*OFFICIAL* Alienware 17 R4 Owner's Lounge

I ordered alienware 17r4 6820hk with 1080gtx QHD as well, reps said uneven core and screen issues already been fixed...my unit arrival time is Mar.21, price b4 tax was $2790. let's see how 's goes. yup..7820hk will be a bonus.

 

I got the same spec as you too, you are experiencing those things, and it's because you are using power saving mode, which we called the integrated graphics, you probably should change it by using fn+f7 ....

 

Anyone knows? Since I need to replace/reorder anyway, I am considering stepping down to 1070 to avoid GSync (which I personally find useless on such a small screen) and thus getting Optimus and a 4K screen.

 

Which is why I asked my question by what exactly do you mean by crippled before I guessed

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And you also answered your own question


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OHH man you saved me .. i totally forgot about this XD .. much appreciate it ))

 

So, I took the plunge (despite reading all the horror stories!)

I ordered from the dell outlet, it was listed as 'dent/scratch' 6820, 1080gtx, 16gb ram, 512m2 SSD, 1TBhd, QHD etc

total cost came to £1637 delivered. Arrived 3 days later.

I spent ages looking it over. There isn't a single mark on it anywhere, it's in pristine condition, all the removable clear plastic was still on it. If it's been sent back then they must have changed the case or something as it's new.

I have the joy now of trawling through this site looking for the guides on taking it apart to apply thermal paste, bending heatsinks etc

It's replacing my old m17 r4 that had a 680gtx. Great laptop but didn't have the power to run VR.

I did a quick out of the box benchmark on firestrike, 13670. Graphics score was 19*** something but cpu score was quite low so I think that's definitely holding it back, will look at overclocking once I've had a play with the cooling.

 

Well here is my best output from the 7820/1070 model. No repaste, just a basic OC, UV, GPU OC. You can compare to others to see the differences. Seems to be a 20% boost in GPU performance alone between the 2. FireStrike: 15890.

http://www.3dmark.com/fs/11752691

 

That's almost *exactly* what I get in Firestrike graphics score with the 6700HQ/1070 model ... your actually 100 points higher than me ...

 

how's the UHD screen

 

I

Which screen did you choose and how do you like it? The QHD screen is actually quite good,especially if Dell (AUO really) manage to fix the striping problems, and I like the additional brightness but seems to be a GSync only (for obvious reasons). A bit worried that other models might not have enough brightness (yes, I am a sucker for brightness, don't hate me ).

How much of a difference do you (or others) get in battery life with Intel HD graphics compared to the Nvidia one when doing light work, like web browsing, running Word etc. I guess there really is no reason why the dGPU should be much works in terms of power when running in "low power mode", although they usually are.

 

I'm amazed every time I use the 6700HQ/GTX1070 machine/1080p machine on battery power, which is very often but never for gaming ... just random office/web type busy work. Even running a "balanced" power plan and screen brightness at up to 65% (which is still *very* bright) my battery will consistently show 5+ hours available when I switch to the Intel GPU via F7 function key ... downright astonishing ... I've never run it all the way out so can't say officially how long it will last but I have a feeling it's a good bit more than the 5+ hours that the tray icon shows ... reason I say this is that after three hours, I will still see 4 to 5 hours available and 70+% of battery life remaining ... so I think it would most likely run for about 7 or more hours...

Oh yeah, if I leave the machine idle for 5 minutes, the remaining battery reads 11hours or more; how much of that I'd actually get doing routine stuff is anybodies guess ... I'm thinking 6 to 8 hours or so ... pretty remarkable when you can hit a FN key and plug in and suddenly have one of the fastest gaming portables on the planet ...

 

Congrats and welcome to the party! Let me know if you needed any help

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Very impressive but G-Sync is soo smooth I'd never ever go back to anything else now it's brilliant for fast FPS!
I guess the decision is if it's your only laptop get a non G-Sync but if it's just for gaming and you have another for browsing then get the Optimus

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And with only the 1070, how much battery life is achievable? i dont want gsync, but i have no other option where i want to buy:S

 

I really do missed the switchable graphics to intergrated. I'm only getting 2-3 hrs versus 5hrs plus when I had the 1070/intel. Really isn't a major issue to me since most of the time I'm plugged in. Also just got done talking to a Dell agent about the QHD fixed and he said that they are on their way starting from the first week of March. He happens to know a lot about the issue so I'm really looking forward to the fixed.

 

Well, until GSync can make a 17" bigger I see no point in having it

 

Unfortunately, I fear that both Frank and Umar will become affected by amnesia right about the time when the fixed panels are available and will forget all about those free replacement screens that were promised...

 

I have much faith in Dell's warranty service especially here in the US. And like many others, I have always had a great experience with their Warranty service. Whether Frank's or Umar's amnesia kicks in or not really doesn't matter because my confidence is that high that they will get it taken care of especially when it is a known issue. Don't be afraid!!

 

Thats my experience as well in Sweden (the country where nothing actually happened at all last friday ) that customer service is great. To bad I've had to use it more than I would have liked though.

 

Maybe 2.75 to 3 hours? And that's not gaming ... I would never game on battery anyway but just saying ...

 

I agree. I love G Sync man! But I only use external monitors when gaming unless I'm writing or using the laptop in a mobile regard, in which case I will use the laptop screen of course.

That said ... I don't really miss G Sync so much if I can get a good 100hz+ refresh monitor. And thankfully the LG 1080p IPS screen on the AW17 over clocks real nice ... I did game on it for a few hours one day when I had to "house sit" another office and where I didn't have an external monitor and it was quite lovely ... admittedly, not as *perfect* as a G Sync option would be ... but Fast Sync at 100HZ or more is nearly as good.

My 24" 1080p 144hz external monitor at the office is not a G Sync screen and it is quite fun to use for gaming ... my 27" 1440p Acer XBU270HU at home is a G Sync screen ... and even having owned the thing for so long ... every time I game on it, I'm just like "DAnGO!" ... never gets old ...

If I was actually gaming on my laptop exclusively, with no other options for gaming? I would def go G Sync ... 17" screen or not ...

Best,
joel

 

Seriously, Alienwares default fan curves are HORRIBLE. Have asked this before but if I remember correctly, no one has answered, what options are there to create a better fan curve? Alienware does seem to be the only gaming laptop vendor that does not have a utility for fan control or what am I missing??

With some slight undervolting and some better fan management, there is a HUGE difference in temps even on stock.

 

With HWinfo you can manually ramp fan to max.


Or get repasted with Liquid Metal.

 

Cheers Pete, I'll definitely be taking you up on that offer once I've ordered all the bits to repaste and change the thermal pads. Scary stuff taking apart a brand new expensive toy!

 

Okay just called and both rigs are now in Engineering hold..... No shift in EDD, but yeah, I expect hem now to come past the current EDD...

 

Yes, and the keyword in that being "manually"

 

UHD Screen any good with gtx 1070 ?


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update 2 - heat sink was replaced today and this replacement heat sink is same as the one in laptop no change in heat stamp every thing remains same but now when I play BF1 it heats up to 80c better then previous 100c...I also noticed options to enable fan performance mode and enabled performance mode for CPU in BIOS ..will enabling this performance mode for fan in BIOS help cooling the laptop ?

 

it is but follow the guide and advice and it'll be no problem. Have you repasted anything before?

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Yes but it will be far too annoying for constant use and you can force this in widows with hwinfo anyway.

If I were you I'd create a custom fan profile, raise the back and get a laptop cooler

Or...repaste with LM

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Question for those of you who have created custom colors for keyboard backlighting:

I have found the hex codes in the theme files (AlienFX) and have successfully modified all back lighting to be white, other than the pesky "TactX" macro keys at are far left (the six vertically aligned macro keys)... there doesn't seem to be a section in the AlienFX theme files that covers these keys. I'm thinking there either has to be some XML code/file somewhere else or otherwise, those keys, for whatever reason must automatically write their color values directly to the devices onboard RAM ...

Any ideas?

Oh yeah, this is on an AW17 ...

Thanks...

 

Just ordered an Outlet 17 R4, will be here Friday!

Can't wait to have another AW, this current MSI GS70 is garbage.

 

Which begs the question, how do you create a customer fan profile for this? Haven't found any program that can do it yet

 

hwinfo. On the sensors window click on the dark grey fan icon and choose customise I think

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Some AW guy said on twitter that they will provide proper fancontrol program in the future - that should be basic and should be already available to us, but hey, better later then never

 

Hey ... if you feel like getting rid of some of your trash, you can always ship me the GS70 Stealth machine! ;-) ... I loved the hell out of mine and just sold it to a lucky gamer kid here in Houston. Send me yours man!!! LOL ..

 

Whats everyone seeing for battery wear on there 99wh? Ive owned mine but about 3 months, but ive probably only used it like 50 times in total. Most of the time its been plugged in, and ive maybe brought it off the charger about 10 times. Right now its sitting at 10.4% wear already, i remember looking at it like a month ago and it was at 5%. Seems a little high since my daily laptop i use that ive owned for almost 3 years and its only at 27% wear.

 

Yes, have done that before as I tried to increase the fan before doing benches but HWInfo doesn't feel optimal for this. Did also try SpeedFan but that couldn't even find the fans controllers unfortunately.Crazy that Alienware themselves does not have this. Anyone knows if Frank A has promised anything here?

 

Considering this being Alienware, I would imagine it to only be able to control one of the fans and that actual RPM is 20% off from selected one

 

Same ****y as I have seen from @Pete Light Something kill the battery in the new models. Maybe another reason why Dell went with maximum allowed battery size. My soon 4 year old AW 17 have max battery wear around 2%. Same also for my Clevo P870.

 

Im just happy i bought the warranty, since im going to be replacing the battery every 3 months at this rate. The second it hits 15-20% im just going to demand a new one. Its only gone though about 10 charge cycles at most. Yet my daily $500 laptop that i charge 2x a day for the last 3 years is only at 20%. The thing i dont get is it doesnt loose charge, its pinned at 100% so its not using the battery because the charger isnt giving enough juice. Its just like you said, something is just eating away at the total battery life and killing my battery.

 

If I had had such a problem that you disclosed, I would have created a thread about this mess in the AW sub forum. It is not a easy task to demand new battery from Dell without proper evidence (several with same problem). They will twist and twist on this and the customer will loose the battle in the end...

 

Did you guys had express charge enabled in the bios? That might explain the wear... otherwise could be a quality issue

 

There were reports on the 13r3 forum as well, but most of them "healed" after a while. Like they had 5% loss a weak, around 20% loss it come to sence and reported 2%. Maybe its just a bug with battery health reporting, not actual wearing. at least thats what i hope lol

 

I just read up on express charge and it sounds like that could be the issue. I only have two options in the bios for it though. Its either "express charge" or "auto". It was set to auto so im guessing its been switching in between them. Doesnt look like i even have the option to switch it off atleast on bios 1.09

 

Weird. In my 17 R3 on the latest bios 1.3.10, there's only option to set Standard Charge or Express Charge. Nothing in between

 

How do you switch to integrated graphics? when i hit FN + G7 nothing happends...........

 

How come the OC in the BIOS seem to cause so much higher temps than doing the same OC in XTU? When using XTU, my temps seem to be about 10 degrees lower at the same speeds. But I don't really know what the options in the BIOS actually do....besides frying the CPU and causing throttling that is.

 

Just disregard what I said earlier with my first reply ... sorry mate ... I didn't notice that you had the GTX1080 rig ... that one has G Sync and with the 1080 G Sync rig you can't switch to "integrated" ... IE: your rig doesn't have "optimus" ...

Best of luck ...