*OFFICIAL* Alienware 13 R3 Owner's Lounge

The thread is going to be lively these next couple days heh


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85gb for gears 4 and 75gb for doom.
Think I need me that 1tb mx300

... Can anyone recommend good temp monitoring tools please? Can't seem to find the relevant posts. Cheers.

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Knowing Dell, probably the 30th of JANUARY


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I have a 1TB 850 EVO i netted for 220 bucks recently. Waiting to take up slot 2. Although I'm not moving it over until I do full checks on the notebook. Think I am going to install BF1 as the stressing game - but then put in a range of other games from my Steam library to test out fan noise, heat, usability and portability.

 

Amazing price that! Nice find!

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Yeah - plus it came with Watch Dogs 2 game code. Scored it from BHPhoto Video. They rock.

 

Amazing!
Was going to use this 10% refund towards warranty buy think i'll get that 1tb cruical drive.
Good price, decent speeds. Seems a good buy!

Also, the tactX keyboard is amazing! Great tactile feel, extremely solid. Good travel. Best keyboard i've used!

 

HWinfo64

 

Extended warranty isn't worth it if you can fix the system yourself. If you aren't good at laptop repairs - then maybe go for it. Although most defects mainfest in the first year. I'd rather trust myself to do a repair than a third party guy who read the manual on AW just before he shows up at my door. My 10% card will buy another AC adapter, and maybe the rest would go towards the Graphics AMP.

 

Think the potential reward in buying warranty (accidental) is that if you break your computer, they'll replace the part free of charge. If they can't repair the computer, they'll replace it w/the newest model potentially saving you hundreds of $

 

Cheers. Literally just installed. Downloading and browsing cpu temps of 62 58 60 62
I'll get some gaming in and see what it gets to.

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Good shout that.
I'm very comfortable with any repair work but it was more the cost of parts if anything failed that I thought was worth it.
Was debating the AGA, think I'll hold of on that until my 1060 shows is age.

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I think it's ridiculous to buy an r3 and then buy an aga. What's the point spending all that money on capable jacked hardware. But you don't wanna use it. If whoever does that should just buy a r2 even if it only has dual core. That makes more sense to me cos there's only 3 single gtx's faster as opposed to a 960m and 7 gtx cards behind (965m,970m,980m,960,970,980 mobile and 980 desktop vs 1060 desktop,1070 and 1080. The mobile 1070 and 1080 are pretty much equal to desktop. Only the mobile 1060 is not on par with desktop). So that's plenty power. 1060 can hold its own for 2 years.


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Okay performance on the go, while more power at home (as it should be).

I bought the AGA w/hopes of future-proofing and plan to shove a GTX 1070 hybrid in there. Math says it's a 50% increase from the 1060 so it made sense to me. The 13 R3 doesn't come w/a 1070 and the 15 R3 isn't nearly as portable

 

More than likely buying the AGA now is somewhat silly, although I'm interested in the capability of the AGA to create a quieter desktop environment and how it would work as a "docking station". Too bad the AGA does not also provide power delivery, which is somewhat of a shame. I also heard you have to sub out the PSU and fan, because included ones are loud/lousy. But I have parts lying around.

And the old school dual core CPU is a MAJOR issue moving forward - I would never consider that viable. Games need quad core CPUs right now.

 

True that, there is some bottlenecking w/the 1080 based on what i've heard. I felt like it was too early to buy an AGA, but it's been out on the market for 2-3 years now and I personally would like more power. I plan to mod my own fan, and leave the stock PSU (should be enough for the 1070). I'm not much of an enthusiast to care for a 1080 or play GPU intensive games that would require one

 

AGA is a great option i think even for the aw13 i mean you can have a great laptop w/1060

then when you want some serious gaming, plug into the AGA with a 1080 or TX which is hooked upto your 4k G-Sync monitor and mechanical keyboard and 6TB drive.... awesome setup...

you can have a serious desktop setup all plumbed into the AGA then when u wanna go mobile just unplug and you have your main rig in your bag.

 

If you wanna run 4k gaming at home and only have one PC then AGA & Titanx pascal is a good (but expensive) option.

The older R2 13 has been shown to bottle neck high end cards in the AGA 980ti/TX/1070/1080 all bottlenecked by the ULV procesor in the r2 13

thats why a load of people were so happy when dell finally put the proper CPU in the 13.

 

PSU in the AGA is perfect for any new high end card i ran my AGA with a 1080 and a titan x pascal no issues at all.

I never ran the fan in the front (just disconnected it) it made no difference temps wise.

 

Ah bugger. Started gears 4. Fans went ballistic! CPU upto 92!!!. Gpu 76 which is fine.
Just the fan noise is ridiculous.
Trying to undervolt now but might look at the fans as I'm sure they are squeaking at idle.
Possibky not seated correctly?
I'll have a look tomorrow.

Other than that. Beast of laptop haha.

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Congrats dude ! Finally )

Have you activated any of the performance modes in BIOS ?

 

Yes, the AGA was one of the only reasons I waited around for the AW13 actually. Not necessarily for a 10-series graphics card, but certainly an 11/12-series later on. However, I got the AGA now because I wanted to be sure the AGA port etc. all works well while I'm in return period, or at least warranty period. Of course, now I only have an AGA

I actually agitated friends at Dell to make an AW machine with even lower internal graphics or only integrated and make it truly portable because let's face it, the 13 isn't vs. the MSI GS43, Blade, Aorus X3 etc. Or stick an AGA port on the XPSes. Not sure if they ever bought the idea though. The MSI GS30/32 tried to do something similar without a ton of success, partially because the quad core still eats too much battery (GS30) and dual core is a bottleneck (GS32). Also hard to market a gaming laptop without internal dedicated graphics...

 

Undervolted 0.135v stable. Hitting 80max on core 0 around 64 core 4. Happy with that. Still a big difference but well within safe levels.

Gpu is at 76 playing gears. But framerate issues for some reason. Just installing nvidia drivers now.

I did put on performance mode but thought the thing was taking off as on full whack all the damn time. Not for me that. Unless no one's in the house and I have headphones on

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Finally just got my Shipping tracking # from Dell. Will be here by Friday 12/23!

 

Mine got shipped yesterday and I'm waiting for the Fedex guy to show up right now.

 

Wait, so you are saying that you enabled performance mode BEFORE your first Gears run and were suprised by the fans? I mean, that's to be expected. How are acoustics with the fans on regular mode? Your CPU temps were fine before undervolt and I would recco just staying on the normal factory default BIOS settings for FANs.

 

Sorry, should have been clearer. Installed gears and ran stock. Stupid loud fans.
Put on performance mode. Even louder.....
CPU and gpu Temps are now great but need to install nvidia drivers. Tomorrow.

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It's true bout the ulv. I just couldn't remember by how much since I never owned one paired with high end gpu. Last and only ulv I had was paired with amd 8750m.
But as good as the aga is. It's damn expensive though. Not so much in its own right. But more in the cost to have a gpu in it.

I read a comment about 4k. That's valid but I can't see why you spend much more when you could just get aw17 1080. Sure it's bigger but I'm going to assume that it's going to be on a desk and not somewhere portable like on your lap if the plan is to use aga. For me I'm quite minimalist so that's why I kinda downplay the aga a bit. Plus it's cos to 4k it plus the cost of the laptop. Makes at the thought of the cost in total.


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After an hour of OCCT:
79,81,76,77C..
Ran silent mostly..

 

Just got my laptop and tried installing this RAM with no luck: https://www.amazon.com/Kingston-Tec...01BNJL8I4/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

The power button just blinks when I try to boot. Has anyone had success installing that memory?

I'm trying to replace the original 8 GB DDR4 stick.

 

By the

Using a cooling pad, repaste, undervolt?

 

Nothing, Just stock.. Low room temp could have helped ,CPU spiked only once early, remained high 60s all run ..
Haven't run any game yet..

 

Same here - finally got the shipping email late this afternoon - looks like a Friday 12/23 arrival for me as well!

 

That brand does not work, pick b/t corsair, crucial or g skill.

 

Had the exact same issue with the same set.
Complained to Amazon and they sent a replacement pack. Got one stick from the original and one from the replacement package and the system booted alright in that configuration; automatically set to 2400 mhz.

Kingston's Impact Hyper X is very tricky with this AW.

 

Actually it does; running mine with one. But for some reason its tricky with the BIOS

 

Great !
Have you disabled V-sync in nVidia's settings ? Had downright retarded FPS in Gears 4 and disabling it [along with Xbox's DVR] solved all initial FPS issues.

 

After one hour of games - here are my temps. Was playing Conquest in BF1. Looks golden, actually looks cool, would like to trade 3 dB fan noise for 5 more degrees. Cause this thing is about 3 dB louder than I hoped.

 

The ram didn't work with either original sets? If you mix and matched from two different sets, you won't be eligible for warranty coverage... as they have non matching serial #.

 

I have not, I will look at this today. Thanks, good info that!

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I have exactly this one, 2X16GB, on my 13R3 and works perfectly.

 

I'll try to do that today.

 

First impressions - it's a well built, solid machine. Looks better in person than in pictures. The OLED screen is beautiful, although on a personal preference perhaps a 15" would have been better for me. It runs fairly quiet, I've had no problems playing full screen videos when hooked up to a TV.

I undervolted it by 0.150v and it seems stable, also tested it using Intel ETU for around 10 minutes and it didn't go above 73 degrees, but mainly stayed in the 60s.

Only niggle is that it came with 2% battery wear, but I suppose I can live that.

Also for those that have bought the Alienware neoprene sleeve 2.0, I can confirm that it does fit quite snugly.

 

Both disabled and did sort it out. Only getting 30fps at 1080p ultra? Hmmm.
Seems my nvidia drivers are missing now.
Won't let me reinstall either.

I'll have a look later on. Off out now.
Probably just needs a custom install and fresh install.

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Yours runs quiet while gaming? Or just during regular light usage? Full screen video isn't exactly stressing. Mine is very quiet (practically completely quiet) when watching 4K videos, and for CPU centric tasks the fans aren't annoying. During gaming, it's a different story - gets up to 48-49 dB and is very loud. Acoustically the fans aren't annoying (no high pitched whine or other unpleasing sounds), but overall the high fan noise output puts me on the fence.

I was hoping it would stay around 46 max, but I'm hoping that I'm still in a break in period for the thermal paste. My temps are fantastic at the moment, so the fan can chill out a little. I'm not in fan performance mode.

EDIT: I was hoping that both Dave Lee's and Linus's review, showing about 44dB max would pan out. Mine is almost twice as loud as theirs (given that 3db = double power output)

 

It's quiet during normal use. I did try and game a little, and of course you could hear the fans, but that's to be expected. I didn't find them annoying or unbearable. I will try and check what noise levels they're outputting whilst gaming when I get home.

 

Monitor that battery closely ... mine just keeps severely degrading with every discharge [about 3% loss of its holding capacity per full cycle]

 

That's exactly what happened. They only worked when I unpaired them from their original bundling sets. As for the warranty - well, I goofed I suppose ! Hopefully I wouldn't need their warranty service ) [otherwise will pay for being sneaky]

 

I will share my experience.

Ordered an AW13R3 back in the first half of November. OLED/6700/8GB/256 SSD.
Arrived on December 2nd, as per EDD. Worked for half a day, didn't have too much time with it, did a clean install, checked temps and that it.
Less than a week later I left the country (I am finishing my MSc at the moment, not in the USA). I noticed that I can't get nVidia drivers to work, worse the card gives error 43 in the device manager and is completely unusable. Clean driver removal, clean OS install, BIOS reset, even hard CMOS reset (disconnected the battery) didn't work, as expected. Contacted tech support, they tried the same and we concluded that a motherboard replacement is required.
As I am out the country I had to do a warrenty transfer and contact the local Dell tech service. It was surprisingly smooth and over a week later, a couple of days ago, the motherboard arrived and a technician was dispatched to my location. Predictably, he had dirty hands, didn't bother to ground himself and wanted to use an electric screwdriver... He broke the wireless main antenna connector (as expected). I am not sure which thermal paste he used, but he did the repaste fine. They don't have that Killer card in stock, and completely refuse to use any other part, so it will take another 2 weeks. I ordered an Intel 8265, not going to wait for them, and they are not touching it again. There were screws left outside which he had no idea what to do with. After I made sure everything is working and I want to keep the laptop, I took it apart, put everything together correctly. Installed the 2X16GB Kingston HyperX CL14 2400 that was linked here and a 950Pro. Hardest, cleaned his fingerprints.
In conclusion, I guess the technicians are universally incompetent, but Dell's international warrenty works.

As for the laptop. Build quality is great, the screen even better. The temps originally were up to 96℃ uneven in minutes with OCCT. After the technician's repaste with generic paste, and -100mV, it reaches 82℃ max with relatively even cores. I will repaste with Conductonaunt later.
The software issues: Trackpad inverted scrolling when slowly scrolling down is ridiculous. Stuttering is annoying. Didn't have time to deal with those. Hopefully will be fixed.
Otherwise it is a very pleasant system.

 

Some pictures attached comparing (oddly) to my Surface Book. Also a dB meter reading while playing Battlefield 1. Oscillates between 47-48.5 dB at the heigh of the match.