News - Dell Precision M3800 is "thinnest and lightest workstation ever"

[HEXUS]

With 3200x1800 display, weighing just 2Kg, it is designed for creative professionals.

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[aidanjt]

If someone started smearing their finger grease over my £2,000 laptop's display they'd have a quare throbbing eye. The touchscreen PC fad needs to hurry up and go the way of stereoscopy, again.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

the resolution is redicolous! more then a macbook retina display!

[hahcore]

Thay should make a gaming version of this

[Saracen]

If someone started smearing their finger grease over my £2,000 laptop's display they'd have a quare throbbing eye. The touchscreen PC fad needs to hurry up and go the way of stereoscopy, again.

Amen to that.

Also, maybe it's a sign of my age, but personally, I've no interest in a laptop workstation. What I want from a workstation is, for a start, more than a 500GB SSD or 1TB HD, and what I want from a laptop us ultimately just enough power to get the job dobe, the best battery life I can get (and high power doesn't help extend battery life), and minimum weight.

I have hand saws and power saws, hand planes and power planes, and they're different tools for different jobs. As I said, maybe it's my age, but a workstation and a laptop are, for me, for different jobs and I have no interest in a device that is really ideal for neither.

Thus strikes me as a product designed by marketing people, not either engineers or customers. It's great for those that want a posing aid, not a tool, though, and goodness knows, there's enough posing aids in the tech toy field. And poseurs.

[TheAnimus]

"Creative Professionals" I just read that as tosspots who'd buy a MBP.....

It's an odd device, I think there is a market for freelancers and such, who want a machine they bring, which has everything they use loaded etc. It only needs to be light enough to fit in a bag. This is the desktop replacement market, back 10 years ago, I used to lug round this incredibly heavy laptop, that had about a 30 min battery life, because it had the processing power I needed for the simulations and stuff, matlab was never known for its performance!

As such having things like this on the market does make sense for some. However without thunderbolt, as PCIExpress cardbus died, it isn't much use for me, as I'd want at least two displayports.

The hating on the touchscreen is a bit silly, having it is a good facility for many things, the downside isn't the finger prints or the greese, I always have my cleaning kit ready when using my precious 3008WFPs, it's the fact its glossy. I hate glossy screens when I am trying to work in all environments. I mean seriously finger prints are cured with a quick wipe from the glossy finish. But that glossy finish can never be cured. You can try and put it in to remission, but never cure it. Did I mention I hate glossy?

[Saracen]

....

It's an odd device, I think there is a market for freelancers and such, who want a machine they bring, which has everything they use loaded etc. It only needs to be light enough to fit in a bag. This is the desktop replacement market, back 10 years ago, I used to lug round this incredibly heavy laptop, that had about a 30 min battery life, because it had the processing power I needed for the simulations and stuff, matlab was never known for its performance!

As such having things like this on the market does make sense for some. However without thunderbolt, as PCIExpress cardbus died, it isn't much use for me, as I'd want at least two displayports.

.....

Good point about the desktop replacement ethos. My use for a laptop is largely while travelling, though I do also spend my time in two locations, and need Office-type functions, email, etc, and Photoshop, at both locations, so it's mix of decent power, and portability.

For me, a laptop with 30 mins battery life is as much use as a chocolate teapot, unless I know the plane has a power connector, the train has a power connector and I take a 12-240v dc-ac supply in the car with me.

But you're right, of course. That's not what everybody needs.

I still have trouble seeing the spec on that machine as in any way a workstation replacement though, at least, for me. It's neither one thing nor t'other.

[TheAnimus]

When I was doing some small project consulting last summer, I suppose I was being like a freelancer. However I was coming in with a lot of pressure and promise (project was late, overbudget, had to get finished ASAP). I bought specifically a Samsung Series 9, it had just enough grunt, as this project wasn't heavy on hardware, but it looked top of the line, it was status. For the few days I was ever on client site, I was also in a suit. I was the only person bar the company director in a suit. His wasn't tailored (or well).

There is a technology status thing with BYOD computing. Pulling out something that has only been out 1 month, that is shiny, actually helps with that.

It might sound awful, but think of it this way, someone sees someone being brought in, they've never met this person before, this person is going to tell them, rather detailed manner, why they are terrible, everything they've done is terrible and that they need to do it all their way. This isn't a debate. They've been dropped in from above. Having the image of I'm better than you in a rather blunt subtext really helps this, if you've not got time to be nice, and people know that they are going to be fired for incompetence as a side effect.

That's an extreme version of it. It isn't a good way to do things, it amounts to one of the worst ways to 'win' an argument known to man "oh yeah, but I'm a professional".

But it often works.

Many freelancers, the people who I rudely alluded to in my first post, buy the latest MBP whatever as a way of showing they are a serious creative type. Dell know they are missing out on this very high margin market.

[Dooms]

All these devices coming out but none of them are ticking all my boxes.

Razer Blade 14 - Lovely design, great specs, horrible screen, inflated price.

There was me thinking that would instantly open the doors to gaming Ultrabooks but nothing yet and then this suddenly appears... make it 13-14inch, drop the toucscreen, and replace the Quadro for a 735M and I'll actually throw money at it.

[j.o.s.h.1408]

When I was doing some small project consulting last summer, I suppose I was being like a freelancer. However I was coming in with a lot of pressure and promise (project was late, overbudget, had to get finished ASAP). I bought specifically a Samsung Series 9, it had just enough grunt, as this project wasn't heavy on hardware, but it looked top of the line, it was status. For the few days I was ever on client site, I was also in a suit. I was the only person bar the company director in a suit. His wasn't tailored (or well).

There is a technology status thing with BYOD computing. Pulling out something that has only been out 1 month, that is shiny, actually helps with that.

It might sound awful, but think of it this way, someone sees someone being brought in, they've never met this person before, this person is going to tell them, rather detailed manner, why they are terrible, everything they've done is terrible and that they need to do it all their way. This isn't a debate. They've been dropped in from above. Having the image of I'm better than you in a rather blunt subtext really helps this, if you've not got time to be nice, and people know that they are going to be fired for incompetence as a side effect.

That's an extreme version of it. It isn't a good way to do things, it amounts to one of the worst ways to 'win' an argument known to man "oh yeah, but I'm a professional".

But it often works.

Many freelancers, the people who I rudely alluded to in my first post, buy the latest MBP whatever as a way of showing they are a serious creative type. Dell know they are missing out on this very high margin market.

so you reckon a mbp is a waste of money?

[cptwhite_uk]

There is a market for such machines, CAD draughtsmen/women can use these. I was in a job for a short while earlier this year - issued with a mobile workstation class laptop which essentially was my PC workstation to take home, should I need to work at home. I simply hooked it up and synced files with the server in the morning. This device is suited to that kind of usage, it employs quattro so that's the exact market they're aiming for.

Completely agree about glossy - I actively dismiss anything with a glossy screen - thankfully Samsung, Lenovo and a few others still have the sense to use matte panels in premium products.

[Biscuit]

I hope they are wrong about HDMI, should be display port and it should have the ability to hang multiple monitors out of the single connector. Bit of a deal breaker is there is no way to get more than one monitor output from it (not including any of that wireless HDMI nonesense). No Ethernet is a bit pants aswell although a USB3 adapter would do the trick.

Assuming the above points are addressed, for me this is perfect. I spend half my time in an office then half my time on site installing a system so having the extra oumph on the move is great. Using CAD, vast excel documents, remote desktop and the control system i specialize in, all simultaneously, benefits from having OTT resolution.

[Moby-Dick]

Not enough RAM capacity for me sadly - my current mobile demo rig is a Precision M4600 with 32Gb of RAM and a pair of SSD's - battery life isn't great though.

[DDY]

I hope they are wrong about HDMI, should be display port and it should have the ability to hang multiple monitors out of the single connector. Bit of a deal breaker is there is no way to get more than one monitor output from it (not including any of that wireless HDMI nonesense). No Ethernet is a bit pants aswell although a USB3 adapter would do the trick.

Assuming the above points are addressed, for me this is perfect. I spend half my time in an office then half my time on site installing a system so having the extra oumph on the move is great. Using CAD, vast excel documents, remote desktop and the control system i specialize in, all simultaneously, benefits from having OTT resolution.

It may well be the perfect machine for you, I can't tell for sure but it looks like there's a docking station option for the M3800 in the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...OE9R0AnQs&t=36

If it's anything like Dell's current docking stations for the Precision and Latitude range you'll have at least two display outputs and of course Ethernet.

[Biscuit]

It may well be the perfect machine for you, I can't tell for sure but it looks like there's a docking station option for the M3800 in the video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature...OE9R0AnQs&t=36

If it's anything like Dell's current docking stations for the Precision and Latitude range you'll have at least two display outputs and of course Ethernet.

Yeah im currently using slightly older latitude (company supplied) and the docking station is great, that certainly does look like its docked onto something with multiple outputs. If the docking station also turns out to have ethernet aswell, this device could be a total winner for me.

[edzieba]

Repeated bitching about touchscreens

Seriously? The touchpad hasn't suddenly vanished, and the USB ports and bluetooth connection for an external mouse haven't fallen off. Nobody is forcing you to use the touchscreen. Do you really want to make your laptop more expensive by requiring a diferent FRU to be manufactured without the touchscreen (because yes, if you have to build two different screen configuration BOTH will be more expensive than if you just built one model with an integrated touch panel because you then require two different manufacturing, QC, etc lines instead of one). Hell, you may find that occasionally touching the screen can get some gross-seection tasks done faster than mousing over (just as most fine-selection or path-tracing tasks are faster with a mouse, or text entry is faster with a physical keyboard). Adding an extra interface isn't going to make the existing interfaces suddenly vanish, just as the invention of the mouse didn't result in the keyboard vanishing.