*OFFICIAL* Alienware 15 R3 Owner's Lounge

2 day old AW 15 R3. I need help with setting the Boost properly. 6700HQ and OCCT shows underclock at -0.2 - 0.3%. I have changed the power settings to High Performance and nothing. Changed the BIOS to performance and nothing. What am I missing?

Only good thing is that it does not overheat. ever.

 

That really give me hope!

 

Reading the past few pages of this thread = Is it not safe to buy an Alienware 15R3 now? I was looking to get one from the dell outlet. They must be part of the group that got returned and "fixed"? I was hoping to get one of the 15XR3 as Christmas gift for someone but hearing about all these problems is making me do a double take!

 

It looks like the original shipments all had bad paste and flimsy glue on the IPS panels. I have had the TN G-Sync panel, 6700, 1070, and fast RAM since early December. The TN panel is crisp and beautiful. Zero light bleed. I have had no stuttering problems, shutdowns, thermal issues, or anything bad. I did immediately replace the HDD with an SDD Samsung 840, and added an M.2 Samsung 1TB 840 as the boot device. I boot in around 4 seconds now.

I also added a USB based creative sound system, and the sound is now amazing, even better than the Sonos I have. Even though the TN panel is awesome, I just bought an LG 29UC88 Utra-wide panel to immerse myself in games. This is now the best damn gaming system I have ever owned. My next toy is an HTC VR setup to hook to this laptop. The cool thing about this Alienware, is that it is VR ready, and it also has the proprietary external graphics connector, so if my 1070 gets long in the tooth, I can just connect to the next best graphics card. I bought a 4 year warranty extension so I have no worries till after 2020 if something breaks.

This laptop replaced my PC based rig, so I am now mobile if I want to be. It's freeing. I looked HARD at all the other solutions. I was going to go Razor 14, but the price was way too high, and they get real hot. I previously had a Lenovo Y410P which I still use but only for web browsing now. Lenovo can't seem to get their act together with Pascal cards. I also looked at MSI, but the support is not as good, and they are just not as elegant as the Alienware 15. I own an LG OLED TV, so the 13 inch Alienware was also VERY tempting with it's OLED screen, but alas, no 1070 config available.

I used the Veteran discount together with a 10% discount when I bought mine, so the price without the warranty extension was in the high $1500 range. You cannot beat the price when those discount coupons pop up now and then. So all in all, I am a happy camper. I don't need to overclock this thing, as it's fast enough already, so I will never have overheating issues others seem to be having. My CPU thermals are stay in the mid 70's during long gaming bouts. If your into overclocking, then maybe wait for the Kaby Lake based versions coming next. But if you don't, I would say wait for a good coupon to show up during the Christmas deals, and go for it!

 

The headphone jack doesn't seem to be working for me. I plugged in my headphones but the volume mixer doesn't reflect that. Audio is still played out the speakers. I tried the audio driver from dell but that didn't fix the problem.

 

I think it's unknown if the outlet ones will have been repaired properly or not. A few straggler units like mine built in early December are bad. But the rest seem to be coming out good.

I'm sending mine in for repair, not replacement. So if it comes back with a good fix then I'd assume you can extrapolate that they know how to fix it and the outlet models will be good to go. But I won't get it back until late next week.

@iunlock post about the dell interview and the fact they insisted I send it in vs have a tech come to me gives me hope that they know what they are doing to fix it correctly. They were willing to send a tech but really wanted me to send it in so I wonder if that means they have a specific fix in mind.

Will keep updated.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Update: Noticed that my headphone jack was sticking out a tiny bit. I had to use a bit of force to shove it all the way in and that worked. I don't think this is normal though. It's also hard to pull out as well. I've never had this problem with any other devices...

 

Temps hit 90 when playing Batman Arkham Knight for just 15 minutes. Is this because the game is so poorly optimized?

I ran OCCT and Prime95 today and yesterday. Max was either 69 or 72 degrees.

 

I just noticed they are on the outlet already and am shocked. Usually there is about 4 months before they show up... this is really soon. I would not anticipate that they have been "fixed". I have gotten outlet models that have had nothing more than a fresh install of windows with very little to no QC.

 

So what does that mean for those who fixed their unit already? I mean I am pretty sure I got a lemon... it stays in low-mid 70s while gaming with a difference of 1-3c (which is ok I guess) but I can't undervolt (even with just -50mv it freezes/crashes). But when I call support and ask for a change because of thermal/CPU-problems, they will laugh at me.
Because I am reading about the recently shipped units with temps between high 60 to low 70s while occt with stock paste there must be clearly something wrong with mine which was in the first wave and got repasted with conductonaut.

 

Which monitor manufacturer does everyone have?
I thought Alienware mainly using LG or AU Optronics but mine is a Samsung for the 1080p 60Hz IPS [Unknown Model: SDC894F as per HWinfo].

 

The image hosting problems have been like this since 23-24 June!! Nearly 6. Months now!!

I hope you understand that 6700hq is fully locked and can't be overclocked!! 3.1GHz is max from 4 cores.

 

Tried to OC the screen refresh rate but got "the custom resolution exceeds the maximum bandwidth capacity" from the Intel driver.

 

Hello Guys,

I just got my AW 15 R3 yesterday. I was wondering if anyone already tried getting the Recovery image from Dell support site? I tried installing the second one with the (Dell) word included and it does not have any drivers included so I am not sure if the 1st one is same.

 

@yope05 i´ve used the MICROSOFT USB Bootstick (created a bootable USB device and installed from there). Everything went as expected (incl. alienware boot logo) and i had a clean install.

As my system won´t work under load i´ve rejected it but whatever. I would preffer this way instead "recovery", but make sure to take a image of your product key

Regards

 

bad thing is i was not able to created a bootable USB device before.

 

Thermal issues?

When gaming again the gpu is used and creates more heat. Occt doesn't use the gpu so it'll be cooler.

Yours is fine it seems

From what I understand the undervolt thing will be very machine dependent. If every machine could be undervolted -150 they would just set the stock settings to that level and be done. But they can't do they overshoot high. Some will be -170, some -25. But at stock they all have to work. As you set the stock set point lower you will start seeing some that don't work out of the box (like yours maybe) which is unacceptable.

Think of it as already undervolted lol


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Temps don't really go past 70 when I test with OCCT and Prime95. However after just 15 minutes of gaming it hit 90. (Game was Batman: Arkham Knight).

What would you guys recommend I do? It doesn't look good at all gaming-wise although I only tested that poorly optimized game. I don't really have any demanding games to try. I think XCOM 2 is poorly optimized as well but I can test it later. For non demanding games temps hovered in the 70s.

Should I send it back for a repaste? Ask for an exchange since I have a bit of a bezel separation at the bottom as well which makes bleed light visible on the Samsung panel in the dark? (I'm not too worried about the last part)

I'm definitely not repasting it on my own. Would just doing an undervolt be okay as a long term solution?

 

you don't need a key with pre installed win 10 OEM

you shouldn't need to worry about your product key as it's an oem licence now tied to that mother board you just install any standard win 10 image from Microsoft or dell (home or pro) the Microsoft server will know its licenced and auto activate.

 

Get a replacement while you can

I think your temps are higher gaming than running occt because your stressing the whole system and the heat sink has both chips to cool, if your just running occt your not using the GPU

 

What differences are this method compared to running the recovery from Windows 10 OS?

 

Well I just received my replacement 15R3 about 2 hours ago and I am very pleased. Build date: 12/10/2016. No backlight bleed from what I can tell and after undervolting, my CPU maxes out at 71 and my core differentials are within 6 degrees Celsius. A major improvement over the first machine I received.

 

What bios version?

 

Running 1.0.8 out of the box. Haven't tried flashing back to 1.0.2 yet.

 

If you have the 6820HK CPU don't stay on 1.0.8


1.0.2 is the best version of the bios to get most performance out of the cpu

 

Nope 6700HQ here. I thought about going for the 6820, but with the 1060 and for what I need this machine for, it seemed a little pointless for my needs.

 

I was really shocked too. They showed up 3 days ago. I was hoping these were going to "fixed" or tested or had some kind of QC. Maybe I should wait.

 

6700hq should be fine for 1.0.2

remember to undervolt and keep cpu below 44 watt on occt run!

 

those units displayed at the outlet is most likely the ones with defective heatsink

 

Why are so many posters with similar temps to my OCCT/Prime95 results (70 max, 4 core differential) happy about their laptops then?! I didn't repaste or undervolt.

Seems like playing an actual game gives much more realistic temperatures. I've seen a few people mention getting 20 degrees above OCCT temps as well but not sure if that's normal.

What temp am I supposed to get when playing demanding games... Below 80? Would this mean OCCT temps should be even lower than what I got if that were the case? Please share what numbers I should look for. Thanks.

Anyone else with similar temps as me ask for a replacement?

 

Ok not to change the topic: what is anyone doing with the super cumbersome power brick? The brick itself isn't bad, it's nice and thin, but the cables are super thick and stick out an extra 2" on either side of the brick and it doesn't fold up very easy lol

Any ideas or recommendations to get it stowed in a bag or on the desk?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

Ok dude I was just sayin you asked for an opinion, personally a brand new expensive laptop where the bezel was coming away, causing light bleed, a headphone jack you had to shove in to get to work and 90c on the cpu gaming is only going to get worse. If your happy with that and some people are then fair enough enjoy.

My Aw15 r3 similar but I re pasted it never went near 90 after hours of gaming, still sent it back the build quality was really poor I had cross threaded screws bezel issues also, glad I got shot of it.

All that weight I thought would be transferred into cooling advantages but it's no better than laptops nearly half the weight

 

Don't forget that OCCT stress only the processor. Shared heatsink means lower cooling for the processor when GPU is in use.

 

Ah sorry if my message came across as being defensive. I just see people being very relieved when they get the same stock temps as me, if not a bit higher, so I was just surprised about the suggestion to get a replacement.

When I hit 90 degrees that was playing Arkham Knight and people have told me it's a very poorly optimized PC port. My average temperature while playing was only 70 so perhaps it just spiked due to the optimization or lack thereof. I am going to try to test other games although I don't really have that many demanding games installed atm. Will also try undervolting since that is an option I haven't even tested yet.

On reddit I noticed the "tight" headphone jack happened to other posters as well so I assumed it was normal. I guess it isn't.

The bezel has a slight separation at the bottom and talking with other people with the Samsung panel my conclusion is this particular model is a bit more receptive to bezels that aren't perfectly flat. The light bleed is not noticeable at all with the lights on. Even though I'm not pleased at an expensive laptop having these kind of defects, it's not my main concern as a lot of people fixed it by simply taking off the bezel and installing it back on properly.

True. Just surprised how people are posting just the OCCT tests and getting replies that they got a good unit based on that

 

Yeah, maybe run Heaven along with OCCT, because of the shared heatsink?

 

Hello everyone!
My AW 15 R3 with gtx 1070 and i7-6820HK is coming next week!

I'm happy

 

What the hell Dell....

Ordered 15R3 during black friday deal Nov 25th
Shipment to customer advertised Dec 6th
DELL DELAYED shipment to Dec 14th...
Then DELL DELAYED some more to Dec 21st...
Now DELL CANCELLED my order saying item is not being manufactured anymore.

This is paid for already. what kind of Sh*t is this DELL.

Im from the Philippines and am making extra effort just to have this ordered via my friend in California.
And you do this.
WHAT THE HELL.

Anyone else having the same experience?
Anyone care to give any advice how this could be fixed?
Been following this thread since it was still merged for all alienware 2016 variants.
Hope someone can help with this. Thanks in advance

 

I'm sorry this has happened to you. So they gave Hope > Excitement > and they took it all away. I think that does it. I'm going to stop thinking about getting a M15x R3. I think Dell is calling it quits on that one.

 

Hi

pro
- more available disc space as you usually delete the recovery partition
- no bloatware which will get preinstalled by using recovery
- clean system in cause of that

con
- you need the usb stick (or any with the win10 ISO)
- you need to have your product key i guess (edit: you dont need it´s on the chipset)

 

One quick question:

How can i revert to 1.0.8 in case i would like to? i didn't see the bios version in dell's site.

EDIT:

got it.

Okey now i'm going to test with occt bios versión 1.0.2 with my laptop, brb with the snapshot..


Here it is:

Running under bios versión 1.0.2



@iunlock there's any real benefit of running under 1.0.2 ? do i have any performance gain?

I will test now with The Witcher 3.

After playing for 45 minutes in Novigrado.

Max peak temp cpu : 77
Max peak temp gpu: 71

Battlefield 1 conquest 64 players.

Max peak temp cpu : 83
Max peak temp gpu: 77

I didn't notice playing any fps drop or such even that temps are much higher with BF1.

 

Undervolting is always worth doing on a 6700hq as you will always get lower temps just depends how good the chip is u may get -50 or -190 + worth doing anyways, takes a long time to really find true stable uv though.

I fixed my bezel this way but it still had bleed, there is a good fix here to get rid of it completeley older model same principal - http://forum.notebookreview.com/threads/how-to-fix-lcd-light-bleed-on-15r2-uhd.794399/

People sometimes are just running occt to see the CPU core differences as this tells if the heatsink is even or not.

if your averaging 70 i wouldn't worry too much, i just said return it while you can as many people don't like to mess around, i rebuilt my 15r3 from the ground up got it working as it should and still returned it...lol for me it weighed a tonne (i need portable not a DTR) the battery was too poor

 

Wanted to confirm that I need to download the Win10 recovery image from dell & load onto a bootable USB. Is this correct?

 

could you explain what are this temp control 1.08 and this 1.02? I didnt understand. sorry, im newbie .
Also, this could be caused by heating? if so, how can i see if i need to repaste? thanks for your time

 

Take it with a grain of salt. Thermal issues and light bleed fixed and will be screened before shipping.

Source: https://twitter.com/AzorFrank/status/809471113667420160

 

Well that's great news since I just ordered one!
Couldn't pass on a great deal and got $600 off with coupons and a little sweet talk
So all in all paid about a bit under $1700 on a nice specced AW.
16 GB RAM - 2667
256 SSD
And the icing on the cake 120Hz screen and 1070.

 

5th r3 , I bought refurbished thinking maybe they fixed crap. Well idle was at 70 tried to undervolt it to no avail. Took it apart it had missing screws screw holes were stripped out the USB connected was broke and the CPU screws where tighten so tight and they stripped the screws. Managed to get it apart the CPU was on so tight that there was no paste residue on the gpu just the heatsink. Repasted ran firestrike with undervolt. Temps on CPU hit 99c while gpu maxed out at 48..... I move in 3 days so I have to keep the laptop till I get to my new house in January.

 

Greetings all...here's another little video....enjoy...

 

Removing the WiFi cables off of the WiFi card. (Alienware 17R4 / 15R3) - Killer 1535



Enjoy.

 

Breaking News - New Changes to the Alienware Gaming Laptops (Part 1)



Great stuff... Part 2 will be up within a few minutes.

Enjoy...

 

Breaking News - New Changes to the Alienware Gaming Laptops (Part 2)



Surprise surprise....