I've seen the same problem on my Dell M4700. However, it appears to fail intermittently. The last time I booted, the driver loaded without error, but the time before that it failed with the message below.

00:02.0 VGA compatible controller: Intel Corporation 3rd Gen Core processor Graphics Controller (rev 09) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
        Subsystem: Dell Device 053e
        Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 46
        Memory at f6400000 (64-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=4M]
        Memory at d0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
        I/O ports at f000 [size=64]
        Expansion ROM at <unassigned> [disabled]
        Capabilities: [90] MSI: Enable+ Count=1/1 Maskable- 64bit-
        Capabilities: [d0] Power Management version 2
        Capabilities: [a4] PCI Advanced Features
        Kernel driver in use: i915
        Kernel modules: i915


Here's what the error looked like when it failed:
[    6.035344] Oops: 0002 [#1] SMP 
[    6.035410] CPU 5 
[    6.035429] Modules linked in: aesni_intel cryptd aes_x86_64 firewire_ohci(+) i915(+) firewire_core crc_itu_t sdhci_pci(+) sdhci drm_kms_helper drm mxm_wmi i2c_algo_bit wmi video
[    6.035782] 
[    6.035811] Pid: 243, comm: modprobe Not tainted 3.5.0-17-generic #28-Ubuntu Dell Inc. Precision M4700/082H3V
[    6.035914] RIP: 0010:[<ffffffff8167f93a>]  [<ffffffff8167f93a>] __mutex_lock_slowpath+0xaa/0x150
[    6.035984] RSP: 0018:ffff880411e3dd38  EFLAGS: 00010246
[    6.036020] RAX: 0000000000000000 RBX: ffff8804126c9ba0 RCX: 0000000000000000
[    6.036058] RDX: ffff880411e3dd50 RSI: ffffffffa0041a1a RDI: ffff8804126c9ba4
[    6.036096] RBP: ffff880411e3dd98 R08: 00000000000003ea R09: 0000000000000000
[    6.036134] R10: ffffffff8184b320 R11: 0000000000000000 R12: ffff880411e31700
[    6.036172] R13: ffff8804126c9ba4 R14: 00000000ffffffff R15: ffff8804126c9ba8
[    6.036210] FS:  00007fbd4717d700(0000) GS:ffff88042e340000(0000) knlGS:0000000000000000
[    6.036259] CS:  0010 DS: 0000 ES: 0000 CR0: 0000000080050033
[    6.036294] CR2: 0000000000000000 CR3: 00000004127bd000 CR4: 00000000001407e0
[    6.036332] DR0: 0000000000000000 DR1: 0000000000000000 DR2: 0000000000000000
[    6.036370] DR3: 0000000000000000 DR6: 00000000ffff0ff0 DR7: 0000000000000400
[    6.036408] Process modprobe (pid: 243, threadinfo ffff880411e3c000, task ffff880411e31700)
[    6.036456] Stack:
[    6.036484]  0000000000000000 ffff880417a1a090 ffff880411e3dda8 ffff8804126c9ba8
[    6.036596]  0000000000000000 0000000000000018 ffff880411e3ddb8 ffff8804126c9ba0
[    6.036710]  ffff8804126c9800 ffff8804126c9ba0 0000000000000000 ffff880417a1a090
[    6.036826] Call Trace:
[    6.036861]  [<ffffffff8167f43a>] mutex_lock+0x2a/0x50
[    6.036911]  [<ffffffffa012dd4b>] intel_fb_restore_mode+0x2b/0xb0 [i915]
[    6.036961]  [<ffffffffa00f1120>] i915_driver_lastclose+0x30/0x60 [i915]
[    6.037009]  [<ffffffffa001b79a>] drm_lastclose+0x4a/0x320 [drm]
[    6.037051]  [<ffffffffa0021919>] drm_fill_in_dev+0x139/0x1c0 [drm]
[    6.037095]  [<ffffffffa0024243>] drm_get_pci_dev+0xd3/0x310 [drm]
[    6.037135]  [<ffffffff8135ab52>] ? pci_get_subsys+0x92/0xd0
[    6.037178]  [<ffffffffa002454e>] drm_pci_init+0xce/0x130 [drm]
[    6.037218]  [<ffffffffa016d000>] ? 0xffffffffa016cfff
[    6.037260]  [<ffffffffa016d066>] i915_init+0x66/0x68 [i915]
[    6.037300]  [<ffffffff8100212a>] do_one_initcall+0x12a/0x180
[    6.037340]  [<ffffffff810b5a22>] sys_init_module+0xc2/0x230
[    6.037380]  [<ffffffff81689d29>] system_call_fastpath+0x16/0x1b
[    6.037418] Code: 00 4c 8d 6b 04 4c 8d 7b 08 41 be ff ff ff ff 4c 89 ef e8 7a 21 00 00 48 8b 43 10 48 8d 55 b8 4c 89 7d b8 48 89 53 10 48 89 45 c0 <48> 89 10 44 89 f0 4c 89 65 c8 87 03 83 f8 01 75 24 eb 2c 0f 1f 
[    6.038520] RIP  [<ffffffff8167f93a>] __mutex_lock_slowpath+0xaa/0x150
[    6.038576]  RSP <ffff880411e3dd38>
[    6.038608] CR2: 0000000000000000
[    6.038650] ---[ end trace b988d88fde758ecb ]---