FAQ

By default, our devices are configured so that the image output for external monitors works via Mini DisplayPort (mDP). To get an image output from your laptop's Thunderbolt port, the following settings must be adjusted in the BIOS.

-          under “Advanced “ -> “Advanced Chipset Control” -> “DDI Control” from „DDI to mDP“ switch to „DDI to TBT“

-          under “Advanced”  at „Intel Thunderbolt“ the entry „Intel Thunderbolt Technology“ must be stand at „Enabled“

-          in addition „Security Level“ must be stand at „Unique ID“

We are often asked how to deactivate the standby hotkey or button on our notebooks so that they are not accidentally pressed. For this purpose, there is an options menu directly in the Windows Control Panel, in which the actions of the standby button and the power switch can generally be defined. This option menu can be found as follows:

Control Panel -> System and Security -> Power Options
-> "Select what to do when pressing power buttons"

Tip: In this menu, you can also set the notebook not to switch to standby when closing it. It is also very useful to put the "Hibernation-Mode" on the power button. So you can turn off the system with just a single press of the button, without having to close all his open windows. The contents of the main memory are written to the hard disk and read in again when booting up. When idle, the power supply (battery and power supply) can be completely disconnected without losing the data.

The time of delivery depends on four factors:

• Availability of components
• Date of receipt of payment
• Production time
• Shipping term from Leipzig to your destination

In general you have to expect a production time between receipt and shipping within 2-3 business days. Normally, with advance payment this means:

• Components in stock, order will be triggered.
• Order Confirmation is on time, advance payment is requested.
• The transfer takes about 1-3 days until it appears on our account and will be booked.
• Payment has been received - we begin production.
• 2-3 business days later: the notebook or PC will be shipped via DHL or UPS.
• In Germany we usually deliver the next day. Deliveries to any country inside Europe usually take 2-4 days.

In order to shorten the whole process, you have the following options:

• Payment via PayPal, credit card or cash: it saves the extra 1-3 business days for the bank runtime. The production process itself is not accelerated, so it stays at 2-3 working days production time to arrive.
• Cash Express (only within Germany): This is our premium service! In this case the payment is not only quicker, but also the production process is accelerated. The production of your device will be controlled with a high priority and leaves our warehouse no later than the next business day. This is of course only if all the components are in stock. The delivery takes place via DHL Express, additional delays and bottlenecks by DHL are prevented. This requires, however, that the recipient is at the spot of delivery on the day of delivery. If he cannot be reached, the package will be stored at a special Express depot. A new delivery date can be agreed by telephone with the employees of DHL Express.

Should you have any further questions, please contact us.

1. Order received: This means we have registered your order in our system. The confirmation of receipt is not yet an order confirmation.

2. Order confirmation by Schenker Technologies: Your order is confirmed in a separate e-mail which means that this is the binding acceptance of the purchase contract and may at the same time be the payment prompt (for certain payment methods).

3. Order in production: As Schenker Technologies builds devices specifically to its customer's needs all orders are handled and produced individually. This usually takes about 2-3 working days, but may vary according to devices that are in production at the same time and availability of components. Of course we will inform you via e-mail in case of any delays. 

4. Package handed over to logistics partner. Order has been finished: In this case you have already received a shipping confirmation and will receive your order shortly. The shipping confirmation also lists the tracking code for your delivery and you can track the package until it has arrived at your door.

First of all: Please use the textbox "your comments" (max 255 characters.)for general comments during the order process. Here you can add short notes about special offers, requests or delivery criteria.

Disk Partitioning

If you like a special allocation of your primary hard drive, this can be done at no extra charge. The maximum number of partitions is limited - we recommend a maximum of two partitions on the system disk: one partition for the operating system and one partition for your data. To specify your partition requirements, please use the textbox "your comments" during the ordering process. All other disks can be partitioned by you easily via "Disk Management" in Windows. For instructions, see here.

Delivery without preconfigured components

If you already own a data carrier medium, the corresponding component can be excluded from the configuration and the purchase price can be lowered.

Display variants

Note. These changes can affect §3 of our Conditions 
If you want display that is not offered in your desired configuration, please ask for it via e-mail before ordering. Some options are not offered in the shop, due to the high cost of conversion and the resulting upgrade prices. Please note that such special solutions may have a poorer price / performance ratio. Furthermore, you will forfeit your right of revocation because of this individual variation. Prices and detailed options you may inquired via e-mail.

Some models of XMG / SCHENKER may also be available without logo upon request. This is particularly suitable for corporate customers who want to install their own company logo by laser engraving on the display lid. If you want to order your model without XMG / SCHENKER logo, please enter the request in the "comments" box in the second order step. If we cannot fulfil this wish, we will inform you quickly via e-mail. Whether your model is available without logo, may also depend on the respective configuration (e.g. display and graphics card). If you have questions about this, please feel free to contact us via e-mail before ordering.

Please note that even with a logo-free chassis our XMG / SCHENKER logo will be shown during the boot process on the home screen (depending on settings).

Sometimes we are able to offer devices that have slight traces of use in our online shop. These are either returned laptops, or devices which have been in use at fairs or other events. 
All of these devices have been evaluated by us again and have been technically examined. The traces are mostly minor scratches on housing parts. Laptops with scratches on the display are generally not sold. 
The protective films on these devices have quite often been removed already. Also the keyboard could possibly already have minimal wear phenomena. 
All units are individually assembled and cleaned according to customer requirements and are in perfect condition technically. We cannot always offer driver cd but otherwise all the accessories (power supply, battery) are complete. All drivers can of course be downloaded from the support section. 
If the devices are older models (e.g. 1 year or older), they can be found in our "Hot Deals" section. When it comes to cutting-edge models, the option "chassis with slight traces" is (if available) offered directly in the configurator of the respective model.

Of course it is possible to order as a business customer from within the EU. We need your business registration including your complete company name, company form and address. Furthermore, your VAT ID needed. These data are checked by us with the German Federal Finance Office. Furthermore, it is necessary that the shipping and billing address are identical or that the delivery address shown belongs to a branch or branch office of the billing address. Please start the process by simply filling in your VAT ID when ordering (text field in last order step). Once you receive the receipt confirmation e-mail, please answer that e-mail by attaching your business registration. To be able to check your VAT ID, we require the precise legal form of your company. Please send us one of the options you find here: link. You can use this form by entering our VAT ID (DE 270 518 880) in the first form field. 
You will receive a confirmation email once we have released the net payment of your order. Of course, the commercial invoice will also only show the net amount it with reference to § 4 Nr. 1 B i. V. m. § 6a UStG for intra-community sales. Should this cause any questions, please contact our telephone support for further input.

How many monitors can be connected to your laptop depends on the connection and resolution of the display. Notebooks with the power-saving techniques NVIDIA Optimus are in general more limited - but they offer the possibility to directly connect display ports directly to the dedicated graphics card. To learn how many displays your notebook can operate natively, please see the datasheet or user guide. 
If you encounter limitations, the following products can help:

• Matrox TripleHead2Go DP Edition - not to be confused with the DVI variant of TripeHead2Go. (See Review in the forum of Notebookcheck)
• Club-3D Multi Stream Transport (MST) hub (see announcement on Tom's hardware)
• Port Replicators (USB Docking Stations) with DisplayLink chipset
• Intel Wireless Display

Which of these solutions is best for you depends largely on the intended use and the existing facilities. Please read the respective FAQ posts on the port replicators and Intel Wireless Display, to gather information on any possible restrictions.

Please find a business notebook with a full-fledged docking station here SCHENKER F516. All I/O-Ports are lead to the outside via PCI-Express. The docking station features its own PSU and is able to charge the battery of the notebook.

Next to the ordinary, proprietary docking stations there are also so-called port replicators. While their use was pretty restricted when there were mostly USB 2.0 ports, they become more and more valued by customers as USB 3.0 and further ports make more use of them.

Docking Station / Port Replicator with USB 3.0

Widely used are port replicators with USB 3.0. They offer sufficient bandwidth to provide the following ports:

• Gigabit-LAN
• USB 2.0 and USB 3.0
• Stereo-Sound (in and out)
• DVI-I (compatible with VGA) and HDMI

These docking station or port replicators offer all possibilities to connect all peripheral devices needed on your desk with Plug&Play. These docking stations feature dedicated controller for all ports. The display ports are controlled by a special DisplayLink-Controller and allow you to operate two external monitors with a resolution of up to 2048x1152, on top of the display of the notebook itself.

Important information:

• For easily operating the docking station, all manufacturer's drivers need to be up to date and installed correctly.
• There are many models on the market but not all of them are similarly reliable. Some models have stability problems under certain circumstances. We therefore recommend the following models at this time:
  • j5 create USB 3.0 UltraStation JUD500
  • i-tec Docking Station Advance
  • i-tec Docking Station Advance Mini
  • Toshiba Dynadock U3.0 Universal
  • TARGUS USB 3.0 Dual Video (ACP70EUZ)
• DisplayLink-Controller (DL-3900) has some problems with displaying 3D applications in full screen mode. This means, we cannot recommend to play 3D games on monitors that are connected via docking station. This is hopefully going to change with new driver updates. To use full screen applications, please use the display of your notebook or a monitor directly plugged into your notebook.

Interesting test (in German) for universal docking stations with USB 3.0 can be found here:

Eins für alles - USB-Dockingstationen gegen den Kabelsalat in c't 12/2012
Toshiba Dynadock U3.0 Universal USB 3.0 Docking Station Review auf TweakTown.com
USB Docking Station im Test: Fujitsu USB 3.0 Port Replicator PR08 auf Notebookcheck.com

Docking-Station / Port-Replicator with USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C

USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C doubles USB bandwidth from 5 Gbit/s to 10 Gbit/s. Docking stations with this port generally do not differ from ones with USB 3.0 variants. Each port (LAN, sound, display etc.)is still managed by its own controller and is translated into an USB protocol. Double the bandwidth basically leads to the capacity of supporting higher display resolutions or the Gigabit-LAN-port can be better used while at the same time using the display.

At this time (February 2016) the range of products is unfortunately rather small, due to the fact that notebooks with USB 3.1 Gen2 Type-C are not widely offered yet.

Docking Station / Port-Replicator with Thunderbolt 3 Type-C

Thunderbolt 3 offers 40 Gbit/s via a native PCI-Express-ort, which means that the translation into USB protocol is not necessary. Also, Thunderbolt 3 can release a natives DisplayPort signal via Type-C. These port replicators will have an advantage when it comes to bandwidth and compatibility compared to their USB predecessors. But still a power supply is needed to support the notebook. Thunderbolt 3 is rather expensive due to time-consuming certification and to this date (February 2016) only available in high-end notebooks like the SCHENKER WORK-Series. A higher availability of Thunderbolt 3 via Type-C is expected with Intel Kaby Lake.

G-SYNC ensures that the frame rate (refresh rate) of the display is dynamically coupled to the image output of the graphics card. The so-called "tearing" effect, which occurs when the upper and lower half of the screen do not match exactly, is avoided. G-SYNC thus ensures a smoother gaming experience with suboptimal performance (about 30-50fps) and reduces the input delay (input lag) because the images are displayed on the graphics card as soon as they are rendered.

A detailed, three-part intro to G-SYNC can be found at Blurbusters:
http://www.blurbusters.com/gsync/preview/
http://www.blurbusters.com/gsync/preview2/
http://www.blurbusters.com/gsync/how-does-gsync-fix-stutters/

G-SYNC only works with certain display models. Many of our gaming notebooks are now available with G-SYNC-enabled, internal displays. To learn whether your notebook supports G-SYNC on the internal display, please refer to the display slot in the configurator or in the data sheet of the notebook.

G-SYNC is not compatible with NVIDIA Optimus. With our NVIDIA PRO Series you must disable Optimus (aka "MSHYBRID") in the BIOS to be able to use G-SYNC. To fully benefit from G-SYNC, the following should be noted:

• G-SYNC needs to be activated in the NVIDIA Control Panel.
• The option "Vertical Sync" should be activated.
• It is recommended that you disable VSYNC in the options menu of the respective games (it is usually disabled by default).
• In some games like Counter-Strike Global Offensive and other games based on Source or Quake engine, it is worthwhile to put the FPS-limiter of the game engine to a value which is just above the refresh rate of the display used. This significantly reduces the input lag.
  Example: Display with 60Hz → fps_max 61
  Alternatively, you could also disable the above-mentioned "Vertical Sync". This means that G-SYNC is automatically disabled when the in-game FPS is higher than the refresh rate of the display. But this is also means that "tearing" effects might be seen. This option is intended only for professional athletes who depend on their reaction time to every nanosecond and may be able to live with "tearing". NVIDIA has announced to rename the option "Vertical Sync" in a future driver update (January 2016).

Final note: If you want to use G-SYNC via DisplayPort on external monitors, then the external monitor must also explicitly support G-SYNC.

Our partners when it comes to memory are Crucial and Kingston HyperX. Crucial as the house brand of Micron is one of the largest memory manufacturers worldwide and produces both the memory chips and the boards in-house. Particularly high clocked RAM by Crucial is sold under the brand BALLISTIX. Kingston HyperX has also established itself in recent years as a high-end provider in the gaming industry and offers extremely fast RAM without compromising quality.

For most applications (web, office, multimedia and gaming) the standard configurations of RAM work just fine (2400MHz at DDR4). Memory with higher clocking can indeed achieve smaller performance increases in synthetical memory benchmarks. However, these differences are rarely transferred to real applications - mostly, the CPU or the GPU is the bottleneck.

Exceptions are:

• Compression algorithms (such as WinRAR or x264) - there, the memory can certainly have an impact on the overall result. Some examples can be found here.
• Active use of the CPU's internal graphics unit - while dedicated graphics cards (such as NVIDIA GeForce) feature their own graphics memory, the CPU graphics need to access the main memory. Here, an increased memory timing in conjunction with dual channel do achieve noticeable improvement in performance in 3D applications.

The decision about the memory therefore depends mainly on your budget, your application priorities and personal preference. If the above-mentioned exceptions do not matter in your case and you are working on a limited budget we would recommend a larger SSD or another component upgrade instead of a particularly high clocked RAM.

Intel VT-x enables hardware accelerated emulation of 64-bit capable processors. This feature is needed in the operation of virtual machines, if both the host and guest operating system should run in 64-bit. 
For VT-x functions, it must be supported by all components involved:

1. BIOS or UEFI
2. processor
3. Operating system
4. Virtual Machine (mostly VMWare, VirtualBox or Microsoft Virtual PC)

In the BIOS or UEFI chips supplied by us VT-x is already supported by default. A single activation of VT-x in the BIOS setup is therefore not necessary. 

Here is a list of possible sources of problems:

• Incorrect virtual machine settings: in VirtualBox the option " IO-APIC" must be activated. It should also be selected for the guest operating system and the appropriate category. There is e.g. Ubuntu Linux as a default choice, plus an explicit choice for x64. Only after selecting the 64-bit environment can VT-x actually be used by the virtual machine.
• Virus scanners: Some virus scanners use VT-x for virus detection. Please deactivate the corresponding functions for testing purposes or contact the manufacturer of the virus scanner.
• Microsoft Hyper-V: Turn off the "Hyper-V" -Windows services to release VT-x virtualization to other applications (such as VMWare or VirtualBox).

Should you still be unable to make use of VT-x, it is possible that there is a misconfiguration in Windows. Unfortunately the only help here is a clean installation of Windows. Please run a EC and a BIOS update and make sure particularly in the use of Windows 8.x that UEFI is enabled in the BIOS. To check whether VT-x is available for your system, you can use this Intel tool.