*OFFICIAL* Alienware 17 R2/R3 Benchmark Thread

Wha? Why would gelid only be good on graphics cards and not cpu? And you're saying that you previously used gelid, and when you switched over to liquid ultra it dropped 10 degrees? That's crazy.

 

Don't forget that a graphics card in a laptop has a TDP of +100W and still can run very cold even with a medium quality paste. A 47W Hotwell processor gets warmer than gpu even though it has a much lower TDP. This means that good thermal paste is more important on the processor.

 

Am I missing something from your 6820HK screenshots - those last two screenshots are taken while under very low load (one core loaded only) - does that prove much? I think those last two screenshots would have been more telling if they were taken after the CPU had been loaded either during gaming or more stressful benchmarking.

 

The point is to show the core frequencies. Let alone my comment addressing the late snaps...nevertheless, there's a purpose and a point. The snaps had nothing to do with temps.

Powered by: Quad Core Exynos + 6820HK

 

Surprise surprise!

4.6HGz...ran benches, browsed the Web etc...haven't gamed yet...but, with a lot of fine tuning.... here it is....

What a Beast the 6820HK is....



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This run was actually at 4.1GHz and scored pretty well so I've just included it here.


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give me those cpu

 

I had a chance to test a 240W adapter on my AW17r2 and I was able to maintain a stable overclock of:

980m: +300/300 MHz (+75 mV core)
4720HQ: +100 MHz

The temps didn't exceed 87°C on CPU and 73°C on GPU. The CPU tends to get hot even without OC so I'll do a repaste soon.

The firestrike score was 9815: http://www.3dmark.com/fs/8327855

 

Thats a damn fine result! Glad to hear you could sprt out your laptop trouble.

 

Thank you I am very happy too now. This time I did a full format to Windows 10 and I didn't install throttlestop. I only installed XTU for undervolt and OC. The stupid throttling thing is gone for good I hope I will get a 330W adapter myself soon and try reaching 10k with it.

 

I am awaiting an AW 17 R3 with i7-6700HQ. I realise that it doesn't support OC'ing but would UV'ing work using Intel XTU? Also, would it be possible to underclock the intel integrated GPU to help lower the power requirements of the CPU, since I assume all it will be doing is rendering Windows UI accelerations. I was hoping to do a moderate OC of the 970m and since the CPU and dGPU appear to share the same cooling system I'd like to keep the CPU as cool as possible without compromising its performance or stability.

 

I think you can use the XTU for both OC and UV however the amount of OC you can do is going to be limited and to be honest, do not worry about not being able to reach very high CPU clocks if you are going to use the pc for gaming and not-so-cpu-intensive applications. My laptop had serious CPU throttling issues and even when the CPU frequency dropped to 2.6 GHz most games didn't get affected by a single FPS and the more cpu-intensive ones dropped a few fps; this is a 900 MHz drop from the stocks and thank god I don't have those issues anymore.

You can also undervolt the cache voltage, dGPU etc. The only thing you are limited is the CPU multiplier I suppose, you cannot increase the multiplier more than 2 I guess. As for the 970m, I'd suggest you the vBIOS by prema since prema has been doing a great job with that. By using that vBIOS your OC limits are gone.

Have fun with your laptop

 

Thanks, my plan is for a moderate dGPU core OC (stock mem freq as the GDDR5 doesn't appear to be mated to a heatsink and I'm not convinced it will yield appreciable real world performance increase) @ stock voltage offset against a small CPU UV (with small iGPU UC) which I hope will help keep overall temperatures reasonable. I still need to research into things like cache voltages, etc, as you mentioned. I will almost certainly end up using Prema vBIOS based on other people's results. Still on the fence regarding repasting.

 

Does anyone know if the Samsung 950 Pro works with the AW17R2 (specs in signature)... I'd like to order one if it is compatible.. Is there a thread on how to install it & get it working properly? Curious what read/write speeds can be expected?

 

No!!

 

I find that VERY hard to believe. If you search for Samsung 950 Pro 512GB reviews on Amazon.com, and while in the reviews section you type "alienware" as the key word, run the search you will notice verified buyers talking about how they got it to work on their machine. Either they are lying for some odd reason, or it really is possible.

 

I'm afraid @Papusan is correct. They are PCIe only which rules your machine out. There are no sata versions.

Those that do use the, use them on the AW15 R2 and the AW17 R3 (Skylake).

 

Thanks, that does make a lot of sense. I just assumed that it would work since it works on the AW15R2.. How truly disappointing.

What is my best option as far as installing the fastest SSD possible into the 17R2?

 

The AW15 R2 is a Skylake machine whereas the AW17 R2 is Haswell and lacks the additional PCI lanes and M.2 PCIe support.

You already have the fastest option I believe, the 850 Pro....

 

If you buy a 2.5" SSD then choose SanDisk Extreme Pro. It is ranked as the best SATA 2.5" you can get today. I see you have an Hdd in your sig, maybe it's the one you are replacing?

 

Firestrike 1.1 with NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970M(1x) and Intel Core i7-6700HQ
Score: 8424
Graphics: 9936
Physics: 9662
Combined: 3611
http://www.3dmark.com/fs/8464884

Fans started ramping up due to +200mV dGPU, even with -150mV CPU and -50mV iGPU applied. Doubt it could be pushed much further.

 

I'm curious to know what other 980M - Unigine Heaven 4.0 benchmark scores are...

I ran one at 1080p and managed to get the following:

FPS: 99.5
Score: 2506

Min FPS: 32.2
Max FPS: 192.1

 

There's a lot variables your not sharing. I have a 15r2 6820hk 32g ram 980m 8g. Zero overclocking stock clocks on gpu and cpu.
Best I can get is in 1950 neighborhood, but that's with no tessellation, no aa, running full screen at 1080p rez on a 4k screen.

I assume your oc'ed from your sig but what settings are you running within heaven to get that score?. thanks for any info

 

If you really wanted to install a 950 PRO in a SATA 6gbps slot you could use an adaptor. You would be restricted by the 6gbps but I guess you would max it out this way. The 850 PRO is a cheaper solution though. This one is 16mm high, you'd have to check if that would fit, but there are others around if you search for them.

http://www.delock.com/produkte/G_62703/merkmale.html

EDIT: There's also some like this, that fit in a 2.5 slot.

http://www.mfactors.com/ssdm2-v1-3-m-2-ssd-to-sata-adapter/

http://www.addonics.com/products/ad25m2ssd.php

And if you have any old M.2 SSD's lying around, you can make them into a USB 3.0 external disk with the following adaptor.

http://www.mfactors.com/u3m2m-m-2-pcie-ssd-to-usb3-0-adapter/

 

Talking of SSD's I spotted these 1TB NVMe disks are available. Not cheap, but if you could afford two in RAID 0 you'd have 2TB of super fast SSD.

http://www.span.com/product/Toshiba-XG3-SSD-THNSN51T02DU7-M-2-2280-NVMe-1TB-SSD~57712

 

How ironic, I was just about to post one in the NBR classifies, but didn't have time.

If anyone is interested I have the: Samsung 1TB NVMe SSD. These are only found in laptops such as Dell and can't be bought separately.

This drive is from my new Dell XPS and I'll be putting my spare 512GB 950 Pro in there as I don't need the 1TB for that particular laptop.

 

Hi iunlock,

Any chance of a picture of the 1TB NVMe disk? What model number is it?

 

I'll PM you as well, but it's the PM951 (MZ-VLV1T0D).

Powered by: Quad Core Exynos + 6820HK

 

Hi iunlock,

Ok, thanks! I see some have been sold on EBay, fetching quite a price! At that price they could buy two 950 PRO and put them in RAID 0.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Samsung-P...-Internal-Solid-State-Drive-SSD-/172053474730

Two for sale if any millionaires are watching!
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Samsung-PM951-1TB-M-2-NVMe-PCI-e-PCIe-better-than-512GB-500GB-2TB-SSD/282042610141?_trksid=p2047675.c100011.m1850&_trkparms=aid=222007&algo=SIC.MBE&ao=1&asc=36558&meid=688b58282590461299467192926de3f1&pid=100011&rk=4&rkt=9&sd=172053474730

 

Thanks, I have a brand new AW17R3 (maxed specs) on the way, so that should fix that problem.

 

Hi Daniel1983,

Cool

You'll also have the option of 2x 950 512GB in RAID 0, which I'm running on the same (maxed) spec.

 

Good to know, thanks.

Question: I have an Overclocked Titan X that I'm using in the Alienware Amplifier now.. Thinking of ordering a GTX 1080, but there is no point in using it with the Alienware Amplifier; as it will severely cripple that GPU due to the Amplifier's speed limitation. Do you happen to know of anyone else creating new Amplifiers that can use the Thunderbolt/USB type-c connector?? I'd need to get my hands on one of those before I order the GTX 1080, by then the 1080Ti may be released.

 

That won't help you anyway the USB-C uses only 4 PCI channels just like the AGA adapter port so they would have the same speed limitation.

 

The amplifier port on the laptop is only capable of 4GBps...

USB -C/Thunderbolt3 more than 40Gb/s bandwidth..

Have I been misinformed on my quest for answers?

Please, elaborate..

 

Hi Daniel1983,

I found this which may be of interest:

The cable itself carries data at x4 PCIe Gen 3 data rates. That’s about 4GB/s. For comparison, a standard GPU connection on a desktop is a full x16 Gen 3 connection, which carries about 16GB/s. That’s led to concerns over the bandwidth capability of the Amplifier and how much actual performance you give up by throttling the GPU. Alienware’s competitor, MSI, has touted its GS30 Shadow’s ability to give your GPU the full x16 connection in its graphics enclosure.

Alienware, however, feels 4GB/s is plenty. For the record, Thunderbolt 2 is about 2.5GB/s. There’s some testing to support that “whatevs” approach. Puget Systems found no appreciable difference between x16 and x8 and between Gen 2 and Gen 3. Puget didn’t throttle it down to x4 Gen 3, but it did test x8 Gen 2, which is the same data rate. Likewise, Techpowerup.com tests also found no appreciable impact.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/2907...bo-boosts-a-laptop-with-titan-x-graphics.html

 

Also worth a read. This compares the TitanX against the GTX1080 founders edition, giving some 30% to 40% increase, would that cause an issue with PCIe 3.0 x4 ?

http://www.pcworld.com/article/3071...e-most-badass-graphics-card-ever-created.html

 

I see a couple of cool 43" 4k monitors are coming.

Dell
http://www.techspot.com/news/64925-dell-new-43-inch-4k-desktop-monitor-can.html

Philips
http://www.techspot.com/news/64682-philips-4k-resolution-huge-43-inch-monitor.html

 

4K without G-Sync & OLED is like a 17R3 without 950proX2 in raid 0. Not good enough!

 

Hi Daniel1983,

OK for non-gamers though. Depending on the quality they might be good for 4k video processing, photo processing, watching 4k streams, designing, Autocad, etc.

 

What voltage do you recommend running 24/7?
i'm currently at +37 mV with 1305(+267)core clock and 2870(+365) memory clock
This is the results i've got
http://www.3dmark.com/fs/8776003

 

Hey there guys, I recently received an AW R3 with the 6700hq, gtx 980m 4gbs and UHD screen. It's quite an improvement over my previous machine and the 4k screen is gorgeous. I got this score for fire strike which i feel is a bit a low http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/12412868. I'm on bios 1.2.2 and have the latest drivers, any recommendations? I've already re-pasted with grizzly and my highest temps are 70 C for GPU and 75-79 C for CPU.

 

Yeah..., Firestrike score under 8000 is very low. Maybe you should do a new clean Win install!!

 

Try reverting back to older driver versions, NVidia playing tricks recently nerfing things, lol, I used to get 8350 on stock 980m, and the best way to find out, reinstall clean windows 10 os.. u can get ISO from here
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10ISO
Just download the correct version like X64 HOME SL or PRO... etc

 

5% lower score with newest Driver vs older is all too big difference!!

 

the best way to test driver scores is 3Dmark Ultra, with 1-3 runs on each driver to get average points.. then see, Nvidia did that once, who knows, its Pascal GIMP time..

 

Which Nvidia drivers should I be looking into? I've already done a fresh install of windows, maybe it's the newest version of nvidia drivers.

 

i don't have any updates about latest drivers, i don't have a system with NVidia GPU now, I'm using AMD for time being, but download latest driver alongside few older version like 2-3months old.. use Display Driver Uninstaller everytime u cleanup and install new driver.. Test it with 3D mark.. and let me know..

 

You are already on latest driver. Try 362.00 and 365.19. Everybody with 970/980m + 980 get good bench scores with this drivers!! + last driver shouldn't decrease Firestrike score with 5%.

 

So I tried the two drivers and found that 365.19 wasn't as good as 362.00 for me. I ran firestrike and got a slightly better score than previously. http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/12485819 not sure if it's still low or normal?

 

Still very low(Firestrike 8050P). Most laptops from any brand with gtx980M have higher Firestrike score than yours. See the ranking of 980m.

http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-980M.126692.0.html

 

I did a slight overclock with +70 on core clock and +50 on memory with MSI afterburner and got 8424 http://www.3dmark.com/3dm/12486743
highest GPU temp was 69 C