite the appaulling history or clearly recurring problems with this machine, they don't feel it deserves either a replacement or refund. Instead, they'll send someone out a week later with insufficient parts to make it worse!I don't think I need to explain the moral of the story here folks.