*OFFICIAL* Alienware "Graphics Amplifier" Owner's Lounge and Benchmark Thread (All 13, 15 and 17)

Well, "same" in the sense that they have the same coolers and such. But they differ slightly in their binning, which is usually beyond your control.
Honestly, if you do not want spend too much, get the GTX 1070.

 

I recommend going with the founder editions then, it will fit and be good enough to overclock. Also you can probably find them at bestbuy where I bought mine.

 

Can you please confirm if you are using evga precisionx oc 6.01 for overclocking or another software,because I have the same evga gtx 1080 FE with alienware 15 r2 i7 6700hq 970m but evga precisionx oc doesnt launch.

 

So, what are the conclusions for the AGA and GTX 1080, is it worth getting and will performance gains over a GTX980Ti be "enough"? I know the GTX1080 is better than the 980Ti, but not sure how much the AGA will limit it concering PCI-lanes etc.

 

Without changing the power supply, has anybody managed to change the (insanely loud) GA fan for something quieter, e.g. a Noctua NF-A9 PWM FAN - 92MM, without splicing any cables? I found an adapter, wasn't sure if it would work: http://www.moddiy.com/products/3%2d...-Mini-2%2dPin-GPU-Fan-Connector-(Female).html

 

have an msi gtx1080 FE and my benchmark varies between 14200 and 14400 on internal monitor. I have the HTC vive connected to the amplifier (gtx1080) so how can I benchmark externally ?

moreover what program is best to use to overclock the card and what settings should I use ?

 

Settings I'm not sure of since I don't have the GPU but do it in small increments to make sure its stable, most people use MSI Afterburner to OC but I've also used Nvidia inspector in the past with great results but those were done on a laptop.
Good luck.

 

Im using msi afterburner....
Evga precision x OC is basically buggy atm....

 

Yeah baby!!! Finally some progress and stable:

http://www.3dmark.com/fs/8903869

Firestrike Score: 14,758. Thats around 30% up on my previous with my GTX1080. Made some adjustments on MSI After Burner and Throttle Stop and Riva Statistics Tuner.

 

best I could do with MSI afterburner but core clock meh

http://www.3dmark.com/fs/8904582

 

Can anyone share their VR experience with the GA running a 1080 or 1070. I just read on the Alienware reddit that it's pretty poor and even the i7 6820HK isn't enough for good frames.

 

The sweet spot with the weak BGA cpu's is 970/980. In gaming the difference between the 9xx series and 10xx series will be very minimal.

 

I think thats not true.. I got a gtx980 and now a 1070 and Even there is a big difference (> 2000pts in firestrike overalscore). I can play the Division now maxed with >60 Fps which wasnt possible before!

The 6820HK can!!! be as powerful as the 6700k if u oc it a bit. There is a Thread where enough people showed how good the CPU can be with a bit oc

 

Here is a new review that is showing improvements in gaming FPS performance using faster memory:

How to Test for GPU and CPU Bottlenecks! What You Need to Maximize the GTX 1070 and GTX 1080?

He really needs to run that memory test again using a 1080/1070, and on higher and lower end CPU's / memory. I hope someone picks up on this idea and does a wider range of testing.

 

So I am having some sort of (possible) issues with my GA that I'm hoping someone can assist with.

What's happening is that when I start up the Alienware with the GA connected, I will always notice that laptop resets itself at least once in the splash screen, and sometimes it freezes on the splash screen forcing me to hit the power button and reset.

Also when I'm in Windows 10 using my Dell 2560 x 1600 monitor as the only screen with the GA, something really strange that I'm seeing is that when I use IE, the font of the address bar is really big, along with all of the UI elements like the menu screens & download confirmation box. I get the same big text in the windows taskbar icons to the far right side, so if I hover over the sound icon, the name of the playback device and the sound % is really big. It's like these things and these things only are somehow set to have really big text...and I have no idea why. When I'm just using the Alienware screen, all of this text is "normal" size.

Is it possible that either the GA, or the port on the Alienware is somehow defective? I'm just at a bit of a loss as to why these things are happening. I have a 17" 4k screen...I'm wondering if that has something to do with it? Because if I lift up the lid on the Alienware and it "clones" the same screen to both monitors at "4k," this doesn't happen. Does it not like that I'm trying to use 2560 x 1600 on a 4k laptop or something, even though I'm using an external monitor? If anyone else has a 4k laptop and a monitor with a lower resolution, does IE/windows taskbar do the same thing for you when you're using the GA?

Edit: So just to do it I disconnected the GA and just on the laptop screen I changed the resolution to 2560 x 1600....and same behavior. Big text in IE and the task bar icons. So I guess this is just "normal" behavior? Not sure why...but it is doing it on both screens. Still not sure what the deal is with the resetting of the laptop on initial boot though, it actually does the same thing when I disconnect the GA so maybe this is some kind of internal checking that's being done on POST looking for the GA since it's been connected?

 

Don't panic! Absolutely nothing is wrong with your GA. The problem is Windows, and this happens even without the GA.

It's called DPI scaling. Windows is trying to scale up everything you see so that things are big enough on your screen for you to see when you're using your 17" 4K monitor (basically it makes everything 200%-225% bigger), and then scaling them back down to normal when you switch back to your desktop monitor.

Unfortunately, Windows UI scaling is awful, often forgets to scale certain things, and some programs don't scale properly. That massive IE text is because it still thinks you're using your 4K monitor, and doesn't realize you switched to a 2K monitor. If you switch back, you'll start having the opposite problem: some things are too small, some things are scaled up but look super blurry, etc.

Examples: native 4K and upscaled 4K. Notice how in the upscaled 4K, Chrome is super blurry, and some windows are absolutely tiny.

My first suggestion is to sign out & sign in / restart the computer with the 2K monitor connected. This sometimes fixes most UI scaling problems, but more often than not doesn't.

Second suggestion is to disable scaling on your 4K monitor. You do this by going into Settings > System > Display (or right-click on desktop and select Display Settings) and lowering the Scaling option until it's at 100% (and don't forget to sign out & sign in / restart). The problem with this solution is that it makes everything on your 4K monitor absolutely tiny.

My third and most successful permanent solution is to completely disable 4K on your 4K monitor by changing the resolution down to 2K or even HD. Do this in Display Settings > Advanced Display Settings and changing the resolution from 3840×2160 (4K) to 2560×1440 (2K) or 1920×1080 (HD).

I personally use 2K, which is big enough to be readable but small enough to fit most things on screen, but the problem is that it usually isn't listed, and you have to create a new one in Nvidia Control Panel or Intel Graphics Properties.

 

I'm aware of the power of the 10 series. I have 4 different models in for review. Building a 2016 dream machine for a publication now.

I'd be interested to see the thunderbolt driven GA's compared to the proprietary Alienware connector.

 

Wait doesn't the GA's proprietary connection offer slightly better bandwith than a Thunderbolt port like on the Razer Core?

 

Hi guys, just ordered the 13 r2 plus an amp. A quick question, does the laptop freeze when u unplug the amp while it's on? I read somewhere that it does. Had the issue been fixed yet or is it still like that?
Thx in advance!

 

So the new Razer Core Graphics Amplifier uses Thunderbolt 3 and works with any laptop that has a Thunderbolt 3 connection. Very interesting. At more than double the price, could this be the AGA killer? Can't wait to see some benchmarks, if it doesn't pose the limitations that the AGA does, ordering one is a no-brainer for me.

 

keep in mind that the core uses TB3 for every single connection on the machine, so more perif/Ethernet connection mean that you have less bandwidth for gpu

I believe the AGA has separate usb and possibly Ethernet line, not sure about the Ethernet part

 

in the same video he mentioned that the AGA have slightly better performance than the Core and is much cheaper as well... so nope far from the AGA killer

[EDIT] my mistake. the video you posted is the preview video, he released a second video which is the full review

 

Thanks, did not pick up on that.. Also did not expect those findings.

 

Has anyone tried using a non FE 1070 with the AGA?

Sent from my MT2L03 using Tapatalk

 

So far it only works reliably with Razer laptops and very buggy with other laptops, I like the idea but its way too expensive for what it is, more than double the AG.

 

So my AGA arrived today and I tested it out with my gtx 1080 and got this score on the first run http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/12644072, i expected a better score but I'm sure I can tweak a few things to get it up there.

 

My gtx 980ti worse than the gtx 980m while I was playing BF4, any way to fix it?

 

5000 scores lower than the desktop with this card
my gtx 980ti is lagging with the AGA. 30fps in Battlefield 4

 

Make sure that your AGA is in fact using X4 not X3 PCIe speed; check with GPU-Z. Sometimes for unknown reasons it goes down to X3, and a BIOS reset can fix that.

 

How to reset bios?

 

Yup it's running x4, one of the first things i checked. I'm almost thinking it could be my bios? i'm on 1.2.2 which is a fairly old. I've seen people get scores of 21,000 for graphics score but the max I've gotten is 18k with an Nvidia GTX 1080 FE which is I find odd.

 

It's on pcie 3.0... Now what? How to fix it?

 

You mean the computer Bios not the AGA's Bios? I think I can fix that.

 

Rerun the benchmark a couple of times. It seems that one says "TIME MEASUREMENT INCONSISTENCIES"
Make sure you do it after a fresh boot. Kill any extra programs you have running. Wait till the boot has fully completed. (few minutes after boot)

Compare BIOS 1.2.8 and 1.2.2

 

I was upset the whole day after I got the GTX 980 Ti running in terribly speed. I got it yesterday, thank God the water cooer can fit inside.

 

Why? Is 1.2.8 better?

 

Some people have said that 1.2.8 was better for the AGA. So if I were you I would benchmark normal Firestrike on the internal screen with both BIOS versions.

 

As long as it's okay for me to play battlefield, thank you.

 

I updated the bios to 1.2.8 and I do see a slight improvement in score, about 1k getting me up to 19k graphic score. In previous posts I've seen 21k-24k graphics scores, I'm going to be updating to the latest bios to see what difference that makes.

 

But seems the latest Bios is terrible. I just downgraded from the latest.

 

After trying the latest bios 1.2.14 and running the benchmarks, I get about the same score. http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/12651114? and this is with a slight OC... not liking these scores at all.

 

Newest bios. If you still want use faster ram http://forum.notebookreview.com/thr...1-2-14-no-dimm-profiles.793095/#post-10283376

 

Did you check out the clocks of the benches that were had a higher graphics score to make sure you are comparing apples to apples and there were no OC involved?

 

http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/12652220 BIOS 1.2.8 GTX 980 Ti OC Hydro

 

You using an external monitor or the AW screen?

 

AW screen, but I saw you are running your 1080 in 1000MHz which is low, but mine is overclocked(1,354 MHz) with water&wind cooler. Yours suppose to be 1600+MHz.

 

If you want to get better benchmark result....
I suggest use external monitor...
By the way the firestrike core clock and mem clock is bugged (i also dont know why).
My EVGA GTX 1080 FE OC to core: 2.088ghz and mem: 5500mhz....
Below is the result...

http://www.3dmark.com/fs/8850835

 

I only need to play game but just tried once for benchmark. Today I was solving the issue of my 980 Ti not working properly.